Critical Perspectives: Did Prosperity Contribute to the South's Abandonment of the Democratic Party?

2005 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 425-432
Author(s):  
W. J. Rorabaugh
Keyword(s):  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Thomas Jefferson ◽  
The South ◽  
George Bush ◽  
The Past ◽  
Past Generation ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Critical Perspectives

During the past generation the South largely has abandoned its traditional commitment to the Democratic Party and emerged as an increasingly strong bastion of the Republican party. In 2004, George Bush won 58 percent in the South but only 48 percent in the rest of the country. (Throughout this article the South is defined as the former Confederate states plus Kentucky and Oklahoma.) In contrast, as recently as 1960, John Kennedy carried the South; excluding the South, Nixon beat Kennedy. The South's commitment to the Democrats lasted more than 150 years, from the days of Thomas Jefferson until the 1960s. How, then, do we explain the decline of the Democrats and the rise of the Republicans in the South in the past forty years?

How Texas Turned Red

2020 ◽  
pp. 90-108
Author(s):  
Kenneth P. Miller
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Economic Policies ◽  
The South ◽  
Dormant State ◽  
The 1960S

This chapter explains how Texas came to align with the Republican Party. Texas is now the essential Republican state, but for most of its history it was part of the solid Democratic South. In the mid-twentieth century, the Texas Democratic Party divided into liberal and conservative factions—partly over race and civil rights but also over a range of questions including New Deal economic policies and anti-communism. Texas Democrats engaged in what V. O. Key called the most intense intraparty fight of any state in the South. The long-dormant state Republican Party began to revive in the 1960s as many Texans became alienated from a national Democratic Party that was shifting to the left. Republican gains produced a period of balanced two-party competition that lasted from the 1970s through the 1990s. By the early 2000s, the GOP established dominance, making Texas the nation’s largest and most powerful Republican state.

scholarly journals From Strom to Barack: Race, Ideology, and the Transformation of the Southern Party System

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 207-226
Author(s):  
Alan I. Abramowitz
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Party System ◽  
Policy Preferences ◽  
Racial Composition ◽  
The South ◽  
Hispanic Voters ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Race Ideology

The southern party system has undergone a dramatic transformation since the 1960s, a transformation that has affected both the electoral bases of the parties and their leadership. This transformation has involved two related trends-a shift in the racial composition of the Democratic Party at the mass and elite levels and an ideological realignment that has produced a much wider gap between the ideological orientations and policy preferences of Democratic and Republican leaders and voters. In the South, to an even greater extent than in the rest of the nation, the Democratic Party has become increasingly dependent on the support of nonwhite voters. Meanwhile, despite the growing size of the nonwhite electorate in the South, the Republican base has remained overwhelmingly white. The growing dependence of the Democratic Party in the South on African-American and more recently Hispanic votes has contributed to the party's increasing liberalism because African-American and Hispanic voters tend to strongly support activist government. And this trend has also contributed to the growing conservatism of the Republican base as conservative whites have continued to flee the Democratic Party for the GOP. As a result, the two-party system in the South now consists of a Democratic Party dominated by nonwhites and white liberals and a Republican Party dominated by white conservatives.

Religious Non-Affiliation

2021 ◽  
pp. 172-193
Author(s):  
William V. Trollinger
Keyword(s):  
Republican Party ◽  
Christian Right ◽  
Past Century ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Conservative Politics ◽  
The Past ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Political Success

For the past century, the bulk of white evangelicalism has been tightly linked to very conservative politics. But in response to social and cultural changes in the 1960s and 1970s, conservative white evangelicalism organized itself into the Christian Right, in the process attaching itself to and making itself indispensable to the Republican Party. While the Christian Right has enjoyed significant political success, its fusion of evangelicalism/Christianity with right-wing politics—which includes white nationalism, hostility to immigrants, unfettered capitalism, and intense homophobia—has driven many Americans (particularly, young Americans) to disaffiliate from religion altogether. In fact, the quantitative and qualitative evidence make it clear that the Christian Right has been a (perhaps the) primary reason for the remarkable rise of the religious “nones” in the past three decades. More than this, the Christian Right is, in itself, a sign of secularization.

scholarly journals South Carolina: Party Development in the Palmetto State

2003 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 91-108
Author(s):  
Robert P. Steed ◽  
Laurence W. Moreland
Keyword(s):  
South Carolina ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Party System ◽  
Southern States ◽  
The Past ◽  
Party Development ◽  
Party Activists ◽  
Partisan Realignment ◽  
Local Party

Paralleling developments in other southern states over the past three to four decades, South Carolina’s political system has undergone dramatic change. One of the more significant components of this change has been the partisan realignment from a one-party system dominated by the Democrats to a competitive two-party system in which Republicans have come to hold the upper hand. This increased electoral competitiveness has been accompanied by an increased organizational effort by both parties in the state. An examination of local party activists in 2001 points to a continuation of this pattern over the past ten years. In comparison with data from the 1991 Southern Grassroots Party Activists Survey, the 2001 data show the following: (1) the Republican Party has sustained its electoral and organizational gains of recent years; (2) the parties continue to attract activists who differ across party lines on a number of important demographic and socioeconomic variables; (3) there has been a continued sorting of political orientations and cues marked by sharply different inter-party ideological and issue positions; (4) the Democratic Party has become more ideologically homogeneous and more in line with the national party than previously; and (5) since 1991 perceptions of factionalism have declined in both parties, but still remain higher among Democrats than among Republicans.

scholarly journals Southern Politics After the Election of Presidential Clinton: Continued Transformation Toward the Republican Party?

1993 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 197-212 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles D. Hadley
Keyword(s):  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Electoral College ◽  
The South ◽  
Southern Politics ◽  
Southern State ◽  
White House ◽  
Presidential Candidates ◽  
Southern States ◽  
Democratic Vote

To whom does the South belong politically, now that an all-southern ticket has reclaimed the White House for the Democratic party? Review of 1992 voting returns for national, statewide, and legislative races in the South, contrasted with those from earlier presidential years, lead to only one conclusion: the South continues to move toward the Republican party. The Clinton-Gore ticket ran behind its percentage of the national vote in most southern states, as well as behind all Democratic candidates in statewide races, and would have won without any southern electoral votes; whereas Bush-Quayle ran ahead of their percentage of the national vote in every southern state except Clinton’s Arkansas, while Republicans gained seats in southern legislatures and congressional delegations. It is suggested that southern electoral college votes won by Democratic presidential candidates in 1976 and 1992 hinged upon Democratic vote-getters in races for statewide offices in each state carried except the presidential candidates’ home states.

Democrats in the South: The Race Question

2008 ◽  
pp. 503-512
Author(s):  
John Roy Lynch
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Racial Identity ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Active Part ◽  
The South ◽  
Army Officers ◽  
Official Recognition ◽  
Do So

This chapter explores how, when John Roy Lynch came to Chicago, whether or not he should take an active part in politics was one of the first questions that occurred to him. He had no intention of actively participating politically in local matters, but it occurred to him that like some other retired army officers, he could, with propriety, take an active part in national matters. But after going over the field very carefully, Lynch found that conditions nationally, as well as locally, were not such as would justify him in doing so. In fact, beginning with the unfortunate administration of President William Howard Taft, the colored American had no standing with either of the two major parties. The Democratic party, nationally, was still a white man's party and, beginning with the Taft administration, the Republican party was no longer a champion of human rights. In fact, the policy inaugurated by President Taft was equivalent to transforming the Republican party, as far as it was in the power of an administration to do so, into a race proscriptive party. In other words, racial identity regardless of merit was made a bar to official recognition.

scholarly journals The American Cultural War and the Restructuring of Kentucky Politics

SAGE Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 215824401987105
Author(s):  
James Larry Hood
Keyword(s):  
Affirmative Action ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Gay Marriage ◽  
Partisan Politics ◽  
National History ◽  
Political Configuration ◽  
The 1960S

The study is an integration of the last six decades’ local, state, and national history concerning the correlation of border state Kentucky’s partisan politics with the events and themes of the country’s long cultural war. Beginning in the 1960s, the two national parties gradually became far more distinct from one another concerning cultural values. The Democratic Party supported results-oriented affirmative action, a woman’s right to choose, gay marriage, and the need for a powerful, active federal government to protect and encourage all the above. The Republican Party took none of these positions. This led to a new political configuration along rearranged racial, demographic, geographic, and party lines. Where once Kentucky’s Democratic Party had near total control of state offices and Republicans had won federal offices now and then, the new configuration had Republicans threatening to control both federal and state offices.

scholarly journals THE NATIONAL ORGANIZATION FOR WOMEN AND THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IN REAGAN'S AMERICA

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
JOE J. RYAN-HUME
Keyword(s):  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
National Organization ◽  
National Organization For Women ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Demographic Shifts ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Reagan Era ◽  
The Impact

Abstract This article explores the emergence of women in the United States as a liberal voting group in the 1980s and the impact of this development on the power of liberalism, amid the Reagan revolution – an era often viewed as the apogee of conservatism. As the Republican party shifted in a more conservative direction in the 1980s, gender started to correlate with partisan preference/election outcomes in enough contests to give credence to the belief that women were becoming a decidedly liberal voting bloc. Contemporaneously, the equality-seeking movements of the 1960s and 1970s began institutionalizing their operations and exploiting these demographic shifts, becoming more entrenched than ever within the internal politics of the Democratic party. The National Organization for Women (NOW), the largest liberal women's group, proved to be particularly successful in this respect. Therefore, by presenting substantial archival evidence that liberal politicians and organizations remained a dynamic political force during the 1980s, this article details the growing organizational prowess of NOW and examines how liberals resisted the conservative challenge to fashion a political approach suited to the ‘Reagan Era’.

scholarly journals Dixie Backlash? Anti-Southern Affect and Party Support Outside the South

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 179-206
Author(s):  
Jonathan Knuckey
Keyword(s):  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Vote Choice ◽  
The Political ◽  
The South ◽  
Explanatory Variables ◽  
Partisan Change ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Party Support ◽  
Election Studies

The literature on partisan change in the American electorate has devoted considerable attention to explaining Republican gains in the South. Less time has been devoted to examining changes outside of the South, where a Democratic majority has persisted-and indeed grown-over the past two decades. This article examines whether the realignment toward the Republican Party in the South has resulted in a move toward the Democratic Party outside the South. Specifically, it is posited that the growing influence of the South within the Republican Party has resulted in a backlash against the GOP. Using data from the American National Election Studies, this article examines affect toward southerners as a determinant of the political behavior of non-southerners. Findings indicate that even after controlling for other explanatory variables, affect toward southerners is a significant predictor of how non-southerners evaluate the political parties, as well as vote choice in the 2008 presidential election. While partisanship and ideology remain the best predictors of vote choice among non-southerners, anti-southern backlash should not be discounted for the GOP's "Northern problem" in recent elections.

Industrial Revolution in the United States and Its Impact on the Relationship between the North and the South

2020 ◽  
Vol 162 (6) ◽  
pp. 86-98
Author(s):  
A.V. Taigildin ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Republican Party ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
The United States ◽  
The South ◽  
The North ◽  
A Minor ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

The impact of the industrial revolution in the United States on the relationship between its two economic and political regions – the North and the South – was discussed. In the first half of the 19th century, the interests of some regions diverged as the country proceeded with its economic development. This turned out to be a primary cause of contradictions between the North and the South that led to the Civil War of 1861–1865. The development of trade, industry, and transport system during the period under consideration was analyzed. Their role in the conflict was revealed. Special attention was paid to the land question, around which the disputes among industrialists of the North, farmers, and plantation owners of the South revolved. The problem of slavery as a reason for the disagreement between the two regions was emphasized. Based on the literature data, it was shown that the issue of slavery was a minor one. It was used to merely provide cover for the actual economic problems. The conclusion was made that the industrial revolution in the United States triggered political changes, which resulted in the formation of the Republican Party and in the split within the Democratic Party.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document