Massachusetts voters elect African-American governor

Deval Patrick was officially sworn in as governor of Massachusetts on Jan. 4. He is the second African American to be elected governor in the history of the United States since U.S. Reconstruction.

L. Douglas Wilder of Virginia was the first African American elected governor in 1989. P.B.S. Pinchback of Louisiana was the first African American to become governor in 1872, not by election but by replacing the governor who had died in office.

In a landslide victory on Nov. 7, Massachusetts voters swept Democratic candidate Deval Patrick into office with 56 percent of the vote—20 percentage points more than his rival, the white Republican Party candidate Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey.

This was a resounding and historic vote against racism, for immigrant rights and against cutbacks. The Black community heavily campaigned for Patrick, who carried out a grassroots campaign that captured the hearts and minds of many oppressed people with its message of respect and hope for poor and working people.

“We have made history” was the overwhelming sentiment in communities of color in Boston. This feeling is underscored by the fact that many African Americans remember all too well that only 30 years ago Black families’ homes were being stoned and firebombed in mostly white neighborhoods like East Boston, South Boston and Hyde Park; that the racist anti-busing forces had their headquarters in City Hall, and that Black people could risk their health and even their lives if they ventured into certain neighborhoods.

Many Boston newspapers, when writing about Patrick’s campaign, evoked an incident where racist whites broke the nose of an African-American man—Theodore Landsmark—with a pole flying the U.S. flag. The attack took place on the steps of City Hall and a photo of this horrific attack was disseminated around the world.

Progressive vote against racist reaction

Patrick’s election victory is also very significant in that it takes place in a state that is more than 80 percent white and where African Americans are only 7.5 percent of the population. Patrick had a solid majority of votes in the mostly white neighborhoods of South Boston—once the center of the racist anti-busing forces—and West Roxbury. In Patrick’s hometown precinct in Milton, 88 percent of registered voters turned out.

These statistics show that voters in Massachusetts did not succumb to racism despite ongoing racist TV ads backed by the Healey campaign.

Healey campaign volunteers actually picketed outside Patrick’s home in orange prisoner jumpsuits. Healey also reverted to attacks on some of Patrick’s family members, shocking many. In response to these reprehensible ads the leading Massachusetts legal trade paper, Lawyer’s Weekly, for the first time in its history decided to endorse a candidate—Deval Patrick.

Patrick’s support of same-sex marriage won a strong LGBT community campaign for him. His support for the rights of immigrants to have driver’s licenses and to have in-state tuition saw record numbers of immigrants voting for him. Before leaving office Romney signed a law which said that state troopers could detain anyone they suspected of being an “illegal immigrant” and call U.S. immigration officials.

But many African-American voters and other voters of color had their right to “make history” taken away or obstructed when 26 precincts in Roxbury, Hyde Park and Mattapan “ran out” of ballots at 6 p.m. on election night.

At one polling place in Roxbury, there were no more ballots at 6:30 p.m. and by the time the polls closed no more ballots had been delivered as the Boston Election Commission had earlier promised. Over 100 people there who had been waiting to vote for more than two hours were forced to leave. Some people at places that ran out of ballots were told to go to other locations. When they arrived, those locations had no ballots. At other polling places, the electronic ballots malfunctioned.

Harvard Law School Professor Charles Ogletree, who was monitoring the polls, said, “We’re getting a sense of déjà vu from the national election, but this is not Florida or Ohio. This is Massachusetts. This is as bad as the worst Jim Crow segregation of the ‘30s ‘40s and ‘50s.”

Despite these adversities, reports from polling places were that the turnout in mostly Black and Latin@ precincts was huge. Polling officials expected 35,000 voters to turn out in traditionally “low-voting” precincts but got 50,000 instead.

Masses hope for real change

Patrick’s election as governor ended a 16-year Republican reign characterized by gross cuts in spending for programs serving the state’s most vulnerable and oppressed.

The Nov. 7 vote was a clear rebuff to the severe, unrelenting and racist cutbacks of out-going Republican Gov. Mitt Romney’s administration.

On July 8, 2006, Romney signed Massachusetts’s 2007 fiscal year budget, vetoing $573 million in spending that overwhelmingly impacted state health, childcare, food and housing programs. For example, Romney vetoed $3 million in emergency food assistance. He called it “excessive.”

He vetoed $5 million of a proposed $10 million for Medicaid for community health centers, $1.3 million for childcare and $5 million for the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition program.

Hatred for Romney reached an all-time high with “The Big Dig” construction scam where billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money was given for years to contractors accused of fraudulence and incompetence who reportedly cut corners and used faulty, unsafe materials resulting in the collapse of a section of the tunnel that killed an immigrant mother.

The Nov. 7 vote for Patrick reflects the overall anti-Republican backlash, especially where the Iraq War is concerned. Despite his progressive platform, Patrick is a multi-millionaire with some political ties to the capitalist establishment. In 1994 Clinton appointed him assistant attorney general for civil rights.

He was Texaco’s vice president and general counsel from 1999 to 2001. According to www.killercoke.org,  during this time Patrick was the principal architect of the Texaco/Chevron merger that resulted in the loss of thousands of jobs. He also opposed the right of 30,000 poor Ecuadorians to sue Texaco for damage to their health and environment.

He served as executive vice president and general counsel for the Coca Cola Company. He stated that Coke’s labor relations in Colombia were exemplary and that most workers were represented by unions in Coke’s Colombian plants—in reality, 90 percent are not represented by unions. He also helped Coke avoid paying billions in taxes. (www.killercoke.org)

Patrick was on the board of the firm that runs Ameriquest, a mortgage company accused of predatory lending practices in poor and oppressed communities. Millions of Massachusetts residents were scammed. (Boston Globe, May 31)

Patrick grew up poor on the South Side of Chicago and was raised by a single parent, his mother. He got a scholarship to a private academy and received his law degree from Harvard University.

Seeking “economic justice” in the areas of jobs, housing, education, health care, an end to high taxes, etc., was the reason given by many voters for why they voted for Patrick, along with appreciating his humble upbringing in Chicago.

Some 14,000 people attended Patrick’s outdoor inauguration to view this historic event, many bringing their children and waiting in line for hours for a chance to shake his hand.