Volume
1 Issue 1 - March 2001
Donald V. Watkins
by: Donald V. Watkins
Birmingham, Alabama
December 12, 2000
The time has come for black voters to explore new political strategies and form expanded strategic partnerships. One of the strongest sources of influence in America is political power, especially when it is well-organized and energized.
In recent years, the political currents have changed in statewide and national elections. Our blind (and often unreciprocated) allegiance to the Democratic Party has diluted our political strength. Black voters are taken for granted while our voices are politely ignored by too many statewide and national Democratic Party officeholders. In Alabama, the Party's hierarchy seems to be hopelessly locked into a death spiral with longtime Democratic Party chief Joe Reed, who was soundly defeated by black voters in his 1999 Montgomery City Council re-election bid. Often, the only reward blacks receive for our party loyalty centers around political convention trips for a few of our political leaders and the appointment of some of their family members and friends to political jobs. Rarely do black voters experience any meaningful benefits for this party loyalty.
Some pundits claim that black voters should switch to the Republican Party. This is not the pathway for leveraging our political strength. The Republican Party has attracted many white voters fleeing the Democratic Party's family of political outcasts (i.e. blacks, hispanics, gays, union members, trial lawyers, women activists, liberals, etc.). Historically, the Republican Party has not actively solicited our voices or votes, and has no real agenda for doing so today. Black Republican Party leaders wield no real power. They often serve the Party faithful as nothing more than political eunuchs.
Black voters can earn a well-deserved political premium on their voting power by becoming political free agents, just like professional athletes. Free agents in sports reserve unto themselves the right to join new teams whenever it is in their best interest to do so. We can accomplish this by organizing and mobilizing ourselves as independent voters, and by teaming with other groups of independent voters. We should focus on statewide and federal elections. Our loyalty should be expressed on an election-by-election basis to the candidate who is most sensitive to our core issues. Our support should be directed to the individual candidate, not the party. Candidates, regardless of party affiliation, work hardest for the political support of independent and swing voters. This is almost their singular focus from the time the candidates receive their party nominations until the Fall general elections. It should also be ours.
Several of my business friends and associates decided recently that we already have the resources in place to begin implementing this political restructuring with Alabama's statewide politics. In January 2001, we will initiate the following steps:
1. We will seek to organize, energize and mobilize a group of 200,000 independent voters by January, 2002 and 300,000 by January, 2004. We have current databases which allow us direct access to over 150,000 adult Alabama residents, most of whom are registered voters. We will encourage the registered voters in our databases to become political independents. We will urge and assist non-registered voters in this database to become registered voters. The databases are predominantly black, but include whites and other ethnic groups. We will make a concerted effort to mobilize all of the individuals in the databases, regardless of race.
2. We will distribute an issue-based monthly newsletter to the individuals in our databases. The newsletters will be non-partisan updates on key issues, including economic development, the quality of our educational systems, tax reform, healthcare, and personal financial growth. The newsletter will have a special focus on the core issues black voters share with white voters. For example, the need for comprehensive tax reform, affordable health care, economic development, and a sound social security program are critical issues regardless of one's ethnic background.
3. We will form strategic political alliances with other groups of independent voters to leverage our collective political voices. We realize that independent voters often share similar views on a wide range of political issues. We will focus on those issues we share with other groups of independent voters.
4. Our organizing group is spearheaded by Alabama-based businessmen and women, not career politicians and officeholders. These established business owners are generally considered to be social moderates and fiscal conservatives. They actively monitor the political, business and financial climate of Alabama. Their backgrounds are diverse and well-respected within the business community. None of these individuals is an elected official. These men and women are located in the state's major metropolitan centers.
5. We will grade statewide and federal elected officials against established criteria designed to measure their sensitivity to the shared core values of independent and swing voters. We will inform our base of voters of the grade each candidate receives.
6. We will fund our political outreach activities with our own money to insure the non-partisan nature of this voter education and turnout effort. Unlike existing political groups, we will not solicit or accept money from candidates or political parties. In fact, we will raise campaign contributions for candidates supported by our group of independent voters. Our voter education activities will be ongoing. Our voter turnout efforts will begin after the parties' nominees for statewide and federal office are chosen.
7. Once we establish this political restructuring in Alabama politics, we will work diligently to organize and mobilize independent voters in a similar fashion in other states.
We have seen in recent Alabama elections that a group of ten to thirty thousand well-organized independent voters can swing elections for statewide office. Our status as political free agents will inspire strong competition for our votes. It will also force a moderation in political tactics and rhetoric from candidates who prefer to sail into office on the strength of divisive issues. Finally, it should prevent the hijacking of statewide elections by political extremists.
This new political strategy is long overdue and deserves a chance to work for our benefit. We can expect plenty of criticism from professional politicians who have a vested interest in maintaining the political status quo. They will get over it, or get left behind.
*** Mr. Watkins is Chairman of Alamerica Bank and a lawyer who served as Special Counsel to former Birmingham Mayor Richard Arrington, Jr. from 1985-1999. ***
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