Frist!!

No, I'm not racist. I just don't want to associate with colored folk!

Racial backlash played a big part; FDR was a hero in the South. However, economics certainly had a big impact as well--as the South transitioned from a very class-based agricultural society to a less class-stratified industrial society, a lot of things, including politics, changed.

One other BIG piece is being missed--attitudes toward the military. The South is very pro-military; as the Democrats became less pro-military in the 60's and 70's, it hurt them greatly in the South.

It was liberal policies that allowed the middle class to grow so strong so quickly, and it has been the dismantling of those policies that has allowed the middle class to weaken so quickly.

Please note that the South did not become a Republican stronghold until the 1980s. The process of "dixiecrat" defections to the GOP did not begin in earnest until the passage of LBJ's civil right legislation in the mid-sixties. Note also that the 1980s marked the beginning of the process by which older suburbs (e.g., Westchester County in NYS) started becoming more Democratic. Finally, you will remember that Nixon's "Southern Strategy" was all about preying on the racist fears of dixiecrats and northern urban ethnics to build a permanent Republican majority. Racism is central to the creation of the south as GOP bastion.

Race. One cannot understand anything about the American South without taking race into account. And I say that as someone who was born and bred there. The level of sub-rosa racism -- and the level of denial about it -- is hard to believe if you haven't grown up around it and seen it up close.

Is this a serious question? It's not at all difficult to find suburbs full of lefties, especially here in out-of-touch California.

The whole GOP mantra is essentially, "more for me, less for you" and over enough time, or enough population density, that dissipates. In the long run, they are going down.

It doesn't hurt, of course, that they are incompetent clowns.

Well, you have to admit a transferrence of racist attitudes onto economic policies within the republican party at least provides a motive for supporting economic policies--at least as they've been expressed by the Reagan and W administrations--that appear otherwise to be whimsically nuts.

Unfortunately, the argument that the southern strategy worked isn't tied to racism sounds like rationalizing BS, basically because it is rationalizing BS. Kevin nails one assumption as flawed: that the suburbs had to go GOP is not really valid.

First of all the racial reasons behind the flight to the suburbs were pretty clear. The original Levittown explicitly excluded blacks. And the idea of course that racism was limited to the South is ridiculous - anyone remember the busing riots in Boston?

Second, the argument ignores the other possible explanation - the South's politics has taken over national politics. Look at the national leadership - they're all southerners, Delay, Bush, Frist, with only a few exceptions. And those coded racist appeals worked nation-wide (e.g. Willy Horton)

Third anyone been to parts of the South? Remember Sweet Home Alabama? Look over a lot of the people who switched to the GOP - they were segregationists.

This reminds me a bit of Dinesh D'Souza's "end of racism" argument. It's intellectual sounding hooey - but it's hooey.

Racial backlash.

I'm here in a completely un-suburban part of the south (small town/rural). There was no Republican Party here when I was growing up. Starting in the late 1960s, there began to be one. Now it's the dominant party.

It's about "culture"*, not economic likemindedness. *That's code for "keeping down niggers, queers, and uppity women".

So.. anyone who believes in individual rights and free enterprise is a racist? That attitude might help liberals continue to feel comfortably superior, but besides being shallow and self-serving, it sure ain't gonna win you a lot of votes in the next election..

I will support a previous poster's point that part of the "culture" mix is also attitudes about military intervention (the culture war tactic has been to fuse those with attitudes about the military itself).

the "right" to do as they pleased with their private property and private businesses...

How dare they! Before you know it, these people will be choosing their own "religions."

Simply put, the US Civil War isn't over.

The fact that the Red State/Blue State maps largely reprise the old Confederacy is not an accident.

I think one could make a good argument that over the last 30 years the ideologies of the Confederacy have been steadily advancing on the political front.

So, will we see slavery again?

Dunno, certainly more regressive behaviors have been rekindled in the recent past... like Nazi Germany.

I can not speak to the South, but the key reason for northern suburbs in the midwest is racism and it is virulent. I would even argue that much of the angst about Roe v Wade is racism in disguise. To be sure there is a religious right, but in fact a good portion of that group is anything but religious at least in a Christian way. Roe gave the racists a basis for attacking the liberals, the "activist courts" and the federal government which did not result in them immediately being labeled racist. The same is true with the homophobes--they are against gay marriage not because they are ignorant bigots but because they want to preserve that Christian institution of marriage. Bottom line, Dr. Suess had it right with the Sneetches. It is all race, all the time.

The Democrats became anti-military in the 60s? JFK and LBJ didn't support the troops? I'm pretty sure that Nixon won the presidency (and the South) while promising to end the war by 1970.

Well, the analysis is at a minimum not fully developed, because it doesn't explain why the Republicans became the party of [arguably racist] white suburbanites. Based on past history, the Democratic party, with base in the South and the Northern white working class, would have seemed a more logical vehicle for covert racism.

I love it when folks who live in lily-white neighborhoods (isn't OC zero point two percent white, Kevin) talk as if they know what they're saying when it pertains to race.

Come sit in a surburban neighborhood's classroom, Kevin, and see the white/black ratio, consider your own (do an analysis of red versus blue states and the racial composites therein) and then go back to your limosine liberal enclaves and tell everyone how open minded you folks are.

For goodness sakes, look at a freaking census and you won't illustrate such glaring ignorance.

Once again, Kevin entirely forgets about black people.

THEY haven't gone Republican. Not in the South, not in the suburbs.

The economic reasons cited for the switchover to Republicans have been in effect since the end of World War II (if not before). But the switchover to a Republican South did not take place before 1960 and was completed by the 1980's. This was exactly the time when the Democrats came out in favor of civil rights and the Republicans turned from the party of Lincoln to the party of Strom Thurmond.

This is about race.

Several of the posters above nail it: it's about race. I was in elementary school in Georgia during the height of the "busing" experiments, and I can tell you that many of my suburban neighbors were pissed off. Racial tension, racial battles at school. I also remember feeling wholly out of place in a family where HHH was cool, while the rest of the neighborhood was all about Nixon.

But the switchover to a Republican South did not take place before 1960 and was completed by the 1980's.

I double-dog dare you to look at the composition of the state houses, state senates, LT. Govrs and Governors of the southern states in, say, the mid-90s and then try to retype that with a straight face.

Go look it up. You're in for quite a shocker. If you want facts, that is.

"I was in elementary school in Georgia during the height of the "busing" experiments, and I can tell you that many of my suburban neighbors were pissed off."

Think you'd have liked the riots in Boston (let's see....is that city Republican) any better?

Upon signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Lyndon Johnson is said to have told aide Bill Moyers, "I think we have just delivered the South to the Republican Party for a long time to come."

It's about race.

Well, it appears pretty well supported by history that the "South's" answer to race relations was segregation, until the era of legal "de-segregation" began. Add onto formal desegregation the additional remedy of affrimative action, and there you have it.

The Democratic party became the party of civil rights. At that point, the Republican party could have either chosen to depart the political field or become what it is at the moment, which is the party that believes no further remedies are needed to address racism.

Why anyone would question that, as a general rule, the people who were in favor of overt segregation until the 1960's would do a u-turn on a dime and vote for the party trying to dismantle the segretationalist system, I mean, isn't the answer obvious?

Since you're so keen on using the Boston riots as your proof of something (what, exactly?), RW, did the Boston riots last for years and years, as did the racial fighting and tension in the schools in the South?

It's so hard to pinpoint what I find so frustrating about these discussions (the comments, not Kevin's post), but to start with, I can't treat as serious anyone who acts like people, cultures and regions don't change- ever. That's not an apology for the South or a claim racism isn't a strong undercurrent today, but aren't you all at least mildly curious of what might have changed from 1865 to 1965? Or even 1935 to 1965? To my eye, there are two overriding political economic shifts: agricultural development starts black migration, up North and to Southern cities, paving the way for the Second Reconstruction. Second, in the postwar years, a large number of white Southerners passed from the working class to the petit bourgeoisie in all its variety. I don't think one has to choose an either/or (race or class) to see how both transformations are immensely important to the political life of the South and the nation. To that end, the Johnson/Shafer argument is a useful one, even if it is worth tweaking it to give class specificity to "suburban" politics.

but besides being shallow and self-serving,

. . . and TRUE. . .

it sure ain't gonna win you a lot of votes in the next election..
Posted by: Shag on March 14, 2006 at 3:37 PM | PERMALINK

So, will we see slavery again?
Posted by: Buford on March 14, 2006 at 3:44 PM | PERMALINK

Hell no.

Minimum wage is cheaper labor than slavery. You don't have to house and medically treat minimum wage employees. Especially if you dismantle medicaid and social security, and all forms of taxation on capital

Kruse (and several posters above) is absolutely right: racism is integral to the creation of the suburbs, so suburbanization cannot be considered apart from issues of race.

There is no way that you can talk about the rise of the GOP in the south without talking about race and backlash, and the Civil War (War Between the State, War of Northern Agression, Recent Unpleasantness, etc), Lincoln, etc., etc. etc.

Was it overt? Yeah sometimes it was (there is a reason that Helms and Thurmond went Republican - though doesn't explain Byrd). But I would still say that is way to obvious/easy explanation in most cases it seems way more subversive and unconscious.

Don`t forget the huge shift in population southward (ever heard the term "Sunbelt" ? - See Kevin Philips work) in the 70-80`s time frame which matches the shift in national politics very closely (and where are MOST of our military installations located ?)

Don`t get caught focusing on symptoms and ignore the root cause(s)

"The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist thinks it will change; the realist adjusts the sails." - William Arthur Ward

"RW, did the Boston riots last for years and years, as did the racial fighting and tension in the schools in the South?"

No.
You got me. A bunch of liberals in Massachusetts did not riot for years and years. They only rioted for a short period, primarily out of overt racism that to this day still goes excused.

While in the south, most kids in a classroom are sitting near classmate of color (per the census) and you don't have things like riots over verdicts or Bensenhurst.

That should make you feel better.

Gee, that explains it. I mean, it's true there are suburbs in the South and none in New Jersey, or Connecticut, or California or any of those other Blue States! So suburbanization explains it all!

Can you define lily-white for us RW? As of 2000, Orange County consisted of 51.3% "white persons, not of Hispanic origin." I think it's you who needs to look at a census, as opposed to your off the cuff responses based on made up facts: http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/06/06059.html

Here in Fairfax, Va., the larger and more prosperous the suburbs grow the more Democratic they become. I think the partisan proclivities in the deep South can be summarized in morals and religion mixing with a "angry white male" base meaning that we are still suffering (ie., Bush) a Civil War hangover.

The South became a Republican cornerstone in 1972 with the courtship of Wallace voters. Bang. By 1976, Democrats feared that and nominated a Southern white to counteract it. Had Wallace not been shot and had he continued to run and draw of his 14% of the vote, the 2 parties would have simply continued along their economic policy divides. And no waaaaay would the party have nominated Jimmy Carter. Or Bill Clinton, for that matter.

Nixon's Southern Strategy destroyed any semblance of political rationality in this country. Who knows what we have now. A minor form of damnation, I think.

"Can you define lily-white for us RW?"

Thanks for the link. It's up to 1.7% black. I'm sure that means Kevin may pass one on the way to the grocery story (every other trip)!

1.7%. Tell us more about folks running away from the coloreds, Kevin!

Double B, thanks for attempting to conflate a thread on black/white discussions into one including latino backgrounds since that is the only way to muddy the water over an open-and-closed reference.

Nice try.

It appears RW's point is that either there are Democrats in the south or racists in the north, or both. Gee, how about that?

I think any hand-wringing over the "South" should probably be recharacterized as so as to wring some hands over the rural vote.

The South covers two elements of the Republican base, the racist vote and the fundamentalist religious vote. The Republicans take these voters where they find them. If they find them in mostly rural Red States, then that is one big reason why these states are red.

We have suburbs in SoCal. Certainly, the search for the good public school district causes some white flight. However, we also have a Republican governor who during his first career appeared naked in a shower scene and boasted about boning multiple babes while also making sure not to alienate any dudes who might also have found him attractive. Please see "Pumping Iron."

This would probably not fly in a state in which the racist/fundamentalist daily-double prevails, regardless of the number of suburbs.

I once heard an African-American writer, born in the south who moved to the north as a teenager during the Civil Rights Movement describe the differences this way:

In the south, you could go to a white neighbor's home, sit on their porch swing and share a glass of lemonade. What you couldn't do was sit on the bus together or attend the same school.

In the north, you could sit on the bus, go to the same school, but no one would ever offer you a glass or lemonade, or invite you to their home.

I figured she was in a position to know.

It's silly to conflate the south and suburbanization. The South clearly went Republican because of (mostly) covert racism. However, the suburbs in the blue states weren't exactly Mondale country, either. My impression of the south is that it's not all that suburbanized, so I think you are looking at developments that are related only by their connection to race. As posters have noted above, the Republicanization of the south is a more recent phenomenon than suburbanization.

It is about race. The Georgia General Assembly just narrowly voted down a measure to ammend the state Constitution to permit state funding of private (read religious, read Christian) shools. This was an attempt to bolster funding for private schools so that white Republicans can afford to take their kids out of racially mixed public schools. The Democrats banded together to defeat the measure but only because a 2/3 majority is required to ammend the Constitution. The Republicans think they can set the whole Country back to the 1950s. Perhaps the Republicans should listen to one of their own:

"Encourage free schools, and resolve that not one dollar of money shall be appropriated to the support of any sectarian school. Resolve that neither the state nor nation, or both combined, shall support institutions of learning other than those sufficient to afford every child growing up in the land the opportunity of a good common school education. . . Keep the church and state forever separated." Ulysses S. Grant

Maybe over the years white racism has become much more covert that one must look at indirect indicators to define it. However, black racism today is alive and well, and very much overt. Would the overwhelminingly liberal white posters on this blog address all forms of racism or only the PC kind?

"So.. anyone who believes in individual rights and free enterprise is a racist?"

I think the argument is: since blacks are uniformly for big government programs, if you are against it, you must be a racist.

I'm a 72 year old white female who grew up in Alabama and live in Georgia and I would say the primary reason Democrats turned to the Republican party had to do with the Civil Rights Act. No bones about it.

"Several of the posters above nail it: it's about race."

Of course it's about race. The Dems have been playing the race card come every election. Do you think that might alienate some folks who are being demonized?

In defense of RW, and dismissing the undercurrent of his arguments (ie the greater argument that Kevin puts forward, ie race drives southern attitudes/politics more than anything...)

Having lived my entire life in the south with all extended family either north of the Mason-Dixon and west of the Rockies, having been told just how racist my area of the country is, gets tired.

Sure southerner's do harbor a rather unhealthy amount of racism... but...

Can't hold a candle to the ignorance, fear, and overt hatred non-southern white Americans have towards people of color. This transcends race and class, and lets face it, geography.

My high school was over 50% African American, I lived in downtown Atlanta proper for the better part of a decade where I was a minority. I admire African-American culture and people, and feel very comfortable being the only white face in the room; something that I doubt residents of Orange County can state with any sincerety.

Having friends and family relentlessly paint a picture of just how hopelessly bleak southern attitudes are towards race was and is condescending to the core, and I identify myself as a Yankee with a southern accent.

This is merely projection. Why deal with your own issues of race when you can blame 'red-staters?' Sure as hell is easy to blame the other, now isn't it?

I say all this acknowledging America has a problem with its attitude towards race, and understanding that I benefitted directly towards federal efforts to desegregate the south.

Now if northerners and Californians can get with their own fucking program and desegregate, themselves, rather than point fingers, maybe we can make some progress on the whole issue.

Fact is, while black kids in my county have to ride a bus for 70 minutes each day while residents of Monmouth County, New Jersey can ignore Asbury Park from a segregated distance; any diagnosis on this issue of race is stunted before it gets started.

But keep pointing fingers, to paraphrase our rightard's parliance about winning voters, but that's a brilliant way to disseminate progressive ideals...

"I'm a 72 year old white female who grew up in Alabama and live in Georgia and I would say the primary reason Democrats turned to the Republican party had to do with the Civil Rights Act. No bones about it."

Only 64 percent of Democrats in Congress voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act (153 for, 91 against in the House; and 46 for, 21 against in the Senate). But 80 percent of Republicans (136 for, 35 against in the House; and 27 for, 6 against in the Senate) voted for the 1964 Act.

People moved to suburbia after the war because tract houses were cheap to build and land was cheap. It was hard to house 3 million post war families by craming more apartments into cities.

Right, that was before the re-alignment. The Dems were the home of bigots then, the Republicans are now.

"I admire African-American culture and people, and feel very comfortable being the only white face in the room; something that I doubt residents of Orange County can state with any sincerety."

Which Orange County? The one on TV or the one in California?

I love how the southern Republicans keep calling for lower taxes. In net effect, most southern states don't pay taxes (there are exceptions such as Florida and Texas). As we all know and have blogged about here and elsewhere, these states get more back from the federal govt than they pay. I am mighty sick of hearing them tell us what the hell they want to do with our (blue state) monies.

Secondly, more concrete research is needed regarding all the blather about how the South is more patriotic. New York state has more soldiers, and had more people killed, in Iraq than any other state. My guess is California must be a close second.

"New York state has more soldiers, and had more people killed, in Iraq than any other state. My guess is California must be a close second."

How many are actually from NYC? I bet they are mostly from the red counties rather than the few blue ones.

The South became a GOP stronghold beginning in 1948 when Hubert Humphrey and Truman insisted on a civil rights plank in the Demo platform. The Dixiecrats fled the party that year and ran Strom Thurmond. That started it. When the Kennedys and LBJ backed the civil rights efforts that completed it. Especially the signing of the CR act of 64 and the voting rights act of 65. The reactionary Dems in the south and elsewhere fled into the waiting arms of the GOP and Nixon's southern strategy didn't hurt either. Racism and economics go hand in hand here. Stupid southern whites feared any economic gains by blacks would hurt them and dirty fucking race baiting politicos did everything in their power to convince them it was a zero sum game the the dumb fucking crackers bought it all.

Do you think that might alienate some folks who are being demonized?
Posted by: Freedom Fighter on March 14, 2006 at 4:48 PM | PERMALINK

Yes. It surely alienated the muslims of the world when they were demonized by a cartoon.

How did the GOP win the South? Let's look to Richard Nixon, whose "Southern Strategy" turned the tide in favor of the GOP in the South.

Economically, Nixon was fairly liberal and a self-professed Keynesian. He proposed numerous expansions in gov't spending for education and social welfare, all of which were heavily touted during his campaign. He even wanted national health care. None of these policies would appeal to upwardly mobile, economically conservative suburbanites.

So how did Nixon add such voters to the GOP base? He used neo-racist code words like "states rights" and promised to enforce the status quo with a "law and order" platform.

At this point, even many Republican leaders have admitted that the party exploited racist sentiment from the 1960s through the 1980s. Why are some still so desperate to deny it?

I believe the issues are so enmeshed it's impossible to unravel them.

But the myth is that the South has some sort of monopoly on these trends.

White flight happened everywhere the economics would support it. Whether you're talking private schools or suburbs where the prices acted to promote de facto segregation, these are alive and well in every damned corner of this country.

You'd be hard pressed to find resistence to school integration more vehement and more tinged with hatred and fear than that which occured in South Boston or Philadelphia.

I refer ya'll to Randy Newman's song "Rednecks'.

Although racism is a close second, nothing trumps low economic status when it comes to the bigotry of exclusion. There are only so many seats at the table they set, and buying one is the surest way to dine there. Sometimes guests are invited for consideration of inclusion, which may be granted if they are exceptionally beautiful, talented, or resourceful. There's always a price to pay, though, usually involving betrayal in one form or another. Luckily, that price is too high for many to pay--at least in its entirety--which is why there are many beautiful, talented, and resourceful people who are on the noble side of the class warfare bigots never stop waging.

Although we're starting to get warmed up here, especially with the reference above to "dirty fucking crackers" remember, Kevin's original post was more along the lines of "if Dems are trying to figure out how to carry a Southern state or two, is the issue racism or some sort of economic-based suburbanism?"

Great question, IMHO off target. Remember gang, that the Nixon administration was over thirty years ago. The Republican's already had the racist vote then, as they do now.

Today, the reason for the Republican trifecta of the House, Seanate and Presidency is becase in addition to the racist vote, the fundamentalist vote has been added, and most importantly, the "we all know that all government programs are worthless" vote pushed them over the top.

Compare Nixon. He may have had the racist vote, but given that a significant proportion of the voting public was either from the WWII generation, or had directly taken part in the Federal government mandates civil rights movement, it was tough sledding in 1972 to assert the bald, unsupported proposition that "all government programs are worthless."

That particular meme needed a bit more seasoning.

i would like to second in defense of RW from this perspective:

i grew up as a Navy brat and never lived anywhere longer than 7yrs. my extended family lives in NC and has since the beginning of the state. i've lived overseas and in several other states. i currently live 30 miles from the Canadian border in NYS. so i've seen alot of different places, i've been in the majority, and i've been the minority.

i get pretty damn tired of the all "Southerners are racists" talking points too, and the "Southerners vote Republican b/c they're racist" assumption. {{my mom comes from such a long line of Democrats that she votes Dem without even knowing who the candidate is}}

i'll say this, i never encountered so much overt racism and hostility until i moved up here, especially from educated people who supposedly knew otherwise. this is a rural area, but even people who'd been other places, or have masters degrees freely and openly blame minorities for the problems in this area. and i've heard more racial epithets in the 7 yrs i've lived here than in the 14 i lived in MD and SW VA combined.

it seems to me that whenever race or racism is brought up in relation to politics the automatic assumption is that anything to do with the South is tainted by racism, therefore suspect, and unworthy of consideration. the default perspective seems to be that there just can't be any/or as much/or as bad racism in the North, or that if there is it's just not a problem we're going to deal with.

racism is a national issue, manifested differently (or maybe not so differently) throughout the country. if we're going to look at it as a political problem, then the whole country has to be involved.

so y'all can assume what you will, but to try to reduce the past Republican supremacy in "the South" to an either/or equation of race/economics is just and exercise in futility.

Its funny seeing a Leftist don his pith helmet, doff his magnifying glass and wade into the nether regions of the great unwashed red states.

How about this idea? Instead of developing elaborate, ideologically comforting confections such as this, why don't you, umm, like, *ask* those people about their beliefs and values?

hmm?

"Yes. It surely alienated the muslims of the world when they were demonized by a cartoon."

Yeah, and that is just so much worse than massacring a school full of children, or incinerating thousand in an office building. Maybe the weak and backward Moslems should worry about wearing thin the tolerance of the non-Moslems world wide.

Question : So: was Republican ascendancy in the South due primarily to economic likemindedness or to racial backlash?

Answer: Neither

Question: Well then what was it due to, Oh wise one?

Answer: The New Left

Come on, guys:

"Stupid southern whites feared any economic gains by blacks would hurt them and dirty fucking race baiting politicos did everything in their power to convince them it was a zero sum game the the dumb fucking crackers bought it all. "

Should I be disgusted with myself to feel sympathy with these dumb fucking crackers?

I mean, sure their ancestors have propagated and participated in one of the greatest crimes against humanity in recorded history, but at least many of these dumb fucking crackers have the balls and integrity to acknowledge their participation in said crimes.

Unlike most white Americans outside of the south, who are content to distill history into a soundbite while they fling shit at someone else, and by doing so declare absolution from those crimes, despite having a lifestyle which has hinged on the derivatives of the aformentioned crimes listed above?

Put simply, angryspittle, would those dumb crackers be any less dumb if you discovered one of your ancestors owned else or trafficked someone else?

Kevin: Not absolutely on target (in that it initially covers other material than the rise of residentially segregated suburbs), but nevertheless a fascinating book: Sundown Towns, by Jim Loewen. It looks at residential segregation since the Civil War, including the rise of the suburbs after WW2. A bit heavy slogging at times, because he feels the need to document many of his claims, perhaps ad nauseam, but overall, fascinating.

the reason the South became a Republican stronghold following World War II was due less to racial backlash than to the postwar growth of suburbia

Who is this idiot? The development patterns of suburbia allowed for the resegregation of American society and the resegregation of American schools. Separating the two seems pointless, unless he has some axe to grind.
.

e1 I think you are correct to a degree, there is no promised land up north for black people versus the South in general. But as someone who has lived in Texas and Michigan for extended periods, I feel the threat of violence hangs over the heads of Southern blacks while the economic hammer seems more prevelent up North.

Historically I think that Angryspittle nails the point of view I have as well.

It is certainly a complicated issue and one that can be debated forever. I think the bullheadedness of most people make it impossible to come together on too many issues today.

Sorry Fitz but the New Left is a product of delusional paranoia- The mainstream democratic party is no more liberal than most republicans a generation ago- the political discourse spectrum has moved to the right- modern centrists would be considered conservative in the eighties- which begs the question what are you?

It's both, of course.

White flight leads to suburbanization.

And suburban property taxes, along with exclusionary zoning and the closed social circles that accompany them, lead directly to a Republican fiscal/tax plank in party platform.

They not only feed each other, they're one and the same. And it holds true in northern suburbs as well.

In the south, you could go to a white neighbor's home, sit on their porch swing and share a glass of lemonade. What you couldn't do was sit on the bus together or attend the same school.

In the north, you could sit on the bus, go to the same school, but no one would ever offer you a glass or lemonade, or invite you to their home.

I don't know about her, but I'd take the education and the transportation and fuck the lemonade.

"I don't know about her, but I'd take the education and the transportation and fuck the lemonade."

The north is desegregated?

I had to laugh at Freedom Fighter:
He notes that a higher percentage of Republicans than of Democrats voted for the Civil Rights Act. Of course, at that time the Republicans were drastically outnumbered: 2-1 in the Senate and 3-2 in the House.

How did the Republicans ever make up this incredible deficit? It was called the "Southern Strategy," the not-so-subtle courting of comservative -- that is anti-civil-rights -- southerners. When you take the Southern Democrats off the Democratic side of the vote and put them on the Republican side, that basically results in the Republicans'slim current majorities. And that's actually how the South, and the country, got Republican.

That's also why the Democratic vote was relatively narrow in 1964 -- many of those Democrats from the South were really modern Republicans -- Nixon just hadn't told them that yet. Also, Nixon and Reagan and their ilk hadn't yet purged the Republicans of their small liberal faction of Northeast Republicans -- the Rockefeller, Javits, Ribicoff, Brooke group. The modern Republican Party can't take credit for their votes any more than it can reasonably claim to be the party of Lincoln.

One needs only trace the race game from Reconstruction until Wallace got shot to know how little changed. By the time white southerners got over the fact the Republicans were the party of Lincoln (not until about 1986 here in AL) the Repubs had been playing the race card as well as the old Southern Dems, even better. And remember, starting with Teddy Roosevelt and continuing through Nixon, the Repubs did their best to disassociate with the blacks. Nixon just knocked the ball into the hole.
Racism always trumped class warfare in the South.

In defense of RW:

they would not be any less dumb. They would all be tragic victims of a long time ago past. For me the issue is not slavery or dumbness. It is trying to make a measured look at history. I can see where you are coming from, and I don't blame anyone for their ancestors. But when the Confederate flag issues comes up and it is defended for bullshit reasons (and everyone knows it), or when it seems hard for a Yankee to run for President as a Dem and get any support from the South, you must admit, it seems like there is sort of a grudge there from the folks down South. What you should say is the garbage cuts both ways. Randy Newman got that subtlety. It is not a bad place to start a debate....

This is all very well, but when do we get to talk about how the Left hates religion again?

Um -- correction. Ribicoff was a Democrat.

Oh Fitz Fitz Fitz Fitz Fitz (sigh)

There isn't any "New Left". There hasn't been one since about 1973, and even then it only had lasted a decade (since the Port Huron Statement of 1962). But that doesn't stop people like you from making stuff up and then demanding we all debate the stuff you make up as though it were real.

When DO those lobotomy stitches come out, by the way? Do they itch?

While in the south, most kids in a classroom are sitting near classmate of color (per the census) and you don't have things like riots over verdicts or Bensenhurst.

why do you think public school funding lacks so greatly in the south and when did that trend start RW? um, does 1964 ring a bell. Sure you may find a white student next to a student of color in a southern classroom, but both are getting a substandard education cause the well to do whites moved their kids to private schools and then set about to remove as much funding from public schools as possible.

I think that CFShep nailed it earlier & I'd put myself in agreement with ei's observtions too.

I'd say that the South's republicanism is indeed tied to it's suburbanization & that suburbanization is itself tied to racism. that last part goes for Northern, Western, & midwestern suburbanization too. Racial differenc is written into the American landscape, in suburbs, exurbs, inner cities, school districts, etc, in a way that's very hard to untangle. remember that MLK Jr. & the civil rights movbement were very succsessful in fighting de jure segregation in the south, but much less so in fighting de facto segregation up north, in chicago for example.

it seems to me that Kevin's "chicken and egg" question is a little too simplistic. certainly a racial backlash helped drive certain kinds of southern suburbanization, which in turn probably helped bring voter's to the GOP that would not have come for racial reasons alone. In fact, since the racial backlash vote would almost certainly have gone to the Republicans post 1964 anyway, & especially with Nixon's southern strategy, then maybe suburbanization is primarily responsible for bringing Southerner's to the GOP who wouldn't otherwise have found their way there. this in some ways jibes with an observation that someone (i forget who-old article)made about Al gore Sr., that his work in congress had allowed many people in his state to rise to do well enought that they started voting Republican.

anyway, short of it is: you can't take race out of it. But you also can't simply say that the South increasingly voting GOP for the last 30 years is due to "racial backlash," (at least not to a greater degree than the idea that the whole country becoming more conservative in the same time period is due to racial backlash). That's just too simple an idea & one that really only makes sense if you don't know anything about the South. To the extent that it helps move us beyond the idea that the South is just some damn weird cracker filled place where racism flows into people like it's in the drinking water, this is a good post. but, it sure doesn't take into account a whole bunch of nuances (black southerners, increasingly diverse suburbs, differences between the sunbelt and "the South", suburbs vs exurbs, etc.) that would help to better understand this question.

I think that CFShep nailed it earlier & I'd put myself in agreement with ei's observtions too.

I'd say that the South's republicanism is indeed tied to it's suburbanization & that suburbanization is itself tied to racism. that last part goes for Northern, Western, & midwestern suburbanization too. Racial differenc is written into the American landscape, in suburbs, exurbs, inner cities, school districts, etc, in a way that's very hard to untangle. remember that MLK Jr. & the civil rights movbement were very succsessful in fighting de jure segregation in the south, but much less so in fighting de facto segregation up north, in chicago for example.

it seems to me that Kevin's "chicken and egg" question is a little too simplistic. certainly a racial backlash helped drive certain kinds of southern suburbanization, which in turn probably helped bring voter's to the GOP that would not have come for racial reasons alone. In fact, since the racial backlash vote would almost certainly have gone to the Republicans post 1964 anyway, & especially with Nixon's southern strategy, then maybe suburbanization is primarily responsible for bringing Southerner's to the GOP who wouldn't otherwise have found their way there. this in some ways jibes with an observation that someone (i forget who-old article)made about Al gore Sr., that his work in congress had allowed many people in his state to rise to do well enought that they started voting Republican.

anyway, short of it is: you can't take race out of it. But you also can't simply say that the South increasingly voting GOP for the last 30 years is due to "racial backlash," (at least not to a greater degree than the idea that the whole country becoming more conservative in the same time period is due to racial backlash). That's just too simple an idea & one that really only makes sense if you don't know anything about the South. To the extent that it helps move us beyond the idea that the South is just some damn weird cracker filled place where racism flows into people like it's in the drinking water, this is a good post. but, it sure doesn't take into account a whole bunch of nuances (black southerners, increasingly diverse suburbs, differences between the sunbelt and "the South", suburbs vs exurbs, etc.) that would help to better understand this question.

According to this essay, it is true up until the 1960s that racist appeals won in the South, but those racist appeals were from Democrats. What changed in the 60s was not that Republicans started making racist appeals to Southern voters, but that Democrats stopped making those appeals.

Was there EVER a time in which whites in the South did NOT vote to support racists? Was there ever a time in which they did not vote as "Conservative" as any region in America? Was there ever a time in which they were anything but religious fanatics, eager to vote in like minded politicians?

If not, why try to explain the Southern vote in any other way than as one of nearly complete stasis in their underlying preferences? The anomaly in the Southern vote was the one that existed BEFORE the rise of the GOP in the South, namely the numerous decades in which they voted Democratic even while the Democratic Party took a non-Conservative turn -- and that anomaly itself was explained by a form of stubborn Southern stasis, which had them voting their prejudices against the Republican Party instead of in favor of their many Northern blood brothers in that party.

GWH-

I'm with you, vis a vis the Southern Swastika. I lived in Georgia when they tried to take that shit off the state flag. I had a college roommate from Maryland, of all places, who tried to hang one of those things up in our room. I told him that I would be happy to defacate on it and light it on fire if I saw it again... oh, and by the way, you're from MARYLAND, what the fuck are you doing with a symbol of the KKK?

The whole heritage not hate meme gets thrown out the windown with a timeline of the history of the re-appropriation of this filth.

Frankly, I agree with angryspittle's assertions to a degree, with the caveate that his lack of acknowledgement for greater culpability, fused with his blatant stereotyping, pretty much turns his argument on its face.

He's a progressive, liberal dude who has probably lived in a lilly white suburban community in Connecticut. In junior high, he was probably taught about how Grant and Lee and Monitor and Merrimack settled scores, and voila, the good side, HIS side, won.

No need for introspection. Just fuck them dumb ass crackers in the South, and everything is fine.

ahh-I don't know why that posted twice. sorry.

also tho:

"In the south, you could go to a white neighbor's home, sit on their porch swing and share a glass of lemonade. What you couldn't do was sit on the bus together or attend the same school.

In the north, you could sit on the bus, go to the same school, but no one would ever offer you a glass or lemonade, or invite you to their home.

I don't know about her, but I'd take the education and the transportation and fuck the lemonade. "

Well, yeah, do first things first. But I hope you get that education, transportation, and lemonade are thoroughly interrelated. and that "lemonade" in this case means "social closeness" or something similarly un-trivial.

Bullshit on Mr. Risen. It was totally about race. I was there.

I once heard an African-American writer, born in the south who moved to the north as a teenager during the Civil Rights Movement describe the differences this way:

My sister said it this way:

In the South, you can come in our home, but don't rise above me. In the North, you can rise above me, but don't come into my home.

Essentially, the Southern Strategy was one in which the Republican Party communicated to whites in the south: Look, don't vote your HISTORICAL prejudices! Be true to your most BASIC prejudices, against the coloreds and the people who love them! We are the party faithful always to the biases that REALLY make a difference to you!

Clearly, it was tremendously appealing to most Southern whites.

I know!

Let's ignore the fact that most State Houses in the South are controlled by Democrats. That way, we'll be able to call our political opponents racists and explain away our defeats!

Anybody here lived in both the South and Boston? Care to tell me where racial animus is worse?

Or for that matter, please tell me why Klan membership is highest in Ohio and Michigan but has declined as a cultural/social/political/hate mongering force in the South.

When President Lyndon Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Bill into law, as he gave one of the pens to a young aid, he said, "I've just handed the country over to the GOP for the next 50 years."

So, LBJ knew what it was, back over 40 years ago.

Oh, and Frankly0, not to blow your thesis out, but my state up until recently had a Senator on the hill, a conservative known for his racist tendancies...

perhaps you've heard of him, John Edwards?

Oh, and Jimmy and Bill were real assholes too, weren't they?

I'm going to head out here in a second, but before I do, I'd like to impart some wisdom that I've shared with my kin each time they try and rub Jesse Helms in my face:

Before reminding us on how racist, backwards, class-oriented your countrymen to the south can be, please remember where our favorite coke-sniffing, male-cheerleader-in-chief was born and spent all but 2 of his formative years growing up in...

drumroll...

hint:

...it wasn't the south...

...it wasn't Texas...

Connecticut perhaps?

Please continue to repackage your politicians and blame them on us.

Whatever people in different regions may say about their attitudes toward race, residential real estate pricing in every region of the country is consistent: if the residence is in a predominantly black neighborhood or the children from the residence will have to attend a predominantly black public school, the price of the residence will be below the mean for the region. It's true in Alabama and it's true in California.
Notwithstanding what people say with their mouths, what they say with their real estate spending shows their true attitude toward blacks. And not a few blacks have little enthusiasm for the idea that their kids will go to a predominantly black school.

Oh, and Frankly0, not to blow your thesis out, but my state up until recently had a Senator on the hill, a conservative known for his racist tendancies...

Funny, I was thinking Jesse Helms.

Edwards was a moderate who could have been elected in all kinds of states in America, and managed to be elected in NC. Where could Jesse Helms have been elected, outside of the South?

What are you trying to claim here? That the most right wing, most racist Senators are NOT to be found in the South?

To echo what has already been said.

Racism is about social class. Growing up in Virginia, I was told many times about the coming of racial equality and how it threatened prosperity. You were a pariah if you were the first person on your street to sell to a black family in the fifties and sixties. It meant that property values would drop for everyone else and the schools would go to hell. Whole city blocks would clear out after a black family moved in, even in the better neighborhoods. What couldn’t be done with Jim Crow was done with the automobile and distance. The pattern is still the same today. No one buys in a black or Hispanic suburb. Certainly, it is less virulent than before, a few minority families are allowed, even welcomed depending on where you live, but it means the same thing at the end of the day. But there is no Southern monopoly on racism. Not now and not historically. Some of the most segregated cities are now in the old North.

Many people have pointed out the history of the Southern Strategy and its links to racism. The current coalition began, however, when conservative Southerners joined with Republicans to resist parts of the New Deal. These tended to be the non-populist, non-LBJ Southerners. It was Nixon’s genius to realize a real coalition could be built around a populist culture war. To be honest, a great many people in the South are happy to see institutionalized racism behind them. This is one of the reasons religion has become so important to Republicans.

our favorite coke-sniffing, male-cheerleader-in-chief was born

Yeah, well, Bush is the result of Babs' ("there's a woman who knows how to hate") upbringing. He could have been born in the Vatican and still would have turned out as vile.

Jeffrey Davis & URK & Others

I heard it this way (and I find it more eloquent and succinct)

In the South: they don’t care how CLOSE they get, as long as they don’t get too BIG.
In the North: they don’t care how BIG they get, as long as they don’t get too CLOSE.

Whatever people in different regions may say about their attitudes toward race, residential real estate pricing in every region of the country is consistent: if the residence is in a predominantly black neighborhood or the children from the residence will have to attend a predominantly black public school, the price of the residence will be below the mean for the region.

The strong correlation between race and wealth and the fact that, were it otherwise, there wouldn't be very many black people that could afford to live in districts with predominantly black public schools, which itself would instantly change the identity of which schools were "predominantly black", of course, has nothing to do with this, at all.

Well, if its true that suburbia led to the GOP's rise in the South, and not racism, do we still need to ask ourselves what's wrong with Kansas?

I think that whole argument is shite. Fleeing to the suburbs was simply a tactic of segragation through wealth. Why do some people like to go to clubs where a bottle of beer is $8.50? Do they think it tastes better with a 600% mark-up than with a 150-200% markup? No...but they think it will get them surrounded by better people.

The South has voted solidly Republican in national elections since the late sixties. Simply stated, the South in general has voted as such because the Republican Party more closely relects it's conservative values. Since and during the sixties, liberal social values have been shoved down the throat of the public all across the country. My agrument is that the South has always been conservative although it did not vote as such from the early thirties until the late sixties. Why....because during the depression and the post WWII years, people truly thought the government was the answer to all their worries. The country's suicide attempt in the sixties changed their minds. OK, I'm ready to be labled the R(acist) word. Funny thing is, it really has very, very little to do with race.

RW,

There aren't a lot of blacks in California period (6.7%). Even in Los Angeles County (9.8%), the percentage is lower than the national average. I was simply pointing out a factual rebuttal to your statement that Orange County is lily-white.

To all Southern apologists,

Does the South take an unfair beating when it comes to racism? Yeah, it probably does. Every corner of this country from Northern Maine to San Diego has problems with race. After reading this entire thread, I don't think anyone here has stated otherwise. But this is a political site and politics is about winning elections. Boston has huge racial problems, but when blacks and whites get into that voting booth they don't generally vote on that issue. Southerners do. At the NATIONAL level, Democrats are thought of as the party of black people and that doesn't fly in the old Confederacy. The question isn't whether the South is more racist, but why the Republican Party now dominates the South? The answer is race.

Speck.
I tried to make the same (obvious) point above.
They simply cant accept that the 1960's new left emerged and sunk the fortunes of the democratic party.
Hell, they cant even admit anything eventful happened during the 60's to the democratic party.

In 68 they were outside the convention, in 72 they were inside.
Its been all downhill since.

Yes the South is a very conservative area, certainly socially conservative.
Why all the talk of race?
So they can call Republicans racists.
(and ergo, feel morally superior while loosing)

I live in a predominantly upper-class white town. I work in a more middle-class predominantly hispanic town.

I commute 20 miles to work.

I could probably buy twice the house for the same amount of money if I simply moved to the town where I work.

There are a couple of important reasons why I will never move to that town.
1. While my current job is a decent, stable opportunity, I feel that there are better prospects in my home-town, or in the town that lies in the opposite direction. I'd like to continue working for my present employer until I retire 20+ years hence. But I wouldn't bet my future on it. They could lay me off tomorrow. If I lived in their town, my options would be slim. If I stay in my town, I have options, some chance of improvement even, commuting 20 miles in the opposite direction. I think it's worth the extra expense to live where I'm living.

2. The Schools in the town-where-I-work have gangs. The schools in my home-town do not. It's as simple as that. If it were a white southern town and if the gangs were neo-nazi skinheads, I'd feel the same way. I don't want my kids mixed up in ANY gangs, and I don't want my kids to have to be a non-gang member around gangs either.

Both of my kids take Spanish language. We all honor the Mexican heritage of California. We all recognize that their culture is part of our culture. We all get drunk on Cinco de Mayo. Our kids put the smack down on pinatas at their birthday parties. And I'm proud to count many individuals of hispanic heritage among my close friends and co-workers.

So is it racist of me to not want my kids going to schools where there are a lot of hispanic students?

3. And, of course, I would not want to move from my current town of residence because we've put down roots, have many social ties and involvements, and are active in the community. But if we assume for argument's sake that I'm just relocating to this area, and thus, this third reason is moot, the first two are still very important to me.

ONCE AGAIN:

Please explain how the State Houses across the South stayed firmly in Democratic control until this day and square that with the "success" of the so-called Southern Strategy.

Are Southerners only racist in national elections? Are Southern Democrats more racist than Southern Republicans on a local level?

Other suggestions?

What I find amazing is how the South continues to be looked upon as a bunch of lazy, racist, dumb, bible-thumping hay seads. Truth of the matter is that the South of today resembles the mind-set of the founding fathers much more closely than any other region of the country. I'm sure some think this is a bad thing. Do things move a little slower in the South....yea probably....most Southerns admit it. What I admire is that they like that way. The South had risen again. God bless 'em......and I'm not even from the South. From the soon to be redevined swing state of Michigan.

"defined" ..... "Babs" typo

No one buys in a black or Hispanic suburb.

I'm not so sure. Historically, white flight has been associated with the growth of suburbs as whites fled the metropolitan core. With rising land values, extortionate gas prices, and high construction costs, you may see a reversal. In my metropolitan area, minorities, especially new arrivals, are being pushed out into cheaply built apartments in the 'burbs, and gentrification of the "black ghetto" is underway.

Are Southerners only racist in national elections? Are Southern Democrats more racist than Southern Republicans on a local level?

Yes, yes.

Also, Democrat candidates could stay with footholds because they were incumbents - and then again with the large non-white population in some rural counties.

So... Duh.

Blaming it all on racism is warm and comforting, like blaming corporations, and avoids the unpleasant alternatives, like examining Democratic philosophies and policies.

....the "right" to select their neighbors, their employees, and their children's classmates, the "right" to do as they pleased with their private property and private businesses, and, perhaps most important, the "right" to remain free from what they saw as dangerous encroachments by the federal government.

Notice the quotation marks. One assumes in the context of this statement that Democrats stand for the opposite point of view. Think about that for a while. And you wonder why you can't win elections?

Before reminding us on how racist, backwards, class-oriented your countrymen to the south can be, please remember where our favorite coke-sniffing, male-cheerleader-in-chief was born and spent all but 2 of his formative years growing up in...

drumroll...

hint:

...it wasn't the south...

...it wasn't Texas...

Connecticut perhaps?

But the issue is where did he get the votes to get elected to public office, and it wasn't Connecticut or even Boston. W/o his support in the South including (drumroll) Texas, this joker would still be screwing up private companies rather than the whole country.