WASHINGTON (AFP) — African-Americans voiced nervous elation and hope Tuesday at the prospect that the country might be poised to elect its first black president.
“I never thought I would live long enough to see that,” Alnett Wooten, 86, said of Democrat Barack Obama’s ground-breaking race to win the White House, as she went to vote in downtown Washington.
“But as I always say, God is good. He knows, and I just pray that He will keep him safe.”
“I couldn’t sleep,” said Alice Hayes after she cast her vote for Obama over Republican rival John McCain in Washington’s Chevy Chase district.
The hospital official said just eight years ago she could not have imagined a black American even in the running for president, much less becoming the favorite in the race.
“I hope to see a change in this country,” she said, echoing Obama’s campaign theme.
In Miami Beach, Florida, Miykel Stinson, 27, said the memory of her grandfather being beaten to death in Louisiana during the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s was on her mind as she cast her ballot.
“It means a lot to me,” she said of the election.
Illinois Senator Obama, born in 1961 in the middle of the tense and often violent US civil rights battle, has already made history as the first black to be chosen by one of the two major US parties as its presidential nominee.
As voting opened on Tuesday morning, most opinion polls gave him a strong advantage over McCain to win the election.
Reports from around the country suggested that blacks were turning out in never-before seen numbers for the election — which is a key part of the Democrats’ strategy to defeat McCain.
Four minutes after the polls opened in Decatur, Georgia, African-American security guard James Lee joined the quiet line of voters at Avondale Middle School to cast his vote for Obama.
“With the Bush election, it seemed like black people’s votes were thrown away. That took me out of it,” he said.
“When I heard about Obama, it inspired me. He wants to change the country, take it in a new direction, and he thinks of everybody.”
Sheron Regular, a black singer and poet in her late 50s, was enjoying the free election day coffee at a Starbucks on Malcolm X Boulevard in Harlem, New York City.
“I vote for Obama because it’s in my interest,” she said, adding she was “sure he will win.”
“This is a historical day, America finally opened it’s mind,” added Harlem drummer Ramon Quinones, 43. “I am a proud Democrat, I vote for Obama.
In Washington, government employee Jacqueline Lawson was nervous with excitement after she marked her ballot.
“I’m just elated, happy that the day has finally come. I feel so a part of this election like never before,” Lawson said.
But at a voting station in Washington DC’s Maryland suburbs, 48-year-old accountant Denise Randolph was holding her breath.
“I think it’s still up for a grabs,” she said. “This is the largest (turnout) I have ever seen in 10 years.
“I view it as a good thing and it’s about time. That means people are interested and they should be.”