Most people resist change fiercely, even if it be to their benefit, so I found this Dispatch article by Joseph Hallet cheering:
When Walter R. Cates tells people what he's become, incredulously they respond, "You're a what!''
From the moment he took his first breath 63 years ago, Cates has been three things: "I've always told people I was born black, Baptist and Democrat.''
Now he's a Republican.
He recently switched parties, officially announcing it Thursday during a Buckeye Republican Club luncheon.
Cates is one of the most recognizable and influential leaders in Columbus. As former president of the local NAACP chapter in 1973, he sued the Columbus school district, police and fire divisions for discrimination and forced them to change.
Cates, known in the black community as "The Mayor of Main Street,'' founded and heads the Main Street Business Association. He often is credited, as much as anyone, for the streetlights and sidewalks, the bus stops and clinics, the stores and businesses that breathe life into the city's urban core.
Cates has been a member of the Franklin County Democratic Party Central Committee, he's served on the party's candidate screening committees and he even ran for the Ohio Senate as a Democrat in 1992.
Now he's a Republican.
There was no philosophical transformation. Issues such as gay marriage, abortion, guns, school prayer -- all the stuff that moves the Republican base -- had nothing to do with Cates' move.
"This is all about delivering the goods,'' he said. "The Republicans are listening more.''
From the late U.S. Rep. Chalmers Wylie to Rep. Pat Tiberi, from U.S. Sens. George V. Voinovich, Mike DeWine and former Ohio Senate President Stanley Aronoff to a raft of politicians in between, the Republicans are delivering the money to improve his community, Cates contended.
He looks around and sees Condoleezza Rice and, formerly, Colin Powell, at the right hand of President Bush. He notices that two of the five highest-ranking officials in state government -- Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell and Treasurer Jennette Bradley -- are black Republicans, and he wonders just what is it that he's getting from the Democrats.
Cates' answer: "All the talk in the world.''
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