Of Dreams and Vindication

I was going to write this post earlier today, but that would have been too premature even for me. Now, though, CNN has officially projected that our next president will be Barack Hussein Obama, and I just wanted to share some of my thoughts on that idea.

For the first time in my life, I can actually say that I believe in the age-old adage that anyone can be anything in America. I have heard it ever since I was a boy, but I have always seen too much evidence that there are far too many things in our country that far too many people simply could not realistically aspire to. I wanted to believe it, but could not. Yet now I sit here, knowing that the next president of the United States will be a black man. Even more surprising, I am not surprised. It feels right, and feels natural.

I am very proud to be an American right now. Not because Barack Obama is president, but because Barack Obama had a chance to become president in the first place. 40 years ago, when he was a young boy, there was no chance for him to ever aspire so high. 200 years ago, he would have legally been considered only 3/5 of a person. He was born into a world where people of his skin color were systematically and brutally repressed. In the year he was born, the idea of a black president would have been so ridiculous as to be laughable. The idea of a black mayor or governor was cause for outrage and protest. And then came a difficult, sometimes violent process of change. A million men and women marched on Washington. Rosa kept her seat. Martin had a dream.

But the dream was deferred. For a long time it seemed as though the dream would wither on the vine. A new glass ceiling seemed to slide into place, and it seemed to me that the fantastic and gifted Americans of color would be allowed only so much success, only a select few glimpses of their true potential. The 60s and 70 rolled by, and progress towards racial equality only progressed in fits and starts. The year I was born, America was overwhelmingly racist. If you would have asked me when I graduated high school if I thought I would ever live to see a black president, I would have told you that I would hope so, but didn't think it would ever happen.

And yet today it did happen. I have no idea what kind of president Barack Obama will be. Maybe a terrible one, maybe the best since Lincoln. Time will tell. What I am grateful for and proud of is that a black man has risen to the highest office of the most powerful nation in the world. I am also proud that the American people, both black and white, are starting to fulfill the dream that Dr. King spoke of. His dream was not a dream for black people, but a dream for an America where men are judged 'not for the color of their skin, but for the content of their character.'

This election was, I think, proof that we are finally making real progress towards that dream. God bless America. God blessed America.