Texas Politics in Transition Electoral realignment the point at which a new political party supplants the dominant political party becoming the dominant political force in the nation A critical feature of electoral realignments is the formation of new political coalitions Truman Dewey Thurmond 1948 Eisenhower Stevenson 1952 Democratic supremacy persists although its original base has shrunk to minor significance In 1940 only one Texan in seven was a Negro White Texans unlike white Mississippians have little cause to be obsessed about the Negro The Lone Star State is concerned about money and how to make it about oil and sulfur and gas about cattle and dust storms and irrigation about cotton and banking and Mexicans Factors Working vs a Two Party System Once locked in partisan identification is highly resilient Power of Texas Democrats in Washington Difficulty recruiting high quality candidates Lack of Republican Party infrastructure Popular image of Republicans Tejano Civil Rights Movement League of United Latin American Citizens The American G I Forum Felix Longoria Plessy s separate but equal ruling held until it was overturned in Brown v Board of Education in 1954 The court found in the words of Chief Justice Earl Warren that in the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal has no place In Brown v Board II decided in 1955 the Court found that the students should be admitted to the public schools on a racially non discriminatory basis with all deliberate speed Though some border states began to desegregate the Deep South embarked on a policy of massive resistance A choice not an echo Election of John Tower 1961 Growth of urban suburban middle class Anti communism Political influence of newcomers to state Division w in Democratic Party Arguments against oneparty system Effects of Civil Rights 1964 and Voting Rights Acts 1965 Alienation of white voters from the Democratic Party Mobilization of African American and Hispanic voting strength 1964 Johnson D Goldwater R Realignment Shifting image of national Democratic Party and National Republican Party nationalization of politics Backlash against liberalism of Democratic Party growing association of Democrats with minority rights labor unions Underlying changes in Texas economy