First Black

It’s hard to be the first Black. I know. I’ve been there. I was the first Black to play varsity sports at my high school, first in my family to graduate from high school, first to graduate from college, first to work at a major corporation. There is a responsibility that goes along with the role of being first. You have to represent everybody that may have aspired to do what you’re doing but for whatever reason was unable to. There is tremendous pressure to succeed, since your failure would indicate that those denied in the past weren’t worthy anyway.

Being the first Black is a lonely experience. It is the ultimate minority experience. There is no other like you. No one else to share what you are really thinking, how you really feel. You don’t know who to trust. You don’t know who trusts you. You have no mentor. No one will school you on what to do and what not to do. No one will explain major and subtle expectations.

Failure is not a private affair. Others are watching. Some wish you well, others will rejoice in your failures. The pressure of it all can be debilitating.

No one should have to endure what Jackie Robinson did to make it possible for Blacks to play major league baseball. In my lifetime alone there has been a constant stream of “first Blacks”. They include Cicely Tyson, Sidney Poitier, Bill Cosby, Benjamin O. Davis, Thurgood Marshall, Bill Russell, Edward Brooke, Robert C. Weaver, Emmett Ashford, Carl B. Stokes, Shirley Chisholm, Arthur Ashe, Marlin Briscoe, Gordon Parks, Satchel Paige, Isaac Hayes, Daniel James Jr., Frank Robinson, Bill Lucas, Max Robinson, Guion Bluford Jr., Vanessa L. Williams, John Thompson, Doug Williams, Art Shell, Colin Powell, Douglas Wilder, Dr. Mae Jemison, Carol Moseley Braun, Toni Morrison, Tiger Woods, Franklin Raines, Condoleeza Rice, Robert L. Johnson, Halle Berry, Denzel Washington, Serena Williams, Tony Dungy, Eric Holder, Susan Rice, Ursula Burns, Michelle Obama, Barack Obama……

Some would think, and many would hope that the election of Barack Obama as President of the United States was the summit, the pinnacle of a mountain that our country had been struggling to climb since 1776. On the night he was elected I sat in my living room and allowed the tears to flow unimpeded down my face. The first time I heard him say “Yes We Can” I did not believe it. I wanted to, but I had seen too much growing up in Alabama to believe that America would ever cast enough votes to make a Black man the most powerful man in the world. The pride I felt on that night cannot be quantified. I had tremendous hope that his election would give our children the pride and self-esteem that is so necessary for success in our world. Perhaps now we could stop focusing on the “first Black” to do this or that. Perhaps that incredible, unjust pressure of being “first” would be alleviated.

But then, almost simultaneously, I thought to myself, “my God, I hope nothing happens to this man”. As I watched him and his beautiful family on that stage in Chicago, I thought about John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Medgar Evers. I thought about the venomous hatred he would have to face each day. I thought about the unrealistic expectations that would be placed on him. I thought about the collective pressure from all of those that needed him to prove that a Black man was indeed possessive of the intellectual, managerial, and organizational skills required of a President.

The last time an incoming President faced the kind of issues President Obama would face was 1932. Franklin Roosevelt was the new President, and the country was experiencing the Great Depression.

 In 2009 President Obama faced one war in Iraq and another war in Afghanistan, not to mention a terrible recession that threatened economic disaster. The financial system was near collapse. The housing market was just as bad. The auto industry was near bankruptcy. Consumer confidence was non-existent, and unemployment exceeded 10%. Meanwhile, the Republican Party became the party of “NO”. Refusing to cooperate with the new President on anything. Their stated purpose was to make sure that he would be a one term president.

Today, American combat troops are no longer dying in Iraq and Afghanistan. The financial system is sound and the stock market is at record levels. The housing market is soaring, and the automobile industry is booming. Consumer confidence is soaring as well, and unemployment is below 6%. President Obama was re-elected despite the best efforts of Republican opposition.

 I believe that history will be kind to President Obama for all of these things, but his crowning achievement will always be the Affordable Care Act. Several Presidents in our history saw the wisdom and necessity for universal health care and made efforts to implement it. They include Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Lyndon Johnson, John Kennedy, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. Six were Democrats, six were Republicans. They all failed. Only President Obama got it done.

I still pray that he will finish his term unharmed. I know that many Americans hate him. I know that many others don’t appreciate him. Ironically, the same thing could have been said about Abraham Lincoln.

Only a man bestowed with greatness could be born Black in the United States of America and accomplish the things that President Obama has accomplished. He is a great man, and he will be remembered as a great President. To be the First Black President of the United States is beyond comprehension. God Bless Michelle Obama. He never would have made it without her. God Bless their children, she never would have made it without them.

It’s hard to be the “First Black”. Ask anybody that has ever experienced it, like Jackie Robinson, or Barack Obama, or me.