Race, Gender, Politics and Employment Law

As you know, we’re trying to determine what impact certain presidential candidates could have on the workplace and we’re trying to learn some employment lessons from this year’s campaign.  Two issues that have crept into the campaign and also find themselves well-established in the workplace and employment law are race and gender. 

Although these issues weren’t discussed in last night’s debate between Senators Clinton and Obama, the fact is that this debate was between a woman and an African-American.  The two candidates decided to play nice last night as demonstrated by the picture accompanying an article in today’s New York Times. 

While traveling this week, I tuned into an NPR affiliate with which I was unfamiliar and listened to a program called “Political Junkie” with which I was equally unfamiliar.  This was the day after the Florida primary, so that’s what was being discussed.  It was a call-in program, and after callers expressed opinions or asked questions or made comments, the host or hosts would respond.  One caller professed to be a life-long Floridian and a white male Democrat who had voted for Senator Clinton.  He went on to say that he and a lot of his friends could never vote for Senator Obama–for many reasons.  One of the hosts asked for some of the reasons.  The caller said that while Obama was an eloquent speaker, there was no substance to what he said.  The host asked for another reason.  And the caller just flat out said it.  Race.  To clarify, the host asked, “So, you’re saying that you can’t vote for a black man?”  “Yes,” replied the caller, “and I’m telling you that a lot of people feel the same way.  They may not say it publicly, but they’re not going to vote for Obama when they get in that voting booth.”  The host said that the caller probably did speak for some other people and wondered if others would feel the same way about voting or not voting for a woman.

This election has been called a breakthrough event, in part because we will have a presidential candidate who is either a woman or an African-American.  Does that mean we have largely put behind us the issues of race and gender?  That question has implications not only for this campaign but for every workplace and for the law governing every workplace.  As noted in my post last week about the golf controversy, I’m not sure issues like race are close to being put behind us, because we can hardly talk about such issues.  If this year’s campaign and election will cause us to start talking–even if it involves talk like that from the radio caller–then we might have a breakthrough of sorts after all.  Stay tuned.

1. 

   John Phillips says:

   February 9, 2008 at 1:57 pm

   Thanks for the mention. There are many political opinions about all sorts of issues on the above blog. If you’re into this election, you should definitely check out this blog.
2. 

   John Phillips says:

   February 20, 2008 at 7:10 pm

   Thanks for the mention.