First Black female Governor
By Don Valentine
Hallelujah, in the almost 241 years of this great Union of States, we have a legitimate chance for our first “Black female Governor”. Stacey Abrams, the top Democrat in Georgia’s General Assembly, has thrown her bid in to become Governor of Georgia.
In the short relative span of 232 years America elected its first Black President. Giving our arrival to this land this is an accomplishment. Let me put it in the words of Dr. Ben Carson “…the slaves were immigrants to the United States”. Hunh, I digress that is a conversation for another column.
After the retirement of the elder Statesmen, like President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the party has been looking for fresh faces to take the mantel. The party saw potential in her leading into the 2016 national convention. She was giving a short speaking slot that produced an eloquent, dramatic footprint on the delegates. Sort of reminds you of a skinny Junior Senator from Illinois.
Her oratory skills are not the only tool in her arsenal to make her a worthy candidate. She accelerated on her academic and professional endeavors with atypical success. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from Spelman, and then went on to receive her J.D. from the Yale Law School. After being named a Harry S. Truman Scholar, she graduated from the L.B.J. School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin with a Masters of Public Affairs. She went back to Atlanta to practice tax law. Then at only 29 years old she became Deputy City Attorney for Atlanta. To put her meteoric accomplishments in perspective, what were you doing at 29?
The Democratic Party is not the only ones to recognize her potential. Emily’s List, a prominent pro-choice, white, organization with tremendous influence with certain swaths of the electorate, has endorsed her. Stephanie Schriock, Emily’s List president, said in a recent interview with the USA Today, “Stacey has proven herself to be an absolute tourdeforce in a state that has never elected a woman before or person of color as governor.”
Tell your family and friends in Georgia to keep an eye out for Stacey Abrams. I know I will. She could be a formative piece of our national government before long.
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