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Columbus
Dispatch...
In
emotional speech, Kasich talks of faith, civil rights
By Joe
Vardon
Wednesday
January 18, 2012
WILBERFORCE,
Ohio — Tears rolled down Gov. John Kasich’s cheeks yesterday while the
choir
belted out Amazing Grace. As How Great Thou Art wound to a close, he
urged the
mostly African-American crowd at historically black Central State
University to
its feet.
Wiping away
tears and humbly telling the audience, “I don’t really know what I’m
going to
be talking about today,” Kasich launched a nearly 30-minute speech
delving into
issues of faith and perseverance and how they related to him, Martin
Luther
King Jr., the students in the audience, and his approach to governing.
“As we say,
he’s ’bout it ’bout it when it comes to doing something,” said Zhelma
Kendrick,
52, of Xenia, a sophomore at Central State. Kendrick said she typically
leans
Democratic “when it comes to politics,” but Kasich “just came across as
being
caring and concerned about change.”
“After
listening to him, I have a different perspective on some of these
politics
issues,” she said.
The setting
for Kasich’s speech was a Central State convocation. University
President John
W. Garland said Kasich was the first sitting governor to speak at such
an
engagement during Garland’s leadership tenure, nearly 15 years.
Kasich has
discussed his own faith before, and at times during yesterday’s speech
he
returned to familiar themes of job creation and policy initiatives, but
perhaps
never before as governor has he stitched those themes together like he
did
yesterday.
Of King,
the slain civil-rights leader whose birthday the nation celebrated on
Monday,
Kasich said: “It was the grace of the Lord empowering him to do what he
did to
change the face of our country.”
“He not
only touched the hearts and the souls of African-Americans, he touched
the soul
of white folks who lived in the suburbs and said, ‘This is not the
America that
I love,’ ” said Kasich, who grew up in a small, blue-collar town near
Pittsburgh.
Kasich said
his message to the student body was, “deep in your soul, you can figure
out
your purpose,” and he encouraged the students to pursue that purpose
vigorously.
“As an
African-American, you still have obstacles that are unique, in my
opinion, to
your race,” Kasich said. “Why not admit there are some people in our
society
that you have to go the extra mile for? I don’t like that, I don’t look
at it
that way, but it happens in our society. But you know what, when you
are of
excellence, when you produce, when you know what you’re doing — oh,
they can
deny you a few times, but they can’t deny you forever.”
Jackie
Ruffner, 19, a freshman from Cleveland, was impressed: “He just has so
much
energy,” she said of Kasich.
Michael
Colbert, director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services and
one of
two African-Americans in Kasich’s cabinet, introduced the governor.
Colbert is
a Central State graduate.
Read this
and other articles at the Columbus Dispatch
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