Republican George Wallace?

[Fuzzy Bear]

If Wallace had switched to the GOP after 1964 he would have been a far more influential politician, but a less famous one.  He would not have been a major factor as a Presidential candidate, but he would have become a key power broker in GOP politics.  He also would have accelerated the shift to the GOP in the South at the state and local levels.  Wallace would have been a formidable candidate for Senate against John Sparkman in 1966, and if he had won that election, it is quite possible that James Allen would have been elected to the Senate as a Republican in 1968.  Under those circumstances, the 1968 election would have been a cakewalk for Nixon, instead of the barnburner it turned out to be.  Nixon would have swept every Southern state, with the POSSIBLE exception of Texas, and his lead in the popular vote would have been a minimum of 7-8 points.

If this had happened, Wallace would not have run for President in 1972, would not have been assasinated, and would have had a longer, and more productive, political career.  He would have been a viable GOP candidate for President in 1976, or he may have been named as Ronald Reagan's running mate prior to the convention (in place of Richard Schweiker).  Such a selection may well have (in the context I am talking about) put Reagan over the top at the GOP convention, and may have enabled a Reagan-Wallace ticket to carry Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, Virginia, and (possibly) Florida and North Carolina.  Such a selection may, however, have cost the Republicans Illinois and Michigan, two key states Ford won in 1976.  Texas was close for Carter, and I think Texas MAY have gone for a Reagan-Wallace ticket in 1976, but it is also possible that a number of Northeastern states that went for Ford (NJ, CT, VT, ME) may have gone for Carter.

If Wallace had switched to the GOP after Nixon was elected, he'd have had 15 more minutes of fame, then anonymity.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I meant shot and paralyzed.

I actually visited the shopping center where he was shot weeks before the shooting.  My family took a trip from Long Island to Washington, DC and stayed with a family member in Laurel, MD. 

[Fuzzy Bear]

Read my previous posts: there is no way he would have ever become a Republican.  Also, the Republican shift in the South had very little, if anything, to do with race.  Ike carried several Southern states in 1952 and 1956 and Nixon did the same in 1960, despite both being strong supporters of civil rights and the Democrats putting racists and segregationists on their tickets all three times.

The only clear-cut segregationist the Democrats put on the ticket was John Sparkman in 1952.  Estes Kefauver refused to sign the Southern Manifesto.  LBJ, whatever his private views, did support and floor manage the Civil Rights bill of 1957.

The defections of Gov. Allan Shivers (D-TX) and Robert Kennon (D-LA) to support Eisenhower was due to issues of control of tidelands oil, but Kennon was a 1948 Dixiecrat.  Sen. Harry Byrd (D-VA) instituted his Golden Silence in no small part because of the National Democratic Party's support for civil rights as part of their platform beginning in 1948.  Southern conservative racists saw that the accomodation they had with Northern Democratic liberals on race was done, and they began making plans.  Some of the shift in the South was due to the economic conservatism of Bourbon Democratic Southerners, but much of it was due to conservative Democrats recognizing the position that the NATIONAL Democratic party was taking on civil rights.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I REALLY don't think George Wallace would've become a Republican, but not for the reasons that OldiesFreak mentioned.

For one, George Wallace was a very populist politician.  Not only would his pro-segregation stance be at odds with the Republican Party (actually, it would've been at odds with the majority of the Democratic Party as well, as the numbers indicate on the vote by party on the Civil Rights Act.), but so would his economic philosophy.  Republicans, while not outright laissez faire in the 1960's, were at least considerably more pro-business in rhetoric than what Wallace would've felt comfortable with.  At least as a Democrat he would retain his populist visage by sticking with the "little guy's party", something that he wouldn't have as a Southern Republican (who were mostly seen as rich oilmen at the time).

Agreed.  Although most Democrats voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act, they did so in smaller percentages than the Republicans did.

Wallace is considered the most influential loser in the history of Presidential politics by some historians.  He certainly would not have enjoyed that "distinction" if he had left the Democratic Party, and certainly not if he had run as a Republican.

Wallace was not an economic conservative in terms of infrastructure spending and basic bread-and-butter issues, and a populist at a time where conservative populism hadn't really developed. 

I certainly believe that if Wallace had thought things out longer-term, he would NOT have run for President as an independent in 1968.  And imagine what would have happened if Wallace had entered the Democratic race early in 1968.  He likely would have swept the entire South, save Texas, and he would have won a number of delegates in those Northern states where busing to achieve school integration was a burning issue.  Just imagine what Chicago would have been like in 1968 if the entire South and some of the other border states brought Wallace delegations to the convention. 

Under those circumstances, HHH would not have been the Presidential nominee.  The question is whether or not Wallace would have supported the Democratic ticket.  It is POSSIBLE that 1968 would have been a Dixiecrat replay, where Wallace was the DEMOCRATIC nominee in a number of Southern states.  But if he didn't just bolt, imagine what THAT Democratic Convention would have been like in Chicago. 

The same question could be asked about 1972 if Wallace hadn't been wounded and hadn't bolted in 1968.  Had Wallace never bolted the Democratic Party, he would have been viewed differently in 1972.  Different enough to have been offered the Vice Presidency?  Probably not, but Wallace would have very much have been a Democratic kingmaker, albeit a resented one.

That's assuming that Wallace would have been Wallace, and folks would have gone along with him.  If Wallace had moderated mid-stream on his Presidential quests, his supporters would have found no reason to support him.  His movement was not a cult of personality; it was a populist revolt against the type of liberalism that (in the eyes of Wallaceites) wished to impose a new Reconstruction on the South and which hated all things Southern, but which was all for road projects, new schools and colleges, and infrastructure projects.  Guns and Butter politics. 

Wallace's supporters weren't really ready to be Republicans.   In Marshall Frady's Wallace, a biography of George Wallace prior to the 1968 election, one of Wallace's closest aides told Frady that Alabamians didn't really like Goldwater; it's just that Goldwater opposed the Civil Rights laws, and Alabamians voted for him in appreciation.  That comment, however, is telling.  It suggests that the entire South didn't necessarily have to be lost to the GOP, but the Democratis couldn't find a way to work that out. 

[Fuzzy Bear]

According to Mr Segregation himself he voted republican for president four times. He voted Republican in 1964, 1972, 1992, and 1996. Third-party in 1948 and 1968. Democrat in all other presidential races;including, Mondale and Dukakis.

I don't believe Wallace voted for Goldwater in 1964.  The Democratic Party in Alabama named a slate of unpledged electors, and I believe Wallace voted for them.  Wallace also may have voted for McGovern; he liked McGovern personally, but didn't endorse him because his supporters would have gagged on that, and McGovern's supporters would have probably jumped ship in significant numbers.  (Wallace secretly hated Nixon, who funded his primary opponent's campaign in 1970 and who was launching investigations into corruption and tax fraud centering around his brother, Gerald Wallace, and some of his aides (including Seymore Trammell, who ended up going to jail).  Nixon viewed Wallace as the stumbling block to winning Wallace's voters.

[Fuzzy Bear]

He certainly voted Republican in 1992 and 1996. He also said he voted Democrat against Reagan twice and against 41 the first time. He was also a staunch supporter of the Kennedy Johnson Ticket in 1960. Every dixiecrat was for that ticket in 1960; except, for, Thurmond, Harry Byrd, and Shivers.

I didn't know about 1992, but I did read in 1996 that Wallace liked Dole and intended to vote for him, saying that the Democratic Party became too liberal.