Who were the few R voters in the Deep South until 1944?

[buritobr]

Until 1944, the number of Republican voters in the Deep South was very low, but not zero.

Examples

Teddy 1904
National: 56.42%
Louisiana: 9.66%
Mississippi: 5.59%
Alabama: 20.65%
Georgia: 18.33%
South Carolina: 4.63%

Harding 1920:
National: 60.35%
Louisiana: 30.49%
Mississippi: 14.03%
Alabama: 37.11%
Georgia: 27.63%
South Carolina: 3.91%

Landon 1936
National: 36.54%
Louisiana: 11.16%
Mississippi: 2.75%
Alabama: 12.82%
Georgia: 12.60%
South Carolina: 1.43%

Dewey 1944
National: 45.89%
Louisiana: 19.39%
Mississippi: 6.44%
Alabama: 18.20%
Georgia: 18.25%
South Carolina: 4.46%

Were these voters richer or poorer than the average? Were they more urban or more rural? Were they more liberal or more conservative?

[All Along The Watchtower]

Richer, more urban, and liberal vs conservative doesn't really apply in the same way (especially for such a long time ago).

[Indy Texas]

New Orleans always had a fairly decent community of non-Southerners who had moved there to work in the shipping industry. You also had the United Fruit Company (which basically fulfilled every top-hatted, mustache-twirling stereotype ever conceived about sinister businessmen) headquartered there, but it was mostly funded and ran by Northern financiers.

I'd assume there were a very small handful of blacks who managed to fit through the various Jim Crow hurdles of literacy tests and property requirements and the like. But by and large, it was probably people who were not from the South but had moved there for work. For that reason, they were probably higher income than average and probably had higher education levels. (Poor people generally have little reason to move for work since they tend to be in relatively interchangeable jobs that can be found anywhere, and back then could also have been substistance farmers.)

[VPH]

Was there a lot of voter coercion (or voter fraud) with white voters? I always figured at least some folks would be drawn to the GOP, despite their history with these states.

[Skill and Chance]

Well, there were notable concentrations of racially moderate whites in New Orleans and Atlanta, even back then.  I believe that fairly significant black voting continued in Atlanta during that time as well.  That could be enough to explain Louisiana and Georgia being over 10%. 

Overall, this is ambiguous because some of the Republican candidates during that time were decidedly populist-Progressive and others were decidedly conservative.  Alabama in 1920 is particularly interesting because Harding was known as one of the most racially open presidents during that time period.  There must have been a strong anti-Progressive faction in Alabama then.

[RFayette]

Well, there were notable concentrations of racially moderate whites in New Orleans and Atlanta, even back then.  I believe that fairly significant black voting continued in Atlanta during that time as well.  That could be enough to explain Louisiana and Georgia being over 10%. 

Overall, this is ambiguous because some of the Republican candidates during that time were decidedly populist-Progressive and others were decidedly conservative.  Alabama in 1920 is particularly interesting because Harding was known as one of the most racially open presidents during that time period.  There must have been a strong anti-Progressive faction in Alabama then.

Also, AL and MS seem to often be lumped together, but it appears that Alabama was much more Republican relatively, especially in 1900-1928.  MS and SC seem to be inconceivably monolithic.

[Indy Texas]

Well, there were notable concentrations of racially moderate whites in New Orleans and Atlanta, even back then.  I believe that fairly significant black voting continued in Atlanta during that time as well.  That could be enough to explain Louisiana and Georgia being over 10%. 

Overall, this is ambiguous because some of the Republican candidates during that time were decidedly populist-Progressive and others were decidedly conservative.  Alabama in 1920 is particularly interesting because Harding was known as one of the most racially open presidents during that time period.  There must have been a strong anti-Progressive faction in Alabama then.

Also, AL and MS seem to often be lumped together, but it appears that Alabama was much more Republican relatively, especially in 1900-1928.  MS and SC seem to be inconceivably monolithic.

North Alabama is where the Appalachians begin - it was never part of the lowland plantation economy. I've driven through northern Alabama and was taken aback by the forests and the hills and valleys - all that seemed to be missing was a few log cabins and some people in pioneer clothes. Mississippi, on the other hand, was pretty much one giant cotton plantation.

[Thunderbird is the word]

Ancestrally unionist outliers like Winston County Alabama. I also think that to some extent class alignment might have been reversed in the south since everyone was a Democrat including the wealthy aristocrats.

It'd be interesting to look at white catholic immigrants in places of New Orleans and see if maybe they tended to be more Republican as an inversion of the north where they were more Democrat in opposition to the established group.

[andrew_c]

Anyone who opposed Jim Crow laws.

[buritobr]

We can find the county map in the Wikipedia, with diferent shades of red and blue.
Here we can see the map of 1920 (a year in which the Republican vote in the deep south was not very low)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1920#/media/File:1920nationwidecountymapshadedbyvoteshare.svg
In the Wikipedia, R is red and D is blue
The huge majority of the counties in Mississippi and South Carolina are dark blue. In Georgia and Alabama, there are some light blue and light red counties in the North, in Appalachia. The light red counties in Georgia have border with the red counties in East Tennessee.
Harding won also some counties in the south of Louisiana.

In 1928, Smith won the south of Louisiana.

[YaBoyNY]

Pretty much entirely composed of Northern born whites and those few blacks who jumped through the hurdle that was the Jim Crow system.

[ElectionsGuy]

Pro-business, more upper class, urbanites and suburbanites, and also immigrants, though that's largely a phenomena at the end of the time period in question. Another answer is black voters, even though their vote was largely suppressed by the end of the 19th century. Republican voters were also disproportionately Appalachian. Eastern Tennessee and Kentucky, Western North Carolina, Virginia, and northern Georgia and Alabama. People in the mountains never experienced slavery, they never experienced the same economic system that people in the lowland did. I imagine they were still very racist, but they valued individualism a bit more.

[ag]

Most of it has been mentioned before, but, to summarize

1. Ancestrally unionist/whig enclaves/families (appalachian whites and, yes, "scalawags").
2. Northern migrants and their offspring ("carpetbaggers").
3. The few blacks that, actually, had the vote.
4. (Possibly) some federal employees (remember, patronage was in the Republican hands for much of the period).
5. (Possibly) some northern-oriented trading types.
6. Assorted misfits and other trators.

Remember: these percentages are, actually, for the general elections. Much of the time in many of the places the general election was a minor sideshow. The true election was the Democratic primary. Turnout in GE was extremely low. Barely 50 thousand people voted in SC in 1924. The state had 9 electors - Idaho, with just 4 electoral votes had nearly three times as many votes cast. So, we are really talking about very small numbers.

Really, some, if not most, of the Southern general elections during the period would have deserved the lable of an "electoral type event".

[ag]

Just checking it. During the entire first half of the 20th century no Republican in SC got even 6,000 votes. So, perhaps a more interesting table would be

1904 TR
LA 5,205 votes
MS 3,280 votes
AL 22,472 votes
GA 24,004 votes
SC 2,554 votes

I think we may safely blame the Appalachians

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

On the surface it would seem that with Democrats winning such high percentages, there is no way the GOP would ever win the popular vote. But the substantial decline in turnout in the South's general elections meant that the mid 50's numbers the GOP would get in the big Northern states would be sufficient to win the popular vote as a result.

[ag]

On the surface it would seem that with Democrats winning such high percentages, there is no way the GOP would ever win the popular vote. But the substantial decline in turnout in the South's general elections meant that the mid 50's numbers the GOP would get in the big Northern states would be sufficient to win the popular vote as a result.

This is why it makes no sense to calculate nationwide popular vote in the US - or, at least, to take it is a measure of nationwide popular will. States have different electoral laws. The president is not elected by the popular vote. If s/he were, turnout patterns would have been very different.

In any case, adding popular vote in SC in 1924 to the popular vote in New York that same year is akin to calculating an average body temperature in a hospital (including the morgue): pretty damn stupid exercise.

[mianfei]

Just checking it. During the entire first half of the 20th century no Republican in SC got even 6,000 votes. So, perhaps a more interesting table would be

1904 TR
LA 5,205 votes
MS 3,280 votes
AL 22,472 votes
GA 24,004 votes
SC 2,554 votes

I think we may safely blame the Appalachians

The few typically GOP counties of the "Solid South" era in Alabama (Winston, Chilton), Georgia (Fannin) and Arkansas (Newton, Searcy) were in areas too steep or infertile to farm and which thus had very few slaves and whose white populations resisted secession even if doing so was a hopeless cause. For this region, the view of the southern planter class that the Republican Party was associated with occupation and black political power did not hold here. During the 1850s there existed anti-secession groups in Mississippi and Louisiana too, but these were in mostly Catholic coastal areas which had no affinity with the GOP even if in areas too infertile for plantation agriculture.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

Most likely blacks.

[Fuzzy Bear]

V. O. Key's Southern Politics explains this well.

Key wrote of the various types of Republicans in the South.  There were Mountain Republicans, who were residents of the western Carolinas and East Tennessee, who lived where few blacks lived and were opposed to secession, and this carried on from generation to generation.  (They believe that the Civil War was a war for someone else's interests besides their own.)  There were Black Republicans, and, indeed, the GOP in the South was one of its most integrated institutions in those days.  There were Presidential Republicans; folks who voted in the Democratic Primary for local offices, but cast a Republican vote for President.  Key pointed out that the main focus of these Republican organizations was not to elect officials (except in rare instances such as East Tennessee, where the GOP has long controlled two Congressional districts).  The main purpose was to be the recipients and apportioners of Federal Patronage should the happy day come when the GOP took the White House back. 

Key analyzed each of the 11 Southern states.  In a number of states, Key pointed out that there was, indeed, latent bi-partisanship that was being smothered by racism and the issue of the black man and his place in society.  Such a discussion derailed discussion of other issues such as labor unions, poverty amongst whites and blacks alike, economic fairness, voter participation, and such.  The one-party South was a vehicle by which the issues that threatened the elites that controlled local affairs in the South would not be discussed, and quietly resolved in favor of the elites.

[Calthrina950]

Until 1944, the number of Republican voters in the Deep South was very low, but not zero.

Examples

Teddy 1904
National: 56.42%
Louisiana: 9.66%
Mississippi: 5.59%
Alabama: 20.65%
Georgia: 18.33%
South Carolina: 4.63%

Harding 1920:
National: 60.35%
Louisiana: 30.49%
Mississippi: 14.03%
Alabama: 37.11%
Georgia: 27.63%
South Carolina: 3.91%

Landon 1936
National: 36.54%
Louisiana: 11.16%
Mississippi: 2.75%
Alabama: 12.82%
Georgia: 12.60%
South Carolina: 1.43%

Dewey 1944
National: 45.89%
Louisiana: 19.39%
Mississippi: 6.44%
Alabama: 18.20%
Georgia: 18.25%
South Carolina: 4.46%

Were these voters richer or poorer than the average? Were they more urban or more rural? Were they more liberal or more conservative?

What is especially fascinating to me is that between 1868 and 1964, only two Republicans won even 40% of the vote in Georgia: Grant in 1872 and Hoover in 1928. From 1904 through 1940, Democrats always received at least 90% of the vote in South Carolina, and during that same period, always received at least 80% of the vote in Mississippi.

[morgankingsley]

The very few black people who could vote

[The Mikado]

It's odd no one is mentioning northerners who moved South in this period, which was hardly unheard of even if it wasn't as common as it'd become later.

[Sumner 1868]

It's odd no one is mentioning northerners who moved South in this period, which was hardly unheard of even if it wasn't as common as it'd become later.

Yes, you can see this in South Florida counties. Pinellas and Palm Beach already had a sufficient enough retiree wave that they voted for Coolidge in 1924.

[Arbitrage1980]

Wow. Harding killed it in LA, AL, GA.

[Arbitrage1980]

Until 1944, the number of Republican voters in the Deep South was very low, but not zero.

Examples

Teddy 1904
National: 56.42%
Louisiana: 9.66%
Mississippi: 5.59%
Alabama: 20.65%
Georgia: 18.33%
South Carolina: 4.63%

Harding 1920:
National: 60.35%
Louisiana: 30.49%
Mississippi: 14.03%
Alabama: 37.11%
Georgia: 27.63%
South Carolina: 3.91%

Landon 1936
National: 36.54%
Louisiana: 11.16%
Mississippi: 2.75%
Alabama: 12.82%
Georgia: 12.60%
South Carolina: 1.43%

Dewey 1944
National: 45.89%
Louisiana: 19.39%
Mississippi: 6.44%
Alabama: 18.20%
Georgia: 18.25%
South Carolina: 4.46%

Were these voters richer or poorer than the average? Were they more urban or more rural? Were they more liberal or more conservative?

What is especially fascinating to me is that between 1868 and 1964, only two Republicans won even 40% of the vote in Georgia: Grant in 1872 and Hoover in 1928. From 1904 through 1940, Democrats always received at least 90% of the vote in South Carolina, and during that same period, always received at least 80% of the vote in Mississippi.

1872: high % of blacks voted due to Reconstruction.
1928: Al Smith's catholicism hurt him in the South. The county map of FL for instance is interesting, as Hoover massively outperformed Coolidge in the state despite doing worse nationwide.