"As much as I want to look forward, I not could resist the temptation of looking backward"

As much as I was tempted by the desire to immediately enter my thoughts into the 24-hour news cycle, I was equally compelled by the need to self reflect.  

Tuesday night was a great night for America and potentially for the world.  It doesn’t close a book as much as it introduces a new chapter—an epilogue perhaps.  

As much as I want to look forward, I could not resist the temptation of looking backward, reflecting on what I just witnessed. As implausible it seemed to me one year ago that Barack Obama could receive the Democratic nomination for president, how did Tuesday night feel to my mother and father and those of their generation?

For them, Jim Crow was not an intellectual exercise to be read about and dissected utilizing the Socratic method; it was a way of life. But 40 years after Martin Luther King was assassinated, a biracial man by the name of Barack Hussein Obama would receive the presidential nomination of the same political party that were the architects Jim Crow legislation is progress.

From the Compromise of 1789 to the Civil War to the Hayes-Tilden Compromise to Plessy v. Ferguson to Brown v. Board of Education to the Civil Rights Movement African Americans have historically been America’s most celebrated group where the “NO Vacancy” sign was posted as they attempted to enter the nation’s door of equality.

As the legal barriers of impediment were struck down implied blockades of fear were erected in their place.  Coincidentally, it was also 40 years ago that Nixon instituted the “Southern Strategy” that paved the way for Republicans to dominate the South and by extension the White House.

We’ve witnessed scores of Republican candidates swept to victory in part because of Willie Horton, the “hands” commercial, support for the Confederate Flag, and using the term “states rights” as a euphemism for white supremacy. 

That is not to suggest such practices have been put to rest, it would not surprise me to see them resurrected in some form during the general election.

Next week will commemorate the 45th anniversary of Gov. George Wallace standing in front of the University of Alabama in a symbolic attempt to block two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from enrolling.  Tuesday night, Barack Obama and the country took a major step to unlock the door that has arguably been the most segregated institution in America.  Until now, the most diversity among the 42 men that occupied the Oval Office was the Catholicism practiced by one.

From this rearview perspective, I too share the sentiments expressed by others that in this moment I am as proud of my country as I was disappointed when it engaged in an unnecessary rush to war. 

My pride does not stem from the specific victory of an individual but what the individual represents and what it says about a country that at times I have had my doubts about its commitment to “We the people of the United States in order to form a more perfect union.”