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This book concentrates on quiet, racially progressive actions by white elected officials in the South during the particularly interesting post-civil rights movement period of 1970–2000. As will be explained in the Introduction and then developed through the chapters of this book, we have coined the terms “stealthness,” “stealth leadership,” and “stealth politics” to describe this style of campaigning and serving by white politicians.

Essentially, we contend that some white officials worked with some black activists to mitigate the often unsavory role of race and move politics forward in the post-movement South. Our thesis is that, together, these biracial leaders helped reconstruct southern politics in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.

Of course, black political leaders likewise have attempted to minimize racial factors in order to bridge the racial divide in this region and throughout the nation. Barack Obama represents the latest and most prominent incarnation of “deracialized” politics, but such efforts have been fairly common in the past few decades, as evidenced by David Dinkins in New York, Douglas Wilder in Virginia, and Tom Bradley in Los Angeles. This variance from insurgent black politics obviously poses an unsettling dilemma for many interested in the more aggressive agenda of black progress. African American scholars in particular have struggled with the idea of race-neutral elections and service. (For further discussion on these points, consult the works of authors like Charles V. Hamilton, Georgia A. Persons, Huey L. Perry, and others as detailed in the bibliography.)

Much of the “deracialization” literature resonates in our project, as the stealth proposition, issues, and activities reported in our research among white leaders sometimes reflect, in ironic ways, the experiences of biracial black politicians.

So, a logical question is how our notion of “stealthness” relates to “deracialization.” The simplest generalization is that our stealth concept focuses on white leaders courting and serving black voters, while deracialization research addresses black officials and their relationship with white voters. Of course, the single, dominant practicality is that all these politicians—both stealthy whites and deracializing blacks—wanted to get elected and stay elected. The most accurate assessment is that such “crossover” efforts sometimes worked and sometimes failed, depending to a great degree on context. However, there are important differences between stealthness and deracialization besides simple terminological preference.

These other differences relate to both theoretical definition and normative ramification. The definitional differences are: (a) our thesis limits the time period for stealth politics to 1970–2000, while deracialization is a practice of continuing interest; (b) stealth was a phenomenon of peculiarly regional and cultural pertinence, while deracialization has been observed and studied in varied locales throughout the country; and (c) the political nature of stealthness was low-profile, sometimes secretive, and especially risky considering the attitudes of white Southern voters, while deracialization is more obvious and acceptable, although certainly problematic in terms of contemporary public mores.

Additionally, there is the critical matter of context. Stealth politics began and took place in a one-party, semi-segregated system of elections and governance, while deracial endeavors have been attempted in varied, less “peculiar” environments. According to coauthor and ex-politician Browder, regional contextual factors placed tremendous pressures on Southern white officials:

I can only imagine the problems that black leaders have had to deal with in various situations, but I know from personal experience that it was virtually impossible for me to eliminate race from politics back then. Of course, I tried to keep both whites and blacks from “racializing” public issues in an already race-sensitive arena; I also had to “deracialize” myself by talking in communitarian language. At the same time, ironically, I often had to quietly but surely “bi-racialize” certain aspects of my campaign and service—in the sense of informal, dual operations—because of the legacies of white supremacy and racial segregation. Furthermore, I sometimes just sneaked things of racial consequence through the political thicket and hoped no one would notice or call my hand on it. The situation changed over time, but you had to be very careful; racial mistakes, especially during the early years, could kill you politically in my part of the country.

Perhaps of equal interest to our readers are the normative connotations of stealthness and deracialization. Stealth strategy clearly involved racial sentiments and challenged Southern political tradition; but our estimation is that quiet, practical, biracial leadership reflected, most centrally, the realities of routine, progressive politics in the South. Stealthy white politicians probably did what they did as their situations allowed or required, quite often but not always with race-principled intent; in that process they collectively helped reconstruct and “normalize” a perverted, contorted, regional system of historically institutionalized white supremacy and racial segregation. Our concern in this project thus is to theorize and evidence those actions as a historical development—a matter of race-sensitive politics and progress, not a moral crusade—that mainly helps us understand the past. Deracialization, on the other hand, usually articulates a more defined, structured, race-based strategy of black leaders for advancing black interests in reasonably normalized locales nevertheless beset with racism and racial tensions. Understandably, prescriptive analysis of this practice figures prominently into debate about the present and future course of black politics.

In summary, our stealthy Southern pioneers charted a course that sets them apart from both the “heroes” and “villains” of the past and the more recent “deracializing leaders.” Stealth leaders fundamentally challenged their own society and cultural traditions in those volatile times; yet their discrete and discreet actions, by design, would limit their careers and shade their role in history. We thus acknowledge the deracialization literature but declare that stealth politics is a very different, interesting, unexplored phenomenon that deserves scholarly attention.

Readers should also take note that in this unusual, exploratory project, the authors’ collaborative endeavor results in a mixed writing style. Generally, we present our analysis in plural, first-person manner (“we” and “our”). However, the Case Study in chapters four, five and six is narrated in first person (“I” and “my”) by coauthor Glen Browder), from the perspective of his own political experience in Alabama and Washington; and the Biracial Roundtable discussion in chapter eight is moderated in similar first-person style by Artemesia Stanberry. We debated about employing this stylistic shift, but in the end we felt that the personalization would add richness and clarity to those four chapters of the manuscript.

Also, since much of the material presented in this manuscript is based on our experience as participant-observers, analysis and comments deriving from these twin perspectives are enmeshed in the text. Therefore, many such statements (including factual observations and personal remarks, whether directly or indirectly quoted) are not endnoted; this book serves as the original source of the material. Otherwise, standard endnoting procedures have been used.

We rely extensively in this manuscript on material from the Browder Collection, consisting of several hundred boxes of documents that have been processed for public access at Jacksonville State University (see Analytic Guidebook for the Browder Collection). This material can be accessed within broader context in the Browder Collection at JSU.

Besides the original and endnoted material mentioned in the preceding paragraphs, this manuscript shares limited excerptions, slight revisions, factual presentations, and political observations with three other sources. First, some background material, particularly in the Browder case study, derives from Browder’s The Future of American Democracy (University Press of America, 2003). Secondly, some sections draw from Browder’s The South’s New Racial Politics (NewSouth Books, 2009) and Professor-Politician by Geni Certain with Glen Browder (forthcoming from NewSouth Books, 2010). All three of these books share certain material through mutual permissions. We are grateful to Ms. Certain, NewSouth Books, and University Press of America for the use of this material.

Numerous individuals contributed to this project, some in personal interviews, but most through telephone, email, and/or written communications. In some situations, their remarks have been edited for concision and clarity without affecting their substance. Among those interviewed and cited are the following:

Bill Alexander	Michael Andrews
Richard Arrington	Jess Brown
Kelvin Cunningham	Artur Davis
Butler Derrick	Marti Thomas Doneghy
James A. Dunn	Jim Folsom Jr.
Martin Frost	Fred Gray
Jerome Gray	Mike House
Paul Hubbert	Gerald Johnson
Martin Lancaster	L.F. Payne
Pete Peterson	Owen Pickett
Steve Raby	Joe Reed
Roy Rowland	Robin Tallon
Lindsay Thomas	George C. Wallace Jr.
Carol Zippert

We are very grateful to countless people who have assisted us in this project, including families, friends, and colleagues. Also, this work could not have been done without the kind support of Jacksonville State University, North Carolina Central University, and Prairie View A&M University. NewSouth Books is truly a Southern treasure, producing “regional books of national interest”—thanks Suzanne La Rosa, Randall Williams, Brian Seidman and all the staff. And, finally, thanks to many others too numerous to cite individually. Of course, any deficiencies or flaws in this book are our own; and we welcome comments and suggestions for future research.