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Neat bit of post-election anaylsis
Check out this overlay of two maps: cotton-producing regions of the South circa 1860, and 2008 presidential election results by county.
The correlation is remarkably strong, and becomes even more apparent when you take a look at some of the maps here, particularly the map that shows the population density of African-Americans about halfway down the page. You can also see tinges of the same pattern on maps showing results by county for all the presidential elections going back to 1860 (!) -- the pattern doesn't hold that far back, of course, but you can see it to varying degrees in every election since 1968 (although Jimmy Carter's being from Georgia dulls the effect somewhat in 1976 and, to a lesser degree, in 1980.
If you want to take the effect back even further, here are maps showing how ancient geological forces laid rich soil in certain areas of the South, thereby creating prime cotton-growing areas and, eventually, counties that went heavily for Barack Obama in2008.
On a related note, here's a complete national map of the African-American population density, which I also found really striking. I hadn't realized just how much of the US black population was concentrated in the South. Look at the West, and how empty it looks, even in the more urban areas. There are maps for other ethnic groups, too. Now that would make for all kinds of interesting overlays.
The correlation is remarkably strong, and becomes even more apparent when you take a look at some of the maps here, particularly the map that shows the population density of African-Americans about halfway down the page. You can also see tinges of the same pattern on maps showing results by county for all the presidential elections going back to 1860 (!) -- the pattern doesn't hold that far back, of course, but you can see it to varying degrees in every election since 1968 (although Jimmy Carter's being from Georgia dulls the effect somewhat in 1976 and, to a lesser degree, in 1980.
If you want to take the effect back even further, here are maps showing how ancient geological forces laid rich soil in certain areas of the South, thereby creating prime cotton-growing areas and, eventually, counties that went heavily for Barack Obama in2008.
On a related note, here's a complete national map of the African-American population density, which I also found really striking. I hadn't realized just how much of the US black population was concentrated in the South. Look at the West, and how empty it looks, even in the more urban areas. There are maps for other ethnic groups, too. Now that would make for all kinds of interesting overlays.
no subject
Heaven. I am in heaven. Thanks!
Amazing how quickly those southern states have flipped from the Democratic "Solid South" to the Republican strongholds of Nixon's Southern Strategy.
On a related note, here's a complete national map of the African-American population density, which I also found really striking. I hadn't realized just how much of the US black population was concentrated in the South. Look at the West, and how empty it looks, even in the more urban areas.
This is not a map of total black population, it is a map of the percentage of each county that is black. I am sure there are more African-Americans in LA county than almost any county in the whole South, but there are a huge number of non-black people there as well, so blacks are not a high percentage and LA does not show up red. But if you had a map of just total numbers of AA people, it would be more heavily weighted to the cities.
no subject
Isn't it cool? And yeah, you can see how solid the "Solid South" was, for a very long time.
Right, that's what I meant by "population density". It makes sense on an intellectual level that cities are more diverse than rural areas, so many of the areas that have the highest percentage black population would be rural. I had just never thought of it that way before. (A few of them are cities, though -- Chicago and Detroit, for example, jump out on the map quite clearly.) The same holds true for the maps that show Hispanic and especially Native American population density. (Not the Asian map so much, though.)