'White working-class' vote in 1964

[Phony Moderate]

This election was held just weeks after LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act. I assume the WWC voted in huge numbers against him, maybe 70-80%, given how they are mostly a load of brainless racist tossers?

[bagelman]

Obviously. Just look at Goldwater's big wins in Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Missouri.

Contrast with liberal educated enlightened states were people actually things beside work for a living (lol, so uncool) like Florida and Arizona. Johnson cleaned house! He won one of those states!

[Adam Griffin]

I understand what you're trying to do here, but are you really going to try to compare the New Deal Coalition - many of whom arguably suffered more economically than any other group in relevant American history - to the cretinous Baby Boomers and Gen Xers, who arguably prospered more economically (at least relative to their efforts) than any other group in American history?

One group had every reason in the world to vote from the cradle to the grave for the Democratic Party based on economics after what they had experienced. The other group inherited the fruits of that, had arguably every advantage possible given to them, and are now pissing their pants because they already let it all get pissed away and want a scapegoat.

[Phony Moderate]

I understand what you're trying to do here, but are you really going to try to compare the New Deal Coalition - many of whom arguably suffered more economically than any other group in relevant American history - to the cretinous Baby Boomers and Gen Xers, who arguably prospered more economically (at least relative to their efforts) than any other group in American history?

One group had every reason in the world to vote from the cradle to the grave for the Democratic Party based on economics after what they had experienced. The other group inherited the fruits of that, had arguably every advantage possible given to them, and are now pissing their pants because they already let it all get pissed away and want a scapegoat.

Well many in the New Deal Coalition switched to Wallace or a vaguely racist Nixon just four years later so you could say that they are not without fault either.

I'm not a great fan of generalizing people on the basis of when they were born (is someone born in 1944 really that different to someone born in 1946?), but if we're going to do it then I would point out that the most senior Baby Boomers were in their mid-30s when Reaganomics (which arguably was directly responsible for a large rich-poor gap increase) began while the very youngest Gen Xers were still basically in diapers. Many of course say that Reaganonomics came about due to the economic malaise of the 1970s - which one can hardly blame on the Boomers and Xers. What we can hold against them is their voting for and idolizing the likes of Reagan, Gingrich and even Clinton - the people responsible for destroying many aspects of the New Deal settlement, though the Democratic Party itself can be held at fault too for not offering a compelling enough alternative to Reaganonomics in the way that FDR did to the laissez faire of the Harding/Coolidge/Hoover era.

[SingingAnalyst]

WWC voters were overwhelmingly for Johnson outside the South. The social upheavals of the 1960s hadn't hit yet, and except maybe in Staten Island, NY (where the Kitty Genovese murder was fresh in everyone's mind) law and order wasn't a factor. Macomb County, MI went 3-1 for Johnson.

[All Along The Watchtower]

lol

[RINO Tom]

WWC voters were overwhelmingly for Johnson outside the South angry protest votes in Mississippi and Alabama. The social upheavals of the 1960s hadn't hit yet, and except maybe in Staten Island, NY (where the Kitty Genovese murder was fresh in everyone's mind) law and order wasn't a factor. Macomb County, MI went 3-1 for Johnson.

FTFY.  Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, Virginia, North Carolina, Texas, Oklahoma and Florida all went to Johnson, and I'll bet my life that lower income Whites voted for him at a higher clip than higher income Whites in those states.  Additionally, Goldwater only got 54% in Georgia and 50% in Louisiana ... certainly plausible that "WWC" voters voted for Johnson or were split in both states.

[White Trash]

The vast majority of Goldwater voters in the South were upper and middle class. A decent sized minority of them were staunch Republican transplants from the North. The majority of working class whites in the South voted for Democrats all their life, and Johnson was no exception.

You're basing this argument on bigotry and conjecture.

[Nym90]

Considering that the vast majority of Americans were "white working class" in 1964, I doubt it differed that much from the national total.