The new black power in Congress

The San Francisco Bay Area post-election is a heady place to be and the highlight of my recent trip there was watching former California Congressman Ron Dellums gloat.

The fiery leader, who tilts so far left he's almost on the floor, served in Congress for 27 years. No rest for this septuagenarian; he just got elected mayor of Oakland. Compounding his electoral glee is the tide that swept in Democrats and bestowed unprecedented clout on black lawmakers.

Massachusetts Gov.-elect Deval Patrick, who led the Justice Department's civil-rights division under President Clinton, became the second black ever elected chief executive of any state.

As part of the power sweep in Congress, Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., ascends to majority whip, only the second black ever to hold that post, and Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., becomes chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, the panel responsible for tax and health-care policy. Then there's Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., who will sit at the helm of the Judiciary Committee, and U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., presiding over the House Committee on Homeland Security.

Dellums, speaking about the election overall, called it "a repudiation of arrogance, incompetence and unchecked power." So true. And I'll take it a step farther. The sizable number of black lawmakers in powerful positions signals a crossroad.

I don't have a crystal ball to help predict whether the new black influence will be Stokely Carmichael's concept of black power or the inevitable passing of the torch of influence that eventually had to come our way.

Here's an opportunity to broaden the so-called black agenda. We in the West have been doing it for ages. Ask King County Executive Ron Sims or former Seattle Mayor Norm Rice how to create a political agenda that speaks to everyone.

Take Congressman Rangel, for instance. His new chairmanship of one of Congress' most powerful roles, involving taxation, has in a panic people on the comfortable side of the canyon separating the rich from the barely-treading-water.

I don't know why, because Rangel isn't talking taxes these days; he's talking about reviving the draft as a deterrent to war. The elder statesman from Brooklyn rightly underscores the challenge this country will face if it continues to challenge Iran and North Korea, aspires to raise troop levels in Iraq and keeps some service members here for the occasional hurricane.

The problem is, Rangel doesn't oversee the Armed Services Committee. Such are the hazards of power that Iraq garners the sexy headlines but Rangel's time will, or should, be spent pondering tax credits and the marriage penalty.

Republicans may fear tax increases but they are even more worried about efforts to impeach President Bush. One can sort of see their point, considering incoming Judiciary Chair Conyers wrote a bill to consider impeachment hearings.

But that was in the pre-election heat of the moment. I'm not hearing any serious impeachment talk these days. Good strategy, but that compliment comes with a warning: Conyers and his colleagues will fall short of their duty to provide checks and balances on the executive branch if they don't mount a healthy scrutiny of the policies that led us to war.

The incoming House speaker, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has turned out to be quite the scorekeeper. She has decided to punish her state colleague, Rep. Jane Harman, bypassing the woman for Intelligence Committee chair. Pelosi is instead considering Alcee Hastings, a move that would add to the number of African Americans chairing influential committees but comes with a serious "yuck" factor.

For those unfamiliar with Hastings, the Florida Democrat is a former federal judge impeached in 1989 and removed from the bench by the U.S. Senate. Pelosi was part of the Democratic machine recently campaigning on ethics. She appears hypocritical propping up the ethically challenged Hastings to punish one lawmaker and score points with black lawmakers.

I love this! We're not there yet, in the sense of racial equality, but we've reached a point of luxury where we, or at least I, can cheer Rangel and Conyers and take a pass on Hastings. We don't have to accept suspect leadership for the sake of racial solidarity. (Let's remember this when the next Seattle School Board election rolls around. But that's another column or two or three.)

A lot rides on the new black power in Congress. All will be waiting to see whether the members can deliver more than a feisty speech to the hometown crowd. I'm betting they can. I'm also betting that like any other lawmaker, they can succeed or fail depending on the day and issue.

Folks like Dellums, Rangel and Conyers braved rocks and water cannons during the civil-rights era to reach this day — the day of history-making headlines and then back to being one of 535 lawmakers.

Lynne K. Varner's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. Her e-mail address is lvarner@seattletimes.com