Obama and Clinton Rock the Essence Festival

by Kate Marvin
Photography by Mavis Yorks

On the eve of July 5th, the first night of the Essence Festival concert series, I had trouble getting to the Superdome. I had tickets, but no car, and when I walked to Canal St. to hail a cab, I couldn’t find one. At 10pm, after a long trial with public transportation, I finally made it to the concert. I might have given up, if I hadn’t known that Senator Barack Obama was going to speak there. I wanted to see him in person. I wanted to hear what he had to say to the thousands of primarily African American people who came to celebrate at the Essence Festival. I wanted to know what he would say about New Orleans.

The restored Superdome’s huge interior gave me chills. Although it was wonderful to see a mosty Black group of people celebrating Black culture and New Orleans culture in this space, I couldn’t stop thinking about the haste with which this “graveyard” was repaired, this site of detention, unneccessary deaths, and governmental neglect. Add to that the lagging and seemingly insurmountable difficulties so many disenfranchised New Orleans residents face as they attempt to return home. It was in this mindset that I sat down to listen to Obama speak.

His speech was confident, motivational, articulate without being high falutin, and expressed all the right sentiments for a socially conscious and politically aware group of concert-goers. Obama focused mostly on the state of New Orleans as symptomatic of larger problems in the U.S., calling the city a “ground zero” in the fight for racial equality in America. He also criticized Bush for spending federal resources on the Iraq war that could have been used to construct stronger levees and rebuild New Orleans.

“We need a president in the White House who's going to wake up every single day to make sure that New Orleans is rebuilt and has somebody personally reporting to him and who’s held accountable to make it happen, because we've had enough excuses," said Obama. The crowd rose to their feet in applause.

I left feeling hopeful. It was good to hear such a powerful person speak out for New Orleanians’ rights in front of an enormous audience. As a grassroots volunteer, I am so often reminded that a discussion of the corruption, bureaucracy, neglect and dismal conditions of poor working class communities in New Orleans is far removed from the mainstream and mostly absent from national media.

The next day, I went to hear Senator Hillary Clinton’s speech at the Convention Center. As a seminar speaker, her audience was smaller than Obama’s, but she also had a platform for a more measured, unhurried address. Clinton spoke about the need for affordable housing and healthcare as a national concern, but focused as well on problems more specific to Post-Katrina New Orleans. “You can’t get the people back unless you have the services, but you can’t get their services back unless you have the people to use the services,” she said, explaining one of the many dilemmas facing New Orleanians who wish to come home. Clinton also proposed a federal plan for rebuilding and recovery, which would institute a Gulf Coast Corps to attract specialists and qualified workers to the area. Like Obama, she suggested appointing a person who would report directly to the president about the process of rebuilding in New Orleans.

The Reverend Marcia Dyson, who had visited Common Ground’s Lower Ninth Ward project earlier in the week, led a question and answer session with Clinton. Reverend Dyson invited Common Ground representatives to a backstage conference with the Senator. Sakura Kone and I went to ask Senator Clinton for a committed effort to rebuild New Orleans. “We can’t wait until she’s in office,” said Kone, “we need her help now.”

My nervous energy subsided as I shook Senator Clinton’s hand. She was down to earth, earnest, serious, and very charming. Most of all, she listened closely to what we had to say. Kone and I thanked her for her words of encouragement and asked her to adopt a block of houses or a school for reconstruction in the Lower Ninth Ward as a symbol of her dedication to rebuild New Orleans. Senator Clinton received this suggestion warmly, told us she would like to follow up on it, and accepted a folder of information about Common Ground and our mission.

Although, as Kone says, “New Orleans is no longer a sexy story on the part of the national media,” I’m hoping for acknowledgment. It should be recognized nationally that New Orleans is still in a state of emergency. I don’t know how serious either of these candidates are about making New Orleans a national priority, but after listening to their speeches, I think we have a chance.