ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes Blacks' support for Black presidential bids. Following Jesse Jackson's historic 1984 and 1988 bids, the Reverend Al Sharpton and former US Senator Carol Moseley Braun ran for president in 2004. Sharpton and Moseley Braun did less well electorally with Black voters for several reasons. First, over the twenty-year period, Blacks became better integrated within the Democratic Party, reducing their suspicion that their votes were taken for granted. Second, surveys show that Black concern about racial problems in the United States fell in the 1990s. Barack Obama's candidacy benefited from these changes. The chapter utilizes the two components, political opportunity structure and internal group status to explain changing Black support for Black power strategies. Black voters are rejecting a Black power approach of organizing and uniting Black votes in favor of a coalitional approach. The chapter discusses the implications of an end of a Black power approach in Black electoral politics.
