Capital Scene

BRIAN Jones calls it “the old voting-booth story.” It has happened to him and a few acquaintances. “You go down to vote, you stand in line, you get there, and immediately the person who’s checking names . . . will hand you a Democratic ballot.” When you ask for the other ballot, he says, “often there’s a look of puzzlement and maybe then a look of embarrassment.” The confusion arises because Jones is black—the president of the Center for New Black Leadership, a fledgling conservative group in Washington. He’s more amused by a recent trip to a magazine shop: “I went and I bought NATIONAL REVIEW. Guy gave me a puzzled look and said, ‘Doin’ a little opposition research, huh?’”

Such incidents contribute to what Clarence Thomas once described as “the loneliness of the black conservative.” That isolation has not abated much over the years. In a recent survey by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a whopping 88 per cent of blacks viewed President Clinton favorably. Black support for the Democrats is so overwhelming that it can mask other trends. The famed “gender gap”—women vote for Democrats, men for Republicans—is a product of black women’s strong support for the Democrats; women of other races lean toward the GOP (albeit not as strongly as their brothers).

About the Author

Ramesh Ponnuru

Ramesh Ponnuru is the editor of National Review, a columnist for the Washington Post, and a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

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BRIAN Jones calls it “the old voting-booth story.” It has happened to him and a few acquaintances. “You go down to vote, you stand in line, you get there, and immediately the person who’s checking names . . . will hand you a Democratic ballot.” When you ask for the other ballot, he says, “often there’s a look of puzzlement and maybe then a look of embarrassment.” The confusion arises because Jones is black—the president of the Center for New Black Leadership, a fledgling conservative group in Washington. He’s more amused by a recent trip to a magazine shop: “I went and I bought NATIONAL REVIEW. Guy gave me a puzzled look and said, ‘Doin’ a little opposition research, huh?’”

Such incidents contribute to what Clarence Thomas once described as “the loneliness of the black conservative.” That isolation has not abated much over the years. In a recent survey by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a whopping 88 per cent of blacks viewed President Clinton favorably. Black support for the Democrats is so overwhelming that it can mask other trends. The famed “gender gap”—women vote for Democrats, men for Republicans—is a product of black women’s strong support for the Democrats; women of other races lean toward the GOP (albeit not as strongly as their brothers).