Jets
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- Jun 29, 2019
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Interesting article that touches upon this issue:
To belabor the obvious, the Republican Party has always been our more conservative political party, and the South has always been our most conservative region. But Southern conservatives were alienated from the GOP because of slavery and the Civil War. However much affinity they might have for Republicans on issues such as national defense or taxes, they were never going to formally join the party of Abraham Lincoln.
And so America had a historical anomaly, in which conservative Southerners found themselves permanent members of our more liberal political party, the Democrats. It took a great deal of compromise and political skill to keep Northern liberals and Southern conservatives sufficiently allied to win the White House and control of Congress.
The first cracks in this unholy alliance appeared as early as 1938. Franklin Roosevelt, irritated by the lack of support many Southern Democrats were giving to various New Deal programs, tried to purge some of them in the Democratic primaries. This effort failed miserably and Republicans made big gains thanks to Democratic disunity. The result further alienated Southern conservatives from Roosevelt.
newrepublic.com
To belabor the obvious, the Republican Party has always been our more conservative political party, and the South has always been our most conservative region. But Southern conservatives were alienated from the GOP because of slavery and the Civil War. However much affinity they might have for Republicans on issues such as national defense or taxes, they were never going to formally join the party of Abraham Lincoln.
And so America had a historical anomaly, in which conservative Southerners found themselves permanent members of our more liberal political party, the Democrats. It took a great deal of compromise and political skill to keep Northern liberals and Southern conservatives sufficiently allied to win the White House and control of Congress.
The first cracks in this unholy alliance appeared as early as 1938. Franklin Roosevelt, irritated by the lack of support many Southern Democrats were giving to various New Deal programs, tried to purge some of them in the Democratic primaries. This effort failed miserably and Republicans made big gains thanks to Democratic disunity. The result further alienated Southern conservatives from Roosevelt.

The Western Origins of the “Southern Strategy”
The untold story of the ideological realignment that upended the nation
