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Artur Davis, Barack Obama and the Alabama Governorship

June 18, 2008 — Last January 29, Cullman County, Alabama, with a 97% white population, elected African-American James Fields Jr. (D) to fill a vacancy in the state House of Representatives. One week later, on February 5, Cullman County gave Hillary Clinton a 78% to 18% victory over Barack Obama in the Democratic presidential primary.

The difference in those two outcomes defines what Congressman Artur Davis (D-AL) sees as the reason he could win the governorship of Alabama in 2010 -- if he runs -- while Obama is highly unlikely to carry the state in this fall’s presidential election.

“I don’t think [Obama] can carry Alabama,” Davis tells SPR. “Number one, for a black candidate to win, he would have to spend two years moving around the state, so people could get to know him.” He notes Fields won in Cullman County because he had established an identity, people knew who he was, while “they know Obama only by television.”

Davis not only represents the state’s largest city and major media market in Congress, but he has been speaking all over Alabama, addressing civic clubs and other groups. He’s betting that if the state’s voters don’t know him now, they will by November 2010. Moreover, he frequently cites state, as opposed to federal, concerns in his speeches -- for example, the need to make it easier for young people to attend college.

“Second,” continues Davis, “anybody out of the national Democratic Party is too far to the left for Alabama voters.” He points out that his own voting record is much more in line with what Alabamians believe. Davis’ National Journal voting record averages 60% liberal, 40% conservative, moderate by anybody’s standards. Obama, by contrast, rates 83% liberal, 11% conservative -- giving him the rank of the most liberal lawmaker in the US Senate. Moreover, the chamber of commerce gives Davis a 73% rating, reflecting such votes as his support for oil drilling in Alaska and limiting emission standards for auto makers. And on so-called hot-button issues, Davis voted to bar same-sex marriage, to limit minors’ access to abortions across state lines, and to build a “border fence” to help deter illegal immigrants.

That is not to say that Davis and Obama don’t have some very important qualities in common. Both men are smart -- Davis graduated from Harvard College and Obama from Harvard Law School -- and both men are at ease with both black and white voters. Indeed, the appeal across racial lines that Obama has made his trademark was already plowed ground for Davis, who has had strong support from Birmingham’s business community as well as from African-American voters. Moreover, if Davis -- an early supporter of Obama’s presidential bid -- runs for governor, he is sure to benefit from Obama’s campaign, whether or not it is successful. For starters, in response to Obama’s campaign, African-Americans are registering to vote in record numbers here as elsewhere in the South. Moreover, the Democrats’ presumptive nominee has made the idea of voting for an African-American candidate more acceptable among whites, even in the South, than it has ever been.

Davis won’t be announcing for governor anytime soon. For one thing, “Alabama voters are not fixated on the governor’s race now,” Davis says. “It’s too early.” He expects he will announce his intentions, as well as form an exploratory committee, in about a year.

Even though Davis hasn’t yet tossed his hat into the gubernatorial ring, he’s already feeling some heat he says was generated by his opponents. A recent story in Washington’s The Hill newspaper related how the salary of a member of Davis’s staff was actually paid by several Alabama community colleges, which in turn received legislative appropriations that Davis promoted. Davis says that his legislative support for the colleges predated the staffer’s presence in his office. He added that similar practices are standard behavior. He also said the story, which originally appeared in Birmingham newspapers last fall, was “shopped around Washington” by some Alabama Republicans.

But such attacks aren’t likely to be Davis’s main problem. “I don’t take his running for governor very seriously,” notes an Alabama Republican insider. “He could easily win the Democratic Primary, but would have a difficult time winning the governorship.” This source points out that as a congressman, Davis is well known in only one of the state’s seven congressional districts. While acknowledging that Davis is “a strong congressman, a breath of fresh air and well-respected… he is not a candidate with a strong opportunity to be elected governor.”