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Subject: DOROTHY GILLIAM=In Black America, What Price a Clinton DOROTHY
Date: Sat, 31 Oct 92 08:47:18 EST
Message-ID: <30.1992Oct31.084718@AmeriCast.com>

DOROTHY GILLIAM=In Black America, What Price a Clinton
Victory?<By DOROTHY GILLIAM<

Sitting here so close to Nov. 3, and so close - if the polls are
predicting accurately - to a Clinton victory, I wonder how the
issues that should have been raised would have been responded to
by each candidate.

For one thing, none of the leading contenders has chosen or been
forced to deal with civil rights matters in the way candidates
have had to in every election since 1944.

Despite that, most black voters have swallowed their reservations
and thrown their weight behind Gov. Bill Clinton. A survey
released last week by the Joint Center for Political and Economic
Studies showed 75 percent of black people who indicated a prefer-
ence favored the Democratic standard-bearer, with 7 percent
favoring Ross Perot and only 6 percent favoring President Bush.

Seeing no viable alternative, African Americans, most of whom are
Democrats, appear to have decided that, on balance, a Democratic
Party that has moved to the right is better for them than the
Republicans.

Perhaps so. But I think black people would be wise to understand
the high price they are paying for a Clinton victory and avoid
raising their expectations too high. Just because Clinton says he
is going to make the economy grow doesn't mean African Americans
will benefit fairly from that growth.

None of the candidates has discussed the inner cities, despite
the Los Angeles explosion. And issues such as the bias in the
criminal justice system and the heavy hand of the law when it
comes to policing the inner cities have been largely ignored. As
a result, Clinton won't have created a strong mandate for pro-
grams for urban areas if he is elected.

The strategy of the Democrats has been to erect a tent of univer-
sal issues such as the economy and health care and bring blacks
under it, rather than to deal with more race-targeted issues. In
that, the so-called new black leadership agrees with Clinton's
key strategists.

"In the communities I deal with, people want to . . .  see a
Democrat in the White House," said Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.).
"They understand that in order to win, it is necessary to bring
back those individuals who had left the party."

But that tactic has required a leap of faith on the part of black
people. Many have made that leap of faith, but that is not to be
mistaken for a blanket concurrence. To put it bluntly, in
Clinton's "rising-tide-lifts-all-boats" approach, many blacks
have been put into a not-so-tender trap.

Jesse L. Jackson and Rep. Charles B. Rangle (D-N.Y.) have been
right in criticizing that strategy. But Jackson also has traveled
across the country helping to register voters, including black
voters who Clinton needs in huge numbers to win. He's boarded
buses, trains and planes to register thousands of voters in 31
states and the District.

He complimented the Clinton campaign's move to a "more inclusive
direction" and denounced an article in the Wall Street Journal
that suggested that "the views of the traditional black leader-
ship are diverging from those of the larger black community."

Indeed, some blacks have criticized what they see as Jackson's
"holding pattern" role, saying it has helped give the candidates
the luxury of being able to avoid dealing straightforwardly with
civil rights as they had to in the past. An economic issue such
as redlining has civil rights overtones, for example. But Clinton
has failed to talk about the racism that underlies why some banks
don't make loans in some neighborhoods.

One hopes that the appealing concepts put out by  Clinton speak
of a deeper commitment to civil rights issues - and I don't mean
marching with a sign. Certainly his record in Arkansas was ade-
quate and that, in itself, is promising.

But should he be elected Tuesday, he has some fence-mending to
do. We still remember that cheap shot, Gov. Clinton, when you
used the platform of the Rainbow Coalition and Sister Souljah to
send a message to your white constituency. But we also remember
the last Bush campaign's Willie Horton tactic and what that did
to the fabric of the nation. It is heartening that you saw it in
your interest to address a significant number of African American
groups. I hope that as you attended those meeting you also heard
and formulated ideas on how to help this country right some of
its wrongs.  Still, failing to deal with civil rights is a heavy
price for a Clinton victory, and only time will tell whether the
price is too high.

It is known that for too long, blacks have been taken for granted
by the Democratic Party.  Clinton needs African Americans to win,
and they know it. Clinton has a responsibility, if he is victori-
ous, to prove that that vote is not in vain.<02:25 10-31C9999---
--

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Washington Post's Capitol Edition On-Line and is not to be ar-
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