Chapter 4

Mississippi: From Unreconstructed to Pacesetter?

 

            The Deep South state of Mississippi provides a nice introduction to the tremendous political change that has swept the South. Possessing the highest percentage of African Americans in the nation (36% in the 2000 census), Mississippi led the region after the Civil War and Reconstruction in imposing harsh apartheid-like measures to preserve the social, economic, and political supremacy of whites. V.O. Key (1949: 229) had observed that “every other southern state” was able to breathe a sigh of relief and exclaim, “Thank God for Mississippi,” a state which had the unenviable distinction of being last on nearly every indicator of a good quality of life.  The state was so slow to change that until recently scholars of southern politics writing about Mississippi would employ such chapter titles as, “Mississippi: Unreconstructed and Unredeemed,” and “Mississippi: It’s All Black and White” (Fortenberry and Abney 1972; Lamis 1990). Yet political observers tended to overlook V.O. Key’s (1949: 229) warning that, “Mississippi only manifests in accentuated form the darker political strains that run throughout the South.”

The “Second Reconstruction,” which produced the 1965 Voting Rights Act that finally enfranchised all eligible African Americans in Dixie, dramatically changed the Magnolia state. As conservative Republicans replaced segregationist white Democratic officeholders, and as African Americans came to comprise a sizable “liberal” bloc in the state legislature, Mississippi began to exhibit political patterns that had existed outside of Dixie since the Great Depression (Menifield and Shaffer 2005:107-129). A state whose political leaders had often been viewed in northern states as pariahs, such as Governor Fielding Wright who had served as the vice presidential candidate of the States’ Rights Party in 1948, was now electing statesmen who rose to senate leadership positions in the national majority party, such as Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott and Appropriations Committee Chairman Thad Cochran (Table 4-1). Indeed, the historically poor and rural state, jokingly referred to as the “buckle” of the Bible Belt, even instituted dockside casino gambling in an effort to promote economic development, and despite opposition from religious groups heeded the cries of economically devastated casino owners on the Gulf Coast by legalizing on-land casino gambling after hurricane Katrina wiped out their dockside establishments. But one aspect of Mississippi politics had not changed all that much—small town residents seemed to respond to the lure of pure political theatre during election campaigns. Only now, instead of such human dramas occurring solely within the dominant Democratic party during party primary campaigns, they increasingly characterize competition between the Democratic and Republican parties in the general election.

 

An Historic Leader of the Segregationist Solid Democratic South

            To understand why the white South was historically Democratic in partisanship, we must go back to the era of Reconstruction after the Civil War, when the party of the North- the Republicans- controlled militarily defeated southern state governments. Needless to say, African Americans in the South, until the New Deal, were heavily Republican in sympathies because of Abraham Lincoln’s leadership of the party of “liberation” (the Emancipation Proclamation). In the 1870 Mississippi state legislature, a biracial coalition of Republicans held 82 of the state legislature’s 107 seats, and two African Americans, Blanche Bruce and Hiram Revels, represented the state in the U.S. Senate. To reinstate Democratic party dominance, conservative whites instituted the “Mississippi Plan” in the 1875 state elections, which included whites engaging in such fraudulent practices as ballot box stuffing, miscounting ballots, destroying ballots, destroying Republican ballots, substituting Democratic ballots for Republican ballots for illiterate African American voters, and intimidating some blacks from voting (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 27-28).

By the 1890s some southern whites had grown weary of the “need” to employ violence and fraud to maintain white political supremacy, while other whites tired of the relentless competition between political factions of whites for the votes of those African Americans still exercising the franchise (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 31; Key 1949: 536). Mississippi, a state that until 1940 possessed a population with a black majority, led the South in devising “legal” technicalities to avoid the Reconstruction-era 15^th amendment to the federal constitution that proclaimed that no state could deny or abridge the right to vote “on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” At a state convention in 1890 attended by only one African American delegate, Mississippi implemented a new state constitution that had the effect of disfranchising nearly all remaining black voters. The constitution included a cumulative poll tax of two dollars per year payable two years before an election, a literacy or understanding test that required that voters either be able to read any section of the state constitution, or be able to understand it or give a “reasonable interpretation” of it. Delegates concerned that these provisions would disfranchise many poor and illiterate whites were ensured that white registrars would enforce these provisions only against blacks (Key 1949: 537; Krane and Shaffer 1992: 31).

            Ultimately, the threat of white violence would maintain the system of racial apartheid in Mississippi and the South. “Between the years of 1882 and 1952, 534 blacks were lynched in Mississippi, more than in any other state” (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 30; Loewen and Sallis 1974: 178). Recounting how her husband and soon-to-be civil rights leader Medgar Evers was treated when he attempted to register to vote after returning from military service in World War 2, Myrlie Evers (1996: 26) explained how whites and their “Negro message-bearers” would visit the Evers’ parents’ home nightly with the warning that the Evers brothers should “take their names off the books.” U.S. Senator and former Mississippi governor Theodore Bilbo in a public speech reminded whites in Evers’ town that, “The best way to keep a nigger from the polls on election day… is to visit him the night before” (Evers 1996: 26). When the Evers brothers nevertheless attempted to vote, Medgar recounted to his wife how they had been ushered into a clerk’s office and how “some fifteen or twenty armed white men surged in behind us, men I had grown up with, had played with” (Evers 1996: 27). Though Medgar Evers was not able to vote on that dark day in his home state where he had “loved to hunt and fish, to roam the fields and woods,” America honored his service to his country after his assassination by a white racist by burying him in Arlington national cemetery (Evers 1996: 3). Temporarily though, until the Second Reconstruction, white supremacy ruled the South. Indeed, as late as 1964 only 7 percent of voting age African Americans in Mississippi were registered to vote. 

            With the disfranchisement of nearly all black Mississippians, whites in Democratic party contests tended to divide along social class lines based on economic issues. V.O. Key relates how conservative white planters who boasted reliance on individual initiative and opposed taxes and New Deal economic welfare programs dominated the Delta, the counties along the Mississippi River characterized by rich soil and large plantations. Whites farming poorer soil in the northeast Hills and the southern Piney Woods backed “neopopulist” candidates who crusaded for lower interest rates, regulations on “predatory” corporations, and New Deal programs that benefited low-income whites. Though whites of both regions supported racial segregation and “states’ rights,” neopopulist candidates were more likely than the more “dignified, aristocratic” planters to employ demagogic and racist rhetoric. Neopopulist governors who threw the “N” word around included James Vardaman, known as the “Great White Chief,” and Theodore “The Man” Bilbo (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 32 quote, 31-33).

The personalistic nature of combat within the Mississippi Democratic party in the first half of the 20^th century is reflected in Theodore Bilbo’s reference to one campaign opponent as “a cross between a hyena and a mongrel… begotten in a nigger graveyard at midnight, suckled by a sow, and educated by a fool” (Key, 1949: 242). The son of one dignified Delta planter, LeRoy Percy, whose father had been hounded by Bilbo described the demagogue popular in the Hills as: “a pert little monster, glib and shameless, with that sort of cunning common to criminals which passes for intelligence…” who was admired by voters as, “a slick little bastard,” who was “one of them” (Key, 1949: 241). In one campaign between Percy and Bilbo’s political boss, Vardaman, Percy’s son describes the surreal nature of the white electorate during this period as an “ill-dressed, surly audience, unintelligent and slinking… the sort of people that lynch Negroes, that mistake hoodlumism for wit, and cunning for intelligence, that attend revivals and fight and fornicate in the bushes afterwards” (Key, 1949: 240).

The racist and demagogic rhetoric used by neopopulists like Bilbo during election campaigns was often quite extreme. In one campaign stop, Bilbo reportedly exclaimed that, “I wish every Negro in the world was one big Negro. I’d take that rope and put it around that Negro’s neck and hang him to that oak tree” (Johnston 1993: 79). Promoting his scheme to send African Americans back to the African nation of Liberia, he explained to a group of blacks that “You will like it in Liberia. Collards grow ten feet tall and there is a possum in every stalk" (Johnston 1993: 58). Such demagogues were not without their humorous moments, though, as when Bilbo responded to a heckler by invoking the name of the state mental hospital. When a heckler yelled out that despite his campaign claims, Bilbo hadn’t done anything for him, the candidate quipped: “Yes, I have. I built Whitfield for you, but you have not used it yet!” (Johnston 1993: 43).  Despite the racist and demagogic rhetoric, Mississippi neopopulists like Bilbo and Vardaman pursued non-racist, progressive policies once in office, demonstrating the popularity of New Deal-style economic issues among the numerous lower income whites comprising the poorest state in the nation (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 33). The nation reacted quite differently to such demagogues than did most Mississippians, however. Serving two terms in the U.S. senate beginning with his 1934 election, one state newspaper editor claimed that Bilbo had been voted the “second most useless senator by 200 reputable Washington newsmen,” while another state editorial gave Bilbo the same credit as George Wallace received in Alabama by pointing out that “Bilbo’s outspoken racial remarks” were “responsible for all of the campaigns by northern sympathizers to promote more racial equality” (Johnston 1993: 61 1^st quote; 81, 2^nd quote).   

The federal governmental “assault” on the [white] “southern way of life” would submerge the saliency of economic issues to voters, as Mississippi politicians raced to defend their “peculiar” segregated institutions. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1944 had stuck down the white primary, whereby Democratic state parties in the South, acting purportedly as “private organizations,” had prohibited African Americans from voting in their party primaries. Given that party’s dominance in the general elections, this was tantamount to denying blacks the right to vote, period. Some Southern state legislatures, including Mississippi’s in 1947, responded by passing laws requiring that people must be "in accord with the statement of the principles of the party holding such primary" in order to vote in a party’s primary (Key 1949: 640). The Democratic State Executive Committee of Mississippi quickly pronounced its party principles, which included a belief in states' rights, the poll tax, and opposition to any federal anti-lynching law and any Fair Employment Practice Committee. This new party rule was seldom enforced in the Magnolia state, only because other voting devices had already been so successful at preventing blacks from voting (Key, 1949: 639-642).

The next year, Mississippi governor Fielding Wright denounced President Truman’s civil rights commission, and sponsored meetings in Jackson, Mississippi (the state capital) of “true Democrats... States’ Rights Jeffersonian Democrats” disgruntled with the direction of the national Democratic party (Maisel, 1991: 1235). After the national party adopted a civil rights plank in its platform, Wright served as South Carolina governor Strom Thurmond’s running mate on the States’ Rights Party. Mississippi’s Democratic state executive committee was one of only four states that listed the Dixiecrats as the “official” Democratic party nominees on the presidential ballot, helping the Dixiecrats to carry the state (Maisel, 1991: 1235, 1075).

Mississippi African Americans boldly fought for their political and human rights. In 1964 a coalition of civil rights organizations formed the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), which conducted its own caucuses and conventions and selected a slate of 62 blacks and 4 whites to challenge the seating of the all-white "regular" Democrats’ delegation at the national party convention. A stunned Credentials Committee heard testimony from Fannie Lou Hamer about how she had lost her job after trying to register to vote, and been beaten by agents of the highway patrol after seeking service at a lunch counter. The national Democratic convention endorsed a compromise that was rejected by both delegations, but most importantly it instituted a new national party rule requiring that at future conventions state parties ensure that "all voters, regardless of race, color, creed, or national origin, will have the opportunity to participate fully in party affairs" (Bass and DeVries, 1977: 205).

In 1968 a “Loyalist Democratic” coalition (loyal to the “national” party’s candidates) of civil rights leaders and moderate whites in the Young Democrats and the AFL-CIO challenged the nearly all-white “Regular Democratic” delegation to the national convention. After the U.S. Civil Rights Commission recommended that racially motivated state parties be excluded from national conventions and all viable Democratic presidential candidates backed the Loyalists over the Regulars, the Credentials Committee voted to seat all of the Loyalists instead of the Regulars. After the Regulars in 1972 were again kicked out of the national convention in favor of the Loyalists, the racially moderate governor Cliff Finch was able in 1976 to organizationally unify the racially divided state Democratic party behind the popular presidential candidacy of fellow southerner, Jimmy Carter (Bass and DeVries, 1977: 204-208; Lamis, 1990: 50-52). Carter, when campaigning in Mississippi, was accompanied by Senators Stennis and Eastland, and created a winning coalition of rural whites in the northeast and African Americans in the Delta to narrowly carry the state (Nash and Taggart 2006: 68, 71).

As African-Americans were finally permitted to vote, the all-white Mississippi state legislature strove to dilute the black vote through such devices as the gerrymandering of district lines to split the black vote between different districts, and by combining black majority districts with white districts to create larger, majority white, multi-member districts. In 1966 the legislature split up the majority black “Delta” congressional district into three districts by drawing district lines across the state from the Louisiana to the Alabama borders so that no district contained a majority black population. Only because of a court order rendered under the Voting Right Act was the majority black "Delta" congressional district finally restored in 1982, with the state's first African-American congressman since Reconstruction elected in 1986, Mike Espy, who later served as President Clinton’s first Secretary of Agriculture (Parker, 1990: 50).

The 1966 legislative session also ditched its predominant single-member district tradition and provided that two-thirds of the state house members (80) would be elected from 26 multi-member districts. Majority black areas were often combined with majority white areas to provide a majority white multi-member district. The capital city of Jackson in Hinds county had a large enough concentrated African American population that single member districts would have likely resulted in the election of four African American state representatives, so the legislature combined all 10 of the county’s seats into one multi-member district where whites comprised 60% of the population and could elect all 10 representatives (Parker, 1990: 65). Given such voting devices, only one African American, Robert Clark, a Freedom Democratic leader, was elected to the 174-member legislature in 1967 (he was elected as an “Independent”), and for eight years he served as the only African American lawmaker. It wasn't until 1979, after fourteen years of lawsuits filed by Mississippi African Americans and numerous trips to the Supreme Court, that the legislature finally enacted a single-member district plan, which dramatically increased the number of African American lawmakers in both chambers from 4 to 17 (Coleman, 1993: 44, 66, 69, 80). A three-judge federal district court in southern Mississippi unsympathetic to civil rights claims necessitated the lengthy litigation. All were ironically appointees of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, but their nominations had had to receive the approval of the Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by segregationist Democrat, Mississippian James Eastland (Parker, 1990: 82-85, 128). Eastland’s racist rhetoric was so blatant that at a meeting of the white Citizens’ Council in 1956 he had not only used the N word, but also employed the phrase “African flesh-eaters,” and speculated that it might become necessary to “abolish the Negro race” (Nash and Taggart 2006: 76). 

As late as 1969 when Charles Fortenberry and F. Glenn Abney entitled their study, “Mississippi: Unreconstructed and Unredeemed,” white Mississippians appeared to be resisting federal efforts to promote racial desegregation. A statewide study of registered white voters found a majority claiming that Congress had passed many “unconstitutional laws” in the past five years, that “most” Supreme Court rulings had “not been in the country’s best interests,” and that the federal government had become so powerful that “we are living in a dictatorship” (Fortenberry and Abney 1972: 491). The saliency of race issues was so great to white voters that the economic and class differences of the first four decades of the 20^th century that Key had written about were completely overshadowed. Candidates in Democratic primaries who appeared to be more conservative on racial issues received the most support from whites who were less educated, had lower incomes, and were of the working class, while “racial moderates” drew more support from the less numerous higher socioeconomic status and white collar voters (Fortenberry and Abney 1972: 511-512).

All three Mississippi governors serving in the 1960s were segregationists or racial conservatives. Ross Barnett, a segregationist and member of the white Citizens’ Council, was elected in 1959 with the campaign song: “Roll with Ross… He’s for segregation one hundred percent. He’s not a mod’rate like some other gent” (Fortenberry and Abney 1972: 507). Paul Johnson was elected in 1963 after proudly pointing to newspaper pictures showing him physically opposing James Meredith’s successful effort to become the first black student to integrate Ole Miss (the University of Mississippi), and asking voters to “Stand Tall with Paul” because he had stood up for Mississippi against the federal integrationists (Nash and Taggart 2006: 22 quote; Johnston 1993: 154). Johnson had promised to “fight fire with fire” in opposing integration, and blasted primary opponent J.P. Coleman, a racially moderate governor in the late 1950s who had backed the creation of an integrated federal Veterans Administration hospital in Jackson and had vetoed a bill to require the NAACP to disclose the names of its members, for supporting John Kennedy for president (Fortenberry and Abney 1972: 509; Nash and Taggart 2006; 110). With African Americans finally enfranchised thanks to the federal 1965 Voting Rights Act, white candidates began to abandon their outright segregationist rhetoric. Instead, gubernatorial winner John Bell Williams in the 1967 campaign stressed that he was a “conservative,” and reminded voters that he had defied the national Democratic party with his open support for Barry Goldwater and been punished by being stripped of his seniority in the U.S. House of Representatives (Fortenberry and Abney 1972: 510).

Republican candidates in the 1960s were also racial conservatives. Chicken farmer Prentiss Walker, elected in the Goldwater “landslide” (in Mississippi and other Deep South states at least) to become the first GOP congressman from the state since Reconstruction, lost his bid two years later to unseat veteran U.S. Senator James Eastland, after futilely trying to link the segregationist senator with the Kennedy clan in Washington (Johnston 1993: 189). After calling himself a “staunch segregationist” in his losing bid for governor in 1963, Republican Rubel Phillips launched another unsuccessful bid in 1967, this time as a racial moderate. After receiving the unexpected endorsement of the executive committee of the black Freedom Democratic Party, Phillips repudiated it as a “kiss of death” type of endorsement (Lamis 1990: 47 quote, 46; Johnston 1993: 196-197). Thanks to Goldwater’s popularity among white Mississippians, Republicans won their first state legislative seats since Reconstruction (two in 1963 and one in a 1965 special election), as well as elected mayors in Columbus and Hattiesburg in 1965. The next decade would see the GOP able to offer a more credible electoral threat, which coupled with the political empowerment of African Americans would have a dramatic impact in creating a truly biracial governing Democratic party.

 

Republican Gains Necessitate a Unified, Biracial Democratic Party

            By the 1970s Mississippi Republicans began to offer truly capable candidates who posed serious threats to state Democrats. With Republican president Nixon winning reelection in 1972 and carrying Mississippi with an overwhelming 80% of the vote, the state elected two GOP congressmen, Thad Cochran in the 4^th (Jackson) district, and Trent Lott in the 5^th (Gulf Coast) district (Table 4-2). Both were conservatives who benefited from the retirement of incumbent Democrats (also conservatives), and from divisive Democratic primaries that attracted numerous candidates mistakenly expecting the primary nod to be tantamount to election. Both Republicans were attractive candidates in their 30’s with Lott serving as retiring congressman William Colmer’s administrative assistant, and Cochran gaining a reputation as a successful young Jackson lawyer. While Cochran was elected with only 48% of the vote in the general election, it is unclear that the presence on the ballot of black Independent Eddie McBride, who drew 8%, elected him, since Democrat Ellis Bodron was viewed as quite conservative and Cochran had some black support (Barone, Ujifusa, and Matthews 1973: 545, 547). That same year Meridian car dealer Gil Carmichael offered a more “progressive” vision of the GOP in his unsuccessful bid to unseat Senator Eastland. He accused Eastland of being the “number one head honcho” of the “old Democratic machine of this state” that had kept the state “on the bottom” and “misused it, abused it, and wasted it” (Lamis 1990: 49-50).  Carmichael won a respectable 39% of the vote (40% of the two-party vote) against the powerful 30-year incumbent, despite being “snubbed” by a Nixon administration unwilling to risk the support they were receiving in the Senate from southern Democrats like Eastland (Johnston 1993: 239).

            As the GOP threat grew and white Mississippians became reconciled to the inevitability of racial integration, the state Democratic party was able to unify its black and white factions into a truly biracial, governing party. In 1971 Democrats elected as governor, William Waller, a candidate who pledged to take government away from the “Capitol Street Gang,” the capital city’s business establishment, and return power to the “people” (Nash and Taggart 2006: 32). Waller, who as a former DA had at least tried to prosecute Medgar Evers’ assassin, “appointed more blacks to state positions than any previous governor,” and also vetoed and killed the state’s segregation-era Sovereignty Commission (Johnston 1993: 234 quote, 221; Katagiri 2001: 221, 227). In 1975 Democrats elected a “working man’s” candidate as governor, Cliff Finch, a man “proud” to be derided by opponents as a “redneck” (Nash and Taggart 2006: 32, 1^st quote; 33, other quotes). Finch’s campaign gimmick was carrying a lunch pail with his name on it, as he worked at a blue-collar job one day a week, operating a bulldozer, a drag line, or plowing a field (Nash and Taggart 2006: 32). Finch as governor also appointed African Americans to state offices, and succeeded in organizationally unifying the state Democratic party in 1976 (when Georgia Democrat Jimmy Carter carried Mississippi) under two co-chairs, black Loyalist Aaron Henry and white Regular Tom Ridell. Finch was elected only after fighting off a strong challenge from Republican Gil Carmichael, who offered a progressive candidacy with regular press conferences, disclosure of campaign contributions, and backing for the Equal Rights Amendment for women, handgun control, a new state constitution, and a compulsory school attendance law (Bass and DeVries 1977: 216; Nash and Taggart 2006: 53). Carmichael in losing garnered an historic high (for a Republican in a non-presidential, statewide race) 46% of the two-party vote, shocking the political establishment.

            Democrats would receive an even greater shock with the election of Republican congressman Thad Cochran to the U.S. senate in 1978 to replace retiring senator Eastland. After the notorious Eastland apparently handpicked his successor, Democratic nominee Maurice Dantin, the African American Charles Evers, brother of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, ran as an independent (Nash and Taggart 2006: 80). Blasting the welfare system for creating dependency and complaining that Democrats “took ‘blacks for granted,’” Evers offered African American voters “somebody that looks like you and talks like you and has suffered like you,” brought in black heavyweight world champion boxer Muhammad Ali, and carried ten majority black counties (Nash and Taggart 2006: 82 quotes, 83). Cochran’s 45% popular vote plurality win did include some black support, however. Cochran’s personal popularity might have won him a bare majority in a two-way race, as he had twice won reelection as congressman, capturing 71% and most recently 78% of the vote. Political observers described his “evident braininess” serving as a congressman, his personality as being “engaging, articulate,” and his style as being “soft-spoken” and “even-handed” (Barone, Ujifusa, and Matthews 1979: 475).

That the historic first of an election of a Republican in a statewide vote was not a “fluke” is further suggested by Cochran’s easy 61% reelection victory in 1984 over popular former governor William Winter. While building a conservative roll call record in the senate, Cochran also backed programs that helped a poor state like Mississippi, such as food stamps, rural housing, and aid to black colleges. Most memorable was an advertisement he ran featuring an elderly woman who had trouble getting her Social Security check. “And she looked to Thad, and Thad delivered,” concluded the announcer (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 102). Voters came to the same conclusion, with one statewide poll showing that an overwhelming 96% of the comments that voters offered about the incumbent were favorable. His seniority, experience, and work for the state were decisive in his easy reelection (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 102).

            Despite the loss of one U.S. senate seat and the loss of Mississippi in the 1980 and 1984 presidential elections, Democrats entered the 1988 elections with significant strengths that reflected their newfound resilience as a truly biracial party. Democrats were able to reelect John Stennis as senator in 1982, despite voter concern over his age of 81. Stennis responded with a modern television campaign that showed him working tirelessly at his desk at the crack of dawn “while the nation sleeps,” and that showed him climbing a scaffold to inspect a shipyard. Despite GOP state executive director Haley Barbour’s clever campaign theme, “A Senator for the 80s” and a spending advantage, Stennis’ 45 years of senate service gave him a far more visible name. Coupled with the small numbers of voters who identified with the Republican party and the sizable 17% of voters who mentioned Stennis’ party as the main reason they voted for him, the courtly senator won a landslide 64% of the vote in his last campaign (Shaffer and Krane 1992: 99-101). Mississippi Democrats profited from their association with the courtly Stennis, who was so respected by his fellow senators and by presidents that Congress named a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier after him. His Washington reputation for integrity mirrored his 1947 campaign pledge, an “earthy” promise that reflected his “rural county background,” a pledge “to plow a straight furrow down to the end of my row." (Johnston 1993: 90). Reflecting his personal modesty, a belief in the importance of the average Mississippian, and a recognition that he merely served their interests, Stennis during his last campaign pointedly reminded his “professional” campaign consultants who kept telling him “this is what we have to do to win” that, “We don’t have to win” (see the website http://www.stennis.gov/about/about_show.htm?doc_id=693885 of the Stennis Center for Public Service).

Democrats during this period also elected three candidates as governor to follow racial moderates Waller and Finch, continuing the party’s stranglehold on Mississippi’s governorship (Table 4-1). In 1979 a genuine racial liberal, William Winter, a former state treasurer and lieutenant governor, turned back Carmichael’s third bid for statewide office. Winter’s “articulate and professional image” of being “experienced” and “thoughtful,” served as a necessary tonic to voters who had grown weary of the alleged mismanagement and corruption of the final years of the Finch administration (Nash and Taggart 2006: 90, 1^st two quotes, 91, last two quotes). As governor, Winter challenged the “old-guard” conservatives who controlled the legislature to reform public education, giving a passionate speech proclaiming that “It’s boat rocking time in Mississippi.” Winter successfully mobilized public support and won strong backing from the Jackson Clarion-Ledger newspaper (whose aggressive coverage of this issue won it a Pulitzer Prize) to enact his historic 1982 Education Reform Act. This landmark act raised taxes and mandated public kindergartens statewide, a compulsory school attendance law, a reading aide program in the first three grades, an accreditation system for public schools, and a teacher pay raise (Nash and Taggart 2006: 145).

The 1983 gubernatorial election showed that Mississippians’ love of political theatre was no longer confined to one dominant party, as supporters of Republican nominee Leon Bramlett charged that Democratic nominee, “populist” Attorney General Bill Allain, had engaged in homosexual acts with black male transvestite prostitutes, a charge that was withdrawn by the prostitutes after the election (Nash and Taggart 2006: 152-159)! Acknowledging how his biracial coalition had won him victory, governor-elect Allain addressing the Mississippi NAACP publicly thanked delegates for “being with me… when Mississippi politics got into the basement… I know the people who elected me, and I won’t forget you” (Lamis 1990: 61). As governor, Allain appointed the first African American to the state Supreme Court, Reuben Anderson, and signed a bill necessitated by his lawsuit as state attorney general which upheld the state constitution’s separation of powers principle by removing legislators from all executive branch boards and greatly reorganizing state government (Nash and Taggart 2006: 166). Reflecting the ideologically diverse nature of governing Democrats, Allain appealed to conservatives by opposing any tax increase, even displaying a stone tablet at a press conference containing the chiseled words, “Veto tax bill” (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 192).

Mississippi and its Democratic party gained more national prominence with the election of an African American congressman in 1986 and a Harvard law school graduate as governor in 1987.  A high level appointed administrator in two state government offices, Mike Espy was an articulate and soft-spoken African American who didn’t “threaten” whites. He benefited from a national agricultural recession, and unseated conservative Republican congressman Webb Franklin in the 2^nd “Delta” district. Espy proved so skillful in his constituency service activities that even Hiram Eastland, second cousin to former Senator Eastland, hosted a biracial gathering to honor Espy at the Eastland family’s Adair Plantation Home in Doddsville (Shaffer 1991: 107). The capable Espy coasted to reelection triumphs of 65% of the vote in 1988 and a whopping 84% in 1990.

Mississippi’s “Harvard-educated” governor was Democrat Ray Mabus, who had fought corruption by county officials as auditor and who pledged that if elected, “Mississippi will never be last again.” A former Winter staff member who had helped author the historic Education Reform Act, Mabus pledged to further improve public education and to dramatically raise teachers’ salaries. The losing Republican gubernatorial nominee was Jack Reed, a progressive Tupelo businessman who had counseled racial moderation in the 1960s and who served as chairman of the state board of education (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 103-104; Nash and Taggart 2006: 198). Mabus’ accomplishments as governor pertain to increased education funding and racial diversity in state jobs. He appointed African Americans to important state offices such as to the state supreme court (Fred Banks), the College Board, the Public Service Commission and the State Tax Commission, and significantly increased funding for elementary, secondary, and higher education in his first two years (Nash and Taggart 2006: 183, 224). Democrats in the late 1980s continued to control about 90% of state legislative seats and all statewide elected offices. However, Jack Reed’s historic high of 47% of the popular vote for a GOP gubernatorial candidate should have served as a warning beacon that dramatic change in Mississippi politics was on the horizon. 

 

The Republican Tsunami Begins

            The retirement in 1988 of a Mississippi legend and an icon of the U.S. senate, John Stennis, was an historic event in the Magnolia state in yet another way. It ushered in a period of Republican gains that marked the historic minority party’s coming-of-age as a real threat to the Democrats. That year, yet another conservative replaced a conservative senate Democrat, and for the second consecutive time the conservative senate victor was now a member of the Republican instead of the Democratic party. Three years later, Republicans even captured the governorship for the first time since Reconstruction, thereby controlling all three of these highly visible offices. Looking down table 4-1, which lists Democratic officeholders in the left columns and Republicans in the right columns, one can easily see the dramatic transformation of the state’s political landscape. Prior to Cochran’s election to the senate in 1978, the Republican cells of the table are empty and the Democratic cells are full with such notable officeholders are Senators Stennis, Eastland, and a long list of governors. After the 1991 state elections, the Democratic cells are suddenly empty, and Republicans can boast about their U.S. senators Thad Cochran and Trent Lott as well as their two-term governor, Kirk Fordice.   

            Trent Lott’s victory in the 1988 senate race was a bit of a surprise to political observers, as the bright, articulate Republican with the “slick,” “well-kept” hair provided the most entertaining political theater during the campaign war (Lott 2005: 106). Seeking to represent the poorest state in the nation with the highest proportion of African Americans, Trent Lott was initially viewed by political observers as too conservative (typically receiving liberal ADA scores of absolute 0) and too partisan (serving as House GOP Minority Whip). Indeed, he represented the “whitest” and most Republican house district in the state (the Gulf Coast). Furthermore, he faced “folksy” populist Congressman Wayne Dowdy, a popular Democrat who combined a progressive record on public works and entitlement programs with a conservative record on national defense and “moral” issues. Outspending his Democratic rival by over $1 million, Lott hired a campaign consultant whose trade name was “Dr. Feelgood,” and proceeded to launch a series of visually appealing television ads that depicted the Republican “leader” as a supporter of such popular programs as Social Security, college student loans, environmental protection, and highway construction.

Entertaining and educating voters, Dowdy launched a television ad blasting Lott’s use as minority leader of a “chauffeur.” Lott’s camp responded with an ad featuring his chauffeur-guard George Awkward, an African American, who explained that he had been a Washington D.C. police veteran for 27 years and that, “I’m nobody’s chauffeur. Got it?” In a televised debate, Dowdy kept trying to depict Lott as being out-of-touch with the average Mississippian and exhorted voters to “cut George.” Reminding voters of Dowdy’s low attendance record on house roll call votes, Lott deadpanned: “I’ve got a better idea. Let’s cut Wayne. At least George shows up for work and he makes less than you do” (Shaffer 1991: 103). With Stennis and four other southern Democratic senators stumping for him, Dowdy was able to close the gap in the polls, but Lott still pulled out a 54% popular vote victory.             

            Most political observers nevertheless discounted GOP gains, since they had occurred only in federal elections. But facing a recession necessitating painful state budget cuts, the dominant Democratic party in state government proceeded to unravel. Harvard educated, Governor Ray (“Mississippi will never be last again”) Mabus was adamant about convincing the “buckle of the Bible Belt” to enact a lottery to pay for education improvements and to impose “user fees” that affected powerful interest groups. The state legislature balked and showed some willingness to enact a general tax increase to minimize the budget cuts, but Mabus opposed this alternative. The resulting stalemate between the Democratic governor and the Democratic-controlled legislature produced two years of painful budget cuts and no raises for teachers and state employees.  Expecting the real contest to be within the Democratic party, some education supporters urged the pragmatic and flexible Wayne Dowdy to challenge the incumbent governor. And then the fun began!

            Both Democratic titans stirred up their supporters when speaking at the Neshoba county fair, Mississippi’s giant “house party” attended by working class whites. Mabus in his white shirt and tie appeared a little out-of-place, and a section of the fairground roped off for his supporters merely illustrated how so many of his backers were “yuppie” types. Mocking Mabus’ campaign slogan of four years ago, Dowdy pledged that if elected, “Mississippi will never be lost again.” Laughing at the “arrogant” and wealthy “tree farmer’s” claim of a humble background, Dowdy quipped, “The ‘ruler’ claims to be the only farmer in the governor’s race. I guess he was president of the Future Farmers of America chapter, up there at Harvard.” Mabus for his part accused his fellow Democrat of saying that Mississippi could not compete with California and chided him: “Be ashamed. Wayne, be ashamed. Dowdy the doubter. Wayne, you stayed in Washington too long. You’ve given up on Mississippi” (Shaffer, Sturrock, Breaux, and Minor 1999: 253 both quotes). When the dust had cleared, Mabus was able to pull off a bare 51% majority victory in the primary, but instead of being gracious to his defeated opponent on election night he gloated, “This victory shows that Mississippi doesn’t want to go backward (paraphrased).”

            Enter Republican Kirk Fordice, a blunt-speaking construction company owner who had been a Republican party activist since the Goldwater era. Some state Republican party operatives tried to “anoint” as their gubernatorial candidate Pete Johnson, a close relative to two Democratic governors who after election as auditor in 1987 had switched to the GOP, exciting the party with their first statewide officeholder since Reconstruction. Blasting “Petey” as a “career politician,” Fordice made his conservatism clear to Republican voters, opposing racial quotas and all tax increases, and upset Johnson in the Republican runoff primary. Fordice’s primary victory is understandable in view of the less than 10% of Mississippi voters casting ballots in the Republican as opposed to Democratic primary. One poll showed that 37% of Republican activists described themselves as “very” conservative, 48% as “somewhat” conservative, and only 15% labeling themselves as liberal or moderate (Shaffer and Breaux 1995: 171).

In the general election campaign, as newspaper articles daily decried the painful state budget cuts, Fordice unleashed television ads depicting himself as merely “a private citizen, just like you,” and challenged voters to “take Mississippi back from the political hacks” (Shaffer, Sturrock, Breaux, and Minor 1999: 254-255). With polls showing voters increasingly disillusioned with the performance of the governor, the state legislature, and even with the overall quality of life in the state, Fordice stunned political observers with a narrow 51% popular vote victory to Mabus’ 48%. Significantly outspent by the incumbent, Fordice’s visibility was so low that on election night one veteran reporter on ETV turned to another and asked, “Who is Kirk Fordice?” The wave of voter dissatisfaction also claimed the three-term Democratic lieutenant governor (and president of the state senate) Brad Dye, who was replaced with state senator Eddie Briggs, another historic GOP first. As governor, the conservative Fordice is most known for establishing a rainy day fund from surplus revenue in good economic times to tide the state over in bad times, and for appointing far-sighted successful businessmen to the new state Gaming Commission who required that those seeking licenses to build casinos also promote tourism by building hotels, golf courses, and restaurants (Nash and Taggart 2006: 271, 272).                

            Mississippi Republicans proceeded to hammer their Democratic opponents with the “liberal” label, a tactic particularly effective in presidential elections. After Clinton’s choice of Tennessee Senator Al Gore as his running mate, Governor Fordice charged that Gore embodied the “left-wing, tax-and-spend, big-government thinking that has stifled the United States Congress” (Shaffer 1994: 70). Taking on the “liberal” media, the Republican governor promised on election night, “When George Herbert Walker Bush begins to surge ahead you will see their lips come out and little tears will begin to form because they have lost another chance to put a liberal, Democrat, draft-dodger, philanderer as the commander-in-chief of this greatest country in the entire world” (Shaffer 1994: 72). Despite losing the nation while carrying Mississippi and most southern states, Republicans were not giving up on Clinton-bashing. At a 1996 presidential campaign rally, Governor Fordice introduced House Speaker Newt Gingrich by blasting the Democratic president: “No American citizen should be permitted to go on foreign soil in time of war and demonstrate against his own country” (Shaffer and Burnside 1997: 99). Sometimes, national Democrats even seemed to help their GOP foes. In a Jackson visit in 2004 just before the state’s primary, Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry responded to an angry older African American woman, who said that she was “sick and tired of the onslaught of the homosexual community using the civil rights movement to further their agenda” by preaching that discrimination against gays should be taken as seriously as discrimination against African Americans and by backing gay couples having some of the same rights as straight couples (Goodman 2004: 1). Needless to say, Republicans continued to carry Mississippi in every presidential election starting with Reagan in 1980, and the GOP “lock” caused both national parties beginning in 1996 to write the state off in terms of devoting campaign resources and candidate visits in presidential races.

            Mississippi Democrats scored some important triumphs in the 1990s, thanks often to its African American base. In Fordice’s first year as governor, the Democratic-controlled state legislature voted to override his veto of a sales tax increase earmarked for education at all levels (K-12 and higher ed) and to override his veto of a bond bill for higher education libraries, and in both cases the overwhelming support that the black legislative caucus gave to the state’s education needs was decisive (Menifield and Shaffer 2005: 117-118). Espy’s 2^nd congressional district seat was won in 1993 by civil rights veteran Bennie Thompson, an outspoken liberal African American, who warned voters in the majority black district that, “If you vote for my opponent, it’s like the chicken voting for Colonel Sanders” (Glaser 1996: 163). As Thompson won repeated reelection despite Republicans now fielding [conservative] African American candidates against him, the congressman seemed to shed his more “belligerent” image that “scared” white constituents. Deflecting criticism of his liberal Democratic partisan nature, “Bennie” points out that he champions the needs of the “poor, senior citizens, children, and the disenfranchised” (Shaffer and Burnside 1997: 103).        

            The decade of the 1990s saw Republicans make further congressional gains, as voters replaced retiring moderate-to-conservative Democratic incumbents with conservative Republicans. Replacing veteran House Appropriations Committee chairman Jamie Whitten in the 1^st district (north Mississippi) in 1994, GOP state senator Roger Wicker stressed that if his father, a conservative Democratic officeholder, were alive today, he “would be a Republican” (Shaffer, Sturrock, Breaux, and Minor 1999: 260). Replacing conservative Democrat Sonny Montgomery, a personal friend of former President Bush, in 1996 was Lott staff member “Chip” Pickering. When his Democratic opponent in a debate had sought to “nationalize” the house election by warning that impoverished Mississippi did not “need to send Newt Gingrich another player,” Pickering roused the audience by turning the tables and snapping back, “I guess the choice is sending Bill and Hillary another player” (Shaffer and Burnside 1997: 102).

One Democratic officeholder who successfully resisted GOP efforts to brand his party’s candidates as “liberals” was 5^th district (4^th after the 2000 census) congressman Gene Taylor. With a relatively moderate roll call voting record, Taylor has stressed his constituency service, such as his steering navy shipbuilding contracts as a member of the Armed Services Committee to Pascagoula’s Ingalls shipyard. Defusing the unpopularity of President Clinton in his district, Taylor after the 1994 GOP congressional landslide voted “present” instead of voting for his party’s unsuccessful candidate for Speaker. The nominal Democrat even sported a “Colin Powell for President” bumper sticker two years later, and voted to impeach the president of his party for lying under oath. 

Mississippi’s reelection of its first GOP governor in the century was memorable primarily because of the political theatre that was increasingly characterizing competition between the parties instead of within one dominant party. With a booming economy that benefits any incumbent, prospects appeared dim for Democratic challenger, reform-oriented Secretary of State and former Winter staff member Dick Molpus. After Fordice admitted that he had marital difficulties, Molpus began to characterize his policy disagreements with Fordice as “irreconcilable differences.” Fordice responded at a debate before the Mississippi Economic Council by trotting his wife Pat up onto the stage with him, blasting Molpus for his "thinly veiled cheap shot” at their 40-year marriage and kissing Pat on her cheek to the roar of the sympathetic business crowd (Wagster 1995).

Molpus’ wife Sally, a former teacher, was also able to get into the fray, cutting a television ad where she criticized the Republican’s school choice plan as “a little scary,” charging that it would put public money into private schools. At a press luncheon, Fordice proceeded to mock Sally’s voice and label her charge an “untruth, which is unseemly to me. I wouldn't put my wife out there if I had a big whopper to tell and wanted to tell it. I'd tell it myself." Molpus promptly retorted that Fordice had "called my wife a liar. Quite frankly, I'd like to take him to the woodshed" (Gordon 1995a). Subsequently, Molpus claimed that after a televised debate, Fordice had roared, "You said last Friday that you wanted to take me to the woodshed. Well, this 61-year-old man will take you to the woodshed and I'll whip your ass." Fordice staffer John Arledge who was there at the time disputed Molpus’ charge, though the event seemed consistent with the governor’s earthy reputation (Gordon 1995b). Though unable to regain the governorship, Democrats took heart from sweeping all other statewide races in 1995, even winning back the lieutenant governorship with state senator and education committee chairman, Ronnie Musgrove.

One difference in this modern era of politics in Mississippi compared to the days of V.O. Key is that episodes of pure political theatre have become more likely to occur in the competition between the two parties rather than within a dominant Democratic party. But whatever happened to the old Delta vs. Hills regional split of V.O. Key's era within the Democratic primaries between rich conservative planters and poor whites? The rise of a genuine two-party system has produced some real class differences between the parties as has existed nationally since the New Deal. Lower income and less educated voters are much more likely to vote Democratic, while the higher SES are voting more Republican (Krane and Shaffer 1992: 94).

A study of attitudinal differences between the state's regions made possible by combining or "pooling" opinion polls from 1981 through 1996 found that voters in the "core" Delta counties and the Natchez counties (south of the Delta but also along the Mississippi River) remained politically distinctive compared to the rest of the state. However, by the closing years of the 20th century they had become the most "liberal" part of the state, being most Democratic in party identification and most likely to favor Democratic party candidates, largely because of the majority black composition of nearly all of these counties (Shaffer and Horne 1998). The social conservatism of the core Delta (but not the Natchez area) remained quite evident, though, as whites and even African Americans were somewhat more conservative than residents in the rest of the state on the issues of a "woman's place" in society and on school and neighborhood integration. The Delta�s social conservatism was muted, however, by its enthusiasm for gambling and the legalization of dockside casino gambling in some Delta counties to promote economic development and to provide jobs.

Democrats scored big in the last state elections of the century, winning back the governorship with pro-education Musgrove, who as lieutenant governor had appointed many blacks to chair important senate committees and had supported improved funding of public education. Democrats also retained the lieutenant governorship with centrist “country gal” Amy Tuck, and swept all other statewide races except auditor (though Republican auditor Phil Bryant, appointed to a vacancy in 1996, was hardly an unbending partisan, boasting a reputation of even-handed integrity.). Republicans now appeared to be the party in disarray, bitterly charging that their gubernatorial candidate, Democrat-turned-Republican congressman Mike Parker (of the now defunct 4^th district) of sitting on his lead and not spending all of his money. Parker’s issueless ads had “focused on his hometown, his family, and his career,” and he had spent “little time traveling around the state, meeting with groups of votes, and organizing supporters” (Nash and Taggart 2006: 275). Musgrove proceeded to deliver on his campaign pledge to raise elementary and secondary public school teachers’ salaries to the southeast average over a six-year period without raising taxes. He also called a special legislative session to enact tort reform for doctors and the health care industry in general (Nash and Taggart 2006: 301). And then it all fell apart for the Democrats!

As the nation was shook by the terrorist attacks of 9-11, the ensuing recession plus the diversion of state revenue to the teacher pay raise produced three years of painful budget cuts in Mississippi higher education and other state programs. Even normally Democratic “liberal” professors were disillusioned with a Democratic chief executive who, unlike previous Democratic governors such as Ray Mabus, was taking money away from higher education to give to elementary and secondary education, while also opposing any tax increase. Meanwhile, with Mississippi losing a house seat after the census, Democratic party activists were pressuring “their” lieutenant governor to back a redistricting “shoestring” plan that would seek to retain Democratic congressman Ronnie Shows over Republican Chip Pickering. The independent-minded Tuck, responding to concerns by city officials that some major cities would be lumped into the same district under the “Democratic” plan, rebuffed her parties’ leaders. Tuck also angered liberals by supporting tort reform, and after Shows’ defeat by Pickering in the 2002 elections the pro-education but socially conservative Tuck switched her affiliation to the Republican Party (Goodman 2002).

The 2003 state elections constituted a new high point for the GOP, showing that it was now a very competitive party, not just in federal but also in state elections. Incumbent governor Musgrove was unseated by Republican Haley Barbour, a former chair of the Republican National Committee turned successful lobbyist, who outspent the incumbent by nearly a two-to-one margin and implemented an impressive “Seventy-Two-Hour-Program” of intensive neighborhood canvassing to get-out-the-vote for election day (Nash and Taggart 2006: 307 quote, 304, 306). In addition to angering higher education personnel and state employees with constant budget cuts and seemingly nonexistent raises, Musgrove had alienated many social conservatives by attempting to change (unsuccessfully) the state flag to remove its Confederate symbol. As Musgrove ads kept blasting his opponent as a “Washington lobbyist” without even mentioning his own name, the overweight Barbour with his Yazoo city southern drawl projected an image of sincerity and decency as he recounted Mississippi’s problems and promised, “We can do better.”

The 2003 elections also saw Amy Tuck reelected lieutenant governor, this time as a Republican, after Democrats nominated a liberal, African American state senator, Barbara Blackmon, who squandered a possible upset in the making. The outspoken Blackmon insinuated that the “pro-life” Tuck had had an abortion, prompting the lieutenant governor to sign an affidavit that she had never had an abortion and to proclaim that she was “pro-life in my private life and I am pro-life in my professional life” (Byrd 2003: 3B). Republicans also reelected Phil Bryant auditor and picked up the open treasurer’s position with Tate Reeves, who outspent a well-qualified African American, Gary Anderson. Democrats received some consolation by winning the open attorney general’s seat with Assistant Attorney General Jim Hood, and reelecting Secretary of State Eric Clark, Agriculture Commissioner Lester Spell, Jr., and Insurance Commissioner George Dale. Democrats suffered a loss of the agriculture commissioner’s position in 2005, however, as Spell, a native of Republican stronghold Rankin county, switched parties. Democrats also retained control of both chambers of the state legislature, despite the continuation of the trend begun in 1979 of GOP gains in number of seats.

Republicans continued to make gains in 2007, as Barbour was easily reelected governor with 58% of the vote over social conservative John Arthur Eaves, who backed “voluntary, student-led school prayers” and promised to throw the “money changers” out of the state capital (Nossiter, 2007). In endorsing Barbour, the Clarion-Ledger pointed out that he had “done a good job of attracting new jobs as shown in his personal role in helping land the new Toyota plant …” (the Clarion-Ledger, 2007: 4G). Barbour’s decisive and confident leadership after Hurricane Katrina devastated the coast, when he publicly vowed that the coast would rebuild to be “better than ever,” and his active fight for federal disaster funds won him the prestigious Governing magazine’s award of Public Official of the Year. Even Mississippi’s first African American congressman since Reconstruction, Mike Espy, ended up backing the Republican, as did other Democratic former officeholders, lieutenant governor Brad Dye and governor Bill Waller (Rupp, 2007: 1A, 6A).

Republicans also won every other statewide office except for attorney general, though Democrats maintained control of both state legislative chambers. The GOP won every open contest for statewide office, as auditor Phil Bryant moved up to the lieutenant governorship, and well-qualified candidates won the offices of secretary of state, auditor, and insurance commissioner. Republicans also reelected incumbents for treasurer and the party switching agriculture commissioner, the latter after winning over a tough primary challenger. The only statewide Democrat victorious was the well-qualified incumbent attorney general, Jim Hood. The state Republican Party had aggressively backed their statewide candidates, contributing the following sums to party candidates: $450,000 for insurance commissioner, $287,500 for attorney general, $137,000 for auditor, $120,000 for secretary of state, $100,000 for agriculture commissioner, and $65,000 for lieutenant governor. The only Democrat successful in attracting such a large sum was Attorney General Jim Hood, who received $850,000 over the year from the Democratic Attorney General Association (see Mississippi secretary of state website). Democrats also shot themselves in the foot when the state party executive committee sought to deny incumbent Democratic insurance commissioner George Dale a place on the primary ballot, because he had endorsed Republican President Bush in 2004, forcing Dale to go to court to have his ballot position restored, but to then be knocked off in the Democratic primary election.    

Democrats have responded to the rising GOP threat by attempting to revitalize their party with new state party chairs. The importance of African Americans to the party was recognized in 1987 by the Democrats’ selection of the first black state party chairman in the nation, Vice Chair and former Stennis and Eastland aid, Ed Cole. Another African-American succeeded Cole in 1994, state senator Johnnie Walls. After continued organizational difficulties, Democrats then selected a string of white males to lead their state party—Musgrove friend and businessman Jon Levingston, outspoken liberal Rickey Cole, and in 2004 popular former congressman Wayne Dowdy. Dowdy displayed his usual folksy demeanor when crisscrossing the state during the 2004 presidential campaign by comparing party politics to an automobile transmission: “You put it in D to go forward and R to go in reverse” (Jones 2004: 1) Both parties chose new state party chairs in the presidential election year of 2008, when both of the state's U.S. senate seats were up due to Trent Lott's precipitous retirement.

Republicans continued to romp in the 2008 and 2010 federal elections, winning both U.S. senate seats and the presidential race in 2008, and knocking off two Democratic U.S. house incumbents two years later. Governor Barbour had appointed 1st district GOP Congressman Roger Wicker as the interim Senator after Lott's resignation, and Democrats promptly nominated former governor Ronnie Musgrove as their candidate for the November special election. Wicker proceeded to paint Musgrove as a "liberal," blasting him for accepting money from a national PAC that was "the largest gay rights group in the country," and accusing the Democrat of promising to support the "liberal Democratic leadership" in Washington (Pettus 2008). Both camps quickly turned negative with Musgrove claiming that Wicker had voted repeatedly to raise his own pay and that he had gone "to Washington promising change, but Washington politics changed him," while Wicker reminded voters that they had rejected Musgrove's gubernatorial reelection bid and had given "him his walking papers" (Todd 2008). With Republicans outnumbering Democrats by 6% in the exit polls, Wicker kept Lott's seat in the Republican ranks. Meanwhile, Republican Cochran won his usual landslide reelection, beating a former state legislator who had lost to Lott two years earlier, African American Erik Fleming.

In the 2008 elections, longtime chancery clerk and moderate Travis Childers briefly regained the 1st district house district for Democrats after a bitter GOP primary, only to be unseated two years later in the national GOP landslide, along with moderate Democrat Gene Taylor of the 4th house district. Victorious GOP state lawmakers Alan Nunnelee and Steven Palazzo in 2010 aided by state Republican leaders aggressively sought to tie the Blue Dog incumbents to liberal national Democrats, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and President Obama, a winning strategy given not only voter discontent with Washington but also Obama's failure to win more than 37% of the vote in these districts. Nunnelee blasted Childers for backing Obama's stimulus bill, arguing that "we don't like to borrow money from the government of China to be repaid by our grandchildren," while state GOP chairman Brad White accused the Democratic incumbent of playing "on the team of (House Speaker) Nancy Pelosi" (Berry, 2009). Palazzo argued that having been a Marine in the Persian Gulf War gave him "the courage to take on people like Pelosi and Obama," and blasted "the government takeover of health care" (Pettus 2010a, 1st quote; Pettus 2010b, 2nd quote). To add insult to injury, a party switch after the 2010 election gave Republicans a tie with Democrats in number of state senators for the first time since Reconstruction.

The 2011 state elections completed the meltdown of state Democrats, as the Republicans retained the governorship, 6 of the other 7 statewide elected officials, and seized control of both chambers of the state legislature for the first time since Reconstruction. Lieutenant governor Phil Bryant, a champion of "transparent government," who as former state auditor had aggressively recovered funds from "corrupt officials", and who had established a pro-business image even earlier by writing a capital gains tax cut act as a state legislator, defeated African American Democrat and respected Hattiesburg mayor Johnny DuPree (Mitchell 2011). Bryant touted his close work with popular Governor Barbour recruiting new jobs to the state and "being responsible with taxpayers' dollars by not spending money we don't have," while the state Republican Party sent out two mailings to its supporters, both touting Bryant's conservative values and one blasting DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz's visit to Mississippi in support of his opponent whose election was "so important to the liberal, national Democrats" (Harrison 2011, 1st quote; 2nd quote is in a mailing). Bryant's victory marked the first time since 1987 that one party won three or more gubernatorial elections in a row, only this time it was the Republican Party and not the once-dominant Democratic Party that held that distinction.

By 2011 Republican candidates for statewide office now boasted the impressive resumes' of experience in public office that the previously dominant Democratic Party's candidates had once held. Victorious Agriculture Commissioner candidate Cindy Hyde-Smith, a stockyard owner and cattle farmer, boasted two terms as chair of the state senate agriculture committee, earning the Mississippi Farm Bureau's awards of Agriculture Legislator of the Year and also Ag Ambassador for her efforts to promote the state's catfish industry to other states (Salter 2011a). Another GOP woman for an open seat, Lynn Fitch, parlayed her executive directorship of the state Personnel Board, which has jurisdiction over 32,000 workers in 130 agencies, into the state Treasurer's position, boasting that she had cut her own budget but been able to do "more with less" (Nalley 2011). Thirty-six year old Tate Reeves, the two-term treasurer, boasting a fiscally conservative record and a reputation as a rising star in the state and national GOP, moved up to the lieutenant governorship's position without Democratic opposition (Salter 2011b). Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann, praised by the Clarion-Ledger for having "admirably served the public" by "ensuring that public lands are managed for the benefit of the public" was reelected without general election opposition (Clarion-Ledger 2011). Two other GOP officeholders reelected to their statewide offices were Auditor Stacey Pickering and Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney. The lone remaining Democratic statewide officer, Attorney General Jim Hood, won an easy reelection to a third term, however.

The 2011 election also saw Republicans gain control of both chambers of the state legislature for the first time since Reconstruction. Conservatives had been increasingly flexing their muscles, offering a conservative Democratic challenger to Billy McCoy's reelection as Speaker in 2007 who won 47 Republican and 13 Democratic votes to McCoy's narrow victory of 62 House Democrats, prompting McCoy to refuse to appoint any Republicans as committee chairs, an historic shutout of intra-chamber power for the historic minority party (Pettus 2011). Early in 2011 some conservatives created the website FireMcCoy.com, labeling the New Deal Democrat McCoy, who was pro-guns and pro-life, as "Mississippi's Nancy Pelosi," leader of a "band of liberal merry men" who were harmful "to the conservative cause in this state" and who should receive "their pink slips" (Salter 2011c). The Mississippi Tea Party also focused on "replacing Billy McCoy and his liberal House leadership with conservatives," endorsing ten house candidates (five of whom won), and providing them with candidate training, television and talk radio publicity, and targeted ads and a sign blitz in each district (Miss. Tea Party 2011).

The 2012 elections saw Republicans maintain their dominance of federal elections, easily retaining their U.S. senate seat, three of the four U.S. house seats, and carrying the state in the presidential election. Often facing Democrats who had so little campaign money that they weren't required to report it to the FEC, GOP congressional and senate incumbents won anywhere from 57% to 80% of the vote. The only positive points for Democrats was their dominance in the 2nd congressional district, with Congressman Thompson winning 67% of the vote, plus a more narrow than expected victory margin for Republicans in the presidential race. Romney won only 55.3% of the vote to Obama's 43.8%, a margin that might be attributed to a heavier than expected Democratic voter turnout. Indeed, the narrow 4% edge of Republicans over Democrats in exit polls failed to exceed the 4% party edge among all adult Mississippians.

The 2014 U.S. senate campaign (as with the Nunnelee and Palazzo congressional renominations in 2012, when both Republican incumbents had to fight off spirited Tea Party challengers) suggested that the "real" contests were now within the dominant Republican party rather than in the November general election. Seventy-seven year old Thad Cochran, who had been in the senate for 36 years, faced state senator Chris McDaniel, a conservative leader and a Tea Party favorite. Cochran's campaign pledged continued use of "his status as a top member of the Appropriations Committee to support federal projects such as military bases, university research and agricultural projects in Mississippi," while McDaniel blasted Cochran's allegedly liberal votes and labeled him as a "senator who's been in Washington so long, he's forgotten his Mississippi conservative values" (Pettus 2014a, 2014b). Aggressively campaigning across the state, McDaniel shocked the political establishment by leading the first primary with 49.5% of the vote to Cochran's 49.0% with a minor candidate forcing a runoff race. Cochran supporters quickly became energized, with the aging senator personally campaigning across the state, with Republican establishment leaders urging a Cochan vote to help ensure a GOP-controlled senate, and with many African American leaders praising Cochran’s support for some programs that benefitted minorities. One kiss of death for the spunky challenger was that his call for cuts in education prompted pleas for Cochran's reelection on the part of the chairmen of all three of the state's public education bodies (elementary and secondary, community colleges, and universities). The Cochran forces reversed their initial first primary deficit with a narrow 51% runoff victory, prompting a bitter McDaniel to spend months in court challenges over allegedly illegal Democratic crossover votes in the GOP runoff. Continuing the GOP monopoly of both U.S. senate seats starting in 1988, Cochran easily bested Democratic former congressman Travis Childers, whose supporters had hoped in vain for a McDaniel GOP upset, as polls had shown a tossup or even Childers victory if he had faced the Tea Party favorite (exit poll: http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/MS/senate).

The 2015 state elections underscored the dominant position of Republicans, as the GOP once again swept all statewide offices (except attorney general), and gained a 60% supermajority in both legislative chambers. Governor Bryant successfully embraced the popular issue of economic development, as he attended business openings and expansions throughout the state, including in the northern cities of Baldwyn, Burnsville, Columbus, Ecru, Guntown, New Albany, Pontotoc, Starkville, Verona, and West Point. Other Republicans were also positively associated with non-divisive issues, with Treasurer Fitch touting her office's provision of on-line resources teaching financial literacy to schoolchildren, Secretary of State Hosemann promoting election reform measures and publicizing ten photo identifications permissible under the state voter ID law, and Insurance Commissioner Chaney being praised for working to ensure that all residents would have access to insurance exchanges under Obamacare. Fitch and Chaney were reelected without any Democratic opponent, while all other incumbent Republican statewide officers achieved landslides of over 60% of the vote. Attorney General and Democrat Jim Hood won a 55% reelection victory, but Democratic futility elsewhere was reflected in their gubernatorial nominee, Robert Gray, being a truck driver, who admitted that he had been too busy to even vote in the party primary. Gray presumably won because his name was listed first on the ballot, and his two opponents also lacked name visibility and any previous elected office experience and were women. One of the strongest "Democratic" candidates was Elvis impersonator and a former Republican state senator, Tim Johnson, who unsuccessfully ran for lieutenant governor. Republican state leaders were also successful in convincing voters to shoot down Initiative 42 which would have required funding for an "adequate and efficient" public school system, as GOP leaders feared cuts to other state agencies including higher education and opposed the transfer of legislative power to the state courts (who would have been entrusted with enforcing this initiative).

As in other southern states, Democrats in 2018 offered very viable candidates for the state's most prominent offices. House Minority Leader and 11-year state legislative veteran David Baria, seeking to unseat Senator Roger Wicker, backed such populist issues that helped the "working poor" as Medicaid expansion (Harris 2018). Wicker was active in constituency service, backing health care measures such as teleheath services and CHIP, new Army helicopters built in Lowndes county, and an increase in the Navy fleet (advocated from his seat on the Armed Services Committee)(Wicker 2018). His accessibility and service to all Mississippians prompted former Democratic gubernatorial candidate John Arthur Eaves Jr. to host a fundraiser for him, praising his willingness to "meet and listen," as his doors were always open "for me and a lot of Mississippians who have needed help" (Pender 2018). Wicker's campaign also stressed his conservatism and his support for President Trump, as shown by headlines in a newspaper ad: "Conservative Leadership for Mississippi & the Nation... Senator Roger Wicker & President Donald Trump... Working to Make America Great Again!" (Daily Journal, Tupelo, June 3, 2018, p. 6A) With Republicans outnumbering Democrats by 50-36%, and Trump approvers outnumbering disapprovers by 59-40%, Wicker won a 58.5% landslide reelection to 39.5% for Baria (https://www.cnn.com/election/2018/exit-polls/mississippi/senate).

Democrats in 2018 offered an even stronger candidate in the Senate special election (necessitated by Cochran's resignation), former Congressman Mike Espy, an African American who had also served as President Clinton's first Agriculture Secretary. Praising Senator Cochran's work for all Mississippians, Espy stressed that "his only loyalty is 'Mississippi first' over any party or person" (Ramseth and Pender, 2018). He also pledged to "work to correct the stereotypes and attract companies and jobs to Mississippi" (Pettus 2018a). His campaign attracted such national Democratic figures as New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, who argued that southern Democrats "put people first, before party," and "that's what Mike Espy is going to do" (Pettus 2018b). However, when California Senator Kamala Harris at a Jackson Democratic women's breakfast proclaimed that "racism, anti-semitism, sexism, homophobia, these issues are real in this country," the spokeswoman for the interim Senator shot back, "This race is not about identity politics, it's about conservative versus liberal" (Amy 2018).

Republicans in the 2018 special election were initally split between the interim Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, the state Agriculture Commissioner appointed by Governor Bryant, and conservative state senator Chris McDaniel, who had forced Cochran into a runoff primary in 2014. Blasting party switcher Hyde-Smith as a "life-long Democrat" who had voted in the 2008 Democratic presidential primary, McDaniel proclaimed his "love" for the Republican platform, but asked "what good is a platform if you don't have fighters to fight for it" (Bedillion 2018a). Governor Bryant offered an effective defense of Hyde-Smith, calling her a "rock-solid conservative," consistently rated by BIPEC as a "business champion," who had "carried the banner for the Republican Party in two statewide elections for agriculture commissioner," and who had "co-chaired the Trump Agriculture Policy Advisory Council" (Bryant 2018). President Trump in late August tweeted his "complete and total Endorsement" for Hyde-Smith, praising how she "is helping me create Jobs, loves our Vets and fights for our conservative judges" (Pettus 2018c). In an early October rally in Southaven, President Trump reiterated that "a vote for Cindy is a vote for me and 'Make America Great Again'," while "a vote for Espy is a vote for the Democratic agenda, for open borders, and for radical socialism" (Bedillion 2018b). After making the runoff election with 41.3% of the vote to 40.9% for Espy and 16.4% for McDaniel, Hyde-Smith was boosted by a second visit from Trump, who warned a Tupelo rally that "Espy would 'vote in total lockstep' with Chuck Schumer, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, and the 'legendary Maxine Waters'" (Colvin 2018). Joining Trump on Air Force One was South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, who added, "when Kavanaugh needed your senator, she was there" (Bedillion 2018c). (Indeed, Hyde-Smith had been filmed sitting right behind Maine GOP senator Susan Collins when the undecided Maine senator publicly announced her decisive support for the judge.) Hyde-Smith also projected a "down-home" image, running an ad "showing her in blue jeans and boots at her family's cattle auction" and relating cattle ranching to service in Washington as she picked up a shovel, "You can't be afraid to put your boots on and clean up the mess" (Pettus 2018d). She also aggressively took on constituency service, presenting a $100,000 USDA grant to Mississippi State University, and being appointed to Cochran's important Appropriations and Agriculture Committees. A couple of missteps did however give Democrats an opening to accuse the Republican of racial insensitivity and urging voter suppression, as Hyde-Smith joked in Tupelo that she so respected a supporter that "If he invited me to a public hanging, I'd be on the front row," and joked to a few students at Mississippi State University that "there's a lot of liberal folks in those other schools who that maybe we don't want to vote" (Pettus and Beaumont 2018, 1st quote; Phillips 2018, 2nd quote). Upon winning the runoff with 53.6% of the vote, Hyde-Smith graciously pledged: "no matter who you voted for today, I'm going to always represent every Mississippian" (Pettus 2018e).

The 2019 state elections saw a gubernatorial contest that was the most competitive in 16 years, as Democrats nominated their only statewide official, Jim Hood, the four-term attorney general who was perceived by voters as an ideological moderate. Fearing that the GOP front runner, Tate Reeves, had made too many enemies as lieutenant governor and president of the state senate and was viewed as "arrogant", some Republicans (including three former state party chairmen) backed Bill Waller in the GOP primary, a personable former chief justice of the state supreme court whose father had been a Democratic governor. Running as a pragmatist who wanted to solve the problems of deteriorating highways and bridges and of rural hospitals closing, Waller backed a gas tax hike and an expansion of Medicaid under Obamacare, prompting Reeves to call himself the "conservative" in the party primary and to win the endorsement of governor Phil Bryant, former governor Haley Barbour, and of conservative Chris McDaniel. Waller nevertheless battled Reeves into the primary runoff election, where Reeves won the nomination with 54%. Democrat Hood meanwhile portrayed himself as a fighter for "working people... people that work everyday, pay their taxes, follow the rules, go to church," and blasted the Republican controlled state legislature for their tax cuts that had taken money away from education and infrastructure needs and for their failure to expand Medicaid under Obamacare (which would have brought jobs and money into Mississippi)(Bologna, 2019). Reeves proceeded to blast Hood's "liberal" policies and promised to "oppose the values of Hollywood and Washington D.C.," and the "liberal ideas of the party of Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and Jim Hood" (Pettus, 2019). Campaigning for Reeves in Tupelo, President Trump praised him for being "pro-jobs, pro-family and pro-life" and for supporting "our police," and blasted Hood for opposing "our travel ban" (Vance 2019). Stumping for Reeves in Biloxi, Vice President Pence praised him as a "strong conservative", and blasted Hood for being an out-of-touch liberal who was a Hillary Clinton supporter and soft on gun rights (Pettus and McGill 2019). Former governor Barbour in an editorial column blasted the attorney general for making it "harder to recruit companies" to the state because of his "shakedown tactics" known as "jackpot justice" which had necessitated tort reform, and called Hood's tax increases "an even bigger job-killing passion" (Barbour 2019). With Republican statewide candidates sometimes campaigning together as a team, the GOP swept all eight statewide offices for the first time since Reconstruction with Reeves winning a relatively narrow 52.6% victory.

Republicans in 2019 won every non-gubernatorial statewide office by landslide margins of between 58% and 61% of the vote (excluding one unopposed incumbent), as they offered strong candidates and benefitted from their party identification advantage among voters. Delbert Hosemann, the three-term secretary of state who had been praised for implementing a voter ID law in such a professional and fair manner that the state avoided a lawsuit, beat first term state representative Jay Hughes for the open lieutenant governor's spot. Three-term state senator Michael Watson won the open secretary of state office, beating highly respected African American Democrat Johnny DuPree, former Hattiesburg mayor for 16 years and unsuccessful gubernatorial nominee in 2011. Two-term state Treasurer Lynn Fitch became the state's first female and first Republican attorney general, beating an African American Democrat Jennifer Riley, the former executive director of the state ACLU. Three-term Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney, whose considerable public service experience also included eight years in the state senate and chairmanship of the senate education committee, won re-election over a political novice, African American Robert Amos, a small business owner. Andy Gipson, appointed Agriculture Commissioner to replace Hyde-Smith, boasted experience 10 years of experience in the state house and chairmanship of Judiciary B Committee as well as awards for his conservatism, pro-life, and NRA support, and defeated Democrat Rickey Cole, a former state party chair. David McRae, an attorney and partner in a family business who had failed to beat Treasurer Lynn Fitch in the GOP primary four years previously, now won the open Treasurer's position over an African American female Democrat Addie Lee Green, a Bolton alderwoman and election commissioner. Appointed Auditor by Governor Bryant the year before, Rhodes Scholar and Harvard Law School graduate (and Federalist Society President) Shad White, who had previously been lieutenant governor Bryant's Director of Policy, ran unopposed, as he was praised for his recovery of stolen and inappropriately spent funds by local governmental officials of both parties.

The regular 2020 Senate election was a rematch between Republican Senator Hyde-Smith and Democrat Mike Espy. Initially, Espy stressed his bipartisan approach and that as a Congressman he had worked across the aisle with Senator Cochran and President Reagan. But he then endorsed Biden, was in turn endorsed by the Democratic presidential candidate, and accepted campaign help from liberal national Democrats such as New Jersey Senator Cory Booker, Georgia voting rights activist Stacey Abrams, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Stressing Democratic issues such as expanded health care and racial justice, Espy blasted Hyde-Smith for allegedly backing voter suppression and joking about public hangings. The incumbent, meanwhile, stressed her delivery of federal funds to Mississippi, her service on the constituency-relevant committees of Agriculture and Appropriations, and her conservative values. Republicans such as former governor Bryant linked Espy to liberal Democrats nationally and warned against their takeover of the Senate. Needless to say, the Republican incumbent won re-election once again, and by a slightly larger margin than in 2018, as her vote was highly correlated with Trump's and she won all except five white majority counties (Shaffer, 2021).

The year 2023 saw the GOP maintain its domination of state offices, as it swept all eight statewide offices and retained about two-thirds of state legislative seats. Indeed, in the 7 non-gubernatorial state offices, Republicans were victorious over Democrats with 58-61% of the two-party vote. The only real excitement in those races was a heated GOP lieutenant governor primary battle between incumbent Delbert Hosemann and staunch conservative Chris McDaniel. Blasting the incumbent as "Delbert the Democrat," McDaniel labeled Democrats as being "the party of radicals... the problem with America," and accused the incumbent of reaching "across the aisle" and appointing some Democrats as committee chairs (Perlis 2023a). Hosemann blasted McDaniel as being a do-nothing state senator lacking legislative accomplishments, and touted his own leadership accomplishments of the largest teacher pay raise and roads and bridges infrastructure programs in state history (Jones 2023). The incumbent also backed four health care measures that would help the state's struggling hospitals, called for free community college tuition, stronger penalties for dangerous crimes such as carjacking, and a gradual reduction in the state income tax. The Hosemann campaign also sent multiple mailings to GOP voters reminding them of his pro-life and anti-crime record, and attacking his opponent's alleged corruption and ineffectiveness. Hosemann won renomination in the first primary with 52% of the vote to McDaniel's 43%.

The 2023 governor's race was much closer, as Democrats nominated Brandon Presley, the 4-term Northern District Public Service Commissioner. The religious, pro-life and pro-gun rights Presley portrayed himself as a "Populist, FDR-Billy McCoy Democrat" who had worked across the partisan aisle and even voted for President Bush's re-election (Perlis 2023b). Pledging to fight for the "working families" by attacking public corruption and backing health care improvements such as expanding Medicaid, Presley mocked the governor: "I ain't never owned a tennis racket... I ain't never been a member of a country club" (Gordon 2023). The popular north Mississippian touted some endorsements from North Mississippi local Republican officeholders, and worked to stimulate African American turnout by campaigning at Jackson State University and advertising on radio stations with largely black audiences. Republican Governor Tate Reeves argued that "conservative leadership works," as he touted the state's economic development efforts, such as incentive packages that attracted a $2.5 billion aluminum mill and biocarbon facility and led to other businesses expanding in the Golden Triangle region (McLaughlin 2023). Reeves' bragging on the state's education advances in 4th and 8th grade reading were even praised by the founder of the California Reading Coalition (Collins 2023). He also blasted his Democratic opponent as being supported by a "radical, vicious" national party that believed that "taxes are good, boys are girls, and our state and nation is racist" (Inman 2023). Reeves pulled out a 50.9% to 47.7% victory, a narrow 3.2% edge that showed that Democrats could be competitive with a strong candidate and sufficient campaign support.

           

Legislative Politics in a GOP-Dominated Era

By 2012, party caucuses were clearly operating to choose the party and institutional leadership, but both chambers reinstituted bipartisanship in appointing committee chairs. Floor votes gave Republicans the two top positions of House speaker and speaker pro tempore, and Democrats illustrated their party’s biracial nature by electing one white as House Democratic leader and one black as House Democratic deputy leader. The Senate elected Republican Terry Brown president pro tempore, who joined the GOP lieutenant governor. Retaining the bipartisan tradition of the state senate, Lieutenant Governor Reeves appointed 10 African American Democrats and 5 white Democrats as standing committee chairs to join the 23 GOP committee chairs, a partisan division of chairmanships nearly identical to the party split in the entire membership. House Speaker Philip Gunn restored the bipartisan tradition of the House that had been shattered four years earlier, appointing 8 black Democrats and 2 white Democrats as standing committee chairs to join the 30 GOP chairs. Furthermore, Democrats were tapped to chair some substantively important committees, such as the Corrections, Economic Development, Highways and Transportation, Housing, one of the two Judiciary committees, and the Municipalities committees in the Senate, and the Agriculture, Corrections, Energy, Municipalities, and Transportation committees in the House (Shaffer and Breaux chapter in Bullock and Rozell, 2014: p. 109; 2012-2016 Mississippi Official and Statistical Register, Secretary of State of Mississippi).

The 2013 state legislative session illustrated how governing Republicans today offer some diversity of ideas and some willingness to be pragmatic and to compromise. Speaker Gunn with local lawmakers went on an “Ideas Tour� by holding nine forums across the state just before the session, and listening to average Mississippians’ concerns and ideas about state public policies. The Senate reluctantly bowed to the House’s greater concern over a broad charter schools bill by accepting the House’s more limited and narrowly passed charter schools bill. A House committee chaired and dominated by Republicans killed a bill establishing a state committee that could attempt to “neutralize� allegedly unconstitutional federal laws such as Obamacare and anti-gun measures, as the chairman explained that the measure lacked support in the full House after being compared to a state Sovereignty Commission that sought to defend segregation decades ago (Pettus 2013a). Governor Bryant withdrew the nomination of an anti-abortion activist to the state Board of Health after the press disputed whether she met a geographic distribution requirement of state law, and after a Republican committee chairman publicly noted that some senators were concerned that she might be a “one-issue person� who was “not well-informed on other public health issues� (Pettus 2013b). A Republican-led and dominated Senate committee rejected the House Speaker’s nominee to the state Board of Education after one GOP committee member (a former public school administrator) expressed concern over the nominee’s home-schooling of his own children, and even a GOP supporter expressed concern over his board membership on a “conservative-leaning� Center which had opposed state-funded preschool programs (a program successfully enacted by the legislator)(Amy 2013). On the other hand, one triumph of partisan divisiveness was the legislature’s failure during the regular session to fund even the existing Medicaid program, as the two parties’ leaders were bitterly divided over the expense and wisdom of expanding the program to the working poor under Obamacare. Yet even on the issue of health care Republicans were hardly united, as Insurance Commissioner Chaney attempted to set up a state-run insurance exchange to avoid a federal takeover, while Governor Bryant feared even that concession to Obamacare’s legitimacy and successfully torpedoed the Chaney plan (Shaffer and Breaux chapter in Bullock and Rozell, 2014).

The 2014 state legislative session illustrated a pragmatic approach involving compromises on some major education issues. With GOP House Speaker Gunn favoring an across-the-board first year raise for a multi-year teacher pay raise given the state's low salaries and the absence of a reliable way of measuring teacher performance, Governor Bryant favoring merit pay raises, and House Democrats favoring a more rapid raise (without a performance requirement), the legislature passed and the governor signed the state senate plan (backed by GOP lieutenant governor Reeves and Senate Education committee chair Republican Tollison) providing for a 2-year across-the-board raise, even higher starting salaries, and the possibility of teacher bonuses based on a proposed school performance plan (Harrison 2014a, 2014b; Daily Journal 2014). Carey Wright became the state's first female permanent state education superintendent by a 46-6 senate vote after Education Committee chair Tollison praised her experience in high-performing school districts, her focus on improving student achievement, and her being from out-of-state, while some Senate Conservative Coalition Republicans blasted her backing of Common Core and of state-funded prekindergarten as a federal education takeover and an usurping of parental responsibility (Amy 2014a). Eleven House Republicans voted with Democrats to kill a special education voucher proposal that was a pilot program limited to institutions approved by the state Education Department (and excluding home-schooling), after the Parents Campaign argued that it would take state funds away from the underfunded public school system, and Democratic state representative Baria called it a "slippery slope" that could lead to vouchers awarded to other groups (Amy 2014c, Harrison 2014d).

The 2014 legislative session also saw conservative enactments on some divisive social issues that avoided ideological extremes. A Religious Freedom Restoration Act that prevents state and local governments from putting a substantial burden on religious practices (similar to a federal law used by Hobby Lobby against Obamacare contraception requirement) became law after removing sections covering private business actions opposed by the Mississippi Economic Council (MEC) as possibly interfering with businesses' nondiscrimination policies (the ACLU and the gay rights Human Rights Campaign nevertheless opposed the final bill) (Harrison 2014c; Pettus 2014a). A near party-line vote enacted a law that required welfare recipients (in TANF) to complete a questionnaire to determine possible drug use, which could then result in a drug test and entrance into a 2 month drug treatment program, with Governor Bryant arguing that the program sought to help dependent and addicted families to "better provide for their children," and a GOP lawmaker pointing out that the program's impact was limited as it did not apply to food stamps provided by the SNAP program (Holloway 2014). A bill banning abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy became law, with exceptions in the cases of permanent physical damage or death of the mother, and for certain fetal abnormalities, but a Democratic amendment providing a rape and incest exception was voted down (Amy 2014b). Three bills enacted on near party-line votes and supported by BIPEC (Business and Industry Political Education Committee) outlawed union demonstrations from blocking business entrances, prohibited union use of coercion to grow its membership, and prohibited local governments from requiring use of union labor (Chandler 2014). Democrats once again failed to expand Medicaid to the working poor, this time on a 64-52 House vote (Pettus 2014b). In a more moderate vein, the governor signed a criminal justice reform bill that overwhelmingly passed both legislative chambers that resulted from a task force consisting of judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and legislators (who had worked with groups such as Pew Charitable Trusts), which expanded use of drug courts and lowered sentences involving small drug amounts in order to reduce recidivism and lower prison costs (Pender and Gates 2014).

Bipartisanship took a hit after the 2015 elections, particularly in the state house, starting with controversy over two contested legislative elections. While the senate voted overwhelmingly to uphold a Democrat's narrow victory, the house cast a near party-line vote to unseat a Democrat in favor of a GOP challenger on a legal technicality over disputed voter affidavit ballots (Gates 2016). With a resulting 60% supermajority of GOP lawmakers for the first time ever, GOP House Speaker Gunn reduced Democrats to chairing only two committees (African American Democrats chaired the Energy, and Youth and Family Affairs Committees), while Republicans ended up chairing 42 committees (including joint committees). Gunn announced that "we are advancing a conservative agenda" and that these committee chairs had bought into that agenda (Gates and Pender 2016a, 1). The Lieutenant Governor retained a more bipartisan approach to committee chairmanships, as African American Demcorats chaired 8 committees, white Democrats 5, and Republicans 25. African American Democrats received such desirable committee assignments as Corrections, Economic Development, Highways and Transportation, Housing, and Labor. The minority Democratic Party in the House once again selected a biracial leadership team as minority leader and assistant minority leader. Minority leader David Baria stressed that his party believed in "protecting the working man" and the "rights of individuals" (Harrison 2016a, 6A). House Democrats on three occasions during the 2016 legislative session using delaying tactics to protest Republican actions, first over a judicial redistricting bill that would have reduced the African American presence in the most Democratic of the three Supreme Court districts, secondly over giving control of the Jackson airport to a regional board, and finally in a special session (called to balance the budget) over a just enacted GOP-led tax cut and budget cuts (Pender 2016a).

The more partisan 2016 state legisalture ended up cutting business and individual income taxes by $415 million over a 12-year period with Republican leaders arguing that the cuts would make the state more business-friendly, thereby growing the economy and producing more jobs. Prominent Democrats, including Attorney General Hood, blasted the cuts as ignoring "the health, education, and public safety" needs of the state (Hood 2016: 13A). While the tax cutting effort was clearly led by the Republican Lieutenant Governor and the Governor, the legislative votes were not completely party-line, as 8 senate Democrats and 7 House Democrats crossed party lines, as did 7 House Republicans. The more narrowly divided House finally acceded to the tax cut measure only after it was assured that the Lieutenant Governor would support a $250 bond bill for the state's public colleges, universities, and its MDA economic development agency (Pender, Royals, and Gates 2016). Another controversial GOP measure enacted was HB1523- a "Religious Freedom" bill that permitted government workers and businesses to deny services to gays based on their religious values. Much of the state's business community, including the powerful Mississippi Economic Council and the Mississippi Manufacturer's Association had opposed the bill, arguing that it violated most business' own corporate policies and might harm state economic development efforts, and the ACLU and Human Rights Campaign promptly denounced the measure (Gates and Pender 2016b). Put on hold by a federal judge and with Attorney General Hood refusing to appeal this decision, Republicans vowed to continue the judicial fight with volunteer lawyers.

Other conservative legislation also advanced during the 2016 session, though with more bipartisan compromise and a more limited scope. Given the concerns expressed by Democrats and public education forces, especially strong in the House, the senate agreed to the House position to only permit children to cross school district lines to attend charter schools if their school district's performance was rated C, D, or F. Inability to cross district lines limited Mississippi to only 2 charter schools (both in Jackson), yet even this modest expansion of charter schools faced some senate GOP concerns, as 7 Republican senators were absent for the vote and 4 opposed the measure (Pender 2016b). A private school voucher measure that had passed the House Education Committee died after being double-referred by the Speaker to the House Appropriations Committee, where that committee chair let it die believing that the measure did not have enough support on the floor (Harrison 2016b). Instead, the legislature slightly expanded the state's small voucher program for special needs children by making it easier for them to qualify for it. The governor also signed a legislative Church Protection Act that permitted each church to establish a security program whereby designated church members would atend a firearm safety program and receive legal liability protection for using their firearm in church in persuance of their official duties. A House measure would have permitted a religious or philosophical exemption of childhood vaccination requirements as well as easing out-of-state physician exemptions, but this measure died in the Senate Education Committee after GOP chairman Tollison explained that he listened to the health concerns of doctors and parents; Mississippi remains the number one state in the nation in childhood vaccination coverage. Finally, the governor signed a ban on a second semester abortion procedure called "dilation and evacuation" except in rare health cases, but the owner of the state's sole abortion clinic claimed they generally didn't use the procedure (Amy 2016).

The 2020 state legislative session following the Republican sweep of all statewide offices and of over 60% of state legislative seats in the previous year paradoxically witnessed a new spirit of bipartisan unity on important issues as well as the empowerment of the Black Caucus. Republicans once again held the four top legislative leadership positions, as party line votes reelected Gunn as House Speaker, selected Jason White as House Speaker Pro Tempore, and chose Dean Kirby as Senate President Pro Tempore (Hosemann as lieutenant governor was Senate President). Democrats in both chambers selected Black Caucus members as their Minority Leaders (Derrick Simmons in the Senate and Robert L. Johnson III in the House). Bipartisanship was more evident in the selection of committee chairs, particularly in the Senate, as 13 Democrats (11 of whom were African Americans) were appointed by Hosemann to chairmanships, joining 22 Republican committee chairs. Senate Democrats chaired such important committees as Corrections, Housing, Labor, and Public Health and Welfare. In the House, Speaker Gunn named Republicans as chairs of 38 of the 40 committees, though two Democrats were named to chair the important committees of Judiciary A and Corrections. The spirit of consensus was reflected in a unanimous voice vote to seat Democrat Hester Jackson McCray in a disputed House election, after a bipartisan committee interviewing local election officials rejected the losing Republican incumbent's claims of voting irregularities (Pettus 2020).

Throughout the 2020 legislative session a large bipartisan and biracial majority exerted the legislature's constitutional responsibilities, and generally enacted progressive measures. Sparked by protests in Jackson and other cities against police brutality nationally as well as the SEC conference's decision to ban all post-season championship athletic events from being held in Mississippi because of its divisive state flag containing the Confederate emblem, the Mississippi Economic Council, a coalition of faith and civic groups (Working Together Mississippi), and athletic department workers and students at all eight public universities appealed to the legislature to get rid of the flag. As former governor Phil Bryant and most statewide elected officials joined the chorus, a bipartisan legislative group got Speaker Gunn's support for suspending the rules to permit a late vote on a flag change measure. Conservative state senator Chris McDaniel led the opposition, chiding lawmakers for lacking a "backbone" by giving into "a very slick and a very well-funded campaign," prompting newly-elected senator Jeremy England (a Stennis Scholar from MSU) to stand up to him and urge timely action over divisive delay, eliciting a standing ovation from several members and a hug from long-time Black Caucus legislator Hillman Frazier (Bologna and Ramseth 2020). Both legislative chambers easily achieved the two-thirds vote required to suspend the rules, and to establish a flag commission that would design a new flag that could not have any portion of the Confederate battle flag but that must have the motto "In God We Trust." Bipartisan and biracial hugs by lawmakers marked these emotional votes (Ramseth and Bologna 2020).

Personal and institutional considerations contributed to the 2020 legislative session's spirit of unity. Rejecting newly-elected governor Reeves' intention to monopolize control over the spending of $1.25 billion coronavirus federal funds, the legislature with only 2 dissenting votes (in the senate) voted to keep control of the funding decisions by putting them into the regular budgetary process. In the process of building this overwhelming coalition, Speaker Gunn invited the Democratic minority leader to help craft a $300 million relief package for small businesses, and Democrats were pleased with the bill's inclusion of "several items added from their wish list," including $40 million for minority-owned businesses (Ganucheau 2020). Unity was achieved in the Senate Corrections Committee confirmation vote of controversial Angola warden Burl Cain as Corrections Commissioner, as the committee heard the nominee stress rehabilitation through religion, more outdoor recreation, and better food and medical treatment for inmates, as well as creation of a credit union for lowly paid employees (Ramseth 2020). With only 2 negative votes (in the House) and no public controversy, the legislature also passed a constitutional amendment for November's ballot eliminating an archaic and racially motivated electoral college requirement for the election of all statewide officials (Vance 2020).

The 2023 legislative session just before statewide elections resulted in left-wing Democratic dissatisfaction over some conservative Republican policy victories. The Republican governor and GOP-dominated legislature enacted a law banning gender-affirming medications or surgery for minors and permitting the revokation of non-compliant doctors' licenses, prompting protests by the Human Rights Campaign and the ACLU. The governor also signed bills that provided for the purging of non-voters after eight years, and that outlawed "ballot harvesting" except for the family, household members, or caregivers of those receiving absentee ballots, prompting a federal district court injunction in response to a lawsuit filed by Disability Rights Mississippi, the ACLU, and Southern Poverty Law Center over the latter law. A state house effort to restore the voting rights of felons who had completed their sentences died in committee, and the legislature refused to restore the ballot initiative even after it was limited to non-abortion and non-spending measures (prohibiting Medicaid expansion initiatives). Most controversial was a law that created a separate court for misdemeanors in the Jackson state capital area with judges and prosecutors appointed by the white state Supreme Court chief justice and state attorney general respectively, rather than being elected by the majority black voting electorate, prompting a U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals temporary stay after an NAACP lawsuit and Jackson mayor Lumumba blasting the legislation as reminding him of "apartheid" enacted by lawmakers who "came half-dressed because they forgot to wear their hoods." (Perlis 2023c). Progressive forces did score some victories, as the Republican attorney general and governor both successfully backed the extension of Medicaid coverage to 12 months after birth for mothers, as part of their "new pro-life agenda" in the post-Dobbs era. Pushed by women Republican and Independent lawmakers, the legislature also enacted a speedy process for the processing of rape kits and eliminated archaic state laws that exempted spousal rape and used the term "chaste" for females (Vance 2023). The legislature also enacted measures to help financially struggling hospitals, and refrained from further cutting state income taxes to help them and to meet state infrastructure needs.

A Republican Pacesetter Today?

            With Democrats still holding most seats in the state legislature and the vast majority of local and county offices, it is very premature to declare that Mississippi has made a 180 degree turnaround from a Solid Democratic to a Solid Republican state. Yes, the great majority of conservative whites who used to vote for Democrats like John Stennis and Sonny Montgomery now vote for conservative Republicans like Thad Cochran and Roger Wicker, and Democrats haven’t carried Mississippi in a presidential race since 1976. But the popular vote for governor is generally close, and open contests for the U.S. senate (though they seldom occur) are pretty close. Such intense partisan competition in modern day Mississippi mirrors the virtual tie in the public’s partisan identifications since 2002 (Table 4-2).

Since the intensity of two-party politics in today’s Mississippi now mirrors the divisiveness of party politics nationally, it is instructive to attempt to apply the social psychological vote model outlined in Chapter 2, devised primarily for national presidential elections, to the most important state and federal offices elected by Mississippians. We will include a “performance” category in our vote model, since so many congressional and state officials successfully project a non-ideological image of “doing a good job” and serving “all” of their constituents.” The addition of this category permits us to confine the “issues” category to policies of a more conservative or liberal/progressive nature. Given the ideological realignment of the partisanship of many white southerners, it is also informative to examine the differences in programs championed by prominent Democratic and Republican officeholders.

            Successful Democratic candidates in modern Mississippi have been able to construct a biracial coalition on issues with an economic tone that benefit voters of both races (Table 4-3). Governors Waller, Finch, and Allain all projected a “populist” image with Finch even carrying a lunch pail to symbolize his empathy with the average “worker.” Governors Winter, Mabus, and Musgrove were all elected with a commitment to reform public elementary and secondary education, a program important to the future earnings of the offspring of people of both races. These economic issues have transcended any possible white “backlash” based on the candidates’ identification with African American concerns. Winter was elected governor despite his reputation of being a racial “liberal,” and Musgrove as lieutenant governor had appointed blacks as chairs of such critical committees as Constitution, Judiciary, Elections, and Universities and Colleges. Indeed, when Republican governor Fordice nominated an all-white, all-male slate to the state College Board, the committee chaired by Musgrove’s African American appointee voted the entire slate down (Menifield and Shaffer 2005: 113-115)! Successful Republican candidates, such as governors Fordice and Barbour, have differed from Democrats by their clearer identification with the “conservative” philosophy, a philosophy though quite different from the concentration on racial segregation of such antediluvian Democrats as Eastland, and instead mirroring the broad-based conservatism of such national Republicans as Ronald Reagan (Bass and DeVries 1977: 202).

            Successful Republicans have also tended to benefit from a positive candidate image that lacks any identification with issues having an ideological basis. Fordice kept stressing that he was a businessman and “not a professional politician.” Blasting GOP opponent Pete Johnson as well as Democrats Ray Mabus and Wayne Dowdy during the spirited party primaries, Fordice proclaimed: “Let’s take Petey first. I’m not a professional politician like he is. You put Petey, Rayboy, and Wayne is a sack and shake them up and dump one out- it doesn’t matter who- and you’ve got a professional politician who sings and dances to the same tune” (Shaffer, Sturrock, Breaux, and Minor 1999: 254). Speaking to the College Republicans at Mississippi State University before his gubernatorial bid, Haley Barbour showed a sincere concern over the opportunities that young Mississippians would have, and raised the self-esteem of the audience by telling them that the young Mississippians who had interned with his Washington lobbying firm were as competent and competitive as anyone from any other state. During a televised debate, Barbour appeared genuinely disappointed by the incumbent’s relentless television ads that kept blasting the Republican as a “Washington lobbyist” without even mentioning his own name or accomplishments as governor. Barbour’s conclusion that “we can do better” as a state gained plausibility, given the litany of problems that Mississippi faced.

            Non-ideological “performance” factors have become as important in Mississippi elections, as they are in presidential races. Public satisfaction with a good economy helped reelect Governor Fordice, as the Republican ran a classic, “feel good, it’s Morning in Mississippi” campaign mirroring Reagan’s old reelection theme. Indeed, Fordice’s only memorable television ad had a kid sitting in his lap, as the governor talked about the booming economy that would help ensure the future of young Mississippians. Haley Barbour’s gubernatorial reelection bid was similarly boosted by a good economy and the rising number of jobs flowing into the state, symbolized by a new Toyota plant. Public dissatisfaction helped to unseat Democratic incumbents Ray Mabus and Ronnie Musgrove. Indeed, the daily newspaper and television stories of budget cuts were as painful to Governor Mabus as the nightly news reports of American diplomats held hostage (“Day 365, America Held Hostage,” blared Nightline) were to President Carter. Public dissatisfaction with cuts in higher education and with Musgrove’s “political correctness” in trying to remove the Confederate symbol from the state’s flag torpedoed his reelection bid. Turning to the U.S. senate, longtime Republican officeholders have been masters at projecting non-divisive images of helping “all of their constituents,” as were Democratic congressional “giants of old” such as Senator Stennis and Congressmen Whitten and Montgomery. Who can forget how “Thad” helped that nice elderly lady get her Social Security check from those uncaring federal bureaucrats? Or how “Trent” fought for the college students and senior citizens as a member of the House leadership? Or how “Trent” in his 1994 reelection landslide explained that his visibility and power in Washington was merely a tool that he used to help Mississippians get federal dollars?

            Mere partisan loyalties appear to exert far less influence on Mississippi voters today compared to previous decades. When Democrats were the clear majority party in the Magnolia state, an 81-year-old Senator such as John Stennis could gain reelection simply because enough voters would recognize that “he’s a Democrat.” Ability to maintain a united Democratic party in that older era helped to elect Governor Allain despite allegations of a gay sex scandal. Meanwhile, Republicans would have to hope for a split in the dominant party to elect their candidates, evident in Thad Cochran’s election to the senate in 1978 and Kirk Fordice’s win as governor in 1991. The power of partisanship to decide elections in 21^st century Mississippi has been neutralized by the closing of the party identification gap in the general population. Nevertheless, partisanship can fire up the party loyalists. Conservative Republicans still hold fond memories of Barbour’s aggressive leadership of the Republican National Committee during the 1994 GOP tsunami, propelling him to the governorship in 2003.

            Clearly, Democrats as well as Republicans can benefit from exploiting popular positions on issues, their candidate attributes, or their public performance. But lest we conclude that political campaigns that blur the ideological differences between the two parties result in there not being a “dime’s worth of difference between the candidates,” as Independent presidential candidate George Wallace used to chant, it is important to briefly examine how the two parties behave once their candidates are in office. A national study of governors in the years 2000 and 2001 by Daniel Coffey (2005) found clear party differences in these chief executives’ “state of the state” addresses, which suggests differences in their legislative programs. Democratic governors across the nation tended to be more liberal than Republicans on economic (budget, health, welfare, education) and social (morality, crime, civil rights) issues. These ideological differences were less noticeable among southern governors, however, and the article did not examine U.S. senators.

            There are some notable policy differences between Mississippi’s Democratic and Republican governors. Democrats have been more associated than Republicans with education reform programs requiring more funding, as well as with making more significant appointments of African Americans to state offices (Table 4-4). Governor Winter pioneered the 1982 Education Reform Act, Musgrove implemented an expensive six-year plan to raise the salaries of elementary and secondary public school teachers to the southeast average, and Mabus before the recession reallocated $200 million of state spending to elementary, secondary, and higher education. All Democratic governors starting with William Waller are known for making important appointments of African Americans to state offices. Musgrove, whose economic policies have been rated as comparable in liberalism to the typical Democratic governor across the nation, also greatly expanded enrollment in and spending for the CHIP program, Children’s Health Insurance Program (Coffey 2005: 98). Democratic governors in Mississippi have also pursued some conservative programs, most notably opposing tax increases. Governors Allain, Mabus, and Musgrove were all adamant at opposing any tax increase, though the reelection defeat of two of them suggests that opposition to taxes alone is not a “winning” campaign theme in the Magnolia State.

            Republican officeholders appear to be more consistently “conservative,” though their programs and actions are tempered with pragmatism. Senators Cochran and Lott have both been rated as over 90% conservative in their roll call votes by ideological interest groups, yet both fought to deliver federal money and projects to their constituents. Lott’s image was a more conservative one, reflected in his joking comment at Senator Strom Thurmond’s 100^th birthday party that Mississippi had voted for Strom for president in 1948 and that if he had won, “we wouldn’t have had all these problems over the years either,” a racially insensitive remark that prompted Lott’s resignation as Senate Majority Leader, but which did not prevent him from reemerging as Senate Minority Whip in the aftermath of the 2006 GOP midterm election defeats (Lott 2005: 246). Cochran’s soft-spoken persona and his eagerness to work with normally Democratic groups more clearly blur his “ideological” image. Governor Fordice was consistently conservative in policies, but his vetoes of education programs and his efforts to kill racial set-aside programs were routinely overturned by the Democratic-controlled legislature. Both Fordice and Barbour may be most remembered for their work as governor in promoting economic development. Fordice’s “tight fisted” spending plans permitted establishment of a state “rainy day” fund, and Barbour’s leadership led to tort reform and helped businesses recover from Hurricane Katrina, by not only attracting federal relief funds but also by advocating that the devastated casino industry be permitted to build on land (Nash and Taggart 2006: 309).  

            The devastation of Hurricane Katrina to the Mississippi Gulf Coast has given Republican officeholders the opportunity to show that, like Democratic powers of old, they too can fight for the state’s interests in Washington. Governor Barbour received national attention for his poignant description of how the water surge along the state’s coast had “wiped out everything between the railroad tracks and the gulf,” for his confidence in the ability of Mississippians to rebuild “bigger and better than before,” and for his willingness when testifying before a congressional committee to take his party’s leadership in the White House and Congress to task for not doing enough to help residents who were hurt “through no fault of their own.” Senator Thad Cochran, Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, held up a critical defense appropriations bill to attach a $29 billion hurricane relief measure to it, ensuring its passage despite some conservative Republicans in other states grousing about the steep price tag. Democratic congressman Gene Taylor vividly demonstrated to recalcitrant congress members the plight of his constituents by pitching a “Katrina village” style tent in the middle of one committee room, and Senator Lott and congressmen Wicker and Pickering were also instrumental in the passage of wide-ranging hurricane relief measures (Minor 2005).

Republicans were so successful in fighting for federal hurricane relief that even state Democratic chair, Wayne Dowdy, responding to rumors that Senator Lott might retire from the senate in 2006, admitted that: “For the good of the state, I’d rather have his (Lott’s) seniority than new blood right now” (Salter 2006: 2G). State columnist, Sid Salter (2005: 9A), voiced the thoughts of many residents when he wrote that, “Mississippi’s GOP leadership stepped up and got the job done” by bringing home “the federal bacon” that would permit the state to seriously try to recover from the worst natural disaster in its history. The biggest change in Mississippi politics from the days of V.O. Key is that state political observers used to be able to make such glowing comments about the political “pull” in Washington of its Democratic delegation.

Table 4-1

 

Governors and U.S. Senators and Their Parties in Modern Mississippi

 

	Democrats				Republicans
	Governors	Senators	Senators		Governors	Senators	Senators
1970	Williams	Stennis*	Eastland
1971	Waller*	Stennis	Eastland
1972	Waller	Stennis	Eastland*
1974	Waller	Stennis	Eastland
1975	Finch*	Stennis	Eastland
1976	Finch	Stennis*	Eastland
1978	Finch	Stennis					Cochran*
1979	Winter*	Stennis					Cochran
1980	Winter	Stennis					Cochran
1982	Winter	Stennis*					Cochran
1983	Allain*	Stennis					Cochran
1984	Allain	Stennis					Cochran*
1986	Allain	Stennis					Cochran
1987	Mabus*	Stennis					Cochran
1988	Mabus					Lott*	Cochran
1990	Mabus					Lott	Cochran*
1991					Fordice*	Lott	Cochran
1992					Fordice	Lott	Cochran
1994					Fordice	Lott*	Cochran
1995					Fordice*	Lott	Cochran
1996					Fordice	Lott	Cochran*
1998					Fordice	Lott	Cochran
1999	Musgrove*					Lott	Cochran
2000	Musgrove					Lott*	Cochran
2002	Musgrove					Lott	Cochran*
2003					Barbour*	Lott	Cochran
2004					Barbour	Lott	Cochran
2006					Barbour	Lott*	Cochran
2007					Barbour*	Lott	Cochran
2008					Barbour	Wicker*	Cochran*
2010					Barbour	Wicker	Cochran
2011					Bryant*	Wicker	Cochran
2012					Bryant	Wicker*	Cochran
2014					Bryant	Wicker	Cochran*
2015					Bryant*	Wicker	Cochran
2016					Bryant	Wicker	Cochran
2018					Bryant	Wicker*	Hyde-Smith*
2020					Reeves+	Wicker	Hyde-Smith*
2022					Reeves	Wicker	Hyde-Smith

 

Note: Cell entries indicate the governors and U.S. Senators elected in or serving during the years listed at the left. In Mississippi, governors are elected in the odd-numbered year before a presidential election, so those years are included in this table.

* Indicates that the officeholder was elected in that year.

+ Beginning in 2020, we are omitting odd numbered years, and indicating that that governor was elected in the previous year.

 

 

 

Table 4-2. Republican Growth in Mississippi

+ Reflects a party switch.

++ Reflects results of 1992 special election after redistricting.

* Mississippi statewide state offices are elected in the year before a presidential election. Entries are placed in rows of the next year. Thus, entries for the 1999 state elections are placed in the 2000 row.

** Data drawn from a 1975 poll (Bass and DeVries, 1977: 216).

*** Data drawn from January 8-12, 2023 Siena College Poll.

# Reflects average of special and regular senate elections.

Note: NA indicates not available or no election held.

Source: The Almanac of American Politics, 1972-1982; CQ=s Politics in America, 1984-2006; Shaffer (2001); Lamis (1990); Mississippi Official and Statistical Register, 1992-1996, 2000-2004; the Clarion-Ledger, May 23, 2004, pp. G1-G2; Wright, Erikson, and McIver (1985); Bass and DeVries (1977); Breaux, Shaffer, and Gresham (2007); Jones (2017); 2018 CNN exit poll; the Mississippi Poll project (see: http://sds17.pspa.msstate.edu/poll/poll.html).

 Table 4-3

 

Factors Affecting Elections of Mississippi Governors and U.S. Senators

 

Officeholder (party-year 1st elected)	Issues	Candidate Attributes	Party/Campaign Factors	Performance Factors
Governors
J.B. Williams (D-1967)	Conservative, backed Goldwater			Congressman
William Waller (D-1971)	Anti-establishment			Prosecuted Evers’ assassin
Cliff Finch (D-1975)	Workingman’s image	“Redneck” image	Works at different jobs
William Winter (D-1979)	Racial liberal, Pro-education	Articulate, thoughtful		State treasurer, lieut. gov.
Bill Allain (D-1983)	Populist, has black support		Survives gay allegations	Attorney General
Ray Mabus (D-1987)	Pro-education at all levels	Harvard educated		Anti-corruption as auditor
Kirk Fordice (R-1991/1995)	Conservative ideologue/	“Not a politician”/	GOP activist, divisive Dem. primary/	Gridlock, budget cuts/ Good economy
R. Musgrove (D-1999)	Pro-education, made black appointments			Rep. sits on lead
Haley Barbour (R-2003/2007)	State flag vote, conservative GOP leader/	Sincere, decent, “we can do better”/ Katrina leader	Get out vote drive, RNC chair	Dissatisfaction- hi ed. and flag supporters/ attracts jobs
Phil Bryant (R-2011/2015)	Fiscal conservative, conservative/GOP social conservative	Transparency image/	Against liberal nat'l Dems/Dem truck driver	Attracted jobs to state, worked with Barbour/publicized economic developments
Tate Reeves (R-2019/2023)	Working class Dem blasted as national Dem by GOP/jobs and education gains vs. Medicaid expansion, anti-corruption	Arrogant Rep vs. jackpot justice Dem lawyer/populist-worker Dem vs. rich Rep	Divided Reps. unite to beat liberal Dem; GOP party Id strong/GOP party id edge	Lieutenant Governor beats Attorney General/incumbent Rep gov.
Senators
James Eastland (D-1942, 1972)	Conservative, segregationist		/President Nixon backs Eastland
John Stennis (D-1947, 1982)		Integrity/name visibility	/majority party, youthful ads	/helped state, experience
Thad Cochran (R-1978, 1984)		Articulate, soft-spoken	Black indep. splits Dems/	Congressman/ Seniority, constituent service
Trent Lott (R-1988, 1994)		Bright, articulate	Non-divisive “progressive” TV ads/	16 years in congress/influence “helps state”
Roger Wicker (R-2008)	Dem linked to liberal nat'l Dems		Rep party Id edge	Rep. 14 years U.S. Cong.
Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-2018, 2020)	Conservative, pro-Trump GOP	GOP homey cattle farmer/	Rep party Id advantage; liberal nat'l Dem charge	GOP on approp, agri. comm.; USDA grant/constituency service- fed. $, committees on

Table 4-4

 

Programs of Mississippi Governors and U.S. Senators

 

Officeholder (party-year 1st elected)	Progressive Policies	Neutral Policies	Conservative Policies
Governors
J.B. Williams (D-1967)			Conservative, Goldwater backer
William Waller (D-1971)	Appoints blacks to state offices, kills segregationist Sovereignty Comm.
Cliff Finch (D-1975)	Appoints blacks, unifies Dem party
William Winter (D-1979)	1982 Education Reform Act	Professionalized government
Bill Allain (D-1983)	Appoints 1st black to supreme court	Separation of powers upheld	Opposes tax increases
Ray Mabus (D-1987)	Backs education $, appoints blacks, favors lottery, pro-choice		Anti-tax hike
Kirk Fordice (R-1991)		Pro-business, promotes tourism, economic. develop.	Anti-racial quotas, establishes rainy day fund
Ronnie Musgrove (D-1999)	Teacher pay raise, CHIP expansion	Nissan plant attracted	No tax increase, state budget cuts, tort reform
Haley Barbour (R-2003)		Hurricane Katrina recovery led, Toyota plant attracts	Tort reform, no tax increase
Phil Bryant (R-2011)		Economic development- jobs publicized
Senators
James Eastland (D-1942)			Kills civil rights measures
John Stennis (D-1947)		Fights for programs helping state	Conservative, pro-military
Thad Cochran (R-1978)		Pragmatic, soft-spoken persona	Conservative roll-call record
Trent Lott (R-1988)		Aggressive, public spokesperson	Conservative roll-call record
Roger Wicker (R-2008)		Pro-infrastructure, certified Biden win	Conservative roll-call record
Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-2018)			Conservative roll-call record