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Barack Obama, the son of a black Kenyan and a white Kansan, made no explicit appeals for African-American support on the grounds of racial solidarity during the campaign. His victory speech, however, alluded to the unspoken. It was held in Grant Park, named for the only President to support Reconstruction wholeheartedly. The Democrat Obama freely quoted from the Republican Abraham Lincoln in his speech, the Great Emancipator. And when Obama warned that the nation that "we may not get there" in his administration's first term, his words were those of Martin Luther King on the day before he was assassinated.
So ABC's Steve Osunsami and CBS' Byron Pitts, who both happen to be black, were assigned to cover the tearful celebrations among Obama's blacks supporters. NBC had Tom Brokaw, who happens to be white, trace the arc of history from King's Dream to Obama's election. Osunsami talked over the results at his barbershop in Atlanta: "We can now hold our young black youth accountable," a fellow customer declared. "You cannot say: 'Oh! Because I did not have a father…' Our President did not have a father in the picture." Brokaw asserted that "slowly but steadily with the help of law and attitude, America was liberated from its racist legacy." As for Pitts on CBS, he, like Obama and Lincoln, was inspired by history: "Last night all across America for so many people that is how it felt--A More Perfect Union."
What a great night and thanks for noting Grant's true role as President.
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