The (partial) reversal of the parties

When I was a child, the South was the most solidly Democratic part of the country. In fact, one State, Georgia, had never voted Republican in a Presidential election, and most of the Southern States were solidly in the Democratic column at least since the end of Reconstruction. The most solidly Republican part of the country was New England, and in fact Vermont had been solidly Republican as long as Georgia had been Democratic. Vermont was also one of the only two States that had voted Republican in the 1936 Roosevelt landslide (the other, Maine, was also in New England).

How different the electoral map looks today. New England is heavily Democratic, perhaps the most solidly Democratic part of the country, though it elects some Republicans (like Scott Brown, Olympia Snowe, and Susan Collins to the Senate, and a string of Republicans to the Massachusetts Governorship — though Massachusetts currently has a Democratic Governor, Deval Patrick.) And the South is the most reliably Republican part of the nation, except possibly for the Mountain West.

It would seem that the end of segregation is partly responsible for the South's transformation — without the racism that characterized Southern Democratic politics, the South, more conservative than the rest of the country, found its proper home in the GOP. And Barry Goldwater, though his vote against civil rights legislation was due to libertarian principles rather than racism, attracted some of the Southern racists — it is clear from the fact that, except for his home State of Arizona, Goldwater's only State victories in 1964 were in the South.

It is harder to see why New England has moved the other way. But in the mid-20^th century, New England Republicans were more libertarian than conservative, and the influx of Southerners into the Republican party, and the persistence of Westerners there (both being very conservative socially), has made the Republican party less attractive to New Englanders whose Republicanism meant something less conservative. (I would say that the Democratic Party was not really a great fit for them, but in an electoral system in which only two parties can compete, perhaps that did it.)

A great example of what has happened is in the State of Virginia. In the mid-1960s, I was in that State for educational reasons, and I saw a Governorship election in which the two candidates were Democrat Mills Godwin and Republican A. Linwood Holton. Godwin won, but four years later Holton became the first Republican Governor since Reconstruction. A number of years later, Godwin had become a Republican, and won the Governorship again for that party. (He is the only person in U. S. history to win Governorships under both the Democratic and Republican label!) In another election, I was working for the election of Richard Nixon against Hubert Humphrey, and calling people for the Republican Party; most of the people who answered were happy to support Nixon but we could not get them to abandon the local Democratic Congressman, John O. Marsh. Like Godwin, Marsh also became a Republican, serving in a sub-cabinet position in the Noxon administration.

I do not know of many New England Republicans who have become Democrats in the same way — they have generally become Independents supporting Democratic candidates instead (examples are James Jeffords, Lowell Weicker, and Lincoln Chafee).

But the parties have not totally reversed. Organized labor is still heavily Democratic, and (despite such Democratic supporters as Warren Buffett and Bill Gates) businessmen are mostly Republican. That is part of what keeps me in the GOP — I am still repelled by the influence of organized labor in the Democratic Party, as I stated in an earlier post. But I have to admit, I'm not very happy with what the GOP is now; I felt a lot more comfortable in the party of Dwight Eisenhower and Nelson Rockefeller then I do now in the party of Mike Huckabbee and Rick Santorum.

Postmortems - Part 3 (Pennsylvania/Maine/Rhode Island)

Of all the States, the one about which my feelings are the most complicated is Pennsylvania. I had followed the career of Arlen Specter for many years, beginning in the 1960s when I had a job in Philadelphia and Specter was a young DA uncovering corruption in that city. Over the years Specter developed into the Senator I had my greatest agreement with. So the ideal result for me would have been for Specter to stay a Republican and serve six more years in the Senate. But six years ago Specter was challenged for the nomination by Pat Toomey, a "Tea Party" type before they ever called it that. Given the rightward drift of the GOP, Specter apparently figured he could not beat Toomey in a primary this year, so he went over to the Democrats, which saddened me, though I could understand why he did it. This didn't work, because as far as the GOP primary voters were to his right, so were the Democratic primary voters to his left, and Specter lost that primary to Joe Sestak, so Specter was out of the pictue completely. If Specter had won the Democratic primary, and I had been a Pennsylvanian, I would have been faced with a terrible decision: Support someone who agreed with me on most issues, but whose first vote would be for Harry Reid to lead the Senate? or someone far ro my right, but who at least would help keep the Senate Republican? Sestak's winning the primary made the choice pretty straightforward. And so I wanted to see Toomey win, and was glad to see it happen, even though this was one of the closest races in the 2010 election. Pennsylvania, unlike both of its neighbors New York State and Maryland, was good territory for the GOP this year. Not only was Toomey elected, but a Republican Governor and State Legislature. All I can say is I wish Maryland had done so well.

Both Maine and Rhode Island had independent candidates running for Governor. Maine has in the past actually elected an independent to the office, so there was really a chance, but the Republican, Paul LePage, pulled it out. Maine seems to be the one State in New England which the GOP still can win frequently — it has two very competent Republican women as its Senators, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, who, with Specter gone, are probably the best representatives of the kind of Republicanism I prefer. LePage is considered a Tea Partier, so we'll have to see what sort of job he does as Governor of Maine. But I congratulate him and wish him well.

It was Rhode Island, however, that actually elected an independent this year. And Lincoln Chafee, Rhode Island's next Governor, is an enigma. He used to be a Republican, but supported Barack Obama's candidacy for the Presidency in 2008. And Obama recognized this and refused to endorse Chafee's Democratic opponent, Frank Caprio. (This led Caprio to say Obama could "take his endorsement and shove it," certainly one of the most impolite things a politician has said about a President of his own party!) Obviously, Chafee got elected mainly by Democratic votes, so it will be interesting to see whether he governs as a Democrat or a Republican. He looks like another Lowell Weicker to me, becoming a Democrat in all but name as Weicker did in neighboring Connecticut.