The end of the Republican Party's Southern Strategy

[grantcart]

Dr. Dean and Senator Obama's ambition to compete in 50 states is not only going to bring in some electoral college upsets but it is also going to put the final nail in the Republican's 'Southern Strategy'.

That strategy, borne out of the 1964 Johnson landslide led Nixon to 'turn the other way' on civil rights and campaign effectively in the south by appealing to latent racist feelings by use of code word campaigning using 'states rights' and 'law and order' to make an invisible appeal to historical democrats that resisted the civil rights movement.

The effect was that it has given the Republican a watertight regional base in the south. For 40 years the Republican Party knew that they could count on 13 states giving them 168 EV (TX, OK, AR, GA, TN,KY, VA, NC, SC, FL, MS, AL. LA) The only successful Democratic candidates in the last 40 years have been from the South.

If current trends hold then GA, NC, VA and FL will all go Democratic and split the EVs Obama 70 to McCain 98.

The Republicans will not only have lost the election but have lost their main strategy for amassing electoral votes. After eight years of an Obama administration the country will not only have changed demographically with a new generation of less prejudiced voters displacing the older generation, but the idea of an African American as President will be seen as ordinary and not as something than can be exploited by fear.

Democrats in the remaining states will be motivated and areas that Democrats haven't been seen in decades will become more and more competitive.

Here are the trendlines which show that the 40 year old Southern Strategy is now entering its final Presidential Election. Early voting in NC and GA show huge AA voting that will mean that Obama can win with only 30% of the white vote in North Carolina and only 25% of the white vote in Georgia.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

1. Really encouraging is the way black voting power has continued to grow despite the shackles of 'felo...

shackles of 'felon disfranchisement' in several of those states. For example, (see below) 25 percent of Virginia's African-American men are permanently disfranchised by a law with explicitly racist intent dating from the end of the nineteenth century.

"Disfranchising felons" provides many of these states with a ruse for having a list of hundreds of thousands who cannot vote, and thus the basis for disfranchising hundreds of thousands of non-felons with "similar names".

IMO, only mandatory national standards for administering statewide elections, including banning of "felon disfranchisement", truly can end the Southern strategy of racist appeals to whites combined with racist disfranchisement of Blacks by numerous means. States that would lose Federal funds for noncompliance with a strict mandatory national standard soon would dismantle their racially biased voting laws. If responsibility for maintaining lists of ex-prisoners who cannot legally buy firearms were moved to a national agency such as the ATF, all state lists of "ex-felons" could be banned forever, eliminating much racially-based mischief in the South.

Look deeply into the "recovery of civil rights" in states whick, like FL, ostiensibly have "ended" lifetime felon disfranchisement, and you'll find hundreds of thousands (in Florida's case, 800,000) who await "investigation" and, among those who've supposedly "recovered" their civil rights, actual voter registration in single digits.

From http://www.aclu.org/votingrights/exoffenders/statelegispolicy2007.html :

"As of December 3 1,2004, a total of 377,847 persons were disfranchised in the Commonwealth of Virginia, or 6.76% of the state's voting age population (VAP)....

Virginia's practice disproportionately impacts African Americans to a very significant degree. As of 2006, African Americans made up 19.9% of the state population of 7.6 million, but the state's 208,343 disfranchised African Americans (in December 2004) comprised more than half (55.1%) of the total disfranchised population. And while 6.76% of the total voting age population is disfranchised, the corresponding figure for African Americans is almost three times higher at 19.76%. Sixteen percent of all adult African Americans in the Commonwealth (including 25% of black men) cannot vote because of a felony conviction."

See also http://www.aclu.org/righttovote/

[grantcart]

4. all good points

I would add North Carolina's one stop registration and voting as being an even greater tool to assist full democracy

http://elections.gmu.edu/early_vote_2008.html

[ProgressiveEconomist]

7. "NC's one-stop registration and voting" YES: National election standards could mandate the BEST

practices as well as ban the worst practices.

If Jesse Jackson Jr is appointed to fill Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat, I would look to him to push mandatory national voting standards right away, continuing to fight for his favorite issue from a much bigger platform, and building on the momentum of Obama's movement for more democracy.

See his House website at http://www.house.gov/jackson/test/VotingRightsFAQ.htm .

[uponit7771]

2. RayGun was the first to appeal to the mass hatred of blacks\browns then Bush 1 built on it

[grantcart]

3. Nixon was the first to use it effectively with 'states rights' and 'law and order' "SC appointments'

being the wink and nod to show that he wasn't going to support further civil rights initiatives.

[EFerrari]

5. "And then we're going to Georgia and South Carolina and Florida . . "

:toast:

[Arugula Latte]

6. They are deservedly screwn for years to come.

It's weird to think that when I was a kid growing up in California, that was considered a Republican state. My, my. How times change.

The Southern Strategy + Embrace of hardright psychoChristian philosophy served the Repukes for awhile, but it is backfiring now.

[grantcart]

10. the coming Republican civil war on who is the purest will be a delight to watch

[Arugula Latte]

13. Yep. I'm totally against cockfighting, but I love to watch Republican pricks fighting each other.

:hide:

[OmahaBlueDog]

8. GC, I think you're a bit optimistic here..

.. but optimism is good. Personally, I'll be happy to get Virginia.

To me, it isn't that the GOP Southern Strategy is failing, but it's reaching the point of diminishing returns. We're now roughly 3 generations separated from Jim Crow, and whites in the south are becoming more pragmatic about race.

North Carolina and Virgina are changing states, with the growth of tech and banking jobs. I'm guessing you'll see more of that same change in South Carolina and Tennessee in the next decade.

All of this said, the South still plays host to a huge chunk of the nation's military resources, and to religious fundamentalism. I see it trending conservative for the foreseeable future.

[grantcart]

9. I am astonished by the early voting

Besides the polling trend the actual early voting numbers are showing very strong AA voting so far.

http://elections.gmu.edu/early_vote_2008.html

[theothersnippywshrub]

11. I would say it is the beginning of the end.

The republican party's progression to its current philosophy of fear, xenophobia, racism and anger started with Barry Goldwater and so many other conservative republicans opposing the civil rights laws in the 1950's and 1960's.

That was soon followed by the launching of the GOP Southern Strategy and all of the racist dixiecrats switching parties. And that was soon followed by the Reagan Revolution which united the racist wing, the Religious Reich wing, the "evil communists (now terrorists) are hiding under my bed" wing, the "there is no greater evil than taxation" wing and the sane and decent economic conservative wing of the republican party. And then Gingrich took over GOPAC and taught republicans to recite the infamous list of divisive and hateful words and to campaign only on wedge issues in order to divide the country. And shortly after that the republican party reached the peak of its power.

But its new found power was born of the evil it encouraged and embraced over all those years. And now it is becoming progressively weaker as that evil drives away decent Americans, many of them once loyal republicans. And today the weakness grows even more, like a cancerous tumor, as a result of the various GOP hate groups blaming not only decent Americans, but also other GOP hate groups for the growing weakness.

Different factions of the republican party now proclaim that the war mongers are not sufficiently xenophobic or racist and therefore must be hated. Other factions now proclaim that the xenophobes and racists are not sufficiently anti-taxation or pro-war and therefore must be hated. And each particular faction, except for the sane and decent economic conservative faction, must hate some other faction. And so it goes, with hate being the only common denominator.

The republican party is relatively united now only because of their fear of losing power. But once this election is over, regardless of who wins the presidency and how many seats are won or lost in the Senate and the House, the vicious hatred will be targeted at republicans nearly as often as it is targeted at democrats.

Today's republican party is rapidly becoming a party rooted only in hatred. It is becoming not only an un-American party, but also an anti-American party. The diminishing success of the Southern Strategy will be a part of that evolution. And, by the way, they also hate evolution.

[Laelth]

14. Interesting and insightful analysis. Good post. Thanks.

The United States is a LIBERAL Country.

:dem:

-Laelth

[trof]

12. When LBJ signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act into law

he said "I've just lost the south for the Democratic party for a generation."
He was right.

Now, finally, we see some movement.
I do believe that if Obama is elected, and does well in his first term, we'll see more southern states coming over.

[Fire_Medic_Dave]

15. The trend may continue if the Dems will leave gun control alone.