States where the parties' strongest regions have flipped in the last 50 years

[memphis]

As others have pointed out in individual, the Solid South first began to crumble in metropolitan areas. Country clubbers fled the party and urban neighboods 50 years ago. Rural Dems held on much, much longer thanks to the Voting Rights Act, resistance to change, and rural electrification. Of course, now most cities are majority minority and are thus, Democratic strongholds, but it is a huge mistake to think the same of Southern metropolitans and conclude that we are now in a complete reverse of the Jimmy Carter days. Discounting fringe areas that aren't really Southern, the only reliably Dem metros in the South are heavily black Memphis, Richmond, Raleigh-Durham, and Hampton Roads. Atlanta, New Orleans, Charlotte, Birmingham et al still have Republican leaning metro areas. The Tennessee Valley and parts of Arkansas still substantial have white Dem support. Perhaps they won't in 20 years. Things change slowly in those parts.