Reply #40: You mean the Wallace supporters who'd've backed Nixon otherwise? [View All]

[highplainsdem]

You really think Wallace's pro-segregation voters would have voted for a liberal like Humphrey? The main champion of the Civil Rights Act of 1964? One of the liberal champions of the civil rights plank at the 1948 convention that outraged some Southern Democrats so much they formed the Dixiecrat party and nominated Strom Thurmond?

Nixon would probably have won five more states without Wallace taking those rightwing votes away from him.

Humphrey lost by a narrow margin. And yes, I do hold the liberal/progressive Dems and independents who sat out that election, out of disappointment that their favorites weren't the nominees, at least partly responsible for Nixon's victory. I wouldn't expect racists to have the sense to vote for Humphrey. I expected liberals to have the sense to, when they knew Nixon would be the winner if Humphrey didn't win.