The Sunbelt South

During 1970s, white South at long last accepted defeat in Civil War. In wake of Civil Rights Revolution and postwar economic boom, region no longer clung to traditional southern way of life. But like Germany and Japan after World War II, this loser reaped spoils of victory. Sunbelt South prospered while old industrial heartland faced seemingly catastrophic decline. Regional conflict once again captured national attention; Business Week even ran cover story on The Second War Between States.1 Leaders of Frostbelt, manufacturing regions of Northeast and Middle West, complained of favoritism for South in distribution of federal dollars. They blamed this imbalance for southwesterly migration of people, jobs, and money in 1960s and 1970s. Launching Frostbelt counteroffensive, New York governor Hugh Carey warned that if federal spending was not redirected northward and decline of Frostbelt reversed, it would become a great national museum where tourists would see industrial plants as artifacts and visit the great railroad stations where trains used to run. battle over federal balance of payments highlighted broader regional division, deeper cultural and political conflict that was emerging in early 1970s. Kevin Phillips, young conservative political analyst for Nixon presidential campaign, first diagnosed this sectional cleavage. Coining term Sunbelt, Phillips identified booming region stretching across continental underbelly of United States from Virginia and Florida to Southern California. This temperate zone was attracting people, factories

Genealogy · American Environmental and Regional History · History

• A Turn in the South

  J Shelton Reed, V S Naipaul•The Journal of Southern History•1990

  Add to list