POLITICS: THE ISSUES
G.O.P. Tries Hard to Win Black Votes, but Recent History Works Against It
By R.W. APPLE Jr.
Published: September 19, 1996
WASHINGTON, Sept. 18— In a number of ways, the Republican Party has sought to make this the year it would break the Democratic hammerlock on the votes of black Americans.
Starting with the windfall of Gen. Colin L. Powell's announcement of Republican affiliation, and continuing with Bob Dole's choice of Jack Kemp as his running mate, party officials allowed themselves to hope that their Presidential ticket might pull 15 percent or 16 percent of the black vote this year, up from 11 percent for George Bush in 1992. In the euphoria of the San Diego convention, one top campaign official set the target at 20 percent.
But there is no sign the Republicans are actually gaining; in the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, in fact, they are doing worse than in 1992. Only 3 percent of the black respondents in the survey, completed early this month, said they intended to vote for the Dole-Kemp ticket, and only 7 percent said they would vote for the Republican House candidate in their district.
It was not always thus. From the Civil War until the 1930's, the party of Lincoln was the party of black America. The Democrats permitted no blacks to attend conventions in any official capacity until 1924, and even the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 did little at first to change things. Ralph Bunche, later a noted peacemaker but then a young black political scientist, complained that ''the New Deal only serves to crystallize those abuses and oppressions which the exploited Negro citizenry of America have long suffered under laissez-faire capitalism.''
But in 1936, there were 10 black delegates and 22 alternates at the Democrats' convention in Philadelphia, despite Southern protests, and Roosevelt, with union support, captured 71 percent of the black vote.
Still, in that Presidential election and the six following ones, Republican nominees took 25 percent to 40 percent of the black vote. Black delegations from Southern states survived well into the Eisenhower era.
The big change came in 1964 with Barry Goldwater and ''states' rights,'' a phrase and philosophy widely seen as anti-black and opposed by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the godfather of voting rights for blacks. In that Presidential election and the seven after, no Republican gained more than 15 percent of the black vote. Mr. Bush took only 10 percent in 1988, when he built his campaign in part around his opponent's freeing a black convict who then raped a white woman. In 1992, he added but one percentage point.
So why is Mr. Dole, for all his and Mr. Kemp's efforts, doing worse?
Part of the reason is the weakness of the Dole-Kemp campaign. Part, no doubt, is President Clinton's easy relation with blacks, not only on a partisan level but also in purely cultural terms. His Arkansas roots show when he visits a black church, and his popularity among blacks has clearly not been hurt by his signing of the Republicans' welfare bill.
But most important is the Republican Party's recent record as the vehicle of white supremacy in the South, beginning with the Goldwater campaign and reaching its apex in Richard M. Nixon's ''Southern strategy'' in 1968 and 1972. Republicans appealed to Nixon Democrats (later Reagan Democrats) in the Northern suburbs, many of them ethnic voters who had left the cities to escape from blacks, with promises to crack down on welfare cheats and to bring law and order; the party also fought affirmative action.
That legacy, said Eddie N. Williams of the Joint Center for Political Studies, a nonpartisan research group focusing on black issues, remains a formidable burden for Republicans. Even if General Powell had been on the ticket this year, Mr. Williams said, Republicans would probably not have won a majority of black votes.
''All Republicans -- Kemp less than most, Powell even less -- carry some heavy negative baggage,'' Mr. Williams said. ''Something more fundamental than the Presidential nominee has to change. Their program has to change; their approach has to change.''
That flies in the face of the tactics enunciated by Haley Barbour, chairman of the Republican National Committee. Citing polls that show one-third of blacks or more defining themselves as conservatives, Mr. Barbour argues that it would be a mistake to ''water down'' his party's message. Instead, he says, Republicans need to convince blacks that smaller government, education reform and tough criminal-justice policies are in their self-interest.
If Mr. Barbour is right, the Republicans are failing miserably to put that message across. An overwhelming 86 percent of blacks said in the Times/CBS poll that the Democratic Party, not the Republican Party, was better able to help people achieve the American Dream. And numerous polls have shown blacks far more inclined than whites to favor government spending for social welfare.
Ron Walters, head of the political science department at Howard University, has been saying for several years that Republican policies were ''too full of venom'' for blacks to pay much attention to them. The Rev. Jesse Jackson said in Tennessee recently, ''Once you take the cover off the book, what you find inside is not Jack Kemp but Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott and Pat Buchanan.''
Mr. Kemp is relatively popular among blacks, though not very well known. According to the Times/CBS poll, 15 percent of blacks have a favorable impression of him while 20 percent have an unfavorable impression. Still, choosing him has not helped Mr. Dole's ratings; 6 percent of blacks say they view Mr. Dole positively, while 47 percent say they have a negative view.
Soon after the Republican convention, Mr. Kemp promised to seek votes ''from the South Side of Chicago to the east side of Harlem,'' and he has made good on his pledge, campaigning in Harlem and in inner-city neighborhood in Chicago, Los Angeles and elsewhere, though to paltry crowds.
Trying to send a signal of inclusiveness, convention organizers put General Powell in a prominent position on the program and gave coveted speaking spots to the two black Republican Congressmen, J. C. Watts of Oklahoma and Gary A. Franks of Connecticut. Kay Cole James, a conservative black Christian from Virginia, called the roll of states for the nomination of Mr. Dole.
But only 2.6 percent of Republican delegates were black, compared with 21 percent at the Democrats' convention. Only 1 member of the Republican National Committee is black, compared with 88 on the Democrats' committee, and only 11 state legislators nationwide are black, compared with 539 Democrats.
Most of the Republican convention delegates were chosen in a process where the Christian Coalition had decisive influence, and the group also dominated the writing of the platform, which was full of planks unpalatable to blacks.
''Younger blacks are somewhat more receptive to the Republican Party than the parents and grandparents, who formed their views in the days of Roosevelt and Johnson,'' Mr. Williams said. ''The potential is there, in the medium-term future. But first the Republicans will have to show us that they are the party of Kemp and Powell, not the party of Gingrich and the coalition.''
Graph: ''DEMOGRAPHICS: Republicans and the Race Gap'' Beginning with the Civil War, black voters allied themselves with the Republican party up until 1930's. Graph tracks how they have voted since then, and also tracks which party they have identified with. (Source: Joint Center for Political and Economi Studies)