ABSTRACT
When Senator Barack Obama arrives, Illinois matched Mississippi as the only two states in the Union to have sent two African Americans to the Senate. Mississippi sent two African Americans in the Reconstruction Era, 1868-1880, while Illinois has sent two during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Louisiana and Massachusetts are the only other states to have sent an African American to the Senate. Overall, Obama has run in five primary elections, four general elections, for a total of nine elections. Of these nine elections, he won eight of them and lost one. Obama entered the Democratic state primary on March 17, 1996. In his general election contests, Obama faced opponents in two of his three state senate races. In 1998 when Obama was reelected to the Illinois Senate, he was elected to a four-year term.
