BOSTON, Massachusetts - We wanted to be here, on American soil, for what was shaping up to be an historic occasion. We wanted to be able to tell our grandchildren, Mr. Editor, that we were here on that day.The day the country they said couldn't, did. The day they said the country that wouldn't, did.

It was The Day that the voters of this country elected an African-American the President of the United States of America, The Day they put a black man in the White House - Barack Obama.We were in the bar in the Fairmont Copley Hotel, headquarters to the Democratic Party, at the hour of declaration of victory, and John Kerry was on rewind, offering thanks to those who have made his re-election possible, not that there was ever any doubt about that in what is a solidly blue state, and I'm thinking that this is a very long way from the Guilani/Clinton presidential race everyone thought it would be two years ago. The crowd to whom Senator Kerry is speaking is decidely and majority white, volunteers mostly, I expect, and young, really young. That's not so surprising. This is afterall a city of students. But they're enthusiastic and they are excited. These are also the people who have been turned on and tapped by the Obama campaign.It was long after the victory speeches and well past midnight that they gave voice to their excitment - the beat of drums down Bolyston Street.But it wasn't like that earlier in the day.Harvard Square at noon was a very quiet and different scene.

There was one lone Ralph Nader supporter out pushing her candidate on a street corner, but not the sea of Obama-Biden signs I was expecting to see, to suggest that this was going to be The Day. Except that there were the long lines of voters that started up shortly after the polls opened in the City at seven in the morning, and the fact that bright sunshine was out early for the first time after a couple of cold days, and that it was finally starting to warm up around here. But I couldn't help but wonder - and ask - if it was unusual for it to be so laid back and quiet on Election Day in Harvard Square. "Not really," replied the youngish saleslady. She looked to be in her late twenties, early thirties. She had already voted. They hand out - and wear - stickers to say that they had voted. "I think people here are just anxious about how the vote might go", she explained.

I understand. Massachusetts does not represent all of the United States of America. And, she continued: "There is a lot at stake".Of course, there is.Like the economy. And jobs. And the wars. And race relations in America - and beyond.

Let's not kid ourselves. Race was a factor - and better (or worse) race relations hung in the balance.But let's also give Barack Obama the credit that he is due. He ran his campaign trying not to be the Angry Black Man and, to a large extent, I think, it reflected how he has spent his life to this point.

I recall this passage from his book Dreams From My Father and how he appeared to eschew the stereotype of the black militant of the '60s. "I learned to slip back and forth between my black and white worlds", he wrote. "One of those tricks I had learned: people were satisfied so long as you were courteous and smiled and made no sudden moves. They were more than satisfied; they were relieved - such a pleasant surprise to find a well-mannered young black man who didn't seem angry all the time." I understand the how and the why of masking - and there's still much work to be done to improve relations.But Senator Obama and his campaign were about so much more than just that - he took it to another level, one which Senator McCain either did not get, or could not reach, or both.

What Senator Obama gave us instead were engaging and sober debates about the wars, about economics (jobs), social mobility, education, family - which were focussed especially on how to help those who are struggling. The unexpected but devastating financial meltdown of recent weeks helped sharpen and strengthen his focus.

It was a consistent, steady approach to the issues that held the promise of change, real change, change that people can believe in - and presumably do, now that the votes have been counted.He became the perfect messenger in my view for the message that a good majority of the country wanted to hear - and he stuck to it right from the very beginning of his candidacy.I happened to have cut-out and saved his remarks following Obama's unexpected victory in the Iowa caucuses. "You said the time has come to move beyond the bitterness and the pettiness and anger that has consumed Washington," he told those who were listening at the time. "To end the political strategy that's been all about division and instead make it about addition. To build a coalition for change that stretches through Red states and Blue states."

Sound familiar? It ought to. President-elect Obama took up the theme once again in his victory speech Tueday night and pressed it home once more. It was made all the more poignant and pressing preceded as it was by Senator McCain's acceptance of defeat. McCain's speech was arguably the finest hour of his campaign.

He returned to the man he was before he started his campaign. He wasn't just gracious in defeat, although he was that, but he reverted to the bi-partisan, straight-shooting but respectful approach that made him, that makes him the maverick of the Republican Party, and who was able to acknowledge and appreciate the special significance of Obama's election, which made him sound real again. It was the perfect bookend for Senator Obama's call later for an end to all of the silly partisanship and political immaturity and pettiness that divides people so unnecessarily in Wasington - and elsewhere.There may not have been two better opponents at this stage of the new chapter that is to be written in the history of the United States. Together, one in the Senate and the other in the White House, they may bring an end to the stale partisanship that has plagued party politics for too long and be the breakthrough that people outside the corridors of power are longing for.

This is President-elect Obama's audacious message of hope, Mr. Editor, and it is a tremendous responsibility that he has assumed. HOW significant is the victory? How historic? Well, we've all heard how it's been likened to the campaign and the election of President John F. Kennedy and the uplift his Presidency gave the country. Maybe so. But it was also JFK who promised the United States would land the first man on the moon before the end of the 1960s.

Meanwhile, his brother, Robert Kennedy, running for the Presidency in 1968 said that he could foresee the election of a black man to the White House in 40 years time. Politically, Mr. Editor, and speaking metaphorically of course, I believe that the world has seen the second lunar landing in 2008.