Carol Morello, Washington Post
- A sharp rise in African American voting rates in the 2008 presidential election was largely a Southern phenomenon, according to a Census analysis of voting patterns released Wednesday.
The South was the only region in the country where the voting rate among blacks increased sizably from the 2004 election, from 59 percent to 66 percent. The West, Northeast and Midwest had smaller increases in black voting rates, but they did not represent a significant change, the Census said.
The report, an analysis of raw data released last year, offers a more nuanced view of results from the election, in which an African American was on the ballot for president in the general election for the first time.
