BlogHer - Why Do African Americans Vote Democratic and Why Aren't Republicans Mad at Their Leadership? - Comments

Why I became a republican.

Havebens — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 21:25:01 -0600

Born and raise in the south with Democrates.

http://www.nationalblackrepublicans.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=pages.DYK-OBAMA-CanYouSpareAPROCLAMATION

OBAMA, CAN YOU SPARE BLACKS A PROCLAMATION?

The National Black Republican Association has issued a petition to Barack Hussein Obama, the leader of the Democratic Party, requesting that Obama issue a formal proclamation of apology for the Democratic Party's 150-year history of racism.

We recognize that this is likely too much to ask of the oh so "racially sensitive" Democrats who want us to ignore their racist past and failed socialism that have caused so much harm to black Americans. So we will not hold our breath waiting for their response.

_______________________________

Petition to Barack Hussein Obama for a Proclamation of Apology for the Democratic Party's 150-year History of Racism

We, black American citizens of the United States and the National Black Republican Association, declare and assert:

WHEREAS, the healing of wounds begins with an apology, and the Democratic Party has never apologized for their horrific atrocities and racist practices against black Americans during the past 150 years, nor held accountable for the residual impact that those atrocities and practices are having on us today,

WHEREAS, as a result of the 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission Report of May 31, 2006, the North Carolina Democratic Party issued a unanimous apology on January 20, 2007 for the Democratic Party's 1898 murderous rampage against blacks,

WHEREAS, inner-city minister Rev. Wayne Perryman wrote a book, "Unfounded Loyalty: An In-depth Look Into The Love Affair Between Blacks and Democrats", and filed a lawsuit against the Democratic Party on December 10, 2004, but, after admitting their history of racism under oath in court, the Democrats refused to apologize,

WHEREAS, history shows that the Democratic Party through its racist agenda and "States' Rights" claim to own slaves, sought to protect and preserve the institution of slavery from 1792 to 1865, thus enslaving millions of African Americans, while the Republican Party was started in 1854 as the anti-slavery party, fought to free blacks from slavery and championed civil rights for blacks,

WHEREAS, the Democratic Party enacted fugitive slave laws to keep blacks from escaping from plantations; instigated the 1856 Dred Scott decision which legally classified blacks as property; passed the Missouri Compromise to spread slavery into 50% of the new Northern states; and passed the Kansas-Nebraska Act designed to spread slavery into all of the new states,

WHEREAS, the Democratic Party in the South formed the Confederacy, seceded from the Union and fought a Civil War (1861 to 1865) to expand slavery where over 600,000 citizens were killed, including many thousand blacks,

WHEREAS, starting in 1861, anti-Civil War Democrats in the North were called "copperheads" like the poisonous snake because they (a) wanted to appease the South and accept a negotiated peace that would have resulted in an independent Confederacy where blacks were kept in slavery, and (b) showed their deep opposition to the Civil War draft by taking their anger out on blacks, murdering and maiming blacks in virtually every Northern state,

WHEREAS, anti-Civil War Democrats in New York engaged in "Four Days of Terror" against the city's black population from July 13-16, 1863, and the anti-Civil War chant of the Democrats, as reported by one Pennsylvania newspaper, was: "Willing to fight for Uncle Sam", but not "for Uncle Sambo,"

WHEREAS, the anti-Civil War Democrats verbally attacked Republican President Abraham Lincoln because he wanted to free the slaves through war and grant blacks civil rights, and drafted Northern men into the army to fight and die to make his Emancipation Proclamation a reality - a Proclamation that became the source of the Juneteenth celebrations that occur in black communities today,

WHEREAS, after the Civil War, the Republican Party (a) pushed to amend the Constitution to grant blacks freedom (13th Amendment), citizenship (14th Amendment) and the right to vote (15th Amendment); (b) passed the Civil Rights Acts of 1866 and 1875; and (c) designed Reconstruction, a ten-year period of unprecedented political power for African Americans,

WHEREAS, anti-civil rights Democrat Andrew Johnson became president when Republican President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, and after the Civil War, the Democratic Party fought to end Reconstruction and deny blacks the promised "40 acres and a mule;" fought to overturn all civil rights legislation from the 1860's to the 1960's; and passed repressive legislation including the Black Codes and Jim Crow laws,

WHEREAS, the book "A Short History of Reconstruction" by the renowned historian, Dr. Eric Foner, revealed that: (a) the Ku Klux Klan was founded in 1866 by Democrats as a Tennessee social club; (b) the Ku Klux Klan became a military force serving the interests of the Democratic Party, the planter class, and all those who desired the restoration of white supremacy; and (c) the Ku Klux Klan spread into other Southern states, launching a 'reign of terror' against Republican leaders, black and white,

WHEREAS, the book "A Short History of Reconstruction" by Dr. Eric Foner exposed the facts that: (a) the Hayes-Tilden Compromise of 1877 was an attempt by Republicans to get the Democrats to stop lynching Republicans, black and white, and respect the rights of blacks; and (b) contrary to legend, President Rutherford Hayes did not remove the last federal troops from the South, but merely ordered federal troops surrounding the South Carolina and Louisiana statehouses to return to their barracks,

WHEREAS, after taking control of Congress in the late 1800's, the Democratic Party passed the Repeal Act of 1894 that overturned civil rights legislation passed by the Republicans, including the Civil Rights Acts of 1866 and 1875,

WHEREAS, the Democratic Party supported the "Plessy v. Ferguson" decision in 1896 that established the "separate but equal" segregation doctrine,

WHEREAS, historical documents show that: (a) in an effort to stop the Democrats from lynching and denying civil rights to blacks, the NAACP was founded on Republican President Abraham Lincoln's 100th birthday, February 12, 1909, by white Republicans Oswald Garrison Villard, Mary White Ovington and William English Walling; and (b) the first black general secretary of the NAACP was black Republican James Weldon Johnson who became the general secretary of the NAACP in 1920 and, in 1900, wrote the song, "Lift Every Voice," known as the "Black National Anthem" in collaboration with his brother, John Rosamond Johnson,

WHEREAS, after Democrat President Woodrow was elected in 1912 and while Congress was controlled by the Democrats, black American civil employees where pushed out of federal government jobs, and the greatest number of bills proposing racial segregation and discrimination were introduced than had ever been proposed in our nation's history,

WHEREAS, even though Democrat President Franklin D. Roosevelt received the vote of many black Americans due to his "New Deal," he banned black American newspapers from the military because he was convinced the newspapers were communists and rejected anti-lynching laws pushed by Republicans, as well as efforts by Republicans to establish a permanent Civil Rights Commission that did not get established until 1958 under Republican President Dwight Eisenhower,

WHEREAS, Democrat President Harry Truman not only rejected Republican efforts to enact anti-lynching laws and establish a permanent Civil Rights Commission, but also failed to enforce his 1948 Executive Order designed to desegregate the military, an order that was not effectively enforced until Republican President Dwight Eisenhower was elected,

WHEREAS, with the party slogan: "Segregation Forever!," the Dixiecrats, who were Democrats, (a) formed the States' Rights Democratic Party for the presidential election of 1948; (b) remained Democrats for all local elections and all subsequent national elections; and (c) did not all migrate to the Republican Party as Democrats today falsely claim, but instead those racist Democrats died Democrats and had declared that they would rather vote for a "yellow dog" than a Republican because the Republican Party was known as the party for blacks,

WHEREAS, during the civil rights era of the 1960's, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was a Republican, was fighting the Democrats including: (a) Democrat Georgia Governor Lester Maddox who famously brandished ax handles to prevent blacks from patronizing his restaurant; (b) Democrat Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor in Birmingham who let loose vicious dogs and turned fire hoses on black civil rights demonstrators; and (c) Democrat Alabama Governor George Wallace who stood in front of the Alabama schoolhouse in 1963 and thundered: "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever,"

WHEREAS, the Democratic Party supported the Topeka, Kansas school board in the "Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka", Kansas (a 1954 Supreme Court decision by Chief Justice Earl Warren who was appointed by Republican President Dwight Eisenhower) which declared that the "separate but equal" doctrine violated the 14th Amendment and ended school segregation,

WHEREAS, in 1954, Democrat Arkansas Governor Orville Faubus tried to prevent the desegregation of a Little Rock public school, resulting in Republican President Dwight Eisenhower sending federal troops to prevent violence and enforce a court order desegregating the Little Rock school,

WHEREAS, Democratic President John F. Kennedy was not a civil rights advocate because he: (a) voted against the 1957 Civil Rights Law (that was pushed by Republican President Dwight Eisenhower); (b) opposed the 1963 March on Washington by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (that was organized by black Republican A. Phillip Randolph); (c) authorized the FBI (supervised by his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy) to wiretap and investigate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on suspicion of being a communist in order to undermine that Civil Rights leader; (d) was later criticized by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for ignoring civil rights issues; and (e) only grudgingly agreed to make a telephone call to get Dr. King, Jr. out of the Birmingham jail after members of the King family requested Kennedy's help,

WHEREAS, after the nearly 100 years of opposition to civil rights laws by Democrats, Republican Senator Barry Goldwater, who voted for the 1957 Civil Rights Act and ran for president against Lyndon Johnson in 1964, was unfairly criticized by hypocritical Democrats because Goldwater was opposed to only portions of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that he believed was an unconstitutional expansion of federal powers,

WHEREAS, Democrat President Lyndon Johnson could not have achieved passage of civil rights legislation without the support of Republicans due to the strong opposition of Democrats, and in his 4,500-word State of the Union Address delivered on January 4, 1965, Johnson mentioned scores of topics for federal action, but only thirty five words were devoted to civil rights and not one word about voting rights,

WHEREAS, it was Republican Senator Everett Dirksen from Illinois, not Democrat President Lyndon Johnson, who was key to the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and Dirksen was also instrumental to the enactment of civil rights legislation in 1957 and 1960, as well as the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Civil Rights Act of 1968 which prohibited discrimination in housing,

WHEREAS, the chief opponents of the 1964 Civil Rights Act were Democrat Senators Sam Ervin, Albert Gore, Sr. and Robert Byrd of West Virginia, a former "Keagle" in the Ku Klux Klan, who made a 14-hour filibuster speech in the Senate in June 1964 in an unsuccessful effort to block passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act,

WHEREAS, because Republican Senator Everett successfully fought to pass civil rights laws in the face of strong opposition to civil rights laws by the Democrats, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. hailed Senator Dirksen's "able and courageous leadership;" and "The Chicago Defender," the largest black-owned daily at that time, praised Senator Dirksen "for the grand manner of his generalship behind the passage of the best civil rights measures that have ever been enacted into law since Reconstruction,"

WHEREAS, the statement by Democrat President Lyndon Johnson about losing the South after passage of the 1964 civil rights law was not made out of a concern that racist Democrats would suddenly join the Republican Party that was fighting for the civil rights of blacks, but instead, was an expression of fear that the racist Democrats would again form a third party, such as the short-lived States' Rights Democratic Party,

WHEREAS, after Democrat President Lyndon Johnson expressed his concern that the racist Democrats in the South would be lost after the passage of the 1964 civil rights laws, Johnson's concern came true when Alabama's Democrat Governor George C. Wallace in 1968 started the American Independent Party that attracted other racist candidates, including Democrat Atlanta Mayor Lester Maddox,

WHEREAS, in March of 1968, while referring to the fact that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. left Memphis, Tennessee after riots broke out where a teenager was killed, Democrat Senator Robert Byrd called Dr. King a "trouble-maker" who starts trouble, but runs like a coward after trouble is ignited, which motivated Dr. King to return to Memphis a few weeks later where he was assassinated on April 4, 1968,

WHEREAS, Democrats expressed little, if any, concern when the racially segregated South voted solidly for Democrats; yet unfairly deride Republicans because of the thirty-year odyssey of the South switching to the Republican Party that began in the 1970's with President Richard Nixon's "Southern Strategy," which was an effort on the part of Nixon to get fair-minded people in the South to stop voting for Democrats who did not share their values, and who were discriminating against blacks,

WHEREAS, Republican President Richard Nixon began enforcement of Affirmative Action as a merit-based system to help African Americans prosper with his 1969 Philadelphia Plan (crafted by black Republican Art Fletcher) that set the nation's first goals and timetables, as well as his 1972 Equal Employment Opportunity Act that made merit-based Affirmative Action programs the law of our nation, but Democrats turned Affirmative Action into an unfair quota system;

WHEREAS, Democrat Senator Robert Byrd who was a fierce opponent of desegregating the military complained in one letter: "I would rather die a thousand times and see old glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again than see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen of the wilds,"

WHEREAS, in the early 1970's, Democrat Senator Robert Byrd pushed to have the Senate's main office building named after a former "Dixiecrat," Democrat Senator Richard Russell who was Senator Byrd's mentor and leading opponent of ant-lynching legislation, and in 2001 Senator Byrd was forced to apologize for using the "N-word" on television,

WHEREAS, Democrats did not denounce Democrat Senator Christopher Dodd who praised Senator Robert Byrd as someone who would have been "a great senator for any moment," including the Civil War; yet Democrats denounced Senator Trent Lott for his remarks about Senator Strom Thurmond who was never in the Ku Klux Klan and, after he became a Republican, defended blacks against lynching and the discriminatory poll taxes imposed on blacks by Democrats,

WHEREAS, Democrats today demean and discriminate against blacks including (a) Democrat Senator Ted Kennedy who called black judicial nominees "Neanderthals;" (b) Democrat Senator Harry Reid who slurred Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas as someone who could not write good English; (c) Joe Biden while he was a Senator who boasted that his home state of Delaware was a slave state; (d) Democratic Party operatives who depicted Maryland Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele on the Internet as a "Simple Sambo;" (e) cartoonist Jeff Danziger and Pat Oliphant who portrayed Secretary of State Dr. Condoleezza Rice as a "stooge" and a bare foot, "Ignorant Mammy;" (f) Democratic Senator John F. Kerry who denounced affirmative action on the floor of the Senate in the 1990's; (g) President Bill Clinton who - following in the footsteps of his mentor J. William Fulbright, a staunch segregationist - refused to enforce a court-ordered affirmative action plan while president and was himself sued for discriminating against his black employees while he was the Governor of Arkansas; and (h) Barack Hussein Obama while he was an Illinois State senator who provided funding for slum projects in Chicago that kept blacks trapped in rat and roach infested housing, as well as while he was a US senator voted against the minimum wage bill and wrote a letter of support for former Klansman Robert Byrd that helped that racist win re-election,

WHEREAS, the Democratic Party's use of deception and fear to intimidate black Americans into voting for Democrats is consistent with the Democratic Party's heritage of racism that included sanctioning of slavery and kukluxery - a perversion of moral sentiment among leaders of the Democratic Party; and the Democratic Party's racist legacy bode ill until this generation of black Americans,

NOW, THEREFORE, for the documented atrocities and accumulated wrongs inflicted upon black Americans, we submit this petition to the head of the Democratic Party, Barack Hussein Obama, for a formal proclamation of apology for the Democratic Party's 150-year history of racism.

[quote] I say besides Strom

im_fat@hotmail.com — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 08:08:19 -0600

[quote]
I say besides Strom Thurmond, David Duke, and Jesse Helms. There is the Southern strategy; this insistence that everything is the fault of the poor, that affirmative action is a way of hiring unqualified people instead of a way of promoting diversity. Even Collin Powell has pointed out that he benefited from affirmative action. Never mind that there are the Sean Hannitys, Rush Limbaughs oh and Obama waffles showing up at a value voters summit for three days before someone thinks it is not a good idea. Then there is this insistence that abortion is the greatest evil we need to fight against when we have children living in unspeakable circumstances. But the argument is they just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps when half of them didn’t even get the boots.
[/quote]

I think you need to do some more research of your beloved democratic party. You produced 3 light weights in the republican party's history (Thurmond, Helms and Duke) , and I guess you are using that as proof that the republicans are racist? You should ask yourself who opposed slavery, I will give you a hint it was not the democrats. In fact which party was created specifically to end slavery, again it was not the democrats. More questions, which party passed affirmative action, passed the first civil rights, and all major civil rights bills since? Another hint, not the democrats. How about this, which party was responsible for Jim Crow laws and is tightly linked to the KKK? Perhaps you would like to know which party is CURRENTLY home to a former very very powerful KKK member? Any clue, guess what not the republican party? Which party did Martin Luther King, JR support? I could go on for days about your beloved democratic party...but I will let you do some of your own research.

I mean seriuosly, most whites, agree you are free to vote for whichever party/person you desire and for whichever reason you choose..and while i personally know you would have voted for the democrat no matter what, and it had nothing to do with Obama's color that is not the point..you vote democrat because blacks would call you an uncle tom if you did not and that is the way it is.

It Was

Southerngirl — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 11:57:28 -0500

It was a very open and thoughtful discussion. I think all of us being in church after bible study made it feel a little more OK to do this. We all have biases and its good to confront them. I kind of thought I was going to be lectured as not 'understanding' why I should be a republican but that was not the case. My bias was happily crushed, everyone in the room was very open to me and my veiw and one even said they never thought about it that way. He said he just thought about it from the Christain perspective but hearing what I was saying he said he could see why we would not feel welcome in the fold. we also talked about being taken for granted as a goup. I told them that was what Jesse Jackson's run for president was all about. The democrats took a little more notice of us after that. I think it is what is going one with the evangelicals in the republican party. They feel as though that vote is locked up so they don't have to work for it since they will not vote pro-choice. It was a discussion that I should have broken into a few posts. I am working on the "I don't see color" thing right now. I think we like to say it but it cannot be true. We don't need to ignore our differences but celebrate them and realize that we have more in common than we think. When we get to that point we will truly be a post racial, gender and everytihng else society.

Michelle

I blog at http://www.mommycan.blogspot.com/

Thoughtful discussions

Maria Niles — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 16:47:16 -0500

Although it sounds as if your conversation might have involved getting past some discomfort for everyone involved, it sure sounds like it was eye opening and worthwhile. And your explanation of why black people vote Democratic is great especially the follow-up question to the woman who asked you the question. I hope a little light bulb went on over her head :)

To your questions - I couldn't tell you why more Republicans aren't upset with Bush & Co. but I think many are especially now that 90% of Americans think the country is going in the wrong direction. As to why there aren't more black Republicans - I think you have the answer above:

Then the question is posed to me as to why Blacks always vote Democratic. I say besides Strom Thurmond, David Duke, and Jesse Helms. There is the Southern strategy; this insistence that everything is the fault of the poor, that affirmative action is a way of hiring unqualified people instead of a way of promoting diversity. Even Collin Powell has pointed out that he benefited from affirmative action. Never mind that there are the Sean Hannitys, Rush Limbaughs oh and Obama waffles showing up at a value voters summit for three days before someone thinks it is not a good idea.

Why would anybody show up to a party when the hosts make it so plainly and repeatedly clear that they are not welcome?

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Why Do African Americans Vote Democratic and Why Aren't Republicans Mad at Their Leadership?

Southerngirl — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 11:54:16 -0500

I attend Bible study at an Evangelical church. When I went to Bible study last night I pulled in beside this Volvo XC 70 which I want badly. So I am looking at the car and on the back window there is a sticker that has PALIN! In large letters on top with Mccain/Palin 2008 at the bottom. I smiled and thought to myself Johnny boy had better watch his back. Then I noticed the owner of the car getting out as she was on her cell. We walked in together talking about the lesson for the night. After bible study we go into the little coffee shop and a few of us start to talk. The conversation turn to the election and I realize I am out numbered so I just say well Obama has my vote. There is this smile on Volvo lady’s face as she says I hope this doesn’t offend you but can I ask if it is because he is Black? I say no offense taken but it is because he is a democrat just as I voted for Clinton, Gore, and Kerry I am voting for Obama. So I ask are you not voting for him because he is Black? She goes no it is because he is a democrat. We all have a laugh. And she finishes with she doesn’t see color. I tell her I am the exact opposite. I see color. I am glad we are not all the same. I told her that seeing color allows me to respect the differences that are inherent in us and to me our differences are one of the things that speak to the awesomeness of the God we serve. Of the billions of people on this earth there is no one that is exactly like me that is just beyond awesome. I tell her that it is PC to claim not to see color but if you had seen me in a dark parking lot yelling at my kids and staring at the back of your car how would you have described the incident the next day? She says touché I get your point. I would have said there was this Black lady behind my car yelling at her kids. We all talk about this a little.

Then the question is posed to me as to why Blacks always vote Democratic. I say besides Strom Thurmond, David Duke, and Jesse Helms. There is the Southern strategy; this insistence that everything is the fault of the poor, that affirmative action is a way of hiring unqualified people instead of a way of promoting diversity. Even Collin Powell has pointed out that he benefited from affirmative action. Never mind that there are the Sean Hannitys, Rush Limbaughs oh and Obama waffles showing up at a value voters summit for three days before someone thinks it is not a good idea. Then there is this insistence that abortion is the greatest evil we need to fight against when we have children living in unspeakable circumstances. But the argument is they just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps when half of them didn’t even get the boots. By the time I was finished going on the room was silent and uncomfortably so. Volvo lady looks at me and says you seem to have been holding that in for a while. I tell her that I spend time in a lot of places where I am the only Black person and have been asked that question more than once.

I said now what I really want to know is why you guys aren’t mad at all of the republicans you have helped to elect? None of them have overturned Roe v Wade. None of them have held firm to the personal responsibility code. George Busch lied out and out lied and he was elected twice. His administration has taken a surplus and is leaving a deficit like we have never seen. How could any of you cast a vote for him after what is campaign did to John McCain in SC in 2000? I was told about their family values, that he hasn’t been as bad of a president as Democrats have made him out to be. I say wait where is the personal responsibility thing he contributed to this mess and greatly does he not have some responsibility? To that I got yes but. I told them excuses are tools for the weak and incompetent. Which is Bush? Then I ask the blowup question how in the world can you sleep at night and cast a vote for a woman is so completely unprepared for the seriousness of the time we are in and the man who decided this was a good idea? Volvo lady is the first to the defense of Palin she goes on about her being a Gov and a mayor, and she can’t be that bad if she has gotten that far. I ask her if she got the resumes of Sarah Palin and Barack Obama on her desk which would she call in for an interview and why? She said well I don’t know? The guy running the class says I have to admit I would call in Obama but for this election I agree with Sarah and John more. I told him you would not hire either of them to work with everyday but you would hire them to run your country and that has an impact not only on you but your kids and my kids as well as everyone in this country. They all got my point but we agreed to disagree.

So I would like to pose these questions to you all.

Why aren’t you republicans pissed at George Busch and the likes?

Why do you think more Blacks aren’t republicans?

And to answer your question I go to an evangelical bible study because it is on a convenient night for my family.