Not just black and white in Tennessee

MEMPHIS, Tenn. -

On Saturday night, Harold Ford Jr. was in fine form.

Saturday marked the first debate in the Tennessee Senate race - a race that may decide which party controls the Senate come January - and Ford, the Democrat and a 1992 College graduate, certainly had his own style.

Unlike Republican candidate and former Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker, with his slow, deliberate speech, Ford brims with a confidence bordering on cockiness and a distinct preparedness and electricity.

Ford seems the ultimate polished politician.

A day later, Ford is at Bozo's Hot Pit BBQ in Mason, a rural west Tennessee town of a little over 1,000 with a heavily black population and a per capita income of just $16,000.

Ford is still his confident, charismatic self, but today you can add "compassionate" to that list of adjectives. He shakes hands, both black and white. He gives hugs, cracks jokes and looks each supporter in the eye as if he's fighting for them and them alone. He shows a quality to his prospective voters that many think their current senator, Bill Frist, lacks: Harold Ford cares.

Ford will need to showcase all sides of his personality as he digs in to the final month of perhaps the most contested Senate race in the country. He has clawed back from a 15-point deficit in polls conducted as late as mid-August to take an incredible five-point lead, according to the latest Gallup poll.

The turnaround is incredible because Ford is both a Democrat and an African American in a state that has seldom embraced either lately.

But Ford is no ordinary Democrat.

In his 10-year career in the U.S. House of Representatives, he has remained opposed to gay marriage and supported tougher immigration laws, earning him the moderate voting record that allows a traditionally red state to stomach him.

His days at Penn often forced him to be the only black student in a classroom full of white kids. Parts of the campaign trail he faces seem just as segregated.

But as a Penn undergraduate, History professor Bruce Kuklick said, Ford also fought to get black writer W.E.B. DuBois on the syllabus for a history class. Today, Ford says he is eager to embrace all of the voters of Tennessee, black and white.

Experience has taught him to be a man of both of those worlds. And that experience just may help him take the color out of Tennessee politics.

Walking around South Memphis, the poverty is palpable.

The area is filled with crumbling houses, their weed-filled lawns surrounded by chain-link fences. Cigarette cartons and empty bottles litter the street, and abandoned shacks with boarded windows line each block.

Not far from here is the neighborhood where Ford's father grew up. Harold Ford Sr. lived with 11 siblings and no running water for much of his childhood.

"At home, we always had food to eat," Harold Sr.'s sister, Ophelia said. "But sometimes things were a little bit difficult. . We were scuffling."

Harold Sr., lived in a mostly African-American area. He attended a segregated high school and fought through much of the civil rights movement before eventually becoming the first black congressman in the history of Tennessee, in 1974.

Relying on his own experiences as championed black rights, Harold Sr., was adored in much of the Memphis area.

He was a passionate, caring and responsive politician, revered by blacks and respected by many whites.

Harold Ford Jr., on the other hand, spent his childhood in far different circumstances.

As a kid, Ford lived in Twinkletown, an affluent area of Memphis, before moving to Washington, D.C., at age nine. He attended a prestigious prep school there, then came to Penn as an undergraduate and graduated from Michigan Law School in 1996.

Ophelia Ford says that her nephew's exposure to the world of elite whites began at the earliest of ages, as Harold Sr., would take his son to dozens of different political functions even as an "itty-bitty baby."

"One of the great things that Harold's family did is expose him to every world in the country," childhood friend Hassan Murphy said. "One of the benefits of being a part of multiple communities is that you really get to experience all that those communities have to offer.

"I think he got that in both places . and I think he continues to live his world that way."

And as Ford progressed to Penn and Michigan, both his professors and his peers saw a rising star with a maturity unmatched by most other students.

"I think he was more comfortable in his own skin than a lot of us were at 22, 23," longtime friend and law school classmate Jason Levien said. "He had a bigger sense of the world than a lot of us did in law school. People get caught up in . trying to get grades, and I think he enjoyed that process, but he really saw a bigger world out there."

Ford ran for his father's seat in Congress during his final semester in law school, a move seen by many as premature for a 26 year old with no political experience.

But with Ford's varied background, he ultimately proved himself ready for the national spotlight.

"He certainly has had a broader education, a more varied background and a more cosmopolitan view than his father ever had," said University of Memphis history professor Charles Crawford, an expert on Tennessee history.

"When he first succeeded his father in [Congress], there was some criticism of him being too young and unexperienced," he added. But "I would say that he was better prepared, better experienced to be a congressman than his father was."

Ford has held his father's seat in Congress for the past 10 years, crossing both racial and party lines in the process.

The keynote speaker at the 2000 Democratic Convention and selected as one of People magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People" in 2001, Ford has certainly risen to national prominence.

Now, he looks to take the next step to the U.S. Senate, a position only five blacks have held in U.S. history.

To do so, he'll undoubtedly have to attract white voters; Tennessee only has a black population of about 17 percent.

But unlike his father, who made his appeal to blacks as a civil-rights advocate, Ford seems to attract a broader - and often white - audience.

Ford has broken the traditional black Democratic mold with his moderate voting record, leading some to suggest that he has forgotten his black roots in favor of a broader appeal.

But Ford grew up in the world of white Washington politics. A generation removed from the struggles his father faced, Ford has the freedom to tackle issues outside the traditional realm of civil-rights era politics.

"While Harold is truly a proud black man, he is - unique to our generation - more open to a world that includes people of all different colors and looks," said Murphy, his childhood friend. Harold Sr. "was focused on civil rights and on changing the world for black people, and while that remains an important goal. . I think that our generation - Harold Ford most prominently - has really shifted our approach and that what we think is important is changing the lives of everybody for the better."

Essential to his success with Tennessee voters has been Ford's ability to take those centrist views and make them appealing. He is known for his father's trademark passion, charisma and responsiveness.

"What [Harold] really gets a rush off politically is serving his constituents," Levien said. "He's fanatical about helping people in his district and helping people who have problems, whether it's related to not getting their social security check, not getting their veteran's benefits, whatever the issue is - if the government can help, he always wants to help on a hands-on basis."

Despite all of Ford's acclaim, Tennessee is still Tennessee.

It's a state that hasn't elected a Democrat to the Senate since Al Gore in 1990 and a state where Ford remains the only black congressman.

"There's been a lot of achievement in reconciliation within the races, but in the state there remains much racial prejudice that will lead people to just not vote for a black candidate," Crawford said.

That bias is especially apparent in the eastern end of Tennessee, which has a much smaller black population and a much larger Republican base than its western counterpart.

Still, Tennessee has nowhere near the degree of racial stigma as Southern neighbors Mississippi and Alabama. And Ford has been doing all the right things to put himself in position to pull the upset, Cook Political Report analyst Jennifer Duffy said.

"The one thing about Ford that he can do that tends to hurt other Democrats in the South is that he very easily and willingly talks about values and religion," Duffy said.

As he campaigned last week, Ford quoted the Bible at each rally, relating a story of Jesus' perseverance to his current run for office. In tune with Tennessee's moral character, the crowd responded to his preaching in cheers.

"Charisma means a lot in politics," Duffy added, "and Harold Ford has it."

When it comes to Harold Ford, progress is the key. Progress in Washington. Progress with Republicans. Progress with white voters.

A story Levien told reveals just how much progress the Memphis-born black man has made.

Ford once told him of the first time he met a Jewish person shortly after relocating to Washington, Levien says.

Ford didn't understand what Hanukkah was or why Jews didn't have Christmas, but when he was told that the holiday lasted eight days instead of one, he went home and told his mom he wanted to be Jewish.

Now, here stands Ford, rubbing shoulders with Jews and Christians, blacks and whites, Hillary Clinton and George Bush in Washington, farmers and factory workers in Chattanooga.

When asked about his appeal to white voters, Ford responds frankly: "I don't look at it as black and white."

But a large part of Tennessee does. And it will take Ford's Ivy League image, his confidence and his passion to make them colorblind again.

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