US:BARACK OBAMA has used a controversy over incendiary remarks by his former pastor to confront America's racial divisions in the most wide-ranging speech on the issue by any major politician for more than a generation.
Speaking in Philadelphia, Mr Obama unequivocally condemned statements by Rev Jeremiah Wright that compared the 9/11 attacks to the US bombing of Hiroshima and said that African-Americans should say "God Damn America" rather than "God Bless America". But he refused to distance himself personally from the pastor who introduced him to Christianity, officiated at his wedding and baptised his two daughters. "I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community," Mr Obama said.
"I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe. These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love."
The controversy over Rev Wright's remarks followed a row over Hillary Clinton supporter Geraldine Ferraro's suggestion that Mr Obama's candidacy benefited from the fact that he is black. Mr Obama said yesterday that, while it would be politically convenient to ignore both controversies, race was an issue that Americans could no longer afford to ignore.
"The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like healthcare, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American," he said.
Locating his presidential candidacy within the struggle for racial justice that led through the abolition of slavery to the civil rights movement, Mr Obama said that his faith in the possibility of creating "a more perfect union" came from his personal biography as well as his political philosophy.
"I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas . . . I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slave-owners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters.
"It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic make-up the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one." Mr Obama said that, to understand America's racial "stalemate", it was necessary to acknowledge the legacy of discrimination that has left predominantly black schools underfunded and a persistent gap in wealth and income between blacks and whites.
"A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighbourhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us."
Inequality and injustice had left many African-Americans feeling angry and embittered, he said, adding that a corresponding anger was shared by many lower-income white Americans who resent the impact of affirmative action.
"Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends," he said. "To wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognising they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding." To move beyond the racial impasse, African-Americans had to embrace the burden of the past without becoming victims of it and insisting on a full measure of justice but taking more responsibility for their own lives. Whites must acknowledge that African-American grievances are real and that the legacy of discrimination must be addressed.
"In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well."