Pro-Obama congregants in Cleveland wait in line for 'as long as it takes' to take part in long-held election tradition

"You see what I'm talking about now," pastor Thomas Eppinger said as our van drove alongside the queue outside the polling station in downtown Cleveland. The line went along the block, around the corner and then round another corner, with more than a thousand people waiting patiently to vote in the bitter cold.

Sunday was 'souls to the polls' day in Cleveland, as it was in Cincinnati and Columbus and other towns across Ohio, and throughout black urban communities across America. Congregations like Pastor Eppinger's had gathered in the morning to sing and pray, then jumped in vans and descended on polling stations to practise their hard-won right to vote.

Despite a wait in line of at least two hours, these Cleveland voters, overwhelmingly black and overwhelmingly pro-Obama, showed no sign of disgruntlement. Barbara Dixon, 39, who had just joined the very back of the queue, said she was happy to hold on "as long as it takes, as I want to make sure that this election is won by a president who has values".

Given the voting preferences of the crowd, it was very much in the interests of the Obama campaign to keep everyone happy and in queue, despite the wait. So they passed down boxes of free pizza, and cheered people up by having music star John Legend walk down the line.

Cabral Franklin, 38, handing out pizza on behalf of the Obama campaign, said he thought the turnout was huge because black voters were anxious. "I think people fear Obama is going to need every vote he can get as the election is going to be so close."

Kim Hemphill, 47, having already fulfilled her two hours and standing at the front, said it had definitely been worth it "and that's not just because Obama's handsome and black. He has helped us, he's our president."

For Eppinger's congregation at the church of God's Tabernacle of Faith church in a suburb of Cleveland, Sunday began with his weekly service in which he didn't mince his words. "Today is a historic day, 'souls to the polls' day. So get down to the polls and vote. Our folks died to get us the right to vote, so go out and use it," he told his flock.

In recent years, the practice of going to church on the last Sunday before election day and then going together to vote has become a fundamental African American tradition. "It's our way of teaching our young people that you can't just sit on the side-lines criticising your leaders if you don't vote," Eppinger said in an interview.

But the day has much more than cultural significance. With all eyes focused on Ohio, the ultimate battleground state, the turnout among African Americans has the potential to swing the election.

Cuyahoga County, in which Cleveland sits, is the most heavily-populated area of the state, and almost a third of its 1.3 million people are African American. Exit polls in 2008 showed that black Ohioans made up 11% of the vote, with an overwhelming 98% of them backing Obama.

There's an additional poignancy to souls to the polls in Ohio this year that has made the congregation of God's Tabernacle of Faith take the drive to the polling station particularly personally. Because this was a day that very nearly didn't happen.

Earlier this year, John Husted, Ohio's Republican secretary of state, announced that he was closing polling stations on the last three days of the election. That included the final Sunday before election day – the very day that many African Americans hold sacred as the day they take their souls to the polls.

People wait in line for early voting in the parking lot of the Northland Park Center on 4 November 2012 in Columbus, Ohio. Photograph: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

Husted claimed he was making the change in order to ensure consistency in polling hours between different parts of the state. But Eppinger's congregants took it as a blatant attempt to stand in the way of their vote.

"Husted was trying to throw a monkey wrench into the deal," said Henry Warren, 64, who had come for Sunday service. "But it won't work – if you tell somebody they can't have something, then they want it that much more."

"He had a hidden agenda in doing this," Eppinger said. "Isn't it strange that he tried to stop souls to the polls after a historically high turnout in 2008 elected America's first African American president?"

In the end, the highly charged dispute over final Sunday voting went all the way to the US supreme court. Last month, the justices effectively ordered Husted to drop his decree and keep the polls open.

Eric Kearney, leader of the Democratic group in the Ohio state senate, presented a brief to the supreme court calling for on the justices to keep the early voting. "Souls to the polls this year perfectly moulds that church tradition and the need to re-elect the first African American president," he said.

Denise Bullock, 53, was on the bus from God's Tabernacle of Faith to the polling station in downtown Cleveland. Though she knew she would have to potentially wait for several hours before she could cast her ballot she was determined to do it.

"My family has looked into our ancestry and I know that some of my forebears died fighting for the right to vote, and it's always been something we talk about that we must vote in their memory. I was taught that by my parents when I was a child, and it's what I taught my children and it's what they will tell their children.

Church volunteers have been canvassing the local area to encourage people to participate in the voting drive. The campaign is not non-party political – Eppinger stressed to his congregation during his Sunday service that the point was to vote, not to vote for a particular party or candidate.

Members of the church have circulated the neighbourhood with leaflets saying: "I am a vessel and I vote". The flier promises that "we will pick you up and drop off wherever".

Democratic organisers hope that such dedicated outreach from black churches will sustain enthusiasm and thus turnout among black voters this year, giving Obama the edge. Blowing in the other direction though are harsh economic winds that have sustained unemployment levels among black Ohioans at above 13% – more than five points higher than the general US population.

Eppinger said that he did not blame Obama for black economic woes. "We know that African Africans have for years been last hired, first fired. When a company downsizes, it's the black worker who suffers," he said.