Obama Homecoming Sweet for Black Caucus

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Obama Homecoming Sweet for Black Caucus
By Jonathan Allen, CQ Staff


When 13 lawmakers formed the Congressional Black Caucus in 1971, a black president may have seemed like a distant hope.

But as the 43-member caucus gathered in a townhouse on Capitol Hill Thursday, its most famous member arrived with a security detail, cloaked in the mantle of the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination.

“We’ve never had anyone go as far as he has,” House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., a founding member of the CBC, said of Obama’s place among black presidential candidates. “When I supported Jesse Jackson and Chisholm, I never thought about them in any terms of becoming president.”

Obama acknowledged the political groundwork laid for him by his colleagues.

“He said this is the result of everyone in this room and this caucus,” Conyers said.

Obama’s viability as a presidential candidate is based in part on his ability to transcend racial divisions — he is biracial — but it was clear on Thursday that his presence at the CBC meeting had significantly more meaning to members than past visits from presidential candidates.

“You could feel the historic aspect of his candidacy today, and, even more so, the fact that we’re having this experience with him. It’s incredible,” said Rep. Alcee L. Hastings , D-Fla., who supported New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic primary. “Unlike a meeting with {2004 nominee John} Kerry and {2000 nominee Al} Gore, we are talking about somebody who has experienced everything that we have experienced in trying to get elected.”

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http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docid=news-000002901403

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