West Virginian Exceptionalism

A while back, in the aftermath of Senator Robert Byrd’s death, Jonathan Bernstein looked at West Virginia’s unusual shift from a state that, in Presidential elections, tended to be more Democratic than national trends to being more Republican than national trends might warrant. I think this is interesting since it allows one to look at some of the ways in which the Republican and Democratic parties have changed over the course of the last several Presidential elections. As Bernstein wrote:

Nate Silver has this well-organized in a post way back in April, 2008, showing how each state compares to the national results.  What he shows is that West Virginia was more Democratic than the nation as a whole in every election but one from 1948 through 1996, deviating only in the Nixon reelection landslide in 1972.  Silver groups 15 southern and border states together, so it’s easy to compare where WV lies within that group (the 11 confederate states and WV, OK, KY, and MO).