During Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt's 4 victorious presidential campaigns, South Carolina's voters gave him overwhelming support: 98% (1932), 98% ('36), 95% ('40), and 87% ('44). (Note: All percentages have been rounded down.) But in the '48 campaign, sitting president Harry S. Truman (D) garnered only 24% of the vote and his national opponent took in 3%
Take a moment and do the simple arithmetic. What's missing? The 71% won by South Carolina Governor Strom Thurmond, who campaigned for a segregationist 3rd party informally known as the Dixicrats. Thurmond received more votes in '48 than the total cast in the '44 presidential election in South Carolina.
What happened? Well, perhaps, for starters President Truman ended racial discrimination in the US Army, created a Fair Employment Practices Commission, supported ending state poll taxes, and backed federal anti-lynching laws.
In 1960, national winner John F. Kennedy (D) turned back Richard M. Nixon (R) in South Carolina 51% to 48%. One cycle later, and Republican Barry Goldwater took the state with 58% of the vote to President Lyndon B. Johnson's (D) 41%.
A historical note here, Johnson championed the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964.
The '68 election in South Carolina saw Nixon out-battle Hubert H. Humphrey (D) 38% to 29%. Again, do some quick addition. The missing chunk this go-round, segregationist Alabama governor George Wallace (American Independent Party) grabbing 32% of the vote.
Then Jimmy Carter (D) won over Gerald Ford (R) in '76, 56% to 43%. Four years later, Ronald Reagan (R) defeated Carter 49% to 48%. Reagan had fewer votes in '80 than Carter collected in '76.
No Republican presidential candidate has failed to carry South Carolina since 1980.
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