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“He's Got the Whole World in His Hands”: US History and Its Discontents in the Obama Era

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2011

ROBIN D. G. KELLEY
ROBIN D. G. KELLEY
Affiliation:
University of South California. Email: rdkelley@usc.edu
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Extract

As Samuel Eliot Morrison had done when he delivered the first Harmsworth lecture eighty-seven years ago, I, too, must begin with a Prologue. “Through the Prologue,” Professor Morrison told his audience, “the author endeavoured to establish a personal relation between himself and his audience, and to arouse their curiosity and interest in the play that followed.”1 I pray he is correct.

Type
Round Table
Information
Journal of American Studies , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , February 2011 , pp. 185 - 200
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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References

1 S. E. Morrison, A Prologue to American History: An Inaugural Address (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1922), 1.

2 Here is a partial listing of books authored by Professor Franklin: The Free Negro in North Carolina, 1790–1860 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, new edn, 1995; first published 1943); From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans (New York: Alfred Knopf, 1947); The Militant South, 1800–1861 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1956; rev. edn, Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2002); Reconstruction: After the Civil War (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961); The Emancipation Proclamation (New York: Doubleday, 1963); Color and Race (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968); The Historian and Public Policy (Chicago: University of Chicago, Center for Policy Study, 1974); Racial Equality in America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976); George Washington Williams: A Biography (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985); Race and History: Selected Essays 1938–1988 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1989); The Color Line: Legacy for the Twenty-First Century (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1993); and, with Loren Schweninger, Runaway Slaves: Rebels on the Plantation (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).

3 See the initiatives launched by the Journal of American History, particularly its special issue titled “The Nation and Beyond: Transnational Perspectives on United States History,” Journal of American History, 86, 3 (Dec. 1999)Google Scholar; and Thomas Bender, ed., Rethinking American History in a Global Age (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2002).

4 Franklin, Race and History, 39, 289.

5 John Hope Franklin, Mirror to America: The Autobiography of John Hope Franklin (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005), 202.

6 Robin W. Winks, “To Stimulate to Some Action”: The Harmsworth Professorship, 1920–2000: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered before the University of Oxford on 18 May 2000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 21.

7 Franklin, The Emancipation Proclamation.

8 Franklin, Mirror to America, 203.

9 Franklin, The Color Line, 49.

10 “A President for All Americans,” available at; Chelsea Allison, “John Hope Franklin on Obama's Win,” After the Jump: The Chronicle's Blog, 5 Nov. 2008, http://news.chronicleblogs.com/2008/11/05/john-hope-franklin-on-obamas-win.

11 Quotes from Janine Jackson, “Corporate Media Is Shamelessly Pretending Racism Died When Obama Got Elected,” Alternet, 28 (2009), available at http://www.alternet.org/media/129381/the_corporate_media_is_shamelessly_pretending_racism_died_when_obama_got_elected/?page=entire.

12 Harold Holzer, “Commentary: The Real Ties between Lincoln and Obama,” special on CNN, 17 Jan. 2009.

13 Barry Schwartz, Abraham Lincoln in the Post-heroic Era: History and Memory in Late Twentieth-Century America (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2008); see also “Abraham Lincoln at 200: History and Historiography,” special issue of Journal of American History, 96, 2 (Sept. 2009Google Scholar).

14 I am certain that Obama is well aware of the flurry of racist incidents that erupted across the country in the aftermath of his election. Besides general threats on his life (he's received more death threats than any other president-elect in history, to our knowledge), Amy Goodman reported several incidents on her show, Democracy Now!. Among them: black voters in New York, Pittsburgh, and Georgia were subject to racial slurs and even violence; racist graffiti, swastikas, and so on appeared in several places across the country. In Standish, Maine a general store accepted bets on when Obama would be assassinated, posting a sign that read, “Osama Obama Shotgun Pool.” At the bottom of the board some customer had written, “Let's hope someone wins.” In Rexburg, Idaho second- and third-graders on a school bus reportedly chanted, “Assassinate Obama.” And in Massachusetts an African American church was burned to the ground just hours after Obama declared victory. Amy Goodman, Democracy Now! The War and Peace Report, available at www.democracynow.org.

15 Barack Obama, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream (New York: Vintage Books, 2006), 276.

16 According to the Federal Reserve Board, 53.7% of African Americans and 46.6% of Latinos received high-priced loans, compared to 17.7% of whites. John Atlas, Peter Dreier, and Squires, Gregory D. , “Foreclosing on the Free Market: How to Remedy the Subprime Catastrophe,” New Labor Forum, 17, 3 (Fall 2008), 18–30Google Scholar.

17 Here is just a sampling: Katharine Q. Seelye, “The Abraham Lincoln Analogy,” New York Times, 12 Feb. 2009; Ben Feller, “Obama honors Lincoln's vision of strong union,” Associated Press (Fox News), 12 Feb. 2009; Thomas Krannawitter, “Obama as Lincoln,” Washington Times, 19 Dec. 2008; Philip Rucker, “Familiar Precedent for a President-Elect: Obama Inspired by, Compared to Lincoln,” Washington Post, 19 Nov. 2008; Kristin Jensen and Julianna Goldman, “Obama Says Nation's ‘Sense of Unity’ Is Best Tribute to Lincoln,” Bloomberg News, Feb. 2009; Cristina Corbin, “Obama's Challenge: What Would Lincoln Do?” FoxNews.com, 11 Feb. 2009; “Lincoln and Obama Discussion Among Presidential Historians,” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/17/obama-lincoln-parallel-ex_n_158825.html; “The Obama–Lincoln Parallel: A Closer Look,” CBS News, Jan 2009, http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/01/17/politics/main4731552.shtml; “Eric Foner on the Similarities between Obama and Lincoln,” Charlie Rose, Nov. 2008, http://www.charlierose.com/view/clip/9597; “Can Lincoln's Playbook Help Obama in the Years Ahead?”, CNN, Nov. 2008, http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/18/obama.lincoln/index.html#cnnSTCVideo; “Echoes of Lincoln in Obama,” MSN, 12 Feb. 2009, http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-us&fg=rss&from=&vid=5213900f-8f65-4748-83e7-d0c5d0baa826; “Obama and Lincoln: A Comparison,” USA Today, http://usat.gannett.a.mms.mavenapps.net/mms/rt/1/site/gannett-usatoday-206-pub01-live/current/launch.html?maven_playerId=immersiveproduction&maven_referralPlaylistId=8e268cb11203908ddaf61de8af24b4e3f6b392e8&maven_referralObject=1003132163&maven_referrer=staf; “Obama's Team of Rivals,” Daily Show, Nov. 2008, http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-november-18-2008/obama-s-team-of-rivals; “Lincoln's Legacy Resonates,” NewHour with Jim Lehrer, Feb. 2009, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/video/blog/2009/02/lincolns_legacy_resonates.html; “Gore Talks about What Might Not Have Been, Compares Obama to Lincoln,” http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/08/gore-talks-abou.html; “Similarities Seen between Lincoln and Obama,” Ring of Fire Radio Program, Air American, 6 March 2009, http://www.ringoffireradio.com/blogengine/post/Similarities-Seen-Between-Lincoln-and-Obama.aspx; Richard Carwardine, “On Lincoln and Obama,” BBC History magazine, Feb. 2009, http://content.bbcmagazinesbristol.com/bbchistory/audio/BBC_History_Feb09_Pt1.mp3; “Obama and Lincoln: Similarities the 2 Men Share,” WJZ Chicago, 12 Jan. 2009, http://wjz.com/services/popoff.aspx?categoryId=27&videoId=53708@wbbm.dayport.com&videoPlayStatus=false&videoStoryIds=53708@wbbm.dayport.com&videoTime=&stationName=WJZ&; “Obama's Team of Rivals,” Today Show, NBC, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/22646342#27995176.

18 Barack Obama, The Inaugural Address, 2009 (New York: Penguin, 2009).

19 Ed Hornick, “Can Lincoln's Playbook Help Obama in the Years Ahead?”, CNN, 19 Nov. 2008; idem, “For Obama, Lincoln Was Model President,” CNN, 20 Jan. 2009.

20 Evan Thomas and Richard Wolffe, “Obama's Lincoln,” Newsweek, 24 Nov. 2008.

21 Howard Finemann, “Obama and the Echoes of Lincoln,” Newsweek, 6 Oct. 2008.

22 Holzer, “Commentary: The Real Ties between Lincoln and Obama.”

23 Matt Carey, “Historian Sees Lessons, Lincoln Parallels for Obama,” CNN, 23 Dec. 2008.

24 Doris Kearns Goodwin, “Lincoln Is a Good Model. But He Didn't Face 24-Hour News,” The Guardian, 11 Feb. 2009.

25 Ibid.

26 Matthew Dallek, “The Comparisons between Barack Obama and Abraham Lincoln,” U.S. News and World Report, 20 Nov. 2008.

27 Stanley Greenberg, “Lincoln, FDR, Obama: Presidents’ Day Look at Leaders Who Were Men of the People,” U.S. News and World Report, 15 Feb. 2009.

28 “Obama Leans on Lincoln in Preparation for the Presidency,” Tell Me More, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=97300375.

29 George Frederickson, Big Enough to be Inconsistent: Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008). He noted, “at the crisis [Lincoln] was big enough to be inconsistent – cruel, merciful; peace-loving, a fighter; despising Negroes and letting them fight and vote; protecting slavery and freeing slaves. He was a man – a big, inconsistent, brave man.” W. E. B. Du Bois, “Abraham Lincoln,” Crisis, May 1922.

30 Henry Louis Gates Jr., ed., Lincoln on Race and Slavery (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009).

31 W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America: An Essay toward a History of the Part Which Black Folk Played in the Attempt to Reconstruct Democracy in America, 1860–1880 (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1935), 81.

32 Ibid., 125–26.

33 “Obama's Remarks on Wright – Transcript,” New York Times, 29 April 2008.

34 “Cornel West on the Election of Barack Obama,” http://www.democracynow.org/2008/11/19/cornel_west_on_the_election_of