Overview
The 2002 Newark mayoral election represents a new trend in contemporary
politics: a contest between an older African-American incumbent and member of
the new generation of African-Americans politicians, who often hold different views
and political attitudes.
Newark is not isolated in this regard. In the last few election cycles there have
been a number of these inter-generational contests between older African-American
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office-holders and younger insurgents. The Joint Center for Political and Economic
Studies (Bositis 2001) examined the generational differences between African-American
politicians. The study, which was based on a telephone survey of 800 African-American
elected public officials, found that this younger generation of politicians has been shaped
by different experiences than their older counterparts. Most were born after the Civil
Rights movement, attended desegregated high schools and colleges, and fewer than half
of those surveyed belonged to civil rights organizations. In contrast, the older generation
of officials had been involved in the civil rights movement, and had attended segregated
high schools and historically black colleges. Indeed, one could argue that the different
experiences of the younger generation are due to the efforts of the first generation of
African-American politicians who had to combat racism and confront a white power
structure that did not willingly give up control over elective offices in cities like Newark.
Booker, the challenger, acknowledged this debt. “I’m the beneficiary of a legacy of
struggle,” said Booker, “of the people who bled the beaches of Normandy red for me, of
the people who bled the Southern soil. Martin Luther King and that generation —
including Sharpe James, that generation — I am the product of that generation” (Tapper
Convention