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Last October, Senator Kamala Harris walked down Georgia Avenue in Northwest Washington D.C., greeting the crowd that had gathered to see her in the homecoming parade at her alma mater,

Howard University. She had returned to her college campus as a contender for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination. The crowd that lined Georgia Avenue watched Harris from the

university sidewalks and from the high school across the street, named after Benjamin Banneker, a black man who became famous for his role in surveying Washington D.C. and for his

clockmaking. Although her campaign ended a few weeks later, Harris’s selection as Joe Biden’s running mate made that autumn parade resonate again, as I imagine it marching past the campus

and through the city to the Naval Observatory, the official residence of the Vice President of the United States. The area around Observatory Hill carries the markers for the city’s

meridians, where the nation centres its place and synchronises its time. Black history in America carries similar markers, and the California senator’s name is one such — Kamala Harris is

another famous black first and historical achiever. That is as it should be. However, when black Americans celebrate these moments, they are also evidence of a history delayed intentionally.

We celebrate Banneker, born a free man, for his work on the city’s design, but we know that his government also designed laws and social orders that limited and delayed black folks, free

and enslaved, from navigating those streets. Senator Kamala Harris provides a similar bellwether — we can celebrate a black woman’s accomplishments while wondering why the wheels of progress

turn so slowly. Senator Harris is the first black woman on a major party ticket, and in 2016, she was the second black woman elected to the Senate. As a Howard student at the 1994

convocation, I attended a speech by the first, Illinois Senator Carol Moseley-Braun, elected two years before. As she spoke, I was awed by the history — but the numbers made me weary. After

Edward Brooke of Massachusetts in 1966, she was the second black Senator elected since Reconstruction. Judging by the reaction of one of her colleagues, little had changed over the years. On

his podcast, “The Right Time”, the journalist Bomani Jones recently told a story of Moseley-Braun on an elevator with North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms. During the ride, he whistled

“Dixie”, the song of the Confederate South. Given his public speeches and his record on race, it isn’t surprising. “Turning back the clock” is a familiar warning about the erosion of even

modest racial progress. In her book, The _Warmth of Other Suns, _Isabel Wilkerson noted the fear of the idea turned to practice, when white employers turned back their clocks to get more

hours of labor out of their black domestic servants. Maybe Banneker’s triumph in clockmaking carried some hope of a remedy for that kind of unevenness in America. On the 100th anniversary of

the Nineteenth Amendment, it’s important to remember that many Black women couldn’t cast a ballot until the Voting Rights Act of 1965. To say that all American women can celebrate a century

of the franchise is to erase the labor of voting rights activists like Fannie Lou Hamer, Amelia Boynton, Ella Baker, Diane Nash, and Joyce Ladner. A Biden-Harris victory would surely be

unlikely without their work to narrow the gap between the promise of an equal vote and the reality. Threats to that progress are real and growing, because of new versions of old tactics.

Past generations of black voters faced bodily harm. As President Trump cuts resources for mail-in voting, many Americans will weigh the coronavirus health risks of voting in person, and some

will feel forced to stay at home. As the first black vice-presidential candidate, Harris’s moment coincides with multiple efforts to turn back the clock. But with the threats so apparent

and the stakes so high, the sense of purpose in 2020 may motivate voters who sat out in 2016. The early excitement may be a result of Senator Harris’s command of the moment. Her first

address showed a clear and thoughtful evaluation of the Trump administration’s record on the pandemic response and police violence. Given the success of the announcement, the Harris

selection is celebrated, not just for this moment but for the bigger promise of a win in November. With that, the meridians of Observation Hill would be able to measure a substantial step in

American racial progress.