Northern Democratic counties that became Republican counties

[soniquemd21921]

Long before the "Southern realignment" there were several Democratic-since-the-Civil-War counties in northern states that became Republican in the 20's and 30's and stayed Republican. Some of these counties were at one time the most Democratic counties in their state:

Schoharie, New York (before 1920 this was almost always the lone upstate county to go Democratic; it stayed Republican afterwards and voted against FDR all four times)

Pike, Pennsylvania (never voted Republican before 1920, by 1948 the county that gave Teddy Roosevelt only 36% of the vote in 1904 gave Dewey 70%)

Sussex, New Jersey (and neighboring Hunterdon and Warren, which were as Democratic as Hudson was before the 1920's; since 1920 the only Democrat to carry Sussex was LBJ in 1964)

Holmes, Ohio (largely Amish county - it was almost always the most Democratic county in OH before the 30's; it's been heavily Republican since the 50's) + most of the German counties in western Ohio, particularly Auglaize, Defiance and Putnam

Franklin, Adams and Wells, Indiana

several southern Illinois counties, especially Clinton and Effingham.

Ozaukee, Wisconsin (heavily German)

Carroll, Maryland (since 1920 the only Democrats to win here were FDR in 1932 and LBJ in 1964; before that it usually always went Democratic)

What changed in these counties?

[soniquemd21921]

I hope I'm not the only one that wishes Vermont still voted like it did in 1936 and not 2008.

[soniquemd21921]

German Protestants seemed to have been somewhat split; some largely German counties in Pennsylvania were and still are Republican (Union, Snyder, Lancaster, Lebanon), while others were historically Democratic (Berks, York, Adams). York is another historically Democratic county that eventually became Republican.

Historically the second-most ethnic Republican voting bloc after Yankees were Scandinavians, especially Swedes. It seems that Scandinavians became more evenly split with the advent of the New Deal, while Yankees continued to vote at least 80%-90% Republican until Goldwater (the 80-90% figure is based on pre-1964 election results from small towns in New England and New York).

[soniquemd21921]

Sussex County has been a Republican county since the 1920's. In 1936 it was one of only four counties in the entire state that Alf Landon won (the others were Morris, Ocean and Monmouth).