1860 county slaveholding rates predict current white political attitudes

Evidence

Even smaller variations in slave-owning percentages produce measurable attitudinal differences today. For example, moving from Alabama’s Clay County to Barbour County (associated with about a 25 percent increase in slave owning in 1860) is associated today with a 5.6 percent decrease in the share of whites who identify as Democrats, a 7.8 percent decrease among whites in support for affirmative action, and a 4.8 percent increase in attitudes reflecting racial resentment. — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long, 456

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: A precise, falsifiable quantitative finding with local predictive power — the kind of concrete claim that reframes how to think about legacy of slavery.
• XREF: Connects to the earlier chapter on Confederate monument construction spikes tracking eras of white political reassertion. — connects to: An ideology of reaction rooted in slavery persists in modern American politics — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project: A New American Origin…, 649

Broader Connections

• An ideology of reaction rooted in slavery persists in modern American politics #corroborates (0.82) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 649