Contemporary Politics in the American South
（アメリカ南部の政治動向）
Charles S. Bullock, III*
SUMMARY IN JAPANESE:20世紀の中頃からアメリカ南部の政治状況は大きく変容してきた。変容の最たるものは、共和党勢力の伸長と黒人の政治力の台頭である。
黒人層の政治的影響力は、南北戦争後の「再建の時代」に連邦政府のあとおしによって強まったが、その連邦政府は「リンカーンの政党」つまり共和党が支配力を持つものであった。その意味で歴史的にも南部黒人投票者と共和党との間には共生的関係が存在していた。
しかし、その後の南部白人層のまき返しにより、黒人の政治活動を規制するような立法措置が講じられるに至った。クークルックスクラン（ＫＫＫ）の活動等の社会的制裁も黒人に対して加えられた。こうした南部の黒人差別に対して介入を始めたのが1950年代末からの連邦政府であった。1957年に始まる一連の公民権法を中心とした連邦法の制定や、連邦最高裁判所の一連の判決はその例である。
連邦政府の介入もあり、第２次大戦後の黒人による政治活動や政府組織への参加は活発なものとなった。たとえば1980年代中頃には南部黒人の３分の２が政治に参加するべく投票者登録をおこなっており、これは南部白人と同率である。しかも、1960年代のジョンソン政権（民主党）は公民権の実施を強力におしすすめたこともあって、「黒人の味方としての民主党」というニューディール以来のイメージがさらに補強されることとなった。すなわち、政治力をつけた黒人層は、民主党を支持することになり、黒人の支持のない民主党はあり得ないという状況となったのである。
伝統的に反共和、つまり民主党支持を保持してきた南部社会では、この新たな民主党支持の黒人投票者の台頭は新しい政治上のファクターであった。そのなかで南部黒人は一種のキングメーカーとしての地位を確立することになった。黒人層というキングメーカーの出現によって、南部の政治は大きく変容すると共に、人種問題を政治問題として取りあげざるを得ない状況となったのである。
ところが、一方においては共和党が南部で大きく勢力を確立する基盤がととのいつつあった。まず黒人は歴史的に共和党と共生関係にあったうえに、1950年代のドワイト・アイゼンハワー時代にはこの国民的英雄を支持するという動きを示していた。そのうえに、白人側の事情が変化したのである。
第１には伝統的南部とは関係のない白人層が新しい仕事口を求めたり老後をくらすために北部から移入した。これらの人々は、もとより共和党支持者が多く、南部に移ったからとて支持政党を変更したわけではない。第２には南部白人社会の世代交替にともなって、従来の共和党＝リンカーンの政党といったこだわりが少なくなり、表だって共和党を支持する者がふえた。第３には、「南部のプライド」といったものがうすれた結果、単に支持政党をくら替えする者が多くあらわれるようになった。
このような新しい動きのなかで、1970年代から80年代にかけて南部は大きく共和党支持の旗のもとに統一されつつあるように見える。近来の大統領選挙は一回の例外（カーター）を除いては、南部は必ず共和党候補を支持しているし、国会議員、知事選挙の動きを見ても同様のことがいえるのである。
Since mid-century, no region
in the United states had changed politically as much as the South. Much of what
V. O. Key described in his classic, SOUTHERN
POLITICS, published in 1949, would have been equally applicable ten,
twenty, or even fifty years earlier. Today, Key’s work, while still having
great historic significance, is an adequate description of few localities in
the South.
Key’s South had little party
competition, little racial diversity among its participants, and generally low
levels of participation. This paper will detail the massive changes that have
occurred since Key wrote and will offer explanations for those changes. The
presentation includes both regional data as well as, when appropriate,
statistics on individual states that comprise the eleven-state region.[1]
The thesis of this paper is
that southern politics have been transformed by the joint influences of black
mobilization and Republican emergence. Key observed that “whatever phase of the
southern political process one seeks to understand, sooner or later the trail
of inquiry leads to the Negro,”[2] an observation
relevant for this paper’s theme. Concern in the highest reaches of the national
Democratic Party for the rights of blacks has often advanced the Republican
cause in the South. Today in many statewide contests GOP support among whites
is so great that to win, Democratic nominees must attract extraordinary support
from among blacks. This paper will trace the shift in the role played by blacks
from pariah to kingmaker and the transformation of the GOP from insignificance
to full-fledged competitor.
Black southerners were
important in the region’s politics as voters and officeholders from
approximately 1870 until the turn of the century. During Reconstruction,
federal troops protected black political participation. Even after the
withdrawal of troops in 1876, blacks voted in large numbers and blacks were
elected to positions ranging from local ones up to the U.S. House. From 1900
until mid-century, black participation was rare and black officeholders almost
nonexistent.
This section briefly
outlines the techniques used to exclude blacks from political participation.
Federal efforts to remove these barriers to registration and voting will next
be reviewed. Finally, the current role of black political activity will be
described.
Black Disfranchisement
Georgia’s adoption of the
poll tax in 1876 unveiled the first of the techniques that would ultimately
become near-universal in the South as impediments to black voting.
Comprehensive efforts to create a lily-white electorate were ushered in by the
Mississippi Constitution of 1890. Among the elements designed to restrict the
suffrage were literacy test, a poll tax, a long lead time between registration
and balloting, a residency requirement, and disfranchisement of those guilty of
various lesser criminal offenses.
It was expected that closing
registration long before the election would disproportionately disadvantage
blacks since they would not be sufficiently attentive politically to meet the
deadline. Requiring that one produce the poll tax receipt to vote derived from
a racial stereotype that blacks were more careless than whites. Identification
of a number of offenses for which one could lose the suffrage came from another
racist notion—that criminality was more pervasive among the black than the
white race. The poll tax, although a nominal amount, would be insurmountable to
those tenant farmers who lived in a largely cashless society.
In the South at the turn of
the century, and well beyond, illiteracy was rampant among both races.
Registrars in many localities, however, waived this requirement for illiterate
whites. The same registrars rejected literate blacks on picayune
technicalities. Some states adopted “grandfather clauses” which obviated the
literacy requirement for voters, whose ancestors had been registered at some
earlier period, such as 1860, which eliminated all blacks from waiver. When the
racially motivated provisions of the Mississippi Constitution were upheld by
the United States Supreme Court, other states adopted them so that by 1910 some
of these impediments had been incorporated into the voting requirements of all
southern states.[3]
Another especially effective
stratagem was the white primacy. The presumption here was that the Democratic
Party was a private organization which could establish criteria for membership.
If it chose to restrict participation to whites, this was no different than
private clubs that limited their membership to males or social organizations
for particular religious groups. For more than sixty years after the turn of the
century, Democratic candidates in most of the South had no Republican
opposition; therefore, officeholders were selected in the Democratic primary.
Excluding blacks from that stage of selection process rendered ineffectual the
votes of those few who could participate in the general election.
Still later, some states
reinforced the barriers to black participation by adding interpretation
requirements and/or good character tests. Interpretation requirements allowed
registrars to select a passage of the state constitution which the prospective
voter must explain to the registrar’s satisfaction.[4] Instances were
recorded in which blacks with advanced degrees failed while illiterate whites
passed in droves. The good character test, which was premised on the notion
that individuals not of good character might contaminate the political process,
required that prospective voters have two registered voters vouch for them. In
the Black Belt counties where no blacks were registered, whites refused to
endorse black applications.
Reinforcing the statutory
provisions that made political participation by blacks difficult was fear and
intimidation. From the Reconstruction era when hooded white vigilantes, such as
the Ku Klux Klan, paid nocturnal visits to harass or punish black activists,
fear had been an important tool in the maintenance of white supremacy.
Beatings, arson, and lynching were all used to intimidate the black community.
In later years, economic strangulation became yet another tool as politically
active blacks found their credit cut off, their lease terminated, or their
employment ended.
The Federal Government Steps In
Initial
steps to enfranchise blacks came in the courts. The white primary was struck
down in 1944[5] after twenty
years of litigation. Active involvement of the federal government to facilitate
black registration did not come until Congress enacted the Civil Rights Act of
1957. By authorizing the United States attorney general to sue on behalf of
blacks wrongfully kept from registering, this legislation brought the resources
of the federal government into play and helped offset the paralyzing fear which
dissuaded many blacks from filing suit as private citizens. The Justice
Department became proficient in marshalling the data to prove that the application
of registration requirements often discriminated against blacks.
The Voting Rights Act of
1965 produced the most important breakthrough. This act authorized greater
federal involvement in the registration process and sent federal registrars
into recalcitrant counties to sign up qualified blacks to vote, thereby
circumventing local officials. On election day, federal poll-watchers might be
present to see if the newly registered blacks were allowed to participate.
Southern legislators had
displayed great ingenuity in developing stratagems to evade federal efforts at
registration as well as school desegregation. It was in this context that Section
Five of the Voting Rights Act required that changes in election laws be cleared
by the Justice Department or by the Federal District Court sitting in the
District of Columbia before being implemented. This provision effectively gave
local black leaders a veto over election-related changes.
The provisions for federal
examiners, poll-watchers, and preclearance were restricted to jurisdictions
having a record of limited participation. Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana,
Mississippi, South Carolina, Virginia, and half of North Carolina were covered.
When the legislation was renewed in 1975, the new section dealing with the
rights of non-English speaking citizens brought all of Texas and a small
portion of Florida under coverage. In preclearing changes from these two
jurisdictions, federal authorities are alert to possible consequences for
blacks as well as Hispanics.
Section Five proved
effective in promoting equal electoral opportunities in communities that sought
to change their election laws. Jurisdictions that undertook no changes could
maintain practices even though civil rights advocates believed those practices
to be discriminatory. Private litigation was the only means of attack. In 1980
in Mobile v. Bolden, the Supreme
Court imposed an intent test for suits challenging pre-existing procedures.[6] The black
plaintiffs argued that the at-large electoral system used to choose the three
city commissioners was discriminatory and pointed to the absence of blacks
(even though the city was one-third black) throughout the commission’s history
to substantiate their claim. The Supreme Court ruled against the plaintiffs who
failed to show either that the at-large system was adopted with an intent to
discriminate or had been maintained with the clear intent to disadvantage
blacks. Blacks have frequently sought single member districts, because with
smaller electoral units it is more likely that a heavily black district can be
fashioned from which a black will be elected.
Bolden
infuriated
the civil rights community, which claimed that the intent standard was
insurmountable. How, asked civil rights lawyers, could one know the motives behind
actions of an earlier generation of political figures? Overturning the intent
standard became a major goal of the civil rights community as it approached the
renewal of the Voting Rights Act, slated to expire in 1982.
In renewing the Voting
Rights Act, its applicability was significantly expanded. Congress rewrote
Section Two to make explicit a results, or effects, test. All that is necessary
now to successfully challenge an electoral provision is to demonstrate that the
effect of the provision is to give less equal access to the political process
to minorities than to whites. This provision has most frequently been used to
demand that local at-large election systems be replaced with single-member
districts.[7]
The Supreme Court first
interpreted the renewed Voting Rights Act in Thornburg v. Gingles.[8] The Supreme
Court ruled that even though blacks were being elected in multi-member
districts of the North Carolina state house, only when blacks were regularly
elected at about the same proportion as their share of the population was the
electoral format acceptable. The Supreme Court brought into the descriptive, as
contrasted with the substantive, perspective on representation.[9] Courts have
concentrated on whether blacks are being elected in rough proportion to their
share of the electorate and have paid little heed to whether white
officeholders depend on and are responsive to black voters.
Thornburg
established
a three-part threshold test for Section Two plaintiffs. First, the minority
population must be sufficiently large and concentrated that a district could be
created in which minorities would be a majority of the voting age population.
Second, plaintiffs must show that the minority electorate gives cohesive
support to candidates who, third, were usually defeated by a bloc vote of the
white majority. The first provision has led to the request by plaintiffs in
some communities which have small minority populations that the single,
non-transferable vote, as used to elect the lower house of the Japanese parliament,
be implemented. As of this writing, no court has mandated the implementation of
a single, non-transferable vote, but in several Alabama communities, the
litigants have agreed to this format as an acceptable remedy. Other variants
that have been recently adopted include limited voting in which voters can
express more than one preference but fewer preferences than there are seats to
be filled as well as cumulative voting. Each of these approaches is novel to
southern voters.
Expansion of Black Electorate
Only about 5% of the South’s
voting age blacks were registered in 1940.[10] While
eliminating the white primary had an effect in some urban areas, its impact
region-wide was modest so that even in the late 1940s fewer than one million
blacks were registered. In 1960, when the second Civil Rights Act was passed,
less than one-third of the black voting age population was registered. Only
after passage of the Voting Rights Act did a majority of the eligible blacks
register. By the mid-1980s, almost two-thirds of the South’s blacks were
registered which approximates the white registration rate--actually exceeding
white registration in 1986.[11]
The increased black
registration in the South has eliminated regional differences. Key (1949) and
others had shown that political participation was much less common in the South
than in the remainder of the country. By the 1980s, that disparity had been
reduced to insignificance. The growth in black registration has, not
surprisingly, led to higher rates of black voting. By 1986, there was virtually
no difference between black and white turnout in the South,[12] but the region
remains somewhat less likely to vote than the rest of the country.
Increased black political
activity coincided with the 1964 presidential election in which Barry Goldwater
was the Republican standard-bearer. Goldwater’s victories in the Deep South
convinced many southern Democratic politicians that electoral success
necessitated outspoken opposition to civil rights. As the black electorate
grew, both parties often fielded candidates who did nothing to appeal to the
newly enfranchised but vied for the more conservative element in the white
electorate. In time, southern Democrats came to see that they could not be more
conservative on the race issue than their Republican opponents. Some Democrats,
particularly in Mississippi, learned their lesson when a black Independent
candidate competed with the Democratic and Republican nominees, allowing the
Republican to win with a plurality. Moreover, southern Democrats observed
biracial coalitions electing Democrats in the North and realized that the
Johnson Administration’s legislative program inclined blacks to vote Democratic
even in the South. Southern Democrats, initially in urban areas, hesitantly
endorsed some policy concerns of black voters. These Democrats were invariably
more aligned with black policy preferences than were Republican candidates.[13]
Today black support is
critical to the election of many Democrats, such as the recently elected
Democratic senators who lost the white vote. Those who run particularly poorly
among whites or who fail to mobilize enthusiastic black support lose to
Republicans. Democrat senators from the South are usually supported by more
than 80% of the black voters and perhaps as little as 35% of the white voters.[14] Wide racial
disparities often visible in senatorial election have existed for a quarter of
a century in presidential contests. Even southerner Jimmy Carter failed to
attract the bulk of the white vote.
Black voting has impacted on
the policy stands of many Democratic officeholders. Among the clearest
illustrations are recent civil rights votes. In 1982, 91% of southern House
Democrats supported the renewal of the Voting Rights Act. A generation earlier,
93% of this group had opposed the much weaker 1960 Civil Rights Act. During the
Eisenhower years, southern Democrats gave less support to civil liberties
issues than did Republicans from the South and border states, with support
among southern Democrats falling below 1% in the 84th Congress.[15]
Black votes have also
elected thousands of black officials. When the Voting Rights Act was passed,
only about 100 blacks held public office in the South, and most of these were
in towns with no more than a few thousand residents. Today, there are four
black members of Congress from the South and 181 black state legislators. The
most recent available tabulation of black officeholders, which reflects the
1986 elections, shows there to be some 3,500 blacks in public office in the
South.[16]
Table 1 BLACK OFFICEHOLDERS ACROSS TIME IN THE SOUTH
|
|
1971 |
1977 |
1981 |
1987 |
|
U.S. Representatives |
0 |
2 |
2 |
4 |
|
State Legislators |
40 |
104 |
126 |
181 |
|
County Commissioners |
36 |
260 |
284 |
515 |
|
Mayors |
24* |
86 |
122 |
187 |
|
City Councillors |
302 |
872 |
1058 |
1551 |
|
Judges |
80 |
NA |
NA |
95 |
|
Board of Education Members |
132 |
466 |
568 |
748 |
|
Total |
652 |
1973 |
2410 |
3556 |
The “Total” figure exceeds the sum of the row entries since not all
offices are listed here.
* Includes vice mayors.
Sources: Appropriate issues of Black Elected Officials: A National Roster (Washington, D.C.: Joint
Center for Political Studies).
Table 1, which traces the
increase in black officeholding across time by position, demonstrates that
attainment of congressional seats has come very slowly. Blacks have been more
successful in winning state legislative positions with the numbers quadrupling
between 1971 and 1987. Over this sixteen-year period, black city councillors
and school board members have increased fivefold, and there are now fourteen
times as many county commissioners. Generally, the less significant the office,
the greater the number of blacks, with blacks being far more numerous in the
ranks of local officials such as county commissioner, city councillor, and
board of education member than as state or national officials. This can often
be attributed to the size of the electorate. The smaller the electorate, the
greater the number of officeholders and more likely that districts dominated by
blacks can be created. There are few congressional districts in which blacks
are a majority, and most of those now elect blacks. At the local level, it may
take only a few thousand blacks to form a majority of a county commission or
school board district.
So long as most blacks are
elected with black votes, there is an upper limit to the number of blacks
elected officials, and the numbers of black state legislators may be
approaching that limit. Table 2 shows the number of black legislators by state.
For most chambers, there are one or two points at which the number of blacks
jumps. These shifts occurred when a racially unbiased redistricting was
implemented. Subsequent increases come slowly.
Table 2 NUMBERS OF SOUTHERN BLACK STATE LEGISLATORS 1971-1987
|
|
|
1971 |
1973 |
1975 |
1977 |
1979 |
1981 |
1983 |
1985 |
1987 |
Chamber |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Size |
|
Alabama |
S |
0 |
0 |
2 |
2 |
3 |
3 |
3 |
5 |
5 |
35 |
|
|
H |
2 |
2 |
13 |
13 |
13 |
13 |
15 |
19 |
19 |
105 |
|
Arkansas |
S |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
35 |
|
|
H |
0 |
3 |
3 |
3 |
3 |
4 |
4 |
4 |
4 |
100 |
|
Florida |
S |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
40 |
|
|
H |
2 |
3 |
3 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
10 |
10 |
10 |
120 |
|
Georgia |
S |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
4 |
6 |
6 |
56 |
|
|
H |
13 |
14 |
20 |
21 |
21 |
21 |
21 |
21 |
22 |
180 |
|
Louisiana |
S |
0 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
4 |
5 |
39 |
|
|
H |
1 |
8 |
8 |
9 |
9 |
10 |
10 |
14 |
14 |
105 |
|
Mississippi |
S |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
2 |
52 |
|
|
H |
1 |
1 |
1 |
4 |
5 |
15 |
15 |
18 |
18 |
122 |
|
North Carolina |
S |
0 |
0 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
3 |
3 |
50 |
|
|
H |
2 |