Did the Republicans Pay Too High A Price For Uncritically Embracing Thurmond in 1964?

The late Strom Thurmond left the Democratic Party in 1964, and joined the Republican Party, bringing a part of the Dixiecrat worldview with him.

The Republicans were always been the party of Capitalism and equal rights before 1964. During the Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt years, the GOP opposed the Democratic party's socialist policies, and in addition, they were supportive of black Civil Rights. Before 1964, Republicans had proven that there was no contradiction between supporting capitalism, and supporting civil rights. And during the era of Dwight and Mamie Eisenhower, the Republican Party came to be identified as the party of family values and traditional morality, as well as the party of Civil Rights. In those years, the Republicans proudly identified with Abraham Lincoln and the anti-slavery heritage of the party, and no Republican ever felt obligated to defend the Confederate Flag.

Today, blacks and other racial minorities regard Republicans as racists. Many modern Republicans feel obligated to defend the Confederate Flag and the Confederacy, which are part of the heritage of Democrats of the Old South, and not part of the Republican party's proud abolitionist and pro-Union heritage. And, sadly, Bush had to issue a statement agreeing with the Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action, as the only way he could prove to blacks that he is not prejudiced.

In 1956, Eisenhower received about 50 percent of the black vote, and in 1960, Nixon received 35 percent of the black vote. In 1932, Herbert Hoover received 67 percent of the black vote, during the Great Depression. Did the Republican Party pay too high a moral price for Strom Thurmond's support, when he joined the party in 1964?

I believe that, even without the Southern strategy of Goldwater and Nixon, and even without embracing the Dixiecrat worldview, Southerners would still have joined the GOP, because they share the Republican Party's values on traditional morality, gun rights, patriotism, low taxes, limited government, anti-abortion views, etc. Only that it would have taken 10 to 15 years extra, for the majority of Southerners to vote for the GOP.

More significantly, if the blacks had stuck with the GOP in those years, they would not have been corrupted by the moral relativism of the Democrats, and they would have the strong families that they had in the Eisenhower era, when 78 percent of black babies were born to married parents.

"A better question to ask is, how would the relationship with African-Americans and the GOP be if JFK/LBJ not stolen the 1960 election?"

What if Nixon had been able to overcome the JFK/LBJ fraud? Excellent question; I'll do my best to answer it. We would have avoided the Vietnam War, or if we didn't avoid it we would have won it fairly quickly. Nixon would have gotten a non-quota-inducing Civil Rights Act passed, which would have been supported by Goldwater and would have been acceptable to many white Southerners. Nixon would have won reelection in 1964, beating Hubert Humphrey (John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson would have stayed in the Senate). Goldwater would have trounced Rockefeller in the 1968 Republican primary, and then beat John F. Kennedy in a very close general election race by carrying the South, the West, Northern New England and much of the Midwest. After winning reelection in 1972, Goldwater would name former California governor Ronald Reagan as the heir to the conservative mantle, and Reagan would beat the dickens out of Georgia ex-Governor Jimmy Carter in the 1976 election, and his 1980 reelection was guaranteed after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1979. A major part of the Republican victories in 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1980 would come from black voters, 40% of which voted Republican.

Well, a man can dream, can't he? : )

"The only way to explain the modern perception of Republicans as the racist party would be that we got outbid in the government giveaway game."

Yup, that's probably the biggest part of it. A RINO Governor (serving at the time of the height of the riots and the "Black Power" movement) who sent me an autobiographical book lamented that despite preventing rioting in his state (indeed, even SIDING with the agitators) and bending over backwards to accommodate Black interests, Black leaders told him (upon his running for reelection) "sorry, but you're a Republican" as he went down to defeat. By the early '70s, it no longer mattered that the GOP had voted more for Civil Rights as a percentage than the 'Rats, the perception, spurred on by the 'Rats, self-appointed Black leaders (espousing the aforementioned DuBois & Marcus Garvey (a name not mentioned in this thread) approach to politics), and the media, was that the GOP was racist/anti-Black, was already in place. Forgotten in '72 as Blacks went overwhelmingly for McGovern was that it was Nixon who looked Jackie Robinson in the eye and pledged support on civil rights, and JFK who did not and wasn't particularly well-versed on the issue. After JFK's assassination, Jackie couldn't even claim he disliked the man (too un-PC, then), and it was all over, as they say. :-(

Interesting scenario, but flawed. I don't think Goldwater would've succeeded Nixon in '68, because there would've been a fella named Vice-President Henry Cabot Lodge standing in the way. If a battle royale had broken out between Lodge and Goldwater, the resulting split, despite the unity ticket of Lodge-Reagan to assuage the Goldwaterites, it would've gone down to defeat in '68 against Kennedy-Kennedy (JFK of MA, and RFK of NY, who had defeated leftist RINO Sen. Jacob Javits for reelection in '62 in the upset of the cycle). It, of course, was a disaster from the start, as 52-year old JFK had to deal with "bimbo eruptions" from the start, including the suppressed allegation from 43-year old Marilyn Monroe, who died in a very strange small plane crash in July of '69 off of Martha's Vineyard, coming a month after younger brother Teddy, a well-known drunk, had been arrested and charged with vehicular homicide and failure to report an accident in the death of Mary Jo Kopechne. Teddy, whom JFK had tried to pursuade Governor John Volpe to appoint to his Senate seat (with Volpe going with Eliot Richardson, instead), in a drunken rage said he wasn't going to go up the river for his brothers, confessed he, on the orders of JFK and Bobby, had sabotaged the equipment on Miss Monroe's small plane. A sensational trial ensued, with JFK assuring the country that he and the Vice-President had absolutely nothing to do with her death. While Teddy was being held at a detention center in Boston, he was found dead of a "heart attack" in his solitary-confinement cell. Inmates had testified seeing a helicopter with several men in suits entering that part of the facility before his death. Pressure was brought on Congress to begin an investigation, perhaps leading to impeachment. By early 1970, the stress had taken its toll on JFK, and in March with impeachment looming, Secret Service agents found the 52-year old dead in the Hay-Adams Hotel with young starlet, 23-year old Farrah Fawcett, by his side, also suffering a heart attack after injesting a large amount of cocaine. Already facing indictment for his role in the Monroe death, RFK was sworn in as President, but unable to get Kennedy in-law Sargent Shriver, approved to succeed him as Vice-President with the GOP filibustering the vote, leaving the position vacant. Successfully impeached in the House in May, RFK was forced to appear in court in MA, inciting riots. With the 'Rat-controlled Senate delaying action on impeachment, Washington ground to a halt. Within a month, overwhelming taped evidence that Teddy had kept in a secret safety deposit box, proved that Bobby, along with JFK, had ordered Monroe's death to avoid more public embarrassment with sex scandals. In a moment almost unequalled in U.S. history, on May 15, 1970, as RFK was leaving the courthouse, Joe DiMaggio approached the President, shooting him at point-blank range, exclaiming, "This is for Marilyn !" RFK was later pronounced dead at a nearby Boston hospital. Speaker of the House Gerald Ford was sworn in as President that evening, and in a televised speech announced he was pardoning DiMaggio, saying that 'our long national nightmare is finally over.' Ford would select Gov. Reagan as his Vice-President, and they would go on to serve throughout the 1970s with distinction...

Take that ! :-P

"I don't think Goldwater would've succeeded Nixon in '68, because there would've been a fella named Vice-President Henry Cabot Lodge standing in the way."

Lodge was 66 in 1968, while Goldwater was only 59. Even if Lodge had served as VP under Nixon for 8 years, I don't think he would have beat Barry in the GOP primaries in 1968. I also believe that Babe Ruth would have hit over 50 homers in 1919 had the Red Sox played their home games in the Polo Grounds and had the season been 154 games long. I can't prove I'm right on either claim, but I don't think you can prove me wrong, either. : )

"RFK of NY, who had defeated leftist RINO Sen. Jacob Javits for reelection in '62 in the upset of the cycle"

Had JFK been defeated by Nixon in 1960, RFK wouldn't be able to get elected dogcatcher in Boston, much less Senator in New York. But the rest of your story is entirely plausible. : )

"Lodge was 66 in 1968, while Goldwater was only 59. Even if Lodge had served as VP under Nixon for 8 years, I don't think he would have beat Barry in the GOP primaries in 1968. I also believe that Babe Ruth would have hit over 50 homers in 1919 had the Red Sox played their home games in the Polo Grounds and had the season been 154 games long. I can't prove I'm right on either claim, but I don't think you can prove me wrong, either. : )"

Quite true. I would say in Hank Lodge's defense, that he was a rather youthful 60-something from what I saw of him (think Rumsfeld), and the likelihood is that he would probably have had Nixon's strong backing going into the primaries. I just realized in my scenario with Ford picking Reagan as his VP, that would've left the Governorship of CA vulnerable to Jesse Unruh that year ('70)... Ah, well, can't win 'em all. :-P

"Had JFK been defeated by Nixon in 1960, RFK wouldn't be able to get elected dogcatcher in Boston, much less Senator in New York. But the rest of your story is entirely plausible. : )"

Well, if it had been as close as it was, but with a bit of rejiggering to allow Nixon's victories in TX & IL, that wouldn't necessarily have been the kiss of death for RFK. Javits, a Socialist, was clearly too leftist for NY (he was regarded during most of his tenure as being THE most left-wing Senator, bar none), and RFK could've cobbled together many disparate groups to beat him (including Conservatives ! I frankly wouldn't have been too averse to him if he weren't a Kennedy. Some of RFK's speeches made him SOUND like a Republican by today's standards). I liked the DiMaggio bit, I know he always wanted to get even with the Kennedys over Marilyn's "questionable" death. Despite the theories being almost tinfoil hat territory, I think the boys made sure she wasn't going to go to the press over her affair with the brothers, which would've doomed their chances in '64. She would've blown open the doors on everything we NOW know regarding JFK's sexcapades.

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