Southern Democrats entrenched power by disfranchising blacks and poor whites

Evidence

The struggle for political power in the American South during the early and middle decades of the twentieth century is oft-invoked as a seminal example of electoral entrenchment. The Democratic Party during this period had a monopoly on Southern politics, and the Party itself was ruled by a faction of white conservatives. This ruling faction was able to maintain its grip on the Party—and thus on Southern politics—only by disfranchising blacks and poor whites. To this end, Party leaders engineered the enactment of poll taxes and prohibitions on black participation in primary elections. — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 210

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Southern disfranchisement operated through intertwined legal and violent means to strip black political access — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 47; Southern Democrats used labor law to block CIO-driven voter realignment — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 211; Disenfranchisement entrenched white Democratic supremacy in the South for nearly a century — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 83 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Disenfranchisement entrenched white Democratic supremacy in the South for nearly a century #expands (0.95) — Daryl Levinson and Benjamin I. Sachs, Political Entrenchment and Public Law, 83
• A biased Reconstruction narrative enabled Southern disfranchisement of blacks #expands (0.78)
• Reconstruction-era racism was deliberately engineered by the weakened southern ruling class #qualifies (0.74) — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 1087