By SUSAN SAULNY
Published: May 2, 2009
MILWAUKEE — Although the civil rights movement gave Samuel Sallis equality under the law a long time ago, he was left wanting most of his life, he says, for the subtle courtesies and respect he thought would come with it. Being a working-class black man downtown here meant being mostly ignored, living a life invisible and unacknowledged in a larger white world.
Then Mr. Sallis, 69, noticed a change.
“I’ve been working downtown for 30 years, so I’ve got a good feeling for it,” Mr. Sallis said. “Since President Obama started campaigning, if I go almost anywhere, it’s: ‘Hi! Hello, how are you, sir?’ I’m talking about strangers. Calling me ‘sir.’ ”
He added: “It makes you feel different, like, hey — maybe we are all equals. I’m no different than before. It’s just that other people seem to be realizing these things all around me.”
In dozens of interviews in seven states over the last several days, black men and women like Mr. Sallis said they were feeling more optimistic about race relations than even a year ago, when Mr. Obama emerged as a serious presidential contender after a string of primary and caucus victories. Many whites said they were feeling better, too, expressing an invigorated sense of openness toward people of other races.
Yet no one claims that racial prejudice has disappeared.
In a recent report to law enforcement agencies, the Homeland Security Department warned that right-wing extremists could use Mr. Obama’s election as a recruiting tool. And the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups, reported finding 926 active groups in the United States in 2008, up 50 percent from 2000.
Still, Mr. Sallis said, “it feels like there’s a possibility now that wasn’t there before.”
In Tampa, Fla., Milton Patrick, 33, an auditor who is black, went to a baseball game this spring for the first time at the invitation of his white colleagues. In Karen Jackson’s multiracial Los Angeles office, where race, politics and religion were once taboo subjects, Ms. Jackson, a black woman, said people were engaging her in friendly and meaningful discussions. And in Brooklyn, Shel Harris, a black man, said he dropped his “skeptical, more on guard” attitude toward whites after working alongside so many on the Obama campaign.
“Whenever they said something, I was always looking out for their ulterior motives,” said Mr. Harris, 62, a retired phone company worker. “Now I find that I take white people’s statements more on face value.”
The interviews reflect findings in the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, in which two-thirds of Americans said race relations were generally good, with the percentage of blacks who said so doubling since July.
In just over 100 days, Mr. Obama’s presidency seems to have done much to alter the greater American public’s perception of race relations.
And perhaps, in some cases, even the reality.
“I feel a lot more comfortable starting up a conversation with people of other races on the streets now than I did before,” said Mitch Hansch, 29, a white waiter in New York City. “Since Obama was elected, racial tensions seem a little lower. I think it’s fantastic.”
Northeast of Los Angeles, M. J. J. Schmidt, 62, a real estate executive who is white, said he also felt something different.
“I go to a gym where there are a number of black people,” Mr. Schmidt said. “We don’t often communicate. They tend to have their own circle of friends. But now, there’s been more communication. Now you have an opener. After the election, I started saying hello. I said, ‘Hey, what do you think of Obama, about our new president?’ ”
The power of positive images of the Obama family has no doubt played a role for both races.
“From my vantage point, what contributes to African-American numbers is just the outright awesome pride we feel when we see President Obama stand up with world leaders,” said Clifford Whitby, 46, a black real estate developer in Macon, Ga., referring to the poll. “That does a great deal for the psyche of African-American people. If those numbers weren’t as high as they are, I would think there was something wrong with the polls.”
Some whites pointed to a slightly different dynamic.
“I didn’t vote for Obama,” said Chris Miller, 46, a boat builder in Johnstown, N.Y., who is white. “But just what I saw during the campaign — you had people, white, black, yellow, green, gray, every race and nationality out there together supporting that man. That right there showed me, hey, things are changing, things are better here. I had never seen anything to that extent.”
Alan Ingram, 29, a Web site designer in Milwaukee, agreed. “People had more of an opportunity to get together with this election and all of its events,” said Mr. Ingram, who is black. “You literally saw people of all kinds of backgrounds finding common ground.”
In a cafe on Friday, Mr. Ingram struck up an easy conversation with Nicole Nelson, a white law student, who agreed with his assessment.
“I went to an Obama rally, and I saw everything,” Ms. Nelson said. “I voted for him despite being brought up with conservative, small-town values in a place that had no diversity. I think it was a matter of exposure that changed how I looked at life.”
For some blacks, the subtlest changes have made a difference.
Kevin Chaison, a 39-year-old telemarketer in St. Louis who is black, said he used to feel invisible. “I get more of a sense that I belong now,” Mr. Chaison said. “Now I’m getting more of a, ‘Hey, how you doing?’ than I was a year ago.”
Chester J. Fontenot Jr., 59, an English professor and the director of Africana studies at Mercer University in Macon, said some of the social isolation he long felt as one of the few black professors on campus was beginning to soften.
“I think what’s happened with a number of white people who have come up and started talking to me is they feel comfortable with him,” Dr. Fontenot said, speaking of Mr. Obama, “and that makes it O.K. to come up and engage me. They feel like they have something in common with me now, we have something to talk about.”
Mr. Patrick, the auditor in Tampa, emphasized how even small good-will gestures resonated with him.
Still, he harbors no illusions.
“I’m not trying to sugarcoat things,” Mr. Patrick said. “Things could still be better. But they’re better than they were.”
“Now you get the head nod, or a smile that you just didn’t get a year or two ago,” he added. “For me, it was like, ‘I’m not even going to acknowledge this black person.’ They’d just keep on their merry way. But now, I get acknowledged.
“I’m not saying that the playing field is even, but having elected a black president has done a lot.”
Reporting was contributed by Rebecca Cathcart from Los Angeles, Shaila Dewan from Atlanta, Malcolm Gay from St. Louis, Christopher Maag from New York and Malia Wollan from Oakland, Calif.
A version of this article appeared in print on May 3, 2009, on page A1 of the New York edition.
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