Ebony magazine published an article revealing that Hillary Clinton's great-great-grandfather, Hemings Rodman, was one-eighth black, moving from the antebellum South to the Midwest and joining the white community there. Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. said this shows that racial issues "are as multifaceted now as they were then." Critic Stanley Crouch added, "Her genes riff, like her husband's politics." Noting Mrs. Clinton's status as abused spouse, Psychiatrist Alvin F. Poussaint said "the burdens of broken families, associated with slavery and 'blackness,' affect white America too." The magazine's editors denied relying on Ms. Clinton's campaign staffers as sources for the story.

†