I'm a black dude and I was raised in a family where both of my parents have been Democrats all their lives. I remember in elementary school in a mock election pocking George W Bush over Al Gore because I thought Gore looked weird and my parents firmly told me that George Bush was a bad guy. I'm a registered Democrat still but lately I've been becoming more disillusioned with the Democratic party.
As an African American, one major thing about the Democratic Party that has troubled me has been it's history with southern racism and connections to the KKK, Dixiecrats, LBJ and his racial comments (alleged or not), and how it is today. Whenever I've heard about this I've always also heard it explained away with "oh, the parties switched and now the Republicans are the racists". How true is this, what evolution exactly took place within the democratic party to make it the party that has more racial minorities?
I'd say FDR did because he ran as a democrat but kept the idea of a large government in place. There are other times and policies, but in my personal opinion it is the four terms of FDR as president that solidified the democratic party as one who creates work programs, increases social safety nets, and invests federal capital into non government organizations. The republicans literally had no choice but to oppose it if their party was to survive being swallowed up. After all... a monopoly is not allowed.
Brayden Sullivan
You shouldn't care about the PAST of any political party user. Only what their current planks and positions are.
Connor Gomez
>what evolution exactly took place within the democratic party to make it the party that has more racial minorities?
There have always been Progressive Yankees and Conservative Southerners and they have always more or less had the same attitudes towards race since revolutionary times.
After the collapse of the Whig Party due to the issue of slavery, the Republican Party was formed as an alliance of northern industrialists, with stopping the spread of slavery as one of its platforms. Their foundation is what actually caused the southern conservatives to secede, as they believed themselves to have been placed in political checkmate by the victory of Lincoln. Lincoln was very careful to stress that the problem was not the Democratic Party, but the powerful land owners who had more or less hijacked the party to promote their interests, and even made a Southern Democrat his vice president as a gesture of solidarity.
From reconstruction through to the Progressive era of Woodrow Wilson, the Democratic party was basically a white worker's party, favoring socially conservative Christian values, redistributist economics, and scapegoating black people as the source of their economic woes.
The ascend of Theodore Roosevelt fundamentally changed the relationship of the two parties and set them on a trajectory course for change, as despite being a member of the party of big business, Roosevelt was at his core a Yankee progressive, and championed values which ran antithetical to the conservative business wing of his party, such as strong anti-trust laws and conservation efforts. During the Paleo-conservative era, which was a reaction to the progressive policies of Roosevelt and Wilson era, Republicans had succeeded in more or less completely driving progressive Yankees from their platform, and after the disastrous presidency of Herbert Hoover, these progressives found a new home under the big tent of Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
Dylan Watson
2/2
However with the New Deal policies firmly in place as the dominant policy platform of the Democratic Party, it fissured as a strong continent of southern Democrats took issue with their worker’s party becoming accommodating of a more socially liberal platform, including more inclusion towards blacks and other immigrant minorities, and formed a break away faction called the Dixiecrats. They stays locked in a tenuous relationship with the Democratic Party but three things happened which changed those circumstances 1. The Passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, crammed through congress in the aftermath of the assassination of JFK. 2. The landslide defeat of Barry Goldwater, the first Republican to run on a platform of principled opposition to civil rights 3. Nixon specifically restructuring his party as a big tent of conservatism, and successfully courting disillusioned southern conservatives in what’s called the southern strategy, which catapulted him to massive electoral wins.
Since then, the Republican Party has been an alliance of business and social conservatives while the Democratic party has been an alliance of the social elite and Yankee progressives. Both sides claim to stand for the interests of African Americans, though the conservative base of the Republican party wants the GOP to be a white working class party, while progressives are trying to turn the Democratic Party into an internationalist socialist party.
The parties didn't "switch" but the voting blocks did. Dixiecrats mostly switched to vote republican. I'm not sure why voting history would change your mind on the democratic party. If you're disillusioned with the democratic party then you're probably better off being disillusioned with the party system and american politics in general.
Isaiah Perry
OP, being honest, Democrats haven't changed all too much. Their programs tend to keep the black community in a stagnated state of ignorance and helplessness, relying indefinitely on public programs and the government, causing them to vote Democrat to continue to get the free shit they require due to the atrocious policies in place.
Whether Democrats knowingly have weakened and continue to weaken the African American community, or do so out of ignorance, is up for debate though.
David Sanchez
Stop thinking too much. Your role is killing whitey and taking his women.
Owen Rogers
>the Democrats are the party of the kkk hurrrrrrr
Mention the southern strategy and they reeeeeee too
Camden Jenkins
Why do blacks so overwhelmingly vote for the Democrats? Other minorities (Asians and Hispanics in particular) seem to be getting more conservative with each election (30% for the GOP this year).
Kayden Perry
See
Jackson Bailey
Whoops, missed that.
Chase Smith
The modern Democratic party is anti white
Ryder Barnes
>southern strategy What is that?
Christian Barnes
FDR - New Deal that appealed to blacks among others due to most blacks being poor Kennedy/Johnson - advocating for the civil rights which in turn gave the finger to Southern states Nixon - sweeping up the solid south that the Dems abandoned
Maybe if blacks were not constantly poor they would vote for the GOP but then you see Reagan's and Nixon's acts that may or may not be against them (defunding HIV research, demolishing black homes for highways, running proxy campaigns against the Black Panthers, banning weed knowing full well it doesn't do shit against your health, etc.) Black's figured that the GOP are actively trying to fuck with them (lot of minorities figures this as well but most of them are not as poor).
Isaiah Jenkins
youre nothing but a free vote
Xavier Smith
...
Asher Kelly
Pretty much everything is right
And just because the thread premise is explained doesn't mean you can't be disillusioned with the Democratic Party now though, you can still be mad at the lobbying, superPACs and superdelagates, etc all you want. All the parties needs a kick on the head.
Ayden Gonzalez
Southern strategy, broseph
William Cruz
cause a lot of rep policies say they want to ignore race but then end up fucking over black communities. also cause obama, and lot of republicans (polytrickins) are just outright racist
Lincoln King
Both parties are fucking blacks over
Republican policies generally keep black people poor.
Meanwhile the democrats are masterfully tricking black voters- affirmative action is good in that it gets blacks into colleges but it also lowers standards, meanwhile welfare helps short term but is disastrous long term.
