Black Politics in the Bush Era: Fallout From 2000 Will Continue

The politics of the black community, so critical to Democratic Party fortunes in the 2000 elections, will also be important if Democrats are to have any chance of taking back the House or Senate in 2002. However, given what happened in November and afterward, black enthusiasm will depend on such factors as the strength of election reform, black receptivity to President George W. Bush's "outreach" strategy and the level of power blacks feel within the Democratic Party.

Thus far, the resolution of what can only be considered a massive violation of the civil rights of blacks and others has begun by addressing electoral reform legislative proposals. Nearly two dozen such bills have been introduced in Congress and an estimated 800 in state legislatures. At the same time, Bush and the Democratic leadership have begun the difficult dance involved in establishing a commission to develop recommendations. One problem with the proposals at both levels is that they are heavily weighted toward fixing voting equipment and other material aspects of the electoral system. However, many of the problems blacks faced in Florida and in other states stemmed from intentional racial discrimination in the administration of voting systems, a problem that new machines will not fix.

Any proposed legislation should include a prohibition against such intentional discrimination--an example of which was the allegedly unlawful purge of black voters carried out by state officials. Law enforcement officers should be enjoined from setting up roadblocks on Election Day near polling stations, and election officials should be prohibited from engaging in racial discrimination at the stations. Moreover, legislation should require that whatever commission is formed be both diverse by party and representative of those most seriously affected--something included in none of the legislation thus far proposed. Contracts between nongovernmental organizations and the states for the work of revising the electoral system should be given to experts from the affected communities, and matching-funds regulations should include a concentration on modernizing the equipment in the communities most affected by the problems.

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