By Earl Ofari Hutchinson

Political interests trump race. That’s the hard lesson likely 2008 presidential candidate Barack Obama will soon find out. Those who think Black voters will automatically support one of their own need to think again. Recent history proves that point.

A survey in January 1996 showed that the so-called Black president, Bill Clinton, nosed out Jesse Jackson and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan in popularity among Blacks. Eight years later, when Al Sharpton made his presidential foray in the South Carolina Democratic primary he barely nudged out eventual Democratic presidential contender John Kerry among Black voters. The state’s leading Black Democrats and Rep. James Clyburn, then Congressional Black Caucus chair, worked hard for Sen. Kerry, and other Black elected officials in the state worked for John Edwards. In the November 2006 midterm elections, Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, pro football great Lynn Swann in Pennsylvania, and Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele – all Republicans – banked heavily on getting Black voter support to beat their white Democratic opponents in state races. They failed miserably.

Blacks were enraptured with Mr. Clinton and have supported white Democrats for good reason. They believed these seasoned politicians would deliver on their promise to fight for jobs, education, and healthcare. And they either held office or were good bets to win. Interests and electability trumped color.

The same rules apply to Obama. Blacks may puff their chests with pride at the prospect of him breaking racial barriers, but at the end of the day they’ll still judge him on two crucial questions. Can he deliver on bread and butter issues? And can he win?

The second is critical. Many Blacks are leery that he’s a media-created flash in the pan, and will wilt under the campaign’s intense glare. Most Black voters desperately want to end Republican White House rule. But that doesn’t mean they’ll support just any Democrat. It’s got to be a Democrat with whom they feel comfortable.

Here’s where Obama in the eyes of many Blacks departs from Shirley Chisholm, Jesse Jackson, and Sharpton, the three other Black Democrats who took a shot at the presidency. They were readily-identifiable, urban-bred African Americans who spoke out boldly on civil rights, poverty, and economic injustice. On the other hand, the Harvard-trained Obama as the so-called “post-racial” candidate, of mixed parentage, has soft-pedaled these issues, and thus it’s no accident that more whites, at least in some polls, say they see no color issue with him and say they would vote for him.

Hillary Clinton and Mr. Edwards come much closer to fitting that bill than Obama. Many Blacks applaud Edwards for being virtually the only top white Democrat to speak candidly about racial problems in the 2004 presidential race, and for barnstorming the country afterward championing labor rights and demanding a new war on poverty. Sen. Clinton, for her part, has a highly advantageous last name and husband, solid ties with Black religious leaders and elected officials, and is personally admired by many Blacks. In combined USA Today /Gallup polls conducted in November, December, and January, Clinton had a 39 to 31 edge over Obama among Black Democrats and independents.

But the presidential contest is not just about who likes whom, or who’s electable. It’s also about having a proven record of performance. If Obama is judged on his record there won’t be much to go on. Sure, his speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention was a buzz-creating stem-winder. But since then, has he rammed any meaningful legislation through the Senate, delivered a visionary foreign policy statement, or scored a diplomatic coup with a foreign leader? The brutal truth is that Obama is too new on the political scene, too untested, too politically nice, too liberal, and most of all he’s an African American. That’s just too many strikes for many Blacks to seriously believe he has a real shot.

If giddy Democrats made Obama their nominee, he’d face the GOP contender with a handicap of about 100 electoral votes. That’s the tally of support he wouldn’t be getting from southern and southern-border states. Such political turf is still dominated by mostly white, conservative, male, pro-war, limited government voters who are vehemently opposed to any political tilt to minorities, and who are heavily influenced by ultra-conservative Bible Belt fundamentalism.

There’s yet another reason why many Blacks are skeptical about Obama. His ascendancy as a lawyer-politician represents a threat to the old-guard generation of Black leaders who made the jump to politics from their work as preachers or as civil rights activists. Black leaders, such as Jackson – still an important bellwether – have been guarded in their praise for Obama. That could change in time. If, and this is a big if, they feel that Obama will stick to fighting the battles against discrimination and for economic justice on the political and legislative front, they’d likely warm up to him. That poses no direct threat to the turf they’ve firmly staked out as the official civil rights establishment.

Obama certainly represents a fresh face on the political scene, and has lots of room to grow and become adept on the issues, and if by some miracle the Democrats choose him as their presidential standard bearer, the majority of Blacks would dutifully vote for him, not because he’s Black, but because he’s a Democrat and that’s what most of them are and will remain. Still in a tough presidential race there’s no time for on-the-job candidate training. Blacks want someone who can snatch back the White House from Republicans. And Obama isn’t that someone.

Editor’s note: Earl Ofari Hutchinson is a political analyst and social issues commentator, and the author of The Emerging Black GOP Majority (Middle Passage Press), a hard-hitting look at Bush and the GOP’s court of Black voters.