ANNAPOLIS, Md.--When Michael Steele was running for lieutenant governor in 2002, the Baltimore Sun endorsed the opposing ticket and opined dismissively that Mr. Steele "brings little to the team but the color of his skin." Normally this would be an invidious thing to say about a black politician, but the usual rules of racial etiquette don't seem to apply when it comes to Mr. Steele. For he is a Republican...

He also describes himself as "a very strong proponent and advocate of affirmative action." He says, "You can pretty much pick any profession, and you're not going to find a whole lot of brothers sitting around in the room making decisions. You'll find us in other jobs, but at the end of the day, we need to have the ladder extended so that it doesn't just get to a certain level and stop." He says he encountered racial prejudice in the 1980s, shortly after leaving the seminary. He was "all but given [a] job, by virtue of phone conversations and a review of my résumé . . . but then when I went to do the visit, suddenly there were no jobs available. . . . Despite . . . your own personal success story, there are still people who don't give a damn about that. What they see is a 6-foot-4 black man come to look for a job at my firm, and that ain't happening."

Thus his vision is of a meritocracy, in which success is "based on your talent, your capabilities, your skills, your ability to present yourself, to make your case. That's all people want. That's all African-Americans want in this country. We just want America to let us make our case. . . . Just give me a fair shot. You do that, and success or failure is on my shoulders, not someone else's."