South Carolina is just one of seven states holding Democratic contests on Tuesday but it enjoys out-sized attention from the candidates as the first test among a large pool of black voters, one of the party's most loyal voting blocs.
Unlike the predominantly white early voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire, where blacks account for 2 percent or fewer of Democratic primary voters, party leaders expect blacks to make up some 40 percent of those voting in South Carolina's primary.
"It's the first time these candidates will get a chance to campaign as they will have to in the general election," said Rep. Jim Clyburn, an influential black congressman from South Carolina. "Candidates who do well among African American voters here will go out of here with more credibility."
Black South Carolinians are overwhelmingly Democratic, partly because they perceive the party as stronger than Republicans on civil rights issues, and black Republicans are scarce indeed.
"Republican primary voters in South Carolina are basically 98 to 99 percent white," said Nu Wexler, executive director of the state Democratic Party. Bill Clinton won South Carolina and cinched the Democratic nomination for president in 1992 by courting the party's traditional black constituency, as well as moderate whites.
That point isn't lost on the candidates, who have been flocking to the state's historically black schools and worshipping with congregations at the state's AME churches, which are predominantly black.
It's why Senator Joe Lieberman, who is Jewish, has been running ads on South Carolina's gospel radio stations popular among black listeners.
And it's why Senator John Edwards, whose strength among black voters has helped make him the South Carolina front-runner in some opinion polls, will make his first post-New Hampshire appearance at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, the state's largest historically black school, in a county that is 60 percent black.
Senator John Kerry's South Carolina campaign has stressed his congressional voting record on issues such as support for minority businesses.
"His record with the NAACP is 100 percent," Kerry campaign spokeswoman Holly Armstrong said.
The campaign pitches may be delivered locally but candidates who resonate among black South Carolina voters can also expect support among a tightly knit network of politically active blacks in cities such as Washington, Atlanta, Newark, New Jersey and Detroit, Clyburn said.
"All of these people up North, the African Americans, are from the South," Clyburn said.
But party activists say the top issues among blacks are the same as for whites - jobs, affordable health care and quality education - and they'll vote for whoever they believe has the best shot at getting elected in November.
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