A Question about Southern Democrats and Black Voters

[ElectionsGuy]

This is a historical question, but I thought it belonged in the Congressional section. We all know that blacks started voting for Democrats starting with FDR. At the same time, southern Democrats vigorously defended segregation and institutional discrimination. From FDR until the end of the 60's, you had a pro-welfare state, pro-civil rights Democratic Party at the national level, but not at the southern state levels. So, did blacks still vote Republican during that time period for Congress until the Southern Strategy ruined it? Or did they vote Democratic at the congressional level even though they would basically be voting to keep their rights suppressed? Perhaps the Republicans were not much better on civil rights in southern races (and perhaps many races were uncontested with no Republicans running).

By the way, I'm well aware not many blacks voted during this period, but for the few that did it would be great to know.

[ElectionsGuy]

Does anybody care?

[smoltchanov]

I think it's difficult to give precise answer to your question. Statistics from that period is scarce, detailed (by race for example) statistics is even scarcer, and (as you noted) the corresponding voter pool is rather small (in some southern counties no Blacks at all were registered even in early 60th). Probably - situation  depended on local conditions, local officials and candidate's campaigns as well

[Rockefeller GOP]

I thought I read one time that pre-CRA, Blacks in the South were more Republican than Blacks in the North (not exactly hard to believe), but I don't know if it was substantial support.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I thought I read one time that pre-CRA, Blacks in the South were more Republican than Blacks in the North (not exactly hard to believe), but I don't know if it was substantial support.

Blacks were more Republican in the South because the Democratic Party was defined as a private institution; this was the basis for excluding blacks from voting in the Democratic primary, and the motivation for maintaining a one-party system and ensuring finality of the primary in electing officials.  This ended in the 1940s, when the White Primary was declared unconstitutional.

There were some places where blacks voted in Democratic primaries.  In Shelby County, TN (Memphis), Boss Ed Crump used black votes to help his influence statewide, shepherding blacks to the polls for his candidates in exchange for a BBQ sandwich and a Coca Cola.  Crump was a CONSERVATIVE boss, and a Dixiecrat in 1948 (TN still went for Truman), but many of the blacks he registered had little education and did what Crump's workers told them to do. 

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Alot of Blks supported Nixon; Ford; & Eisenhower. But, Ronald Reagan who magnified the southern strategy, made blacks stop voting; thus Southern Dixiecrats like Roy Barnes; lost.

But boarder state Dems like Mark Warner; Strickland; McCaskill have been elected to Senate, rather than gov.

[Skill and Chance]

I thought I read one time that pre-CRA, Blacks in the South were more Republican than Blacks in the North (not exactly hard to believe), but I don't know if it was substantial support.

Blacks were more Republican in the South because the Democratic Party was defined as a private institution; this was the basis for excluding blacks from voting in the Democratic primary, and the motivation for maintaining a one-party system and ensuring finality of the primary in electing officials.  This ended in the 1940s, when the White Primary was declared unconstitutional.

There were some places where blacks voted in Democratic primaries.  In Shelby County, TN (Memphis), Boss Ed Crump used black votes to help his influence statewide, shepherding blacks to the polls for his candidates in exchange for a BBQ sandwich and a Coca Cola.  Crump was a CONSERVATIVE boss, and a Dixiecrat in 1948 (TN still went for Truman), but many of the blacks he registered had little education and did what Crump's workers told them to do. 

Crump was only part of the story.  TN's Jim Crow laws left poll taxes, primary registration, etc. at the discretion of each individual county.  Memphis just seems to have been a locally more tolerant place in the late 19th-early 20th century for whatever reason, and so Shelby County never moved to officially exclude or discourage black people from voting.  There was notable black Republican activism in Memphis circa 1900, primarily in more educated circles.  Keep in mind that you had a concentration of black college graduates and wealthy black families in Memphis as early as the 1870's, so there was a base from which to organize and defend their rights much earlier than in other areas.  Crump did use illiterate people of both races to boost his machine, but we shouldn't discount the fact that Memphis was just a locally less racist place in general at that time.