The southern strategy, then, first emerged in 1964 to attract white southerners by positioning the Republican Party as the new political home for racial conservatism (Carmines and Stimson 1989). The Democratic lock on the South was broken, and issues and developments after 1964 would continue to erode white southerners ’ loyalty toward the Democratic Party.
But Goldwater carried five Deep South states that had not voted Republican in presidential elections since Reconstruction. President Johnson won a landslide reelection over Goldwater in 1964.
Nonetheless, Goldwater ’s position was enormously attractive to white southerners enraged by the national Democratic Party ’s embrace of civil rights laws. Goldwater ’s argument was not openly racist: He neither vilified blacks nor made openly segregationist appeals, as Thurmond and other southern Democratic politicians had for decades. Far more conservative on racial issues than previous Republican candidates had been, Goldwater argued forcefully against the Civil Rights Act, emphasizing his view that proper jurisdiction over civil rights policy lay with the states, not the federal government. Meanwhile, Republicans moved sharply rightward on racial issues (Carmines and Stimson 1989), nominating Arizona senator Barry Goldwater for the presidency in 1964. Johnson and northern members of Congress from both parties overcame fierce southern Democratic opposition to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which outlawed segregated public places, including most private businesses, and banned employment discrimination. However, the Democratic and Republican parties equivocated on civil rights issues, until 1964. Board of Education ) and the 1957 crisis attending the integration of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, kept civil rights issues on the national agenda. 1960 TO 1964: RACIAL ISSUES REEMERGE, AND REPUBLICANS MOVE TO THE RIGHTĭuring the 1950s events such as the Supreme Court ’s 1954 ruling ordering schools to desegregate ( Brown v. Senate seat from his native South Carolina in 1964, he switched to the Republican Party. The Dixiecrats carried several southern states in 1948, serving early notice to the national Democratic Party that aggressive action on civil rights would result in the party losing much white southern support. The dissidents formed the States ’ Rights Democratic ( “Dixiecrat ”) Party, with Thurmond as their presidential candidate. ” In vehement opposition, delegate Strom Thurmond, then governor of South Carolina, stalked out of the convention, leading other Deep South delegates in tow (Edsall and Edsall 1991, p. But in 1948 Democratic Party convention delegates supported this plank in the party platform: “The Democratic Party commits itself to continuing efforts to eradicate all racial, religious, and economic discrimination. Such support remained strong as long as Democrats did not push aggressively for civil rights for blacks. From 1932 into the 1940s, the Democratic Party ’s majority coalition nationwide was owed in part to intense Democratic loyalties among most white southerners. Meanwhile, most white southerners vilified Republicans as the party of the Union cause during the Civil War and of the hated Reconstruction era, when federal troops occupied southern states after the war. Virtually all southern Democratic politicians favored racial segregation and antiblack discrimination candidates that did not were unelectable. Region-wide, but especially in the Deep South ( Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina), the politically and economically dominant white population enforced segregated schools, neighborhoods, and public establishments, severe discrimination in jobs and housing, and denial of voting rights for blacks. While racial discrimination existed nationwide before 1960, it was especially pervasive and severe in the South. BEFORE 1960: THE UNSTABLE DEMOCRATIC PARTY COALITION In American politics, the “southern strategy ” refers to efforts by the Republican Party and its candidates to win presidential elections since 1964 by appealing to conservative whites (especially white southerners) disaffected with the Democratic Party by its strong embrace of civil rights laws in the 1960s and its racially egalitarian policies since.
BEFORE 1960: THE UNSTABLE DEMOCRATIC PARTY COALITIONġ960 TO 1964: RACIAL ISSUES REEMERGE, AND REPUBLICANS MOVE TO THE RIGHTġ965 TO 1972: YEARS OF TURMOIL AND NIXON ’S SOUTHERN STRATEGYġ969 AND LATER: THE SOUTHERN STRATEGY EVOLVES, BUT CONTINUES
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