GOP presses black voters for 'a chance'
Party chiefs take messages to journalists
ATLANTA -- The chairman of the Republican National Committee, currently engaged in a high-profile recruiting blitz of black voters, told a convention of African-American journalists that his party ''won't become whole again" until more African-Americans choose his party at the ballot box.
Speaking at a forum during the National Association of Black Journalists convention in Atlanta, committee chairman Ken Mehlman invoked civil rights heroes Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and Martin Luther King Jr. to describe his party's history with black Americans, and said his party intends to push for more black GOP candidates for statewide office. He also argued that staples of the GOP agenda -- tax cuts, home ownership, education reform, and private retirement accounts -- mesh with the concerns of black voters and offer a clear alternative to the Democratic Party.
''We're not asking for agreement in everything or an endorsement of our platform," Mehlman told the audience. ''Give us a chance, and we'll give you a choice."
But Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, told the same audience that Mehlman's rhetoric cannot obscure the GOP's record. Though he acknowledged that Democrats have taken African-American votes for granted, Dean said Republicans are responsible for laws and election irregularities in Ohio during the 2004 election that disenfranchised thousands of black voters.
''It's OK to talk about what you're going to do, but you still have to do it," Dean told the audience. ''The truth is there's a whole new generation" of black voters that Democrats have to speak to, he said.
Mehlman made his remarks during an NABJ forum titled, ''Vying for the Black Vote: 2006 and Beyond." In separate appearances, Mehlman and Dean each laid out their vision for courting and retaining the black vote.
Mehlman said he has brought his message to 17 African-American events, ranging from church meetings to a speech at Howard University, a historically black college in Washington.
Last month, he made headlines when he told the NAACP that the GOP was wrong for its past use of the ''Southern strategy" -- political campaigns designed to appeal to Southern whites while marginalizing blacks.
Though he was venturing into hostile political territory, Mehlman said he has been received well. ''People appreciate the dialogue," he said in a brief interview before his session with journalists. The discussions ''have always been frank, very polite, always constructive."
Some analysts suggest there is an opportunity for the GOP to build on inroads it has made with some black voters. The number of blacks who voted for President Bush increased from 8 percent in 2000 to 11 percent in 2004, and Republicans are promoting several black candidates for statewide and federal office, including Michael Steele, Maryland's lieutenant governor and a contender to fill a vacated seat in the US Senate.
Mehlman also noted the diversity of Bush's Cabinet, which has included two African-American secretaries of state, Condoleezza Rice and Colin L. Powell.
But Dean said that while the Republicans talk a good game, they have little to show for it. In Ohio -- whose secretary of state, J. Kenneth Blackwell, is a black Republican responsible for running elections -- an investigation showed blacks were forced to wait up to three times as long as whites to vote, and were about three times as likely to be asked to produce identification at the polls, Dean said.
''Things have changed, but they haven't changed enough," Dean said. Republicans ''are the party that believes that if fewer people vote, they might get elected. The truth is, the Southern Strategy is alive and well today."
Dean said he believes ''there's some truth" to the perception that Democrats have taken black votes for granted.
But he said his party has a record of promoting equal opportunity, and the party intends to fight to get that message through, he said. ''The issues we stand for," such as equal rights and equal access to healthcare, ''are issues that are important to every American." 