The Past, Present, and Future of Southern Politics: An article from Southern Cultures 18:3, Fall 2012: The Politics Issue

By Seth C. McKee

The apparent partisan stability of contemporary southern politics belies a complex and dynamic process that makes it doubtful one party can persist as the dominant force in the most diverse region of the United States . . . This truly ain't your daddy's Dixie."

This article appears in the Fall 2012 issue of Southern Cultures. The full issue is also available as an ebook.

Southern Cultures is published quarterly (spring, summer, fall, winter) by the University of North Carolina Press. The journal is sponsored by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Center for the Study of the American South.

• Language: English
• Publisher: UNC Center for the Study of the American South
• Release date: Sep 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781469607382

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ESSAY

The Past, Present, and Future of Southern Politics

by Seth C. McKee

Not only is there diversity in the South; the region is also changing. Its rate of evolution may seem glacial, but fundamental shifts in the conditions underlying its politics are taking place.

—V. O. Key, Southern Politics in State and Nation (1949)¹

By 1948, President Harry S. Truman recognized that the path to winning another term was through securing the votes of a burgeoning black electorate, and he openly courted northern black support and advanced the cause of civil rights. The 1948 election was a turning point in southern politics, because the Democratic Party split on the race issue. Truman, after returning to D.C. from a 1948 campaign trip, courtesy of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.

For decades, political scientists conducted election studies in which they singled out the American South because its politics was different. Generations of southern Democrats held office amidst a feeble Republican opposition, and, for many, more often than not there was no Republican challenger. During these days of the Solid South, it seemed reasonable to omit the region from a political analysis because there was no point in studying a constant; Democratic electoral dominance across all levels of office-holding, from bottom to top, was nearly complete. But eventually things changed. Starting with presidential elections in the 1950s, the moribund southern Republican Party began its gradual rise. Now, things have changed so much that the South is once again exceptional, but this time because it is so overwhelmingly Republican.²

This essay surveys the partisan transformation of southern politics. It begins with the unrivaled status of southern Democrats. Next, using the lens of presidential elections and how they structure the positions of the parties on major issues, is a chronicle of the long ascent of the southern GOP. The essay concludes with a brief discussion of the near- and long-term electoral prospects for both parties. In the immediate future it seems that Republican dominance will persist, but a longer time horizon bodes well for Democrats as demographic changes favor their party.

THE SOLID SOUTH: THE DEMOCRATIC PAST

Whether it was through the use of constitutional conventions or routine legislative processes, by institutionalizing numerous disenfranchising laws all across the South, Democrats successfully enacted a voting apparatus that served a singular purpose—the creation of an electorate whose participants would favor the Democratic Party. The highly unrepresentative and restricted electorate that southern Democrats created ensured their political monopoly for over half a century.³

The fruits of southern