{"id":18145,"date":"2024-07-28T08:00:40","date_gmt":"2024-07-28T12:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=18145"},"modified":"2024-10-12T09:29:21","modified_gmt":"2024-10-12T13:29:21","slug":"44-obama-barack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=18145","title":{"rendered":"#44. Obama, Barack"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Linda Lou Burton posting from Little Rock, Arkansas \u2013 <\/em>Barack Hussein Obama II (b 1961) was the 44th<\/sup> President of the United States from 2009-2017. He goes into the history books as \u201c the first African-American president in US history,\u201d self-identifying as African-American because his father was Kenyan, and his mother was born in Kansas. Father Barack Sr was a member of the Luo ethnic group that lived along the shores of Lake Victoria; at the time of his birth in 1934 Kenya was a protectorate of the British Empire. Mother Ann Dunham was an only child; when she was born in Wichita in 1942, her Dad was in the US Army; the family\u2019s ancestry was mostly English, with a bit of Scottish, Welsh, and Irish mixed in. How in the world \u2013 our big old world \u2013 did two such disparate people come together, we all wondered, when we first began to hear of Barack. The story is remarkable, a story bigger than imagination. And equally remarkable is the story of the 2008 presidential election, when not only the first African-American sought a spot on a presidential ticket; it was also the year the first female sought that unique responsibility.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>A History Lesson before we begin \u2013 in case you didn\u2019t get the gist back in school. The US Constitution, ratified in 1789, was put together by white male landed gentry as an outline for governing 13 colonies that had bonded together in statehood as a democracy,<\/em> free from the restrictions of a monarchy. The \u201cright to vote,\u201d that is, to select those who would contribute to the governing of those states, was left to the individual states. The qualifications for becoming president were age (35+), citizenship (not clearly defined), and residency (at least 14 years in the colonies-now-states).<\/p>\n

The first count of people was the 1790 US Census, which divided the population of almost 4 million into four categories, measuring Free White Males (over 16 and under 16), Free White Females, and Slaves. Free White Males made up 42% of the entire population; Free White Females 40%; Slaves 18%. The Constitution provided for a system of checks and balances \u2013 that is, self-correcting mechanisms \u2013 as a democracy should. To date it has been amended 27 times, the last in 1992. Let\u2019s look at two that focused on voting rights:<\/p>\n