I am for reparations
NYTIMES.COM: Top Black Donors See Obama’s Rise as Their Own
By MICHAEL LUO
DENVER — When Gordon Davis, a top fund-raiser for Senator Barack Obama, made partner at his white-shoe law firm in New York in 1983, it was a vastly different world for aspiring black professionals like him.
At the time, there were just five black partners at major law firms in New York, Mr. Davis recalled. That group had a tradition of taking each new partner out to an intimate congratulatory lunch. Today, more than 200 take part in the ritual at the Harvard Club.
The change over just a few decades offers a glance at the advances that have enabled a cadre of black elites like Mr. Davis to emerge as a force in the most successful fund-raising operation in presidential campaign history.
Mr. Obama’s acceptance of his party’s nomination on Thursday, on the 45th anniversary of the speech by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington, signifies a powerful moment of arrival for blacks. But the milestone is especially telling for this upper-crust group, which has mobilized like never before to raise mountains of cash to power his campaign.
“There’s a sense of not only pride but of a point in the culture we’re a part of, the society we’re a part of, that this is different,” said Mr. Davis, now a partner at Dewey & LeBoeuf. “It’s a measure of how far we — and I don’t mean just black people — how far this country and the business world have come.”
There are 57 blacks out of the roughly 300 people on the Obama campaign’s national finance committee. Each member commits to collecting at least $250,000, a formidable task that typically requires deep business networks, something relatively few blacks had until fairly recently.
The list of top Obama bundlers includes John W. Rogers Jr., the founder of Ariel Investments, the country’s first black-owned money management firm; William E. Kennard, the first black chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; and Mr. Davis, who drove across the country 45 years ago as a newly minted college graduate to take part in the March on Washington, and went on to serve as the first black parks commissioner of New York City and the first black president of Lincoln Center.
Mr. Kennard and Mr. Rogers are among a half-dozen black bundlers who have raised more than $500,000 for Mr. Obama, putting them in a select group of just three dozen fund-raisers.
Most of Mr. Obama’s major black donors are new to big-money political fund-raising, but there are signs that at least some could go on to become players in Democratic circles. Some, for example, have already begun flexing their muscle by raising money for politicians who endorsed Mr. Obama early on.
At 67, Mr. Davis is something of an elder statesman for the group. Most are part of a younger generation that has benefited from the new vistas opened by the civil rights movement but had not participated directly in those struggles. Like Mr. Obama, they have learned to navigate white-dominated fields, climbing through the ranks by earning approval not among fellow blacks but among whites. Yet they remained keenly aware of the sanctums that were still inaccessible.
Now they have witnessed a breakthrough at the highest levels of the political realm, a culmination in many ways of the long struggle for acceptance that many of them have spent their professional lives waging.
“When you grow up living in a white corporate world, there’s always a part of you that thinks, ‘Gee, if I sold out,’ or ‘How can I do this and also stay true to myself and true to my own identity,’ ” said Jeh Johnson, another top fund-raiser and New York lawyer who today serves as the informal chairman of the group of black law partners.
Of Mr. Obama, Mr. Johnson said, “Here we have a guy who’s running for president and managed to do it in the political world and managed to do it so well.”
When Mr. Johnson became the first black partner in 1994 at his firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, he was part of a wave of blacks earning the same distinction at other major New York firms. What was happening in law was unfolding elsewhere in corporate America, on Wall Street and in other rarefied circles, with blacks finally penetrating the ranks of money and influence in increasing numbers.
“This is now a situation where many of us have arrived at a certain level — lawyers, doctors, professional people,” said Ralph Dawson, who is in charge of African-American donor outreach for the Democratic Party and is himself a black law partner. “And all of that is coming together around this very special individual.”
Valerie Jarrett, a close friend of Mr. Obama and one of his most trusted advisers, pointed out that her experience had been vastly different from that of parents’ generation. Her father, who was the first black medical resident at his Chicago hospital, was asked to enter through the back door on his first day of work, she said.
“There hasn’t been the kind of overt, in-your-face discrimination my parents experienced,” said Ms. Jarrett, who is now the chief executive of one of the country’s largest real estate firms.
Nevertheless, stories of slights, or a nagging sense of “otherness,” are prevalent even among this accomplished group.
Mr. Kennard, who was general counsel to the F.C.C. before he became chairman in the Clinton administration, recalled his first day on that job. He deliberately went in early to his new office. When he arrived, a secretary asked in a snippy voice whether she could help him.
“There was just a tone in her voice, ‘You’re really not supposed to be here for an appointment that early,’ ” said Mr. Kennard, who more recently became the first black partner at his private equity firm, the Carlyle Group, and who sits on the board of The New York Times Company. “I said, ‘Well, yes, I’m the new general counsel.’ Her jaw dropped and she said, ‘You’re the new general counsel?’ ”
Indeed, for all of the signs of progress, there remain feelings of frustration about what has not been accomplished.
Mr. Rogers, who was a crucial early supporter of Mr. Obama when he first ran for the Illinois Senate, and helped connect him to others in the black business community, said he looked around at his industry and still saw few black faces at the highest levels.
“I think the good news is, once Barack is elected,” Mr. Rogers said, “he is going to be a beacon of hope for all of us.”
By MICHAEL LUO
DENVER — When Gordon Davis, a top fund-raiser for Senator Barack Obama, made partner at his white-shoe law firm in New York in 1983, it was a vastly different world for aspiring black professionals like him.
At the time, there were just five black partners at major law firms in New York, Mr. Davis recalled. That group had a tradition of taking each new partner out to an intimate congratulatory lunch. Today, more than 200 take part in the ritual at the Harvard Club.
The change over just a few decades offers a glance at the advances that have enabled a cadre of black elites like Mr. Davis to emerge as a force in the most successful fund-raising operation in presidential campaign history.
Mr. Obama’s acceptance of his party’s nomination on Thursday, on the 45th anniversary of the speech by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington, signifies a powerful moment of arrival for blacks. But the milestone is especially telling for this upper-crust group, which has mobilized like never before to raise mountains of cash to power his campaign.
“There’s a sense of not only pride but of a point in the culture we’re a part of, the society we’re a part of, that this is different,” said Mr. Davis, now a partner at Dewey & LeBoeuf. “It’s a measure of how far we — and I don’t mean just black people — how far this country and the business world have come.”
There are 57 blacks out of the roughly 300 people on the Obama campaign’s national finance committee. Each member commits to collecting at least $250,000, a formidable task that typically requires deep business networks, something relatively few blacks had until fairly recently.
The list of top Obama bundlers includes John W. Rogers Jr., the founder of Ariel Investments, the country’s first black-owned money management firm; William E. Kennard, the first black chairman of the Federal Communications Commission; and Mr. Davis, who drove across the country 45 years ago as a newly minted college graduate to take part in the March on Washington, and went on to serve as the first black parks commissioner of New York City and the first black president of Lincoln Center.
Mr. Kennard and Mr. Rogers are among a half-dozen black bundlers who have raised more than $500,000 for Mr. Obama, putting them in a select group of just three dozen fund-raisers.
Most of Mr. Obama’s major black donors are new to big-money political fund-raising, but there are signs that at least some could go on to become players in Democratic circles. Some, for example, have already begun flexing their muscle by raising money for politicians who endorsed Mr. Obama early on.
At 67, Mr. Davis is something of an elder statesman for the group. Most are part of a younger generation that has benefited from the new vistas opened by the civil rights movement but had not participated directly in those struggles. Like Mr. Obama, they have learned to navigate white-dominated fields, climbing through the ranks by earning approval not among fellow blacks but among whites. Yet they remained keenly aware of the sanctums that were still inaccessible.
Now they have witnessed a breakthrough at the highest levels of the political realm, a culmination in many ways of the long struggle for acceptance that many of them have spent their professional lives waging.
“When you grow up living in a white corporate world, there’s always a part of you that thinks, ‘Gee, if I sold out,’ or ‘How can I do this and also stay true to myself and true to my own identity,’ ” said Jeh Johnson, another top fund-raiser and New York lawyer who today serves as the informal chairman of the group of black law partners.
Of Mr. Obama, Mr. Johnson said, “Here we have a guy who’s running for president and managed to do it in the political world and managed to do it so well.”
When Mr. Johnson became the first black partner in 1994 at his firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, he was part of a wave of blacks earning the same distinction at other major New York firms. What was happening in law was unfolding elsewhere in corporate America, on Wall Street and in other rarefied circles, with blacks finally penetrating the ranks of money and influence in increasing numbers.
“This is now a situation where many of us have arrived at a certain level — lawyers, doctors, professional people,” said Ralph Dawson, who is in charge of African-American donor outreach for the Democratic Party and is himself a black law partner. “And all of that is coming together around this very special individual.”
Valerie Jarrett, a close friend of Mr. Obama and one of his most trusted advisers, pointed out that her experience had been vastly different from that of parents’ generation. Her father, who was the first black medical resident at his Chicago hospital, was asked to enter through the back door on his first day of work, she said.
“There hasn’t been the kind of overt, in-your-face discrimination my parents experienced,” said Ms. Jarrett, who is now the chief executive of one of the country’s largest real estate firms.
Nevertheless, stories of slights, or a nagging sense of “otherness,” are prevalent even among this accomplished group.
Mr. Kennard, who was general counsel to the F.C.C. before he became chairman in the Clinton administration, recalled his first day on that job. He deliberately went in early to his new office. When he arrived, a secretary asked in a snippy voice whether she could help him.
“There was just a tone in her voice, ‘You’re really not supposed to be here for an appointment that early,’ ” said Mr. Kennard, who more recently became the first black partner at his private equity firm, the Carlyle Group, and who sits on the board of The New York Times Company. “I said, ‘Well, yes, I’m the new general counsel.’ Her jaw dropped and she said, ‘You’re the new general counsel?’ ”
Indeed, for all of the signs of progress, there remain feelings of frustration about what has not been accomplished.
Mr. Rogers, who was a crucial early supporter of Mr. Obama when he first ran for the Illinois Senate, and helped connect him to others in the black business community, said he looked around at his industry and still saw few black faces at the highest levels.
“I think the good news is, once Barack is elected,” Mr. Rogers said, “he is going to be a beacon of hope for all of us.”
posted by Stephen at August 28, 2008
<< Home