Lost Cause: Why southern Democrats won't rise again.

Raleigh, N.C. In 1998, Republicans lost several high-profile races in the South. The national media pounced, suggesting that the defeat of South Carolina Gov. David Beasley and Alabama Gov. Fob James, among others, meant that Democrats had finally turned the corner in Dixie: They had reestablished their competitiveness on such issues as state lotteries and education, and won back many Southern whites who had defected to the GOP.

In reality, however, the Democrats' resurgence was due largely to a high turnout among black voters and disaffection among conservatives, such as South Carolinians upset with Beasley over the issue of the Confederate battle flag. But the punditocracy continues to forecast the demise of the southern GOP. Most recently, the New York Times claims to have spotted a new trend: southern Republicans switching parties to become Democrats. In June, reporter David Firestone breathlessly told the story of one Randy J. Sauder, a Republican state legislator in the Atlanta suburbs who recently became a Democrat in order, he said, to please his growing constituency of transplants from the North and Midwest.

Reporters love a story like this, because it advances a counterintuitive theme. But Sauder's switch says nothing about party politics in the South; it is newsworthy precisely because it is rare. Hundreds of prominent Democratic officeholders in the South joined the GOP during the 1990s, and continue to do so routinely; the trend is so unmistakable that it rarely gets noticed anymore. But there is an important larger story here.

Two-party politics is a relatively new development in the South. Before the 1990s, the last period of genuine partisan competition was the 1890s, when an unwieldy coalition of traditional Republicans, blacks, farmers, and nativists challenged the Democratic establishment and, in some states, took control of legislatures and governor's mansions. It didn't last long. Democrats recovered quickly, using the race issue: specifically, segregation. By 1900, Republicans returned to the sidelines, and their populist allies disappeared into the new Democratic coalition.

Some southerners remained Republican: Residents of mountain counties in Virginia, western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee, and northwestern Arkansas had joined the party during the Civil War as an act of contempt for the Democratic elites that favored secession. They provided most of the leaders of the southern GOP into the 1960s. In addition, until the 1930s most southern blacks were Republican, and many continued to be until the 1960s.

Traditional Republicans in the South weren't so much conservative as establishmentarian: They were deal-makers and logrollers. The party was transformed, and moved rightward, during the 1960s and 1970s as southern Democrats fed up with the radicalization of their party began to desert. Jesse Helms was elected to the U.S. Senate from North Carolina in 1972-the same year the Nixon tide helped elect the state's first GOP governor in the 20th century. Breakthroughs similar to Helms's occurred elsewhere in the South.

During the 1970s and 1980s, two more kinds of southern Republicans emerged, both immigrating from frostier climes. The new suburban Republicans had moved south to Atlanta, Greenville, Charlotte, and other cities to take jobs in emerging industries such as computers, telecommunications, and finance. Most had grown up Republican in places like New Jersey, Ohio, and Michigan. They quickly became active in local Republican-party organizations, and they now exercise a dominant role in the leadership. One can meet GOP chairmen in every urban county in North Carolina without ever hearing the word "y'all."

These transplanted suburbanites don't share the old "Jessecrat" combination of social conservatism and fiery rhetoric. They aren't used to being on the political margin; where they came from, Republicans weren't just the butt of jokes-they were mayors and congressmen. These "New South" Republicans are more comfortable wielding power, and speak in tones more congenial to the ears of "soccer moms"; but they are more conservative than southern GOP leaders of the past.

Another key group is the retirees. It is impossible to overstate their importance in southern Republican coalitions. They have both the time and the money to be politically active. In coastal regions, and in growing metropolitan areas where they move to be close to medical and other amenities, these refugees from winter are becoming a solid vote against wasteful spending and tax hikes.

Contrary to what the national media suggest, the growing Republicanism of the South-weaving together the mountain moderates, rural party-switchers, suburban transplants, and thrifty retirees-has produced exactly what one might have predicted: Where school bonds once passed twice as often as they failed, now the ratio is edging closer to 50-50. During the 1970s and 1980s, spending per pupil for public schools skyrocketed. During the 1990s, with Republicans as major players in southern legislatures and controlling some counties, education spending has grown less rapidly, and in some cases not much at all. States like North Carolina, which hadn't seen a tax cut in living memory, started easing the tax burden due to Republican influence.

Of course, you can't run a Jesse Helms-style campaign if you seek election to state or local government. Nor can Republicans hope to prevail in tight races if they appear not to care about the quality of core public services such as education and highways. These propositions are true not just in the South, but everywhere; and Republicans who are able to present themselves as reasonable, competent problem-solvers are doing well in most southern jurisdictions. In North Carolina, a shocking four of the state's five largest cities have Republican mayors, some of whom have been able to cut taxes, privatize some services, and redirect resources to public safety and other priorities important to conservatives. Traditional Democratic power brokers are flummoxed by these developments.

Republicans do face some serious challenges in the region. When you exclude Florida (which, geography notwithstanding, is not a "southern" state) and Virginia (a case somewhat similar to Florida), GOP gains in the early 1990s have faded a bit: In the past two years, Republican governors in South Carolina, Alabama, and Mississippi have been replaced by Democrats. The governors of Tennessee, Arkansas, and Louisiana are Republican, but their legislatures remain firmly Democratic. The GOP's share of southern legislative seats, while up dramatically from the 10-to-20 percent rates that prevailed until the 1980s, remains mired at 40 percent (outside the South, Republicans enjoy a slim majority).

Still, the prognosis for southern Republicans remains good. The party is much stronger than it was in, say, 1984-when Reagan won big in the South, but Republicans got only 42 percent of the vote in southern House and Senate contests. In 1998, the year of the so-called Gingrich meltdown, GOP candidates won 54 percent. Furthermore, the party is building a farm team of local officeholders who may one day move on to legislative or congressional races. A better-than-average showing in the South this fall by semi-southerner George W. Bush-whose poll numbers in Dixie have already reversed themselves from the slide of early September-might well leave several legislative chambers in GOP hands for the post-2000 redistricting, creating a new political landscape for future races.

The national media will continue their search for exceptions, but the overall trend remains unaltered: Prominent southern Democrats are continuing to switch their allegiances, and sometimes their party registrations, to the GOP. In North Carolina, business executives with lifelong Democratic ties, even former Clinton supporters, are giving Bush money and chairing his fundraisers. This isn't news, but it's the truth.