Page 6A — WEDNESDAY, November 5, 2008 smartDECISION08 Columbia Missourian

Obama McCain
334 155
54,224,380 49,680,952*
49.1% of Mo. voters * As of 12:30 a.m. today
49.6% of Mo. voters**
** With 3,427 of 3,533 precincts reporting

Obama shatters racial barriers to win By DAVID ESPO
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Barack Obama
swept to victory as the nation’s first
black president Tuesday night in an
Electoral College landslide that over-
came racial barriers as old as America
itself.
“Change has come,” he declared to
a huge throng of cheering supporters
in Chicago.
The son of a black father from Kenya
and a white mother from Kansas,
the Democratic senator from Illinois
sealed his historic triumph by defeat-
ing Republican Sen. John McCain in
a string of wins in hard-fought battle-
ground states — Ohio, Florida, Vir-
ginia, Iowa and more.
On a night for Democrats to savor,
they not only elected Obama the
nation’s 44th president, but padded
their majorities in the House and Sen-
ate, and come January will control
both the White House and Congress
for the first time since 1994.
PABLO MARTINEZ MONSIVAIS/The Associated Press Obama’s election capped a meteoric
President-elect Barack Obama, his wife, Michelle Obama, Vice President- rise — from state senator to president-
elect Joe Biden and his wife, Jill Biden, take the stage after Obama elect in four years.
delivered his victory speech at Grant Park in Chicago on Tuesday. In his first speech as victor, Obama
Thousands gathered to celebrate his election. catalogued the challenges ahead. “The
“There are many who won’t agree
with every decision or policy I
make as president, and we know
that government can’t solve
every problem. But I will always
be honest with you about the
challenges we face.”
Barack Obama
President-elect
greatest of a lifetime,” he said, “two
wars, a planet in peril, the worst finan-
cial crisis in a century.”
He added, “There are many who
won’t agree with every decision or
policy I make as president, and we
know that government can’t solve
every problem. But I will always be
honest with you about the challenges
we face.”
McCain called his former rival to
concede defeat — and to end his own
10-year quest for the White House.
“The American people have spoken,
and spoken clearly,” McCain told dis-
appointed supporters in Arizona.
President Bush added his congratu-
lations from the White House.
In his speech, Obama invoked the
words of Lincoln and echoed John F.
Kennedy.
“So let us summon a new spirit of
patriotism, of service and responsibil-
ity where each of us resolves to pitch
in and work harder,” he said.
He and his running mate, Sen.
Joseph Biden of Delaware, will take
their oaths of office as president and
vice president on Jan. 20.
Obama will move into the Oval
Office as leader of a country that
is almost certainly in recession, and
fighting two long wars — one in Iraq
and the other in Afghanistan.
The popular vote was close — 51.3
percent to 47.5 percent with 73 percent
of all U.S. precincts counted — but
not the count in the Electoral College,
where it mattered most.
There, Obama’s decision to contest
McCain in states that hadn’t gone
Democratic in years paid off.
Obama has said his first order of
presidential business will be to tackle
the economy. He has also pledged to
withdraw most U.S. combat troops
from Iraq within 16 months.

Black citizens reflect on the Civil Rights

Movement and the significance of
Obama’s campaign for the presidency

Witnessing
History
By CATHERINE MARTIN TRUTH LEEM/Missourian
news@ColumbiaMissourian.com

E
Cortneyjo Washington, left, and Bessie Prude Smith cheer during a watch party at Second
liot Battle recalls the first time he went to register Baptist Church as Barack Obama was announced president Tuesday.

to vote in 1945. He had read an article in an Alabama
newspaper that said four black people and 200 white
people had registered the previous day.
“I thought how terrible it was that so few
blacks were registered,” Battle said during an
interview in his home last week. “I went down
the next morning and was there early, and was
number five or six in the (separate) line for
African Americans.”
But Battle never made it to the front of the
line. He sat there waiting, even as hundreds of
white people came in, registered and left. He
returned the next day, only to be grilled for
three hours on his knowledge of the U.S. Consti-
tution. The inquiry was a means of preventing
black people from registering to vote.
“The man who did the registration could not
pronounce the word ‘constitution,’ but I was
asked to interpret the Constitution,” Battle said.
Despite the struggle, Battle, 84, was empow-
ered by the experience.
“I remember how important voting was to
me, as a result of that attitude,” he said. “They
thought I’d lose my patience and get out of line
and go back home, but I persevered.
“I don’t remember for whom I was voting for
the first time, but I do remember the pride I felt
as I cast my ballot, and I haven’t missed voting
at any time since.”
Battle’s experience in registering to vote was
common among black people before the Civil
Rights Act of 1964, which was passed as an
effort to end racial segregation and voting dis-
crimination. Even though blacks technically had
been given the right to vote through the 15th
Amendment late in the 19th century, discrimi-
nation persisted at the polls for decades.
Battle has been a leader in Columbia’s black
community for years. He was the only black
faculty member to move to Hickman High
School when Douglass High School closed as
part of the desegregation movement of the early
1960s. In the days leading up to a historic presi-
dential election, in which the nation was poised
to elect the first black man ever to be president,
he and other members of the black community
reflected on how far the nation has come since
those tumultuous times before the Civil Rights
Act.
Battle remembers when there was a “total
separation of the races in housing, schools and
about every phase of life.” He said he recalls
that not only were there separate schools and
neighborhoods for blacks and whites, but black
people could not go into white public libraries or
Battle said that although he did not partici-
pate in sit-ins or all of the marches, he protested
in other ways. “We were the first black fam-
ily in Columbia to move out of the segregated
area,” he said. And two of his four children
were the first black students to attend Grant
even sit on benches in public parks. Elementary School.
Battle is originally from Mobile, Alabama, Arvarh Strickland, namesake of MU’s Strick-
and said he experienced segregation and preju- land Hall, also made a difference during that
dice there. That didn’t change when he moved time. Strickland was the first black professor to
to Columbia. teach at MU. He taught an African-American
“Missouri was about as much like Alabama, history class that was requested by students.
Mississippi and Georgia as the Southern states “It was really a great experience because the
were like each other. There was as much preju- students of the ’60s and early ’70s were very
dice and as much segregation here as there was involved in things, and so when I came, they
in my hometown.” Battle said. rushed into my classes,” Strickland said.
Before his employment at MU, Strickland
A city divided protested segregation
Wynna Fay Elbert, on the University of
64, vividly recalls the Illinois at Champaign-
segregation that took
place in Columbia.
“I just can’t believe my first vote is Urbana campus where
Her memory focused for a black man. We went from the he attended graduate
school. By the time he
on a diner on Third
Street, known today
’60s when black people couldn’t graduated, Strickland
said the movement
as Providence Road. vote, and now my first vote is for a was in “full swing.”
Although “black folks
lived all up and down black man.” He began teaching in
Chicago, where there
Third Street,” she said, Dwuana Bradley was “a great problem
they were not allowed Truman State University student with school segrega-
inside the white diner. tion.”
“I remember it like “We were involved
it was yesterday,” Elbert said. “We had to go to in protesting the policies of superintendent
the window to order in winter — rain or hail Benjamin Willis, who built schools in locations
— and wait outside until our food was ready.” that would maintain segregation,” Strickland
Elbert, a member of the junior NAACP at the recalled.
time, remembers when she and seven or eight
others, including “spokesman” James Nunnelly, Dreams fulfilled
walked into the restaurant and sat down at the After living through such a time, the candi-
counter. dacy of Barack Obama is especially meaningful
“We don’t serve niggers here,” the man at the to people who fought so hard for their rights.
counter told Nunnelly. “I didn’t ever dream of seeing an African
“That’s good, because we want coffee,” Nun- American as a serious candidate,” Strickland
nelly responded. said. “Of course, this has been an overwhelming
The man was not amused. He came out from experience for me to live through this election
behind the counter, grabbed Nunnelly and process this time.”
“threw him out of the building by his arms,” Strickland believes Obama has already
Elbert said. changed, at least somewhat, how the black com-
The incident drew a “crowd that grew to munity is viewed.
approximately 300 people who got very excited “The change has not been radical, but it has
and rushed the diner, turning it over on its been a very positive thing,” he said.
side,” Elbert recalls. It eventually attracted the Strickland described Obama as “a man who
attention of the Missouri Highway Patrol, the certainly does not meet all of those stereotypes
sheriff’s office and Columbia police. that many people have of African Americans.”
“The next day the diner was moved from the “Any time we can whittle away at some of
neighborhood, never to return,” Elbert said. these stereotypes, it is good, and a lot of that
Elbert said that episode was “one of the big has taken place since the Civil Rights Move-
things in Civil Rights days” in Columbia. ment. That kind of set us on the course of learn-
ing and changing attitudes and perceptions of
each other.”
Battle has similar sentiments about Obama.
“I never thought I’d live to see the day that his
candidacy would happen,” Battle said.
Battle is a proud Obama supporter, as evi-
denced by the sign in his front yard. He said
he has been glued to his television this election
and has watched almost every one of Obama’s
speeches.
Battle admires many of Obama’s characteris-
tics, including his family values and his commu-
nication skills. He said he feels Obama is a fair
person and “wants to lift up the middle class.”
“He’s not a racist person. He’s for the
advancement of all persons regardless of race,”
he said.
Elbert also said she is enthusiastic about
Obama’s candidacy. She said she was ecstatic to
have the opportunity to see Obama speak at his
MU rally on Thursday.
“He’s another part of history I never thought
I’d see,” Elbert said.
Elbert attended the rally with her daughter
and two granddaughters, ages 16 and 10. She
said she was glad to have “the opportunity to
be there with my grandchildren and see them
excited and questioning what he’s doing and
why he’s doing things.”
“My grandchildren got to see a part of his-
tory,” Elbert said.
The Civil Rights Movement not only affected
the generation that experienced it, but younger
generations relate through memories shared by
family and friends who experienced the move-
ment firsthand.
Hope’s homecoming
Dwuana Bradley, a student at Truman State
University who traveled to the Obama rally with
a busload of students, said she remembers hear-
ing stories about her aunt who was involved in
the desegregation of Arkansas schools. Compar-
ing her own experiences to those of her aunt,
she said she is amazed by the changes that have
taken place.
“I just can’t believe my first vote is for a
black man,” Bradley said. “We went from the
’60s when black people couldn’t vote, and now
my first vote is for a black man.”
Julia Hickem, 46, also attended the Thursday
rally. “This is the happiest moment, besides
my child’s birth, in my life,” she said. “I love
Obama. He is the man for the world.”
Hickem spoke of her mother’s involvement in
the movement, but what she remembered most
was her mother’s spirit.
“She had hope, just like me.”