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Comment by nonethewiser | Hacker News Reader

Its crazy to think they just used to take a break for a summer but it honestly makes sense. They dont pass that many laws anyways and that was always part of the design. As time goes on I think the expectations on congress have increased quite a bit. The governments footprint has really only gotten bigger.

> Sen. James Eastland of Mississippi, a segregationist Democrat who served more than three decades on Capitol Hill, once told then-Sen. Joe Biden that A/C was the most significant change to occur during his career in Congress — and not for the better.

So Joe Biden was a Democrat when the Democrats had segregationists? I thought the parties switched? Its wild to realize 1) Joe Biden has been in politics that long and 2) he was in the same party as segregationists while he is currently trying to represent pretty much the opposite.

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See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Eastland

Due to the suppression of black votes, southern political machines were very effective at getting members of congress in office for extended periods; it also let them punch above their weight due to seniority.

They were democrats for historical purposes until Johnson started advancing civil rights. Then they flipped to the new “conservative” branch of the GOP.

Time is a funny thing. The "switch" you're talking about was in the mid-1960s, galvanized by the 1964 Civil Rights Act. James Eastland was in elected government from 1928 until 1978. Joe Biden's Senate career started in 1973. So while they did have 5 years of overlap (long enough for the quote to have been heard), it's been 95 years since James Eastland's political career started.

People talk about "the switch" as if every Democrat supported slavery and every Republican was an abolitionist. And that's not even close to the truth.

The truth is that there were plenty of Democrats who were abolitionists. And while the Republican party was originally formed as an abolitionist party, by the 1960's, there was a non-zero number of Republicans who probably would have supported slavery.

Because the true divide is North and South. Northern Democrats were often abolitionists. They were just outnumbered by Southern Democrats. If you divide the votes by region rather than party, you'll often see the vast majority of Southern votes have been against civil rights.

To get the Southern vote, you may not have to be a racist, but you have to be at least comfortable with it existing in your constituency. Because while racists may not be the majority, they comprise a large enough faction that their support can sway elections.

>So Joe Biden was a Democrat when the Democrats had segregationists?

There were no de jure segregationists, but even into the 90s there was a significant bloc of conservative Southern Democrats: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Dog_Coalition

Remember, the "red state/blue state" thing dates from the year 2000! There are many living politicians who date from before the phase change: Hillary Clinton (in Arkansas, now a solidly Republican state) was giving speeches on how crack turns Black children into "superpredators", Joe Biden himself coauthored the 1996 crime bill, which kicked off the mass incarceration era. Bill Clinton was running campaign ads on cutting off food stamps to welfare queens and overseeing executions of criminals. It was a different era.

> Hillary Clinton (in Arkansas, now a solidly Republican state) was giving speeches on how crack turns Black children into "superpredators"

In case anyone was curious, here are her comments: > But we also have to have an organized effort against gangs. Just as in a previous generation we had an organized effort against the mob. We need to take these people on. They are often connected to big drug cartels, they are not just gangs of kids anymore. They are often the kinds of kids that are called superpredators — no conscience, no empathy. We can talk about why they ended up that way, but first, we have to bring them to heel.

Your quote doesn’t necessarily mean the Democratic Party was segregationist when Biden started his career, only that he had some overlap with at least one segregationist - Eastland may have been the rare exception to the rule by the end of his career (when he overlapped with Biden).

EDIT: checking Wikipedia it seems Biden was elected to the senate in 1972, long after the time of the segregationist democrats?

Wasn't there a senator Byrd who Hillary also celebrated[1] The senator also happened to be a member of a notoriously segregationist group. He filibustered the Civil Rights Act. He served as a Dem till his death in 2010. Of course some time in the late 90s he denounced his past actions and Hillary offered some warm remarks upon his passing -he was her mentor, afterall.

[1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryweuBVJMEA

Eastland served until 1978.

That doesn’t contradict anything I wrote - it means they overlapped for 6 years but the Democratic Party was not a segregationist party between 1972 and 1978 despite the existence of a few rare remnants at the end of their career.

Joe Biden has been in politics for more than 20% of the time the US has been a country.

Joe Biden was one of the longest serving senators in history. He showed up in the wake of watergate and was barely over the age threshold. History and politics are strange and complicated. The parties didn’t switch so much as they evolved, but the Democrats have always been a big party with something for everyone and there is room in the party for all manner of positions.

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