V.O. Key established race as central to pre-dealignment Southern politics

Evidence

Key memorably wrote, “[w]hatever phase of the southern political process one seeks to understand, sooner or later the trail of inquiry leads to the Negro” (Key Jr, 1949). Drawing on hundreds of interviews with Southern politicians and journalists, the book provides a state-by-state analysis of how race influenced Southern politics, but given its 1949 publication cannot directly speak to the coming large-scale 1960s dealignment. — Ilyana Kuziemko and Ebonya Washington, Why Did the Democrats Lose the South?…, 161

Categorization

• XREF: Key’s thesis provides the qualitative baseline that this paper’s quantitative decomposition extends. — connects to: Racially conservative whites’ defection drove the Southern realignment; Civil-rights-era policy shifts drove southern whites into the Republican Party — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne: How White…, 105

Broader Connections

• Racially conservative whites’ defection drove the Southern realignment #exemplifies (0.88)
• Civil-rights-era policy shifts drove southern whites into the Republican Party #exemplifies (0.82) — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 105