Negro Voter Research Articles

Northern Referenda On Fair Housing: the Response of White Voters

to first-class citizenship, Negro Americans seldom have acquired sufficient electoral strength to achieve their objectives without additional support. As a minority group in most Northern localities, Negro voters frequently have attempted to enlist the aid of whites in the pursuit of full equality and freedom. The efforts occasionally have been successful, but there have been growing recent indications that the responses of the white electorate to Negro political aspirations may reveal opposition and resistance rather than cooperation and support. Political ties between Negroes and whites frequently have occupied a prominent role in the struggle for civil rights. In some Northern cities including Detroit, for example, Negro organizations and white reform groups or labor unions have joined to promote common political aims.? Yet, relatively little attention has been devoted to the positions on racial issues of various groups in the electorate. Perhaps fewer studies have been conducted on attitudes or voting behavior regarding questions of discrimination or prejudice in Northern than in Southern cities.2 The gains that have been secured in the urban areas of the North often have seemed to result from an aroused public conscience rather than from the vigorous exertion of white voters. Frequently, moreover, advocates of civil rights have encountered substantial resistance when proposals have been offered for equal educational opportunities, integrated housing, and impartial police practices. On such issues, the merged voting strength of Negroes and white liberals necessary to attain desired electoral goals often has been either lacking or ineffective. In recent years, at least eleven Northern cities and states have held referenda on civil rights issues.3 In eight of these cities or states, proposals in the interest of Negro citizens have been defeated by the voters. The results of recent ballots on specific issues of discrimination, therefore, have provided little encouragement for securing additional progress on civil rights by circumventing the legislative process through direct appeals to the people. Even more importantly, the strength of civil

Three Carpetbag Governors (review)

book reviews275 clearly delineated. Nugent also displays a tendency to avoid hard problems and to gloss over insufficient evidence by resort to platitudes. Readers are frequently told of reactions by "the people" (pp. 36, 53, 59) without receiving a clear or precise indication as to whom is being discussed. Nevertheless, this is a provocative little book. If the author's main purpose was to stimulate discussion he has partially succeeded. The volume makes a contribution to the revisionist view of the Gilded Age which seeks to reexamine the period in greater depth. Perhaps it was an era characterized by political corruption, materialism and artificiality; but it was also an age of great intellectual ferment and of great political and economic experimentation. Nugent's volume not only helps to convey a little of that sense of excitement that was a feature of the times. In addition, he provides us with some new insights useful to an understanding of the money question in post-Civil War America. Gerald D. Nash University of New Mexico Three Carpetbag Governors. By Richard N. Current. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1967. Pp. xii, 108. $3.75.) This is a small, brief book—only ninety-eight pages of printed text—a ten page bibliographical note and no index. But it is a good book. In his three brief chapters—the Fleming Lectures at Louisiana State University in 1966— Professor Current brings to bear data which obliterates a number of myths about reconstruction government in the Soudi. This will be even a quite influential book, a significant addition to the revisionist literature and a worthy member of the seminal Fleming Lecture Series in Southern History. In this volume Current's task is to examine in three case studies one of the most precious of the reconstruction myths of the Dunningite orthodoxy— the despicable carpetbag governor. By tracing the careers of three of the ten such governors—Harrison Reed of Florida, Henry Clay Warmoth of Louisiana and Adelbert Ames of Mississippi—the author presents a sympathetic and on die whole convincing picture of three very different individuals caught in quite different situations. Clearly, the glib generalizations which depict carpetbag governors as persons of a single type must be laid aside. Not diat Current's research here is exhaustive. It is not. But these three brief case studies tell sufficiendy different stories that accepted generalizations must be reconsidered. Some question might be raised concerning how typical the three governors selected were. The author does make note of the seven otiier carpetbag governors whose careers he might have traced, but he does not make a wholly convincing case for die selection of "his three." Certainly Warmoth is well enough known and has been so broadly vilified diat no argument should be raised against his inclusion. However, Professor Current overlooks a most fascinating yet revealing figure in the well-educated, enigmatic Daniel H. Chamberlain of South Carolina. And Rufus B. Bullock of 276CIVIL WAR HISTORY Georgia, though born and educated in New York, is apparendy considered a scalawag because he served with the Confederacy, and thus is not a candidate for being a carpetbagger. But the book's main point is well made. And it effectively lays the groundwork for a further and more careful study of political carpetbaggerism . It is a frankly exploratory and suggestive volume, not a definitive one. The tiiree governors chosen are indeed different people, and Professor Current convincingly lays to rest a number of myths about reconstruction: that all carpetbaggers were associated with waste; that all carpetbaggers appealed to the Negro vote; that all carpetbaggers were helped by Federal bayonets; and that carpetbaggers were rootless wanderers who never identified with the Soudi. Teachers will find this volume a useful and well written tool to introduce students to the wilderness of reconstruction historiography. Current's three governors come across as real figures stripped of myüiical caricature. Richard B. Drake Berea College Georgia Voices: A Documentary History to 1872. By Spencer B. King, Jr. (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1966. Pp. vi, 370. $6.95.) Almost every compiler of a book of readings finds himself faced with the question of what approach to use: whether to put...

A reappraisal of the social and political participation of Negroes.

Inspection of the effec of socioeconomic status on the organizational membership of Negroes and whites indicates that the konwn relationship between social class and membership is much less pronounced for Negroes. Lower-class Negroes are more likely to belong to organizations than lower-class whites, while middle-class whites are slighty more likely to belong than middle-class Negroes. Upper-class whites, in turn, are much more likely to be "joiners" than their Negro Counterparts. Similar comparisons of Negroes and whites show that Negroes are, without exception, more likely to participate actively in associations. Examination of membership in different kinds of organizations reveals that Negroes are more likely to belong to political and church groups than their white counterparts and equally likely to belong to civic groups. Finally, evidence on Negro voting in presidential elections since 1952 points to a remarkable increase in voter turnout, especially in comparison with the stable turnout of the nation as a whole.

The Implementation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964: Title VI and the Use of Federal Funds

The passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by the United States Congress was a landmark not merely because of the manner in which Congressional opposition to the bill was overcome, but also in the potential effect of the legislation upon a variety of Federal programmes, in particular the use of Federal funds to implement such programmes. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, itself preceded by a period of intense and unprecedented civil rights agitation, in turn provoked further bouts of agitation, culminating in the attempts to register Negro voters in Selma, Alabama, and the march from Selma to Montgomery, Albama. Because of this, that section of the Act (Title 1) concerned with more effective enforcement of the right to vote in Federal elections has gained considerable prominence, especially following the presentation to Congress in March, 1965, of recommended legislation designed to enforce the 15th Amendment to the Constitution. However, one of the most significant and far-reaching sections of the Act is that relating to, and affecting, the use of Federal funds by Federal agencies. Under Title VI of the Act every Federal agency providing financial assistance through grants, loans or contracts, is required to eliminate discrimination in these programmes on the grounds of race, colour or national origin. This power could be a powerful lever for the President to force state governmental agencies to eliminate such discrimination in their programmes or risk the loss of vital Federal funds to supplement such programmes. It provides an important potential economic sanction on many Southern states and its effects may be far-reaching. The importance of Title VI can be seen by reference to particular areas where it has already been implemented.

The Republican Party in Georgia: From Reconstruction through 1900 (review)

422CIVIL WAR HISTORY nothing is said about Negroes within the Confederacy, where the majority of them were during the war, and litde about the daily life, labor, and business enterprises of northern Negroes in this boom period. The selections, perhaps inevitably, overstress the opinions of the more articulate classes of Negroes. Development of the neglected themes would have required hard grubbing among new sources; it would also have meant a second book as distinguished as Mr. McPherson's first one. Within these limitations, there are many rewards for the reader. The editor suppb'es a conceptual framework for consideration of the documents in each chapter, and much biographical information which illuminates the documents. Among the unforgettable documents are Henry M. Turner 's account of the celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation, the narrative of a reluctant "contraband" surrounded by the carnage of Missionary Ridge, and Sojourner Truth's integration of the Washington streetcars : "Sojourner rode farther than she needed to go; for a ride was so rare a privilege that she determined to make the most of it." This book is a useful supplement to the secondary works on the Negro in the Civil War by Bell I. Wiley, Dudley T. Cornish, Benjamin Quarles, and McPherson himself. Let us hope that m his next book the editor, like Sojourner Truth, will determine to make the most of it. Louis R. Harlan University of Cincinnati The Republican Party in Georgia: From Reconstruction through 1900. By Olive Hall Shadgett. (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1964. Pp. Ix, 210. $6.00.) With Professor Shadgett's book, historians are treated to another bold thrust into that twilight zone which lies, as C. Vann Woodward has so felicitously phrased it, "below the threshold of living memory" and beyond the horizon of written history. It is not, of course, a completely novel thrust. Professors V. P. De Santis and S. P. Hirshon have effectively blasted the myth that northern Republicans conceded the South to the Democracy after 1877. Simultaneously, in the usual state-by-state progression of southern historiography, a literature of "Southern Republicans Face the Southern Question" has been growing out of such direct contributions as James W. Patton's pioneer article on die Republicans in South Carolina and such indirect additions as those made by Wharton, Tindall, Wynes, Logan, and Edmonds. Without doubt, this story of the Republican party in Georgia will add an important measure of depth to the synthesis of southern Republicanism which will soon be made. Within the limits which the author set for her study, there is litde of substance to criticize. Yet, voting figures are only casually given and there are no clear and systematic analyses of election returns. On the very important point of Negro voting, for instance, we are left foundering in near darkness. Looking particularly at the highly significant election BOOKREVIEWS423 of 1894, we find that many Negroes did vote the Populist ticket on the one hand and, on the other, that many did not. All of this we could have guessed. The writer, a trained political scientist of obvious capacity, owes us more. Some readers will also be disconcerted by the interjection of a chapter on the national party and the South near the end of a text which is otherwise closely chronological. Yet, the end result was rather pleasing-and must be so for those who have not read De Santis or Hirshon —and this result, perhaps, is justification enough for the author's solution of this minor organizational problem. One could also chastise the author for not including Hirshon in her considerations. This omission, it can be assumed, springs from the fact that Farewell to the Bloody Shirt (1962) was not fairly in the field before she was forced to surrender her manuscript to the press. As a detailed study of Republican politics in Georgia, Professor Shadgett 's work is a gem, but a good gem deserves at least a good setting. Admittedly, this story is not told in a vacuum, but it is also not carefully and deUberateh/ framed in the broad background of Georgian Ufe. For instance, what was the economic and poUtical miUeu in which this RepubUcan party existed? What was...

Sword and Olive Branch: Oliver Otis Howard (review)

314CIVIL WAR HISTORY work on The Military Policy. Only just prior to his suicide, on the last night of his life, when he claimed his scheme of military tactics was a failure and therefore his reputation would also vanish, is there evidence that he felt himself to be a personal failure. But this single act by a man about to take his own life is not sufficient evidence for the psychological interpretation the author has drawn, especially when there is a medical record going back several years indicating severe headaches which could have been caused by a brain tumor. The author's psychological view of Upton leads him into a position which weakens the second thème of the biography. He claims that Upton's reforms were motivated in large part by selfish reasons. Hence Upton viewed the rejection of his ideas as personal rejection. But again this reasoning places complex interpretation where a much simpler one is available. For certain reasons—which the author himself develops, namely that Upton grew up in an area of intense bmnnnitnrinnl«iti; and that Upton when young became infatuated with the soldier's life—Upton chose a career in the army and then came to see the army as reform's best agency. Upton perhaps best expressed this view in the introduction to The Military Policy where he suggested that the army is the best and truest protector of the American way of life. But before the army can do the vital job of protecting American institutions it must first be reformed to do its task efficiently and completely. In discussing the role and nature of Upton's ideas in American and western European military history, the author does his most valuable work. He briefly connects Upton's ideas with most relevant changes in the historical development of tactics, strategy, military technology, and civil-military relationships. If evaluating Upton's ideas with the author's yardstick—that Upton was operating from selfish ambition—there is little need to go beyond the author's depth of examination. But if Upton was the sort of professional soldier who was at heart entirely absorbed in what he considered the perfection of the one institution which can protect human civilization, then the ideas of Upton deserve a closer examination . Thomas Schoonover University of Maryland, European Division Sword and Olive Branch: Oliver Otis Howard. By John A. Carpenter. (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1964. Pp. viii, 379. $6.00.) This is a judicious and carefully documented biography of O. O. Howard , the "Christian general," based primarily upon his voluminous private papers, now at the Bowdoin College Library, and upon army records in the National Archives. A professional military man from his West Point graduation in 1854 until his retirement as major general forty years later, Howard derived both lasting honor and persistent harassment from a role more civilian than military, that of commissioner of the Freedmen's Bu- BOOK REVIEWS315 reau. Almost half of the biography is devoted to the nine post-Civil War years when his responsibilities as commissioner kept him in Washington, and this section includes an excellent survey of the work of the bureau. It is free of the anti-Republican bias and the insensitivity to racism characteristic of a passing phase of Reconstruction historiography, one that marred George R. Bentley's otherwise admirable standard history of the Freedmen's Bureau. The misconception that the bureau functioned as a political tool of Republican politicians bent on exploiting the Negro vote should now be laid to rest Professor Carpenter found no evidence, in either public or private records, to suggest that the bureau was the center of a political network. His portrait of General Howard further discredits such an assumption for it shows him to have been a man incapable of acting the politician and never attempting to become one. His rapid rise in rank, to major general at the age of thirty-two, was a non-political recognition of merit, though he had the usual native son endorsements. During his service in the Army of the Potomac he was above the intrigue so common among his feUow officers; even his private letters, to quote his...

The Changing Character of Negro Protest

A major change has taken place in the desegrega tion process in the last ten years. It is characterized by growing militancy on the part of thousands of Negro and white Ameri cans, and the growth in influence of six major civil rights organ izations. The initiative for change has shifted from the hands of a relatively few professional desegregationists to large num bers of average citizens who are now willing to confront the segregated system through direct action. The growth and im mediate success of the sit-in movement in 1960 added a third method of effective protest—activism—to the legal and edu cational means which had been employed before. It is found that significant desegregation in America has taken place only after the development of crisis situations which demanded rapid resolution by community decision-makers. The movement is turning to an essentially political phase, requiring the major civil rights groups to utilize all three methods more fully in co-ordinated programs. An indication of the success of such co-operative programs is the Voter Education Project, which registered more than 550,000 new Negro voters in the South from 1962 to 1964.

The Manipulated Negro Vote: Some Pre-Conditions and Consequences

T HE SUBJECT OF THIS PAPER iS one aspect of our recently completed field research on political leadership in the face-to-face community. We selected six small Florida towns for interviewing, ranging in population from approximately 4,000 to 15,000. Two towns were selected in each of three major geographical areas of the State: the old South agricultural and pine tree area of northern Florida; the citrus, cattle, vegetable area of the central portion of the peninsula; and the light industry, tourism, retirement area of southern coastal Florida. The towns in the northern tier of counties are still little different from their counterparts in neighboring Southern states. On the other hand, the dynamic economic and population growth in peninsular Florida afforded an excellent opportunity for assessing political leadership and Negro political participation in a wide variety of economic, political, and cultural settings. A research team of two professors spent approximately six weeks in each town, and from 40 to 60 individuals, both white and Negro, were interviewed.l Interviewing began with present public office holders and was then expanded to include other white political influentials as they were identified. The purpose of these interviews was to develop a picture of the political structure of the white community from the end of World War II to the time of interviewing. The interview guide was also designed to obtain white conceptions of the political structure of the Negro community and to uncover the relationship between these two structures. During the white interviews a partial list of Negro leaders was developed which was later expanded during the Negro interviews. The Negro interview guide was designed to obtain information concerning the leadership structure of the Negro community, factionalism within this com-

Working-Class Consciousness, Race, and Political Choice

A study of 375 Detroit blue-collar workers focused on voting in the 1958 gubernatorial election. Workers were classified according to degree of working-class consciousness, race, and union membership, as well as their voting preferences for either the reform or conservative candidate. Class consciousness failed to differentiate the voting choices of Negro workers to a significant degree, since race proved to be the overrinding factor. Almost all Negro voters, regardless of militance or union membership, supported the reform candidate. However, class consciousness and union membership had a predictable impact among white workmen.

Political Factors And Negro Voter Registration In The South

A recent Herblock cartoon in the Washington Post depicts three bare-footed backwoodsmen. The oldest and most tattered of them (labeled “poll tax”) lies wounded, his head propped against a boulder, his rifle abandoned near his side. As the other rifle-bearing rustics-identified as “literacy tests” and “scare tactics”- bend sorrowfully over him the older man says, “I think them Feds got me, boys, but I know you'll carry on.” Perhaps it is premature to anticipate the ratification of the anti-poll tax amendment proposed by the 87th Congress as the newest addition to the federal constitution. No doubt the cartoonist is correct, however, in picturing both “literacy tests” and “scare tactics” as less vulnerable to federal government attack. These presumed barriers to equal participation by Negroes in the politics of the South may “carry on” for some time to come.

Social and Economic Factors and Negro Voter Registration in the South

The vote is widely considered the southern Negro's most important weapon in his struggle for full citizenship and social and economic equality. It is argued that “political rights pave the way to all others.” Once Negroes in the South vote in substantial numbers, white politicians will prove responsive to the desires of the Negro community. Also, federal action on voting will be met with less resistance from the white South—and southerners in Congress—than action involving schools, jobs, or housing.Such, at least, seems to have been the reasoning behind the Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960, both of which deal primarily with the right to vote. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and his predecessor, Herbert Brownell, are both reported to believe that the vote provides the southern Negro with his most effective means of advancing toward equality, and recent actions of the Justice Department seem to reflect this view. Many Negro leaders share this belief in the over-riding importance of the vote. Hundreds of Negro registration drives have been held in southern cities and counties since 1957. Martin Luther King, usually considered an advocate of non-violent direct action, recently remarked that the most significant step Negroes can take is in the “direction of the voting booths.” The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, historically identified with courtroom attacks on segregation, is now enthusiastically committed to a “battle of the ballots.” In March, 1962, the Southern Regional Council announced receipt of foundation grants of $325,000 to initiate a major program to increase Negro voter registration in the South. The Congress of Racial Equality, the NAACP, the National Urban League, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee are among the organizations now participating in the actual registration drives.

Southern Racial Attitudes: Conflict, Awareness, and Political Change

Differences in racial attitudes between southern whites and Negroes are extreme and intensely felt. As south ern Negroes become more militant and politically powerful, and as the national government intervenes more vigorously in their behalf, the consensus within the two races and conflict be tween them produce problems for which the normal processes of compromise and accommodation are largely inoperative. The majority of neither race correctly perceives the attitudes of the other. Negro opposition to segregation is unlikely to change, and pressure from the rest of the nation is unlikely to dimin ish. The attitudes of white southerners are gradually being altered. In the "peripheral" South, the greater awareness by whites of Negro discontent, the existence of a significant mi nority of white moderates, and the growing number of Negro voters make the accommodation of racial conflict politically possible. In the deep South, white awareness of Negro opinion and the number of white moderates and Negro voters are too small at present to permit white politicians to compromise. But forces within the South and from outside seem to be working in that direction.

The Civil Rights Issue and Presidential Voting Among Southern Negroes and Whites

role the rights issue in the 1960 presidential election was investigated through a survey the voting intentions 130 Negroes and 147 whites in a southern city. rights issue proved to be central importance in the decisions the Negro voters. white on the other hand, tended to make their decisions on other grounds, and the rights issue played a much lesser role. This was due not to indifference toward the issue but rather to the belief that the stands Nixon and Kennedy were equally unacceptable. Thus Kennedy was able to attract a majority Negro voters by adopting a somewhat more militant stance than his opponent on rights without alienating a large number southern whites, who tended to regard any differences between the candidates on rights as insignificant. O S NE OF THE major issues recent presidential election campaigns in the United States has been the question rights for Negroes. Yet, in spite the great importance attached to the issue by the candidates in the conduct their campaigns, the impact the issue upon the voting decisions the public has not generally been studied except in indirect fashion, primarily through the analysis gross voting returns. Thus we have little knowledge the specific effects the rights issue as distinct from other issues with regard to the voting patterns either Negroes or whites. There have been many studies Negro presidential voting based primarily upon the analysis voting returns in predominantly Negro wards and precincts in southern and northern cities.' These studies show that until 1936 Negroes in the United States tended to vote Republican as a kind perpetual monument to Reconstruction. New Deal economic and welfare measures, however, tended to attract Negroes to the Democratic party in the elections between 1936 and 1952. In 1956 there were widespread defections back to the Republican Party. According to Lubell's study 86 cities, Eisenhower received only 25 percent the Negro vote in these cities in 1952 but received 36 percent in 1956.2 change was especially great in the southern cities, where the percent voting for Eisenhower rose from 19 percent in 1952 to 47 percent in 1956. A Gallup poll in January 1957, showed that of all the major groups the nation's population, the one that shifted most to the Eisenhower-Nixon ticket... was the Negro voter.3 reason for the shift the Negro vote in 1956 has been the subject much speculation. Moon believes that civil rights was most certainly an important consideration in the minds Negro voters, and he points out that their switch was most pronounced in the South, where the issue was sharp and inescapable.4 Lubell states that ... . the crucial struggle in the minds Negroes during the last campaign was the conflict between their anger over incidents racial violence in the South and the economic attachment that they felt to the Democratic party.'5 Where unemployment was heavy and where Negroes were relatively well integrated into the labor movement, as in Michigan and Toledo, there were few defections from the * Paper read at the twenty-fourth annual meeting the Southern Sociological Society, Miami Beach, Florida, April 1961. I am indebted to the Research Council Florida State University for financial support this study and to Charles U. Smith Florida A. & M. University for his co-operation and assistance during the field survey phase the study. 1 See Elston Roady, The Negro's Role in Southern Politics, Negro in American Society (Tallahassee: Florida State University Studies, no. 28, 1958); Hugh D. Price, Negro and Southern Politics (New York: New York University Press, 1957); Margaret Price, Negro Voter in the South (Atlanta: Southern Regional Council, 1957); and the numerous articles in the Journal Negro Education, 26 (Summer 1957). 2 Samuel Lubell, The Future the Negro Voter in the United States, Journal Negro Education, 26 (Summer 1957), pp. 408-417. 3 Henry Lee Moon, The Negro Vote in the Presidential Election 1956, Journal Negro Education, 26 (Summer 1957), pp. 219-230. 4 Ibid. p. 226. 5 Lubell, op. cit., p. 408. This content downloaded from 157.55.39.208 on Fri, 14 Oct 2016 04:22:55 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Some Observations on the Influence of the Income Factor on Urban Negro Voting in South Carolina

as the result of a survey taken in five major South Carolina cities: Greenville, Spartanburg, Columbia, Darlington, and Charleston, in 1958. The survey was one undertaken with the idea in mind of finding out more about the influence of income, among other factors, upon urban Negro voting.' The authors believe that the income factor may not necessarily be the most powerful one as a determinant of voting behavior.2 In reflecting other factors, however, such as education, it is a reasonably reliable index as to whether a person will or will not vote.

Income and the Social Factor in Negro Voting

The May 1960 issue of ABS (then PROD) carried an article by the present authors on "The Influence of the Social Factor upon the Voting Behavior of South Carolina Urban Negroes." They found that in this group, voting participation increases as organ izational membership increases, and the more organizations to which a person belonged the more likely he was to vote Republican or independent. In a further analysis sug gested by Professor Lewis Froman of Northwestern University, they find that the social factor is independent of and more important than the income factor. The authors are with the University of South Carolina and the Library of Congress, respectively.

The Negro Voter in Northern Industrial Cities

HE POLITICAL ROLE of Negro citizens in northern industrial cities has been described and discussed in numerous reports and commentaries on Negro political behavior, particularly in reference to presidential and gubernatorial elections.' In presidential elections, for example, the best available data indicate that Negro voters have been supporting the Democratic party since 1936, by contrast to a history of strong allegiance to the Republican party in the seventeen elections from Reconstruction through 1932.2 Moreover, it is evident that the northward migration of southern Negroes, plus the accelerated migration to California,3 has served to enlarge the numerical force of the Negro body politic. In the single decade from 1940 to 1950, for example, Negro migrants accounted for more than 50 per cent of the increase in potential Negro voters in various northern cities (Table I). In several outstanding cases, Negro migrants accounted for no less than 80 per cent of the increment.4 As a consequence of such increments, Negro voters in northern and western industrial cities have achieved a balance-of-power position in local, state and national elections. On the national level, this position was notably effective in contributing to Mr. Truman's dramatic victory in the presidential election of 1948. When one recalls that his victory would not have been possible without the electoral votes of California, Illinois, and Ohio, and that he managed to

The Negro Voter in Northern Industrial Cities

The Negro Voter in Northern Industrial Cities

Constitutional Law. Civil Rights. Alteration of Municipality's Boundary to Exclude Almost All Negro Voters Presents No Justiciable Issue

Constitutional Law. Civil Rights. Alteration of Municipality's Boundary to Exclude Almost All Negro Voters Presents No Justiciable Issue

Recent Negro Ballots in Philadelphia

tPrevious studies of Negro political behavior indicate that the Democratic party had received scant support from Negro voters in the 1932 election. For example, Franklin DI. Roosevelt obtained approximately 23 per cent of the Negro vote in Chicago and 29 per cent in Cincinnati, while the gubernatorial candidate in Michigan that year obtained slightly less than 37 per cent of the Negro vote in Detroit. See Harold F. Gosnell, The Negro Vote in Northern Cities, National Municipal Review, Vol. 30, 1941, pp. 264-267 and 278; Ernest M. Collins, Cincinnati Negroes and Presidential Politics, Journal of Negro History, Vol. 41, pp. 131-137; and Edward H. Litchfield, A Case Study of Negro Political Behavior in Detroit, Public Opinion Quarterly, Vol. 5, 1941, pp. 267-274. 2For Negro voters in 1952, Henry Lee Moon reports Democratic percentages of 70.5, 72.5, 74.6, 75.9, 76.0, 79.0, 79.1 and 85.8, respectively, in Chicago, Philadelphia, Kansas City, St. Louis, Brooklyn, Harlem, Pittsburgh and Detroit. 'The Negro Voter in the Presidential Election of 1956, Journal of Negro Education, Vol. 26, 1957, pp. 219-230 (data from Table I, p. 221 and Table II, p. 222). proportion of the total population was 92.1 per cent in 1940 and 94.5 per cent in 1950): 65.1 in 1936-66.9 in 1940 -67.7 in 1944-75.0 in 1948-81.2 in 1952.3 However, there is no question

The Brownsville Episode and the Negro Vote

Journal Article The Brownsville Episode and the Negro Vote Get access Emma Lou Thornbrough Emma Lou Thornbrough Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 44, Issue 3, December 1957, Pages 469–493, https://doi.org/10.2307/1887021 Published: 01 December 1957