Allies' approaches differ on race issue
WASHINGTON - Of all political marriages of convenience, the union of Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a fellow Chicagoan, is among the most freighted. The two men need each other's support, yet also need to keep their distance. Each serves as a standing critique of the other, yet they profess to share similar goals.
When Jackson, who endorsed Obama for president last spring, was quoted last week as saying that his favorite candidate was "acting like he's white," Jackson mostly hurt himself. Both blacks and whites could take offense, and the remark appeared to violate Jackson's own arguments against a racial litmus test. He quickly backtracked.
But the context for Jackson's comment - a rally to support black youths who were initially charged with attempted murder for assaulting white youths in a racially charged atmosphere in Jena, La. - probably wasn't comfortable for Obama, either. Obama, like other Democratic presidential candidates, condemned the "excessive charges in the case" but did not choose to march alongside Jackson and the Rev. Al Sharpton, whose tactics are viewed with suspicion by many whites.
Obama's statement on the Jena 6 made clear that he saw the issue as fairness, not race. The case, he said, was "not just an offense to the people of Jena or the African-American community, it is an offense to the ideals we hold as Americans. . . . I will continue my decades-long fight against injustice and division as president."
Jackson seemed to want a more forceful condemnation of racist double standards from the man who seeks to be the nation's first black president.
And there's no doubt that Obama's decision to avoid some of the rallying and protesting of cases like the Jena 6 is vexing to Jackson.
But as a man who has based his whole career on being an advocate for the black community, Jackson can hardly turn his back on a black US senator running for president in Jackson's own party. Instead, his occasional potshots seem intended to persuade Obama that he owes something to the black community - and perhaps to Jackson himself.
For Obama, linking arms with Jackson and Sharpton at a protest rally would present a political problem. After all, merely allowing Sharpton to share the stage at his primary-election victory celebration last year helped doom Connecticut's Democratic nominee for the US Senate, Ned Lamont, according to many political observers. The move seemed to stamp Lamont as a liberal extremist, giving fuel to "independent Democrat" Joseph Lieberman.
Obama, whose political persona is based on his desire to unite people rather than take sides, would suffer even more than Lamont. Obama seeks to identify himself with the black experience, but not the anger that often seems to motivate Sharpton and, to a lesser but visible extent, Jackson.
Like his marquee supporter Oprah Winfrey and his friend/political protege Deval Patrick, Obama, who has had brushes with racism, has emerged as a cautious but true believer in the power of the American Dream.
The notion of a colorblind American Dream carries deep political resonance, connecting the aspirations of the civil rights movement to the beliefs of the Founding Fathers. And it's what seems to contribute to the success of figures like Obama, Winfrey, and Patrick. Their achievements validate other people's faith in America.
Because of their success, they have an open platform to address the topic of racial injustice, not as Jackson-style advocates but as conveners in the ongoing national discussion about differences among people.
Their implicit agenda - as Winfrey demonstrates when she sits directly between people on two sides of a painful dispute - is to bring about a just reconciliation for the sake of America as a whole, not simply to provide redress for the aggrieved.
To many people, this is a worthy, even courageous goal, showing that the values that underlay the civil rights movement can benefit everyone, and provide a path to resolving even nonracial disputes. (Obama's message of reconciliation is aimed not at blacks and whites, but red-state Americans and blue-state Americans.)
Then there are cases like the Jena 6, and, in the eyes of many people, the need to choose sides. Obama has chosen sides, but in a carefully worded statement that doesn't make clear which charges he considers excessive. (All the charges? Just the initial attempted-murder charge?) To Jackson, this may be "acting like he's white." To others, he may be acting like a presidential candidate.
Peter S. Canellos is the Globe's Washington bureau chief. National Perspective is his weekly analysis of events in the capital and beyond.
