By Darlisa Crawford
Washington File Staff Writer

The theme of "E pluribus unum," -- out of many, one - - resonated throughout the Democratic National Convention keynote speech, delivered by 42-year-old African-American Illinois state Senator Barack Obama on July 27.

His Kenyan economist father and his Kansan anthropologist mother gave him an African first name, which means, he explained, "blessed by God" in Swahili. Obama, identified as a "rising star" in the Democratic Party, drew on his own heritage to praise the diversity of the United States to the delegates.

"There's not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's the United States of America," Obama said. "There's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America."

Obama attended Columbia University and Harvard Law School, becoming the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Serving his seventh year in the state Senate of Illinois, Obama won an upset victory with 53 percent of the vote in the March primary for Illinois' U.S. Senate race. He is currently running unopposed. If Obama is victorious, he will be the only African-American senator in the next Congress and the fifth elected African-American senator in U.S. history.

"I think that my first job is to represent all of the people of Illinois -- black, white, Hispanic, Asian, rural, urban," Obama said.

Notable keynote speakers of the past Democratic National Conventions include former Governor Ann Richards of Texas in 1988, former Governor Mario Cuomo of New York in 1984 and former Texas representative Barbara Jordan in 1976 and 1992. The 1992 Democratic National Convention featured New Jersey Senator Bill Bradley and Georgia Governor Zell Miller as keynote speakers.

According to The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies report, African-Americans comprise 22 percent of the Democratic National Committee and 20.3 percent of this week's convention delegates. In addition to Obama, African-American Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, the Democratic Party co-chair and chair of the Platform Committee, and African-American Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, chair of the Credentials Committee, are playing visible roles in this year's convention.

Key minority convention speakers include African-Americans David Alston, a Kerry Vietnam War crewmate; Florida Congressman Kendrick B. Meek; former Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Carol Moseley Braun; senior minister Rev. Dr. James Forbes of Riverside Church; and Hispanic New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson and Cuban-American New York Congressman Robert Menendez.

President George Bush won 8 percent of the African-American vote in the 2000 U.S. presidential election, compared to former Vice President Al Gore's 90 percent. However, the Democratic Party was not always the preferred political party for minorities.

The Republican Party, the party of Abraham Lincoln, produced the first two African-American U.S. senators -- Hiram Revels in 1870 and Edward Brooke in 1967 -- and the first African-American member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Joseph H. Rainey, in 1870. Currently, African-Americans hold seats as both Republicans and Democrats in the House of Representatives.

"On a significant number of important public policy issues, a sizable proportion of this younger [African-American] generation -- between one-third and two-thirds -- are sympathetic to Republican positions," wrote David Bositis, a senior research associate of The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

"Traditionally in the modern period, about 10 percent of African-Americans are Republican, and they will vote for a Republican candidate every time," National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) president Julian Bond said. "The party that speaks to our racial perceptions and offers solutions to the racial difficulties which we face is the party that's going to be rewarded with our votes."

According to CNN exit polls from the last three presidential elections, African-Americans, Latinos, women, and voters under the age of 30 "consistently support Democratic presidential candidates."

Vice-president of the National Organization of Women, Olga Vives, a Cuban-American, acknowledged that Kerry "is the only one who has said the minimum wage should be raised. A woman makes approximately 76 cents out of every dollar a man makes in the same job. But for Latinos it's 55 cents on a dollar." In an interview with CNN, Vives said, if the Democratic Party "stopped articulating domestic issues that are important to women and minorities, people will go to the other side."

The University of Pennsylvania's National Annenberg Election Survey reported that 45 percent of Hispanics are registered as Democrats versus 24 percent who are registered as Republicans. Of African-Americans, 60 percent are registered as Democrats and 7 percent as Republicans.

According to a July 12-20 Pew Hispanic Center/Kaiser Family Foundation poll, Kerry maintains a 2-1 lead over President Bush among the Hispanic population. Hispanics supported the Kerry-Edwards ticket with a 59 percent approval rating, the Bush-Cheney ticket with a 31 percent approval rating and the Ralph Nader Independent presidential candidacy with a 3 percent approval rating.

A July 22 CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll reported that 83 percent of Americans "have made up their minds about who will get their vote." The Democratic and the Republican convention organizers select speakers to deliver the party message to critical swing voters. Obama's "shared values" theme was intended to unite Americans behind the Democratic ticket. "The pundits like to slice and dice our country into red states and blue States: red states for Republicans, blue States for Democrats. But I've got news for them, too," Obama said, asserting, "We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the stars and stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."