Comment of the Day: Mark Field: How Big a Problem Is the Malapportionment of the Senate?: "It's always possible that the economic argument will work this time. But given that it's been tried repeatedly and yet failed for 400 years, there's a very strong presumption against that. Ira Katznelson and his co-authors explored this in their book Southern Nation, which explored Southern politics during the period 1865-1932. Their conclusion was that left-populist economics could appeal to some Southerners (not necessarily a majority), but ONLY in a context in which voters and politicians were confident in the bulwark of white supremacy. When they had reason to be nervous about that, racial supremacy took a higher priority and support for liberal economics fell. This also explains the racial compromises FDR had to make in order to pass the New Deal programs (detailed in Katznelson's book Fear Itself). This time might be different. But we shouldn't count on that...
#noted
