Hi koan; Re: "In 1860, the Republican's were in the north ... "; True.
Re: "... and the Democrats in the south.";
False. In the election of 1860, the Democrats took two states, both in the North. There were no Southern states that voted Democratic. Instead, like the Republicans, the Democrats were split between a northern and southern parts, depending on their opinion on slavery. Look at this graphic, you will see that the Democrats (blue) took almost no counties in the South:
en.wikipedia.org
Re: "the north was much more liberal than the south, then and now.";
Your (crazy) position is that the Republicans were "liberal" while the Democrats were "conservative". To answer the question of whether the liberals or conservatives were more powerful in the North or South we need to look to earlier elections, before slavery split both the Republican and Democrat parties. That would be Whig vs Democrat elections. Here are some results:
1840, Harrison vs Van Buren:
en.wikipedia.org
1844, Polk vs Clay:
en.wikipedia.org
1848, Taylor vs Cass
en.wikipedia.org
The next two elections, 1852 and 1856, were split by regional candidates and the slavery issue.
From the above, you can see that there was, in fact, no regional distinction between Whig (Republican) and Democrat prior to the slavery issue. So either you have to give up the belief that the Democrats were "conservative" or maybe you can add some sort of belief that things changed suddenly in the 1850s.
-- Carl |
