Dare to Dream for 2000 -- And Beyond
by Phil Tajitsu Nash

U.S. Sen. John McCain, the Arizona Republican and presidential candidate, announced last week that he would name an Asian American to his cabinet if elected to lead this country in 2000.

This breathtaking development got me thinking about just what the Asian American community should be asking for as we begin talks with our colleagues in the Republican, Democratic, and independent parties in preparation for Campaign 2000. While Asian Americans have risen to high levels in government, military, business, education, and other fields based on individual circumstance, affirmative action and luck, getting named to a presidential ticket, the Supreme Court or cabinet-level positions have continued to elude us.

Looking back through history, I see a pattern where individuals with strong opinions and proven track records on a state level were given a chance at a federal position based both on individual merit and historical happenstance.

Take Louis Brandeis, appointed as the first Jew on the Supreme Court by President Woodrow Wilson in 1916. Brandeis had a distinguished career as a litigator and activist, but his strongly-held Zionist positions were also part of a political awakening by Jewish Americans in the early 1900s. Or look at Franklin D. Roosevelt’s appointment of Frances Perkins as secretary of Labor in 1933 or Ronald Reagan’s naming of Sandra Day O’Connor as a Supreme Court justice in 1981; both women were the first to hold those lofty positions; Perkins had distinguished herself in social reform in New York State, and O’Connor was a well-known legislator and jurist in Arizona, but both benefited from rising tides of activism on behalf of women in their respective eras.

The lesson, then, is for us to not try to fit in, or to forget our issues as Asian Americans. We need to push even further as Americans, and demand an Asian American perspective at the table when the Supreme Court meets and when the President sits down with his or her cabinet. (The chance of an Asian American being on the ticket as a president or vice president for the Republicans seems remote at this time, but with Asian Americans being seen as a “model minority,” don’t count out a Democratic ticket with Washington State Governor Gary Locke as vice president for the Democrats.)

At this time, we are being accepted as team players by Republican and Democratic party organizations, with party caucuses formed to address Asian American concerns. However, our ability to demand money to address our issues, staffing on commissions and campaigns, and access to policy-makers is hampered by our inability to push for our own even at a sub-cabinet level. Bill Lann Lee, for example, operates as an “acting” public official at a third-tier Assistant Secretary level within the Justice Department, and his lack of a full public hearing on the merits of his appointment for the last 18 months shows that the Democrats don’t care enough to face down the Republican stalling. The Republicans, for their part, don’t see enough of a threat from the Asian American community in terms of dollars or votes to give up their hold on his appointment. A community-wide effort is underway to collect 10,000 signatures on his behalf and hold support actions on July 21 and this deserves the support of Asian Americans of all political persuasions.

Groups such as the 80-20 Initiative, headed by former Delaware Lieutenant Governor S.B. Woo, former OCA President Michael Lin, Henry Tang of the Committee of 100 and others, are already actively calling for more judicial appointments as well as a possible Cabinet-level position, and they should be supported in their visionary approach to try to have Asian Americans act as a swing vote in key states such as California.

That’s because we are not represented. While Asian Americans make up 3.5 percent of the population of this nation, of the 875 active federal judges, only seven are Asian Americans; of the 250 plus cabinet and sub-cabinet positions in President Clinton’s Administration in 1998, only two were held by Asian Americans. The situation is not better in the academic or corporate worlds. Abolitionist Frederick Douglass once said that “power concedes nothing without a demand.”

It never has and it never will. Asian Americans have got to start making demands, getting angry, using blunt power plays as well as gentle requests. No one gets ahead in Washington by trying to just fit into the background.; As we gear up for Campaign 2000, it is time our community and each individual in it made a little more noise. My hope is that we will dream big, aim high -- and then get what we can.