David Dinkins Elected First Black Mayor of New York
by: Dr. Clint Wilson
A Black man, David Dinkins, became the first of his race to become mayor of the largest city in the United States when the ballots were tallied following the November election of 1989.
Although African Americans comprised no more than 25 percent of the electorate Dinkins prevailed over several candidates including former mayor Edward Koch and current mayor Rudolph Giuliani in a hotly contested campaign that began in the primary elections.
Dinkins, who was reared in Trenton, N.J., moved to Harlem and rose through the political ranks to become Manhattan borough president. He was a graduate of Howard University and took his law degree from Brooklyn College. The Black Press informed its readers of his monumental achievement in major headline stories across the nation.
David Dinkins: New York Mayor-Elect
David Dinkins won a mud-splattered race and became New York City’s first Black mayor by appealing to the loyalty of Democrats and sticking to a soothing campaign theme that stressed the need for unity and reconciliation in a divided city.
Dinkins, 62, strived throughout the campaign to retain his dignity in the face of often bitter assaults on his personal honesty and on his often-muddled financial affairs.
And as recently as Tuesday morning, when the grandfatherly Manhattan borough president cast his vote with his wife, Joyce, by his side, he continued to insist that race was not the primary issue in the campaign.
Far more important, Dinkins said, was the unity he would bring to a city torn by racial tensions and gripped by a spiraling list of inner-city problems.
Just three weeks before the September Democratic primary, tensions escalated dramatically after a deadly racial attack on a Black teenager in Brooklyn.
Despite predictions of racial polarization among voters, the mild-mannered Dinkins picked up substantial White support and soundly beat three-term incumbent Mayor Edward Koch in a city where Blacks comprise only about 20-25 percent of the population.
Dinkins sailed for weeks on the momentum of his victory, making fund-raising pitches to Democrats from coast to coast and meeting with congressional leaders.
But he was brought back to earth by a series of relentless attacks by his Republican opponent, Rudolph Giuliani, and by questions raised in the media about his financial dealings.
A series of hard-hitting Republican campaign advertisements slammed Dinkins for not paying his taxes from 1969-72, for giving money to controversial Black activist and convicted kidnapper Sonny Carson to get out the vote in the primary and for allegedly vastly under-reporting the value of a stock deal with his son, David Jr., 34.
Dinkins, who also has a daughter, Donna, 31, and a 2-year-old grandson, Jamal, found himself on the defensive, fending off non-stop personal attacks.
A moderate with a long history of building coalitions and for supporting Jewish causes, Dinkins also had to dodge accusations that his friendship with Jesse Jackson indicated Jewish voters would get short shrift under his administration.
Stung by the attacks, Dinkins was forced to vow to exclude Jackson from any role in his administration. But he counterattacked, rallying the support of prominent Jewish leaders and reminding voters that he, not Jackson, was running for mayor.
Dinkins also staged a marathon news conference to explain the details of the stock transaction with his son and won the endorsements of all the major dailies but one, The New York Post.
Despite a barrage of negative advertising masterminded by Republican media consultant Roger Ailes, Dinkins rarely rose to the bait.
When he did respond, it was to call Giuliani a Reagan Republican and to criticize him for changing his stand on abortion.
As far back as last summer, when the early front-runner in the Democratic primary had to deal with a surge in the polls by Koch, Dinkins set out to portray himself as the only man who could bring together the city.
Despite slips in support, especially during the damaging stock-deal disclosures of the general election, Dinkins never fell behind.
And through it all, he enjoyed the nearly unanimous backing of Black voters thrilled at the first real possibility of electing a Black mayor.
Dinkins grew up Trenton, N.J. and later moved to Harlem.
During World War II, he twice tried to enlist in the Marine Corps but was rejected because of racial quotas. He persisted and was finally accepted on his third try.
The son of a barber who later became a Trenton real estate broker, Dinkins was married in 1953 to the daughter of a Harlem politician.
He graduated with a degree in mathematics from Howard University in 1956 and later attended Rutgers University on a math fellowship.
Dinkins earned a law degree from Brooklyn College in 1957, and was soon practicing law before opening a private law practice in Harlem that he maintained until 1975.
Dinkins, long active in Harlem’s Carver Democratic Club, made his first foray into politics in 1965, when he was elected to the state assembly.
But he only served one term before the district was redrawn and he was out of a job. He was a Democratic district leader for 20 years and almost became the city’s first Black deputy mayor in 1973. But he had to give up that opportunity when he revealed to city investigators that he had failed to pay his taxes for the previous four years.
Dinkins paid the back taxes with penalties and interest and in 1975 was named city clerk, a patronage post he held until he was elected Manhattan borough president in 1985.
--Afro Times, November 11, 1989
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