The Political Chocolate Factory

Since the 1973 election of Maynard Jackson as mayor, Atlanta has been the proverbial shining star of African-American political leadership.

Unlike other cities with African-Americans at the helm, Atlanta residents had never witnessed their mayor smoke crack (Former D.C. Mayor Marion Barry) or embarrass them with a messy extramarital affair which ended in an obstruction of justice conviction (Former Detroit Mayor Kwame “Playa Maya” Kilpatrick). With the exception of former Atlanta Mayor Bill Campbell- who was convicted of tax evasion-Atlanta’s African American mayors have dutifully governed this burgeoning city without incident.

With Atlanta’s proud legacy of successful African-American stewardship, most people considered it a foregone conclusion that Atlanta’s next mayor would be black. Both State Senator Kasim Reed and Councilwoman Lisa Borders had made their mayoral ambitions public and were considered obvious frontrunners in Atlanta’s mayoral race. To the surprise of many, Mary Norwood, the only white candidate in the mayor’s race, defeated both Reed and Borders in the primary and came within less than one percentage point of defeating Reed in the general election.

So what was is it about Norwood which placed her within 714 votes of defeating Kasim Reed? One word: Race. Demographic data from the 2008 American Community Survey reported a surge in Atlanta’s white population. Atlanta is now 55% black, 38% white, 4.9% Latino and 2% Asian. Compare these numbers to Atlanta’s racial composition in 2000 when whites were only 31% of the population. From 2000 to 2008, Atlanta has welcomed over 30,000 white residents to its community.

According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the precinct by precinct analysis revealed that Reed won in mostly African-American precincts while Norwood won in mostly white precincts.

Based upon this data, one could conclude that both white and black voters engaged in pigmentation politics during the Reed-Norwood runoff and as such, both communities are equally prejudiced. However, this interpretation is fatally flawed in that it fails to take into account the actual qualifications of the candidates running for mayor and the communities they both fought to serve.

Norwood, as Reed pointed out during the campaign, is a conservative leaning candidate in a progressive city. Even more off-putting was the fact that Norwood had done precious little to make an impact on the city which she campaigned to lead. In an October press release, then Mayor Shirley Franklin said of Norwood, “I support candidates with vision, integrity and intelligence and I have voted for candidates with these 3 characteristics throughout my life. Mary Norwood has none of these. Therefore, I do not support her candidacy for mayor.” Norwood was a truly unremarkable candidate.

Reed, on the other hand, was a center-left moderate who was perfectly positioned to govern a southern, urban city. But politics is about identification. Politicians campaign to convince voters that they, “feel your pain”, and identify with your ideals, beliefs, and concerns. The problem here was that the affluent white voters who’d recently migrated to Atlanta didn’t identify with Reed. But why?

It was the Barack Obama strategy in reverse. No matter what Hillary Clinton did (or didn’t do) during the primaries, she could never convince African American voters to cast a ballot for her because our minds were fixated on history. We could already taste the sweet victory of electing our first black President. In much the same way, white Atlantans were thirsty to elect their first white Mayor since the early 1970’s.

Editorial writers had been clamoring for over a year about how this could be the year that Atlanta’s legacy of African American mayors finally comes to an end. Norwood was the great white hope. And those editorials did more to help her campaign than Norwood herself ever could.

Although the African American community may have been a bit nostalgic in their decision to vote for Reed, one cannot assume it was a purely race based vote. The facts supported their decision.

But what does it all mean? Quite simply, the post racial America we’ve been hearing so much about is not representative of the South. In fact, for some whites, the lesson of the Obama election may very well have been not to feel any shame when backing a less qualified white candidate in favor of a more qualified black candidate.

This is not to say that Atlanta isn’t still the sweetest chocolate city in the south, but Hershey’s has been replaced with Godiva. If African Americans wish to continue their legacy of African-American leadership in Atlanta (and elsewhere), then they must do more than conjure up notions of black solidarity. They must appeal to whites (and blacks) using a race neutral strategy. The genius of Reed’s victory (albeit narrow) hinged on the fact that he downplayed race and took Norwood to task when she openly asserted race into the debate. The lesson here for future black candidates is that, in the future, you’ll need more than a stellar resume, hard work, and a majority black constituency to win the right to lead Atlanta– you’ll also need Kasim’s calculus