send to a friend | print | comment

Where are the blacks and women?

Only a few months ago, American was in the midst of an election cycle featuring two trailblazing candidates. The first black major-party nominee for president and the first female vice-presidential candidate on the GOP side. This after the future president and another groundbreaking woman slugged it out in a touch Democratic primary.

But even after all that’s happened on a national level, politics in the Keystone State in many ways remains a white male sport. This dynamic is on starkest display in the coming top-ballot elections, where the lack of women and blacks for the office is striking. As of female candidates or candidates of any color have signaled an intention to run for Governor. Peg Luksik, who lacks a Y chromosome, and Larry Murphy, who is black, are both running in the Republican Senate primary. But neither is considered politically viable.

“There’s always been a dearth of women and African-Americans running statewide and what happens in the future remains to be seen,” G. Terry Madonna, a political scientist at Franklin & Marshall College.

Pennsylvania was 45th in the proportion of women state legislators last year at 14.6 percent, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Of 253 combined seats in the state House and state Senate, only 37 were held by women. Only 8 percent of the seats in Harrisburg are held by blacks this year, according to the NCSL, but relative to other states that puts Pennsylvania in the middle of the pack.

“We have to make a better effort to get candidates to run,” said Stanley Lawson, Harrisburg president of the NAACP. “I don’t think we can depend on any particular party to do it, we have to do it on our own. We have to encourage each other to stand up.”

Madonna attributed the lack of black candidates in statewide races partly to geography.

“The African-American population is highly geographically located in certain regions of the state,” Madonna said.

In those regions, especially Philadelphia, black political structures have indeed thrived. And statewide, there have been attempts to break through the racial barrier, most recently Lynn Swann’s GOP run for governor in 2006. [See sidebar.]

But mostly, Lawson said, “we’re a state of disgrace.”

Women have their own challenges breaking into big-time politics, namely the basic societal constructs of family and gender, said Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky, who briefly represented suburban Philadelphia’s 13th Congressional District during the Clinton administration.

“In the voting booth, most people are still more comfortable voting for a white male,” she said in an interview.

Nonetheless, her advice to women considering public office was blunt.

“Go for it,” she said.

Bonita Hoke, executive director of the Pennsylvania League of Women Voters, said the state has made gradual progress in increasing female representation in politics.

“It’s coming along, but it’s got a ways to go,” she said.

Luksik, the Senate candidate, had a simple explanation for the lack of female candidates.

“The short answer is I guess I’m the only one insane enough to do it,” she said.

May 4, 2009 at 8:32 am

--Dan Hirschhorn

Tags: Larry Murphy, Peg Luksik

comments

comments [1] | post a comment