Curried Goats
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- Aug 28, 2021
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The change in economic values was due to blacks receiving equal rights. So long as welfare was segregated, like under FDR, the white southern population supported it.Some southern whites surely did react negatively to integration, but Carter's win in '76 isn't fully explained by blacks and those "who had yet to cut off their noses to spite their faces."
Ultimately, what southerners saw in the Democratic party on the national level was a shift toward urban interests and values that didn't resonate with the South. It's why Republicans were predominantly in the North and West even up to the late 80s. It's hard to imagine these days, but California had a lot of Republicans even in the 80s. It was not so dominated by Democrats at that time.
While it is true that the South historically supported populism (economically left policies with socially conservative policies), by the 80s, they embraced economically right policies. That's when you started to see local offices shift to Republicans. The Reagan era was the true era of party switching, which reached its peak in 1994. By that point in time, the change was complete. Democrats had become the party of the North and West Coast, while Republicans dominated the South.
It was a change in economic views along with social policy changes in both parties. Reagan very successfully marketed the GOP to the religious right, which had historically been Democratic.