WASHINGTON, D.C. – Hoover Institution fellow Thomas Sowell recently penned a thought-provoking editorial about how education issues can help Republicans court black voters.

Sowell believes some Republicans are taking the wrong approach in reaching out to black voters by working with the same black “leaders” as Democrats – such as Jesse Jackson or the NAACP. A much better approach, he argues, would be to highlight the Democratic policies that go against the interests of blacks and other minorities, according to Sowell’s recent column.

“ … (T)here are issues where Republicans have a big advantage over Democrats – if they will use that advantage. But an advantage you don’t use might as well not exist,” Sowell writes. “The issue on which Democrats are the most vulnerable, and have the least room to maneuver, is school choice.

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“Democrats are heavily in hock to the teachers’ unions, who see public schools as places to guarantee jobs for teachers, regardless of what that means for the education of students.

“There are charter schools and private schools that have low-income minority youngsters equaling or exceeding national norms, despite the many ghetto public schools where most students are nowhere close to meeting those norms. Because teachers’ unions oppose charter schools, most Democrats oppose them, including black Democrats up to and including President Barack Obama.”

Republicans missed an opportunity when Democratic New York Mayor Bill de Blasio recently put up roadblocks for charters in the Big Apple, which “showed a calloused disregard for black youngsters, for whom a decent education is their one shot at a better life,” Sowell opines.

Another losing issue for Democrats when it comes to black voters is the minimum wage debate. The evidence is the fact that less than 10 percent of black 16- and 17-year-olds were unemployed before “the series of minimum wage escalations that began in the 1950s. In the last half century, unemployment rates for black youth have remained between 20 and 40 percent,” Sowell writes.

Both issues present great opportunities for the GOP to sway black voters, but Republican candidates have instead opted to mimic their liberal counterparts in hopes of drawing black votes.

“ … (D)uring the 2012 election campaign Mitt Romney advocated indexing the minimum wage for inflation, which would not only guarantee its bad effects, but would put an end to discussing those bad effects,” Sowell writes.

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The school choice and minimum wage issues won’t win over all black voters, but could be used to convince a small percentage to switch camps.

“Even to achieve that, however, will require targeting those particular segments of the black population that are not irrevocably committed to the Democrats. Parents who want their children to get a decent education are one obvious example,” Sowell writes.

“But if Republicans aim a one-size-fits-all message at blacks they will fail to connect with the particular people they have some chance of reaching.”