"Big" Re-alignment

[RJ]

The basic idea is that a big trend you see is Republican support has become geographically much more broadly based. Just look at the Atlas map: a sea of blue.

This is what I call the "big" re-alignment. The "big" re-alignment theory reflects a view of the FDR coalition not as a traditional political base but recognizes its exceptionalism as an inherently contradictory coalition reflecting an ongoing party transformation. That coalition was merely part 1 of this transformation of the North-South divide becoming the urban-rural divide. The "GOP Southern" re-alignment is part 2 of that transformation. What is traditionally seen as 2 separate re-alignments, I see as a single re-alignment spanning from 1928 through the present day.

I still think that there were 2 distinct realignments. The only reason I say that is because from 1932-1968, our country was clearly in the hands of the Democratic party. They had their way with American politics for the most part. From 1932-52, they held a better than 2-1 majority in the house along with the white house. They passed legislation at will, and were clearly the dominant party, argueably the most powerful either party had been during any extended period in American history. It didn't end there. They took back the white house and just embarrassed the Republicans in 1964, once again passing legislation throughout the 1960's to their own likening. The only prominent Republican from that period was Ike, a moderate conservative.

1968 was clearly a changing of the gaurd. The Republicans slowly took control of the seante and although it took a while, also took congress back. By 2008, we'll have seen the GOP in the white house 28 out of the 40 years, and there have been 4 blowout elections in which the GOP candidate got at least 400 electoral votes. The only Democratic presidents? Carter, who won a contested election which turned out a lot closer than people realize, but that was simply because the opposing candidate had such a bad rap and the party had a black eye from earlier trangressions. There was also Clinton, seen as a moderate Democrat, especially when he was elected.

After the first realignment election, the Democrats could run left extremests and fully expect to win while the GOP couldn't do that. Since 68', it's the Republicans who can run a rightwinger and get away with it, while the Democrats seem to have to run someone at least seen as more of a centrist if they want to win. The point is that there are clearly two seperate trends from the two periods, and that's why I say there are two different realignments going on. Although this is seemingly a nit-picking point, I think it's important to point it out, because I don't think Democrats can expect to win with a real liberal type until the next realignment occurs.

Whatever, though. At least we both agree there were two realignments and when they were...

[RJ]

I suppose if you were to look at our history from 1928-present and attempt to comprehend certain objectives, you could say there is and has been one big realignment. I think it would be important to establish what the term "realignment" exactly means in order to verify whether there were two or in fact one and identify the criteria of each.

My thinking as to why the New Deal and the GOP south are two seperate realignments is I don't think there are common elements as to why the two occurred. First, the urban-rural divide isn't exactly what led to the GOP winning the South. Although the GOP made certain advancments in the South before 1968, the Democratic party was clearly the dominant party at least until 1960. There are also certain states that don't exactly follow the urban-rural splits as you described; the infamous "exceptions to the rule." Here in Ohio, this state(to me) clearly leans Republican, and there are a few good size cities here. I live near Dayton, about 60 miles north of Cincy. Dayton is a strong liberal town, but Columbus and Cincinnati are good GOP bases. The cities in the north of the state are democratic in nature, but the average is thrown off by Col, Cin, and some of the more densly populated counties in southeast OH. Wisconsin has a population density more favorable for the GOP than Ohio's if you follow the rural-urban rule. Iowa's is similar to Wisconsin's, however both  lean Democtaric. Texas and Georgia, however, are strong GOP states and both of them have big cities. I'd guess about 15% of Georgia's population is in Atlanta. In comparison, I'd say a similar portion of Wisconsin's population is in Milwaukee, yet it is opposite Georgia's position. My thinking is there is something else that caused the South to go Republican, and that had nothing to do with the New Deal or the Urban-Rural split theories. I also don't think the urban-rural theory holds a lot of water in the midwest or the old border states with the exception of Illinois or perhaps Michigan.

It has been suggested that the state governments in the south being democratic is a remnant of the days when the Democrats dominated the south. I think it has more to do with the fact that certain states in the south are per capita well below the national average income wise. While southerners may prefer GOP "values and standards," they prefer the democratic party's more leftist economics. I'll reiterate that the Democrats were the party of the South long after the New Deal and I don't think it was the New Deal realignment which changed that.

It may be a bit of a mistake as you suggested to draw points in history and say"this is how it was before, this was how it was after." The divisions in the New Deal Coalition is also something I'm not familiar with and probably should look into. Still, I think there were two distinctly different realignments going on. I'd make my case further, but I don't want to rant anymore than I already have.

[RJ]

I am not too familiar with all of the local conditions around the country, in fact I have only lived in one place my entire life. I can only look based on county data in certain places. In Ohio for example, I look at Dave's map and see that Cuyahoga, Summit, Franklin, Montgomery, and Hamilton are colored the darkest in the population map, the last three which correspond to Columbus, Dayton and Cincinnati, and they trended Democratic in 2004 by 4.48%, 3.51%, 8.23%, -0.44%, 5.87%, respectively, while the state as a whole trended Democratic by 1.40%. So Dayton trended a bit more Republican, but the other 4 places trended significantly more Democratic. In Indiana on the other hand, the state trended Republican by 5.05%, but Lake by only 3.18% and Marion where Indianapolis by -3.23%, where the differential between the parties was the worst for the GOP since 1964. This could just be the result of population movement, or any various other factors.

I'll have to look a little closer at Dave's maps. From what you're saying, Cincy and Col. were more democratic this year than Dayton(or the Democrats gained more of a percentage last year than in years prior?). I can tell you that in the county I'm in, the vote was about 2-1 in favor of Bush last year. Anyway, wasn't trying to be animated or anything, just laying out my case:)