No such thing as a Dixiecrat. The democrats in the media buried the official ballot name Thurmond ran upon. I dug up my 1949 Encyclopaedia Britannica Yearbook for the election results and all the pertinent information.

Thurmond ran as a State's Rights Democrat. I was curious as to the history going in to this race so I dug deep into the SDAI library into the sublevels and the states archives...

Thurmond was Governor of South Carolina. He had just the year before presided over an investigation into the lynching of a black man accused of robbery. 1947 there had been only 4 lynchings in the USA. The previous 56 year period had seen an average of 81 lynchings per year.

Thurmond was a law and order type of guy. He was disgusted by lawlessness and pursued the criminals in an unprecedented manner - for the lyncherdom capital of the south - and brought several of the perpetrators up on charges.

Well...poor Strom was cut off at the pass. The Judge threw out the convictions of the lynchers and said the confessions had been coerced. They walked.

The south, even then, considered this a travesty - a mockery of justice.

This clearly affected Strom - he saw clearly that the racial biases were embedded into the legal system and that it would require a police state to enforce the coming civil rights program of Truman. He felt that what would work easily in northern states would not work so easily in the south. As Governor he became an avid supporter of each state's right to determine what was in its best interests. His support for segregation. like many in the region, was pragmatic. He was not like Byrd - a racist Klan member with his Klaigle.

Remember - this is pre-Little Rock and the National Guard enforced integration. In many ways he could foresee the violence that would occur in the south - which it did.

Reagan and most conservatives are state's rights advocates. The framers of the Constitution clearly set it up so that the federal body would not be intrusive into states affairs.

However, if you recall from a previous post - Roosevelt had discovered he could blackmail and threaten supreme court justices with impunity - this is how the unconstitutional minimum wage and horrible social security programs were given birth.

With a supreme court in the pocket of the President and all too willing to turn the Constitution into toilet paper for democrats - some democrats defected.

1,170,000 people voted for Thurmond as a States Right Democrat, securing him 39 electoral votes in five states. Truman secured 29,000,000 votes and Dewey 24,000,000. Basically Thurmond was about as Popular as Perot or Nader.

No Thurmond was not a republican...not even close.

This election was also bought and paid for by the democratic Machine - Dewey did win, just as Nixon really won against Kennedy in 60. Truman and his corruption machine were working overtime all over the nation - making a fifteen point spread disappear instantly! One of the reasons Truman didn't run again - he had not come through for his "city bosses" that rigged all the vote counts throughout the midwest and the northeast in '48! When yopu don't win the first time - how can you expect to win a second time if your crime-bosses don't want you in?

Poor gap toothed Dewey..ran twice against the Dems only to be gypped twice. The most ripped off guy in presidential election history.

Just an FYI...soundbites and today's media never tell the full story.

SDAI-Tech1