My wife and I were appalled at the bold headlines we saw the Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2006, edition of The Citizen entitled, “Black Republican to run for county comm.”

Mr. Emory Wilkerson, a Republican who happens to an African-American, confirmed this week that he was entering the race to fill the vacant county commissioner post.

Tell me, what was the significance of mentioning his race? It should be irrelevant as to his race; his character is the important matter.
After all, remember it was the Republican Party presidency that wrote the Emancipation Proclamation and one would think that that event would have established a tie between the Republican Party and African-Americans.

What I am saying is, African-Americans were Republicans first and then gravitated to other political parties.

Cecil and Olivia Brown
Peachtree City, Ga.

[The editor replies: Since Fayette’s black state legislators (Democrat) have been pushing for more than a year to change to district voting on the grounds that no black can get elected to countywide office without district voting, the racial angle obviously is newsworthy. (Of course, the real problem may be that black Democrats can’t get elected in a majority Republican county, whereas a black Republican stands a good chance of winning countywide.) We don’t make the race-based news; we just report the facts about the race-based politics that has been front-page news several times in the past 18 months. That said, I should have edited into the story a more detailed explanation and history of the ongoing controversy so that newcomers to the county would be able to put the story (and headline) in the appropriate news context.]