They never doubted it
Deval Patrick made it home Tuesday night just in time to watch his good friend, Senator Barack Obama, claim the Democratic nomination for president. It was a moment he didn't want to miss.
"I was incredibly excited and moved, not just by his speech, but by the moment," Patrick said yesterday. "I've said to an awful lot of skeptics that I think the country is so hungry for leadership - uplifting, visionary leadership - that a lot of our traditional differences don't really matter."
Patrick has long been one of the Illinois senator's most visible supporters. He might be permitted a moment of pride, especially recalling that his endorsement of Obama was not an especially popular move when he made it last fall.
People recall the huge rally Obama staged on Boston Common last Oct. 23, but I'm not sure everyone remembers what an underdog he appeared at that point. Plenty of people I talked to then thought Patrick would have been better off minding his own affairs. Now Obama is the party's nominee, and the challenge of the general election awaits him.
Without question, mending the party is high on the list of concerns, as Patrick acknowledges.
"Party unity is essential to making real change, and I think it's only partly up to the nominee," Patrick said. "It's up to us, all of us. We've had the extraordinary blessing in having candidates of this quality competing, and competing this tenaciously. Now we're going to have to look past the differences, which many of us think are small in substance, and focus on some common principles about the role of government and helping people help themselves. That's what Democrats bring, and we can either have that unity or jeopardize it through division."
Many women prominent in Massachusetts politics have been incensed by what they view as the sexism that has pervaded the campaign against Senator Hillary Clinton, a frustration that came out into the open in April.
Patrick, who met with the group then, sounded yesterday as if he was still trying to grasp why the primary candidacy is viewed as having divided the party along gender lines.
"I'm gong to be and have been respectful of their concerns," Patrick said. "The same point I make about the national party is true of Massachusetts: The coming together is not up to the candidate or the campaign leaders. It's up to individuals reaching across differences in favor of our common aspirations to change the direction of our federal government and our country."
The battles between Obama and Clinton loyalists are still being played out here, mostly in internecine fights within the state Democratic Party.
But those fights, petty as some of them may seem, are a reflection of the struggle that awaits Obama nationwide.
That said, division is only part of the story, and perhaps a smaller part than television and newspapers have reflected. I talked to people all week who have been enthralled by a campaign that they never thought they would live through.
Darryl Smith is Mayor Thomas M. Menino's leading political operative in Roxbury and Dorchester. (In his day job, he is assistant commissioner of the Inspectional Services Department.)
An unabashed Obama supporter, Smith politely declined to join his City Hall colleagues in campaigning for Clinton, even though the decision placed him directly at odds with the mayor.
He had no regrets this week. Far from it.
"I was glued to the TV Tuesday night," he said. "This is one of those moments where people are going to remember where they were. I was proud for Obama and proud for America. He passed every litmus test put before him."
Due to divided loyalties, Smith was forced to sit out the primary campaigns. But working in campaigns is his passion. "If called upon, I would go anywhere in the country for him," Smith said. He didn't sound a bit worried about whether Democrats will come together in November.
Adrian Walker is a Globe columnist. He can be reached at walker@globe.com. 