Domain
Social Sciences
Abstract
This paper is an empirical extension of Avidit Acharya, Matthew Blackwell, and Maya Sen’s piece (forthcoming), “A Culture of Disenfranchisement: How American Slavery Continues to Affect Voting Behavior.” In their project, Acharya, Blackwell and Sen (forthcoming) show that the counties that had more slaves versus free population in the nineteenth century are more likely to exhibit conservative attitudes in contemporary elections. I am extending this argument by measuring potential influence of Civil War battlegrounds on recent voting patterns and political predispositions. My project finds further support for Acharya, Blackwell and Sen’s study on the predictive power of Southern historical forces over current-day voting behavior, concluding that Southern counties with higher levels of free population as opposed to slaves in 1860, and the ones with Civil War battlegrounds are more likely than other Southern counties to vote for the Republican candidate in the 2012 presidential election.
Mentor Name
Dr. Kerem Ozan Kalkan
Mentor Email
Kerem.Kalkan@eku.edu
Recommended Citation
Swiney, Madison R.
(2017)
"Slavery, Civil War, and Contemporary Public Opinion in the South,"
Kentucky Journal of Undergraduate Scholarship: Vol. 1:
Iss.
1, Article 7.
Available at:
https://encompass.eku.edu/kjus/vol1/iss1/7
Pictorial Representation
Included in
American Politics Commons, Other Political Science Commons, Political History Commons, United States History Commons