For over a century after the Civil War, Tennessee was divided according to political loyalties established in that war. Unionist regions covering almost all of East Tennessee, Kentucky Pennyroyal-allied Macon County, and the five Western Highland Rim counties of Carroll, Henderson, McNairy, Hardin and Wayne[3] voted Republican — generally by landslide margins — as they saw the Democratic Party as the "war party" who had forced them into a war they did not wish to fight.[4] Contrariwise, the rest of Middle and West Tennessee who had supported and driven the state's secession was equally fiercely Democratic as it associated the Republicans with Reconstruction.[5] After the disfranchisement of the state's African-American population by a poll tax was largely complete in the 1890s,[6] the Democratic Party was certain of winning statewide elections if united,[7] although unlike the Deep South Republicans would almost always gain thirty to forty percent of the statewide vote from mountain and Highland Rim support.
Between 1896 and 1948, the Republicans would win statewide contests three times but only in the second did they receive down-ballot coattails by winning three congressional seats in addition to the rock-ribbed GOP First and Second Districts.[8] In the early 1910s, prohibitionist “Independent Democrats” fled the party and formed a coalition, known as the “Fusionists,” with Republicans to elect Ben W. Hooper Governor,[9] whilst in 1920 the national anti-Wilson and anti-League of Nations tide allowed the GOP to carry a few traditionally Democratic areas in Middle Tennessee and with them the state,[10] and in 1928anti-Catholicism against Democratic nominee Al Smith gave this powerfully fundamentalist state to Herbert Hoover.[11]
After the beginning of the Great Depression, however, for the next third of a century Republicans would rarely contest statewide offices seriously, despite continuing dominance of East Tennessee and half a dozen Unionist counties in the middle and west of the state.[12] State politics during the 1930s and 1940s was dominated by Edward Hull “Boss” Crump, whose Memphis political machine would consistently provide decisive votes in statewide Democratic primaries aided by cross-party voting by Republicans in eastern mountain counties.[12] Although Tennessee's delegates at the 1948 Democratic National Convention were all opposed to incumbent President Harry S. Truman after his proposal for black civil rights titled To Secure These Rights, the presence of potentially formidable Republican opposition in East Tennessee and the Highland Rim meant that Crump could not even keep his own machine in line.[13] Governor McCord and even Crump's long-time ally SenatorKenneth D. McKellar both broke with him over supporting States Rights Democratic nominees Strom Thurmond and Fielding L. Wright, with McCord losing the Democratic nomination to Crump foe Gordon Browning.[14] In order to get their electors on the ballot the Dixiecrats had to form a separate state organisation in Somerville,[13] although three of the Dixiecrat electors were simultaneously on the slate for Truman and Kentucky SenatorAlben W. Barkley.[15] 14% of white voters supported Thurmond.[16]
Truman carried Tennessee more comfortably than expected, defeating Republican nominees New York GovernorThomas E. Dewey and California GovernorEarl Warren by 12.26 percentage points and Thurmond by 35.73 percentage points. Thurmond did however make significant inroads into traditional Democratic support in the Black Belt of West Tennessee, where he received over eighty percent in Fayette County, and also did well in prosperous urban precincts in Nashville.
Truman received eleven of Tennessee's twelve electoral votes, with the other cast in favor of Thurmond by Preston Parks of Somerville, TN, who was also on the Dixiecrat slate.[15][25] As of the 2020 presidential election[update], this is the last election in which Hamilton County voted for a Democratic presidential candidate.[26]
^ abcdefghijklmnopqrstuIn this county where Dewey ran third behind Truman and Thurmond, margin given is Truman vote minus Thurmond vote and percentage margin Truman percentage minus Thurmond percentage.
^Lyons, William; Scheb (II), John M.; Stair, Billy (2001). Government and Politics in Tennessee. Univ. of Tennessee Press. pp. 183–184. ISBN1572331410.
^Larson, Edward J. (October 3, 2006). Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate over Science and Religion. Basic Books. ISBN9780465075102.
^ abMajors, William R. (1986). Change and continuity: Tennessee politics since the Civil War. Mercer University Press. p. 72. ISBN9780865542099.
^ abGuthrie, Paul Daniel (1955). The Dixiecrat Movement of 1948 (Thesis). Bowling Green State University. pp. 181–182. Docket 144207.
^Tucker, Ray (November 1, 1948). "Truman Whistling in a White House Graveyard, Says Tucker, Predicting It'll Be a Dewey Sweep". Mount Vernon Argus. Mount Vernon, New York. p. 8.
^Gallup, George (November 1, 1948). "Final Gallup Poll Shows Dewey Winning Election with Wide Electoral Vote Margin". Oakland Tribune. Oakland, California. pp. 1–2.
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