From unsuccessful Mayoral candidate J.C. Love:
But the reality is this race IS about race. Look at the crowds that surrounded Woods and Reed election night. Wood had almost all white people in his gathering...Reed had almost all black supporters.
I saw Woods at a popular breakfast spot the morning after the election, and he was at a table with about a half-dozen other people, all of them white. (If I were Wood's Campaign Manager, I would have steered him to a primarily black restaurant, perhaps Greg's on Norman Bridge Road.)
Woods can get every white vote in the city and lose (depending on turnout, of course). But he needs black support to win.
I don't know where Reed was, nor with whom he gathered Wednesday morning.
If Reed wins, he will become the first black mayor of the capitol city, a majority black city. As I've pointed out before, all of the other large cities in the state have already done that.
I was there in the old Parliament House Hotel in Birmingham in 1978 when Richard Arrington won his first term as mayor. (He served for 20 years).
If that mayoral possibility doesn't motivate African-American voters in Montgomery to cast ballots in the run-off election on October 8th, I don't know what will.
"Congratulations to Steven Reed and David Woods. I implore you both not to make the runoff a race to the bottom. Winning the office of mayor should not be solely reliant on racial politics, and it is not about tearing Montgomery in half just for your own gain."
But the reality is this race IS about race. Look at the crowds that surrounded Woods and Reed election night. Wood had almost all white people in his gathering...Reed had almost all black supporters.
I saw Woods at a popular breakfast spot the morning after the election, and he was at a table with about a half-dozen other people, all of them white. (If I were Wood's Campaign Manager, I would have steered him to a primarily black restaurant, perhaps Greg's on Norman Bridge Road.)
Woods can get every white vote in the city and lose (depending on turnout, of course). But he needs black support to win.
I don't know where Reed was, nor with whom he gathered Wednesday morning.
If Reed wins, he will become the first black mayor of the capitol city, a majority black city. As I've pointed out before, all of the other large cities in the state have already done that.
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| Arrington, left, takes part in a radio debate before his election in 1978. |
I was there in the old Parliament House Hotel in Birmingham in 1978 when Richard Arrington won his first term as mayor. (He served for 20 years).
If that mayoral possibility doesn't motivate African-American voters in Montgomery to cast ballots in the run-off election on October 8th, I don't know what will.
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