Hacker News Reader

Comment by jofo25 | Hacker News Reader

I think its quite cool. I had no idea this blue band in the south existed. The history behind the fertile land and slavery migration I found particularly interesting.

It does make an unwritten assumption that more black people = more democrat votes. But I guess that is probably a fair assumption to make.

View on HN

In recent US politics, it is a fair assumption. More than fifty years ago, it was not. Historically, the Republicans were "the party of Lincoln" and the Democrats were the party of the segregated South(1).

One might attribute the beginning of the polar reversal to Truman's integration of the military services, but by the time of the Kennedy administration sent paratrooper's to Oxford the seeds from which the Dixiecrats grew were clearly sown.

(1) The popular image of a segregated South is of course correct, but segregation was a national policy (e.g. the military). It enjoyed popularity in the North as well (e.g. at the time Jackie Robinson came to the Dodgers there were no Major League teams in the former Confederacy and the only Southern city with a team was Washington D.C. Despite not being subject to any state law and home to the Federal government, it was a bastion of Jim Crow.

Having lived in the North for most of my life (or at least above the Mason-Dixon) and having lived an extensive stint in the South, nowadays the Northern cities seem far more segregated. It probably has a lot to do with the fact that there was not forced integration there in the 60's. Look at a city like Chicago or New York where some of the largest population areas are almost entirely black. Check out Kozol's book Savage Inequalities, it's pretty shocking if you didn't grow up in a large northern city. If you did, then well, you know all about what I'm talking about.

There's a lot of elitism from the Northern states still about how they are so progressive but I saw way less racial hostility and more interracial interaction on a daily basis in New Orleans or Atlanta than I do in cities like Chicago or even Saint Louis, a lower midwest town where you can cut the racial tension with a knife.

Missouri was a focal point of the political tensions created by slavery in the 19th century. The Missiouri Compromise led to its admission to the Union as a slave state, and during the Civil War substantial numbers of its citizens, like those of other border states served in both armies.

No need to assume:

  * 93% of black voters voted for Obama
  * 73% of Asian voters voted for Obama
  * 71% of Latino voters voted for Obama
  * 39% of white voters voted for Obama

http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/11/07/14993875-first...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com