Southern Re-realignment: Mississippi

Like Alabama, Mississippi was once staunchly Democratic, turning to the Republican Party for good in the last few decades. Today, it is one of the strongest GOP states in presidential elections, having not delivered its electoral votes to the Democratic candidate since 1976, when Georgian Jimmy Carter narrowly won the state. John Kerry lost here by 60-40, and Al Gore did only slightly better, losing 57-42.

This is a state where senatorial re-realignment has been painfully elusive for Democrats, not just because of the politics, but also because Mississippians are generally so loyal to sitting incumbents. As late as the seventies, Democrats held both of Mississippi's U.S. Senate seats with the duo of James O. Eastland, the long-serving chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the legendary John C. Stennis. When Eastland retired in 1978, Congressman Thad Cochran won the seat, and when Stennis finally decided to leave Washing, he was replaced by GOP Rep. Trent Lott. With the exception of Lott's first Senate campaign in 1988 (which he won 54-46 over another congressman), neither man ever faced a hard race, with both becoming iconic figures in the Magnolia State, much like their Democratic predecessors, and have been unbeatable electorally.

Governor

Prior to Kirk Fordice's election in 1991, Mississippi had not sent a Republican to the governor's mansion since Reconstruction. After Fordice was term-limited from seeking a third term, he was replaced by Democrat Ronnie Musgrove, who served from 2000 to 2004 before being defeated by longtime Republican operative Haley Barbour by 53-46. Very popular today, Barbour was re-elected in 2007 by 58-42, and will serve through 2011.

With the next governor's race in November 2011, talk about it is pretty pointless. Needless to say that because it will be an open seat and because it is not a federal office, Democrats will have a shot to win it.

Naturally, it could be tough for them to win the office because of Mississippi's current political bent, as well as because all but one of the statewide offices are occupied by Republicans. Out of the Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of State, Attorney General, State Auditor, State Treasurer, Agriculture Commissioner, and Insurance Commissioner, only the state's AG is a Democrat. Therefore, there will be a glut of GOP officials with statewide name recognition able to run in three years.

That the governorship has only been held by two Republicans in 150 years, and that Musgrove won the job in 1999 do demonstrate that Democrats can be competitive in winning the job, but it should be noted that Musgrove only won when the Democratically-controlled state house voted him in after neither he nor his opponent won over 50 percent of the general election vote (though Musgrove did finish ahead of said opponent, then-congressman Mike Parker, in the general vote tally). Indeed, Barbour's win in 2003 and strong re-election in 2007 may have signaled the the governorship is now also an office where Mississippians prefer a Republican over a Democrat in general, thereby making it likely that Barbour will succeeded by a fellow party member. Time will tell on this score.

It is also worth noting that Democrats remain a force in the state legislature, where they control the lower chamber, 73-46, and the senate by a narrow 27-25. However, because Mississippi is not set to gain or lose any of its four congressional seats any time soon, this control will not have any impact on redistricting. Nor would it matter a great deal if any of the current district lines were tinkered with any, as Democrats hold three of the four seats, and movement of more Democratic voters into the GOP-controlled Third District would be unlikely to flip it, particularly at risk to the safe siting incumbents. Besides, with the districts as they are -- i.e. nearly all unquestionably red -- it would not matter much anyway. Still, it is noteworthy that Democrats have continued to hold influence at the state level, and certainly plays into the narrative that Democrats can be competitive in state elections -- including the governorship -- more than in federal races.

Mississippi's congressional delegation is surprisingly Democratic

The congressional delegation is much more promising for Democrats, with Dems holding three of the state's four seats. The way Democrats have been able to win these seats is certainly a good primer on achieving political success in the South.

The Second District is the state's only safe Democratic seat. Nearly two-thirds black, and including Jackson and the Delta region on the state's west coast, it is D+10 and probably out of reach for Republicans even in this state. It is an especially poor part of both Mississippi, and it has had black representation in Congress for over 20 years: first by Mike Espy, who would eventually go on to become President Clinton's Agriculture Secretary, and now by Bennie Thompson, who is the chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security.

This is both a district that probably will not be seriously contested by the Republicans in the near future, but at the same time it will not produce a Member of Congress who can win statewide office. Thompson, to both his credit and to his detriment, has a record that is far too liberal to help him win statewide election. This is to say nothing for the concerns that a black man could win statewide in Mississippi for any office today, particularly Governor or Senator. While the state is around 37 percent black, the largest percentage in the nation, the white vote generally goes overwhelmingly to any and all Republican candidates, making it very hard to win statewide for Democrats. This is a problem that we will discuss further in the context of this year's Senate race.

The rest of the state is more interesting. The First District is R+10, the Third is R+13, and the Fourth in southeastern Mississippi along the Gulf Coast is R+16. Yet, the First and Fourth are both in the hands of Democrats. I've already looked at Travis Childers' stunning win, so I won't bother rehashing the election here; my post provides all the information one might interested in for the purposes here.

Needless to say that Childers was able to win a R+10 seat through a near-perfect confluence of events: Childers was a great and enthusiastic campaigner, he possessed conservative social views in great sync with the District, he exploited a nasty Republican primary fight which left scars and hurt feelings as well as geographic tensions unique to the District between the "Memphis" part of the First and the "Tupelo" part from which the District's historic representation had generally come from, a national environment which disfavored Republican candidates for all offices, and Childers had robust financial support from the national Democratic Party when it counted between the first round of general election voting and the run-off. In a nutshell, Childers was just the right candidate (if not the only candidate) who could have won. While the national GOP waded into the race, do not expect a repeat in November: with funds tight all around, and the Republican nominee losing by a surprising eight points then, he will receive many NRCC aid, and will lose again to Childers.

That Democrats have been able to hold the state's most conservative district is perhaps more impressive than Childers' victory. Gene Taylor was first elected in the Fourth District in a 1989 special election, and remains very popular there. Shockingly, Taylor has never faced a tough contest since his initial election. Like Childers, Taylor has strong socially conservative views, opposing abortion rights, gun control measures, and other popular Democratic causes, but he tempers that with populist economic positions which keep him allied with his caucus. Consequently, Taylor has never won less than 58 percent of the vote -- he even won 60 percent in 1994, the year of the Republican Revolution when dozens of congressional Democrats were ousted -- an amazing number, especially when one considers that he sits in the most conservative district in Mississippi, and one of the reddest district in America; one which gave President Bush 65 and 68 percent of the vote in his two races.

Childers and Taylor thus show that Democrats can still win in the heart of Mississippi, so long as they have the right social views, the right circumstances (a special election following the death of the sitting congressman for Taylor, and an open seat necessitated by a congressman quitting to go to the Senate in the case of Childers), and are the right men with a lot of positive energy to win initially, something both men had in spades. I suspect that barring an unforeseen development, Childers will win a full term this November by an impressive margin -- heck, he won his special election 54-46 -- and therefore be able to hold his seat, so long as he never strays too far from his constituents.

The Trent Lott resignation and Ronnie Musgrove

The Senate race this fall between appointed Senator Roger Wicker and former Governor Musgrove will be probably the most important election in Mississippi in decades, at least from the Democrats' perspective. Simply put, it represents the first time in 20 years, that they have a legitimate chance to win a Mississippi United States Senate seat.

Last year, all of the talk was on whether Senator Thad Cochran -- who has been in the Senate since 1979 -- was going to retire rather than run for another term in November 2008. At 70 years old, Cochran had been chairman of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee from 2005 to the start of 2007, but after Democrats retook the Senate in 2006, he was ousted from the position, and many observers speculated that Cochran could be a good bet to retire given his age and loss of the chairmanship. Cochran himself fed into this speculation when he did not do any fundraising -- though, in fairness, given his electoral invincibility in the state, he needn't have to raise a nickel to win re-election -- and did not deny that he at least considering retirement as option.

For their part, Democrats eagerly watched Cochran. While the Senator himself remained obviously unbeatable, Democrats believed that they could contest an open seat with former four-term state Attorney General Mike Moore, arguably the most popular Democratic figure in the state. Moore had served in the position for 16 years, and was widely respected for his stewardship of the tobacco litigation where state attorneys general banded together and successfully sued the tobacco companies in the 1990s. For years, Democrats had been trying to recruit him for higher office, but with neither of the Senate seats opening between 1988 and 2007, Moore had had no opportunities to run. Democrats, as well as Republicans, believed he would be the favorite of either party to win an open seat.

When Cochran announced at the end of 2007 that he was running again, Democrats were certainly dispirited, but not long afterwards, Senator Trent Lott stunned the political world by announced that he would resign his Senate seat at the end of 2007. The timing of Lott's move was certainly interesting: a new ethics law was to go into effect in 2008 which would have forbidden former Members of Congress from lobbying for two years following the Member's last day in office; the law still on the books in 2007 set the moratorium at one year. In order to get around this impending change, Lott left office on December 31 so he would be able to lobby one year earlier.

Naturally, the resignation set off a scramble. Because Lott had won re-election in 2006, his term was not set to expire until 2012. Thus, there were five years remaining on his term. Governor Barbour had the power to appoint a sitting replacement until a special election could be held to determine who would hold the seat for the remainder of the term. While Mississippi state law stipulated that a special election had to be held within 90 days of a Senate resignation, thereby seemingly requiring a special election for March or April, Governor Barbour ordered that the special be held in November when the regular presidential and other state and congressional races were held. His reasons for this holding were purely political, but nonetheless smart given his perspective.

After Lott announced his resignation, two names were being bandied about on the Democratic side: Mike Moore and former Governor Ronnie Musgrove. Both men had won statewide office before (Moore four times as state AG, and Musgrove twice as Lieutenant Governor and Governor), and were seen as especially strong challengers. In short, even many Republicans concurred that both would not only be the Dems' best (and perhaps) only hopes to grab the seat. With this in mind, Barbour recognized that whoever he appointed would need time to build up the necessary name recognition to best either well-known Democrat. Holding the election in November as opposed to March or April would achieve this end.

Furthermore, Barbour calculated that putting the Senate race on the same ballot with the presidential contest would undoubtedly benefit the Republican appointee, as Mississippi was assured of going heavily Republican in the presidential election, regardless of who either party ended up nominating.

In sum, while his decision was irksome to Democrats, Barbour certainly made the wise choice in order to protect his party. Had the election been just a few months after Lott's departure, a Moore or Musgrove would have had a much easier time beating a lesser-known Republican, but with the election in November the playing field would be evened out, if not slanted to the Republicans.

Given the plain language of state law which seemed to require a quick special election, Democrats complained raucously, and the state Attorney General (Jim Hood, a Democrat), challenged Barbour in court. Hood won at the lower court level, but predictably, the heavily Republican Mississippi Supreme Court sided with Barbour 7-2, and upheld the November election date.

The decision for who to tap for the seat was important for Barbour, but complicated. In our previous post on the Childers race, we recapped it in some detail. To just summarize, the obvious choice was Third District congressman Chip Pickering, a young, telegenic, and very conservative rising star. Long before Lott's plans to leave the Senate became public, Pickering was seen as a natural heir for the next open Senate seat. However, shortly before Lott made his plans public, Pickering made a shock announcement that he was retiring at the end of the his current term to spend more time with his family. Therefore, both he and Gov. Barbour were put in a difficult position: Pickering had clearly expressed aspirations to be a Senator in the past, but going back on his word, while not at all impossible, was potentially distasteful, and could have been a turnoff. Ultimately, Barbour tapped Mississippi's other Republican Representative, Roger Wicker of the northern First District.

Wicker v. Musgrove

The November Senate election is of monumental importance to both state and national Democrats. A Democratic win in Mississippi would have tremendous implications for potential Southern re-realignment in perhaps the very most conservative Deep South state.

All hyperbole aside, a Musgrove victory would be one of, if not the most significant Democratic win in the South in a generation. A loss would likely assure that Democrats would be unable to win the Lott seat for the next generation. Sure, Sen. Cochran is likely to retire in 2014 when he is in his 80s, but Democrats can't count on that; Taylor, Childers, and Hood may all be out of office by then for we know now. Democrats will never have as good a nominee, as good a national atmosphere, and as mediocre a Republican opponent all together at once as they do for the Wicker-Musgrove race.

Musgrove is a natural and tireless campaigner. He has universal name recognition in the state from his terms as Lieutenant Governor and then Governor. Musgrorve also possesses strongly conservative social views akin to Travis Childers. And while Musgrove likely would have won in an April election, the November election has one benefit that will help him slightly: because it is a special election, state law requires that no party ID be next to the candidates' names; therefore, neither Wicker nor Musgrove will be identified with their parties on the election day ballot.

In a state as Republican-centric as Mississippi, this can only help the Democratic candidate; though, to be perfectly honest, I think many commentators overstate its value, and I think that when it is all said and done, nearly every voter in the state will know Wicker's and Musgrove's party affiliations, ensuring that the unique ballot will likely be only marginally helpful to the Democrat at best. (Furthermore, the Governor and Secretary of State are already showing machinations to try to and move the special election to the very bottom of the ballot. While the reasons for this are nakedly political, they will probably succeed. It is hard to predict how this would impact the contest, but it probably would not be helpful to Musgrove.)

Despite all of these favorable factors, Musgrove should still be considered the underdog in the race for two key reasons. First, he has been heavily outraised by Senator Wicker. For all the complaints by Republicans that Wicker is not terribly charismatic and not as energetic a candidate as Musgrove, he has raised a mint in cash since he was appointed to the Senate, while Musgrove has done mediocre at best. Thee DSCC has vast resources to help fix this imbalance, and indeed it has already begun funding ads across Magnolia State TV blasting Wicker. Because of the NRSC funding problems, it will have a hard time matching the DSCC here and elsewhere. Still, Wicker's money advantage is vast and thus huge.

Second, Musgrove still faces the Mississippi electorate, and the state's electorate is, simply hostile to Democratic candidates. While the state is around 37 percent black, and that segment votes overwhelmingly Democratic in all races, the other two-thirds -- the white part of the state -- goes almost equally strongly to Republicans. Statewide, it an achievement where the Democratic candidate can break 20 percent of the white vote. As shocking as that may sound, it is fact and the reason Democrats have no much trouble winning all of Mississippi.

With Barack Obama on the top of the ticket, Musgrove may well win the black vote 95-5, but he has to find a way to win a share of the white vote that Democratic candidates almost always fail to garner. That's it. If he can do that, he will likely be the first Democrat since John Stennis to represent Mississippi in the Senate. And make no mistake: while Obama will almost certainly bring out unprecedented numbers of black voters to the polls, voters who will vote almost universally for Obama and down-ballot Dems, there are perils to this calculus. It is absolutely unclear if while at the same time Obama is bringing out and winning more black voters, he will win more or even less white voters than most Democratic presidential candidates.

My personal sense with regards to Obama's impact on the white vote is that despite conventional wisdom (and Mississippi's own past), Obama will do better statewide than John Kerry (he lost the state by 20 points) given the national anti-GOP environment. He will obviously get just about every black vote, but I think he will probably be as successful as most Dems with the state white vote: not much better or worse. Consequently, at least by my logic, Musgrove will get a boast with the black vote but not be badly hurt among the white vote, thereby making his mission of garnering a certain percentage of the white electorate not as difficult.

I will close with that and note that as of now, the race is close by many polls, though the last two polls, both from Rasmussen, have shown Wicker with a nine-point lead after being tied for several months. This is probably the result of Musgrove's name being tied to a federal bribery investigation which has not actually charged the former governor with any wrong-doing. Specifically, in the Rasmussen August poll showing Wicker up 52-43 (47-42 without leaners included), Musgrove garners 22 percent of whites, but his deficit seems to be solely because Wicker is polling 17 percent of blacks. If Wicker gets even half that number come election day, Musgrove is toast.

Outlook

Forgive me for getting to deep in the weeds on these races. My interest is not really in handicapping races so much as providing the appropriate background and context. In terms of Mississippi and Musgrove v. Wicker, the big question is not so much who will win, but rather what the outcome means for the state's politics.

Currently, Democratic prospects in Mississippi, despite Travis Childers's win, are not superb. This is not surprising, as the state is deep, deep red and has been for decades. This is precisely why the Senate race for the Trent Lott seat is so important for the party. It might be the Democrats' greatest opportunity to win and hold a United States Senate seat. Should they fail, they may have to wait another generation for a new opportunity to present itself.

Winning the seat will not re-realign Mississippi to the Democratic Party in the same way that the Webb and (pending) Warner wins have done for Virginia. Mississippi will never vote Democratic in a presidential election. If that is the goal, they may as well take their ball and go home; it ain't ever going to happen with a party that nominates the likes of Mike Dukakis, Al Gore, John Kerry, and Barack Obama.

But what Democrats can accomplish this year is elect a conservative Democrat. Given Mississippi's inclination towards re-electing incumbents (excluding the green Wicker, Mississippi has only elected four men to the Senate since 1947: John Stennis, James Eastland, Thad Cochran and Trent Lott), Musgrove would have a great chance to get into office and hold the seat for the long haul.

As for my own gut look at the race, for most of the campaign I have felt Musgrove would ultimately win, by these two polls giving Wicker a nine-point advantage are bad news for the Democrat. Musgrove needs to shake these stories connecting him to the beef plant bribery scandal and turn the election focus on the economy, much as Travis Childers did with his special election contest. I still believe that Chuck Schumer will invest heavily in the state -- and already has -- but that will change if Musgrove can't keep it close.

Right now Wicker has the decided advantage because he is polling so well among blacks. As we noted, Musgrove must win blacks almost unanimously and then get around a quarter of the white vote. Right now, he apparently has work to do in the black community.