This week I've been doing / will be doing a series of diaries entitled Obama: The Only Thing You Need to Know (Yes, the irony is apparent). Two days ago, this started with the first diary on Barack Obama's time as a constitutional law senior lecturer at the University of Chicago, entitled Obama: The Only Thing You Need to Know. It was so successful that yesterday I followed up with a diary on his time as a civil rights lawyer, entitled Obama: The Only Thing You Need to Know, Part 2.
I know everyone is waiting for the diary on community organizing, but today I chose to focus on an area of Barack Obama's experience that often gets overlooked, and ironically may have helped Bill Clinton win the election in 1992. I'm of course talking about when Barack spearheaded Project Vote! on the eve of the 1992 election, with “George Bush gaining ground in Illinois” and “Carol Moseley Braun embroiled in allegations about her mother's Medicare liability”.
NOTE: This diary was originally posted on DailyKos. It was very popular over there. Since we don't get to vote out here in Chicago for quite some time, I thought perhaps I could have more of a voice if I kept all you first in the nation caucus goers informed. It is part of an ongoing series about Barack Obama's experience, yes I realize the irony, and I'll be catching you all up on them over the next few days. If you'd prefer to go read the most recent one, on Barack's time as a community organizer, head over to DailyKos and skip the suspense.
A huge black turnout in November 1992 altered Chicago's electoral landscape—and raised a new political star: a 31-year-old lawyer named Barack Obama.
Source: Chicago Magazine, January 1993
It's worth noting that he accomplished this feat while writing his book: no small task. From what I've read, Michelle wanted to kill him for all the time he was spending working, but I guess that's just Barack Obama. When he puts his mind to something, he makes it happen, and makes it happen big.
The most effective minority voter registration drive in memory was the result of careful handiwork by Project Vote!, the local chapter of a not-for-profit national organization. “It was the most efficient campaign I have seen in my 20 years in politics,” says Sam Burrell, alderman of the West Side's 29th Ward and a veteran of many registration drives.
At the head of this effort was a little-known 31-year-old African-American lawyer, community organizer, and writer: Barack Obama.
When [Sandy Newman, Project Vote! Director] called, Obama agreed to put his other work aside. “I'm still not quite sure why,” Newman says. ''This was not glamorous, high-paying work. But I am certainly grateful. He did one hell of a job.”
“It was overwhelming,” says Joseph Gardner, a commissioner of the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District and the director of the steering committee for Project Vote! “The black community in this city had not been so energized and so single-minded since Harold died.”
You may recall that we're attempting to work for “more, better Democrats”. Well, sound familiar?
Obama shrugs off the possibility of running for office. “Who knows?” he says. “But probably not immediately.” He smiles. “Was that a sufficiently politic 'maybe'? My sincere answer is, I'll run if I feel I can accomplish more that way than agitating from the outside. I don't know if that's true right now. Let's wait and see what happens in 1993. If the politicians in place now at city and state levels respond to African-American voters' needs, we'll gladly work with and support them. If they don't, we'll work to replace them. That's the message I want Project Vote! to have sent.”
Kindergarten aside, if there was ever any thought that Barack Obama's reason for running for office is some long held ambition, you need look no further than this quote to understand his true motivation for running for President.
I thought it would be fitting to leave you with a video from an Obama volunteer that I found. It's from a voter registration drive, and just shows how Obama has been able to use his organization to do the good work he set out to do. A wise man once said, “give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” Remember, Barack said “…I'll run if I feel I can accomplish more that way than agitating from the outside.” Well, looks like maybe he can:
NOTE: If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please email them to me at justAngryKos @t gmail d0t com . Also, if you have any suggestions for other areas of his life to flush out or articles to use to add to this or future diaries, please feel free to send them my way.
UPDATE: Another great quote from the same story, pointed out by red 83:
The group's slogan-“It's a Power Thing”-was ubiquitous in African-American neighborhoods. Posters were put up. Black-oriented radio stations aired the group's ads and announced where people could go to register. Minority owners of McDonald's restaurants allowed registrars on site and donated paid radio time to Project Vote!
snip
Burrell agrees. “We were registering hundreds a day, and we weren't having to search them out. They came looking for us. African Americans were just so eager to have a say again, to feel they counted.”
“I think it's fair to say we reinvigorated a slumbering constituency,” says Obama. “We got people to take notice.”
UPDATE 2: A great tribute to Obama's community organizing, and personal experience, from Kath25:
Told this before, but it bears repeating. In early fall 2004, I was living in Obama's neighborhood, Hyde Park, and decided to start a small voter registration drive. I targeted the West side, which is predominantly minority and predominantly Hispanic. A friend from work who lived over there took me around to the hang-outs one weekend so I could register the people he knew. Another weekend I worked the subway platforms of the Blue line, registering people waiting for the trains.
People would line up to register, because they wanted to vote for Obama. Young minority males–who are vastly underrepresented at the polls–wanted to be able to vote for this Obama guy. I expected to be cajoling people all day into to doing it, but rather the people I met either wanted to register, or were already registered and eager to vote.
I truly believe that as the nominee, Obama will bring these same underrepresented groups to the polls in record numbers, and bring people into participation in democracy that are currently absent. He has the potential to create transformative change in terms of who elects the President in this country.
He is an inspiring figure, a symbol of triumph over a hell of a lot of obstacles. The fact that he would work so hard to achieve so much and then use his position to help those who otherwise did not have a voice says much about the content of his character.
UPDATE 3: If you're an Obama supporter, please join Kossacks for Obama over at barackobama.com. I just joined yesterday, and have found it a pleasant community with some thoughtful people to bounce ideas off of.