Tar Heel Dems

TPJ has stressed the effect of the National Democratic Party abandoning the South. Our most recent review of the subject was immediately after the General Election in:

Candidates for DNC Chairman, particularly Howard Dean, envision the same problem. Appearing before a DNC candidate regional caucus, Dean had the best advice:

"You want to know my Southern strategy, show up," said Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who dropped out of the presidential race during last year's Democratic primaries. -- Yahoo

"You can't compete in just 19 or 20 states," said former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb, another candidate for national party chairman. "You get better odds in Las Vegas than with that program." . . .

"It's not just about spending more money," Rosenberg said in an interview before the forum. "Money also needs to have strategy."

Roemer said if elected he would work harder to appeal to rural voters in the South and Midwest, two areas that have gone solidly to Bush in the last two elections.

"Some people think we need to steer left. Some people think I would steer the party right. It's not about that. It's about expanding the bus," Roemer said.

Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a fellow Democrat, told the candidates that the party needs to listen more to local officials. He said he is proof that Democrats know how to win on the statewide level in the South, and that can be translated to the presidential election with a more comprehensive strategy.

"The next time around, we want a 50-state platform. We want a 50-state party," Bredesen said to loud applause. "To my party, get out of Washington more." -- Yahoo

Dean is taking the lead here. Showing up in the South is the first step to Democrats recapturing the South for the Democratic Party.

It is also a message for the candidates for North Carolina Democratic Party Chairman. Democrats cannot carry the State consistently by showing up in only half of the counties.

Last week, TPJ provided readers with the results of all 120 races and a macro analysis of how Democrats won the State House in:

This week, TPJ continues its analysis of how the Democrats won the NC State House from several different perspectives. The data underlying this report can be found in this chart:

Of 120 Districts at stake, 110 Districts featured an incumbent running for reelection, including those Districts in which redistricting forced a contest between incumbents or an incumbent was moved to a new District. How did the incumbents fare? Very well!

In 62 of the 110 Districts the incumbent simply had no opposition by a Republican or Democrat challenger. Of the 62, 32 Republican incumbents had no opposition. No Republican challenged 30 Democrat incumbents.

Only 9 incumbents of either Party were defeated. These are the contested races, either in the primary or General Election where incumbents fell:

3	Gorman	contested	LEAN R		Underhill D (51%/47%)
14	K. Williams	contested	LEAN R		Clark R (60%/40%)
34	Munford	contested	LEAN R		Martin D (51%/49%)
36	Miner	unopposed	SAFE R	Dollar R
39	Ellis	contested	SWING		Coleman D (55%/45%)
57	Bowie	contested	SWING		Harrison D (57%/43%)
65	Cole-Sexton	contested	SWING		Cole D (53%/47%)
73	Decker	unopposed	SAFE R	Brown R
91	Baker	contested	LEAN R		Holloway R (57%/42%)

In this election cycle, the intra Party fight in the Republican Party between Co-Speaker Morgan and the radical Republicans accounted for 5 Republican incumbents falling in their primary. Democrats were able to pick up 2 of the 5 seats in the General Election. One reputable rating service denominates both Districts as Lean Republican in historical performance.

Democrats were able to win four contests pitting a Democrat against an incumbent Republican in these Districts.

Martin’s victory in District 34 is perhaps the most impressive. Martin, the son of Democrat icon D.G. Martin, was able to defeat an incumbent Republican in a Lean Republican District. Impressive! The remaining four races demonstrate that Democrats can win in Swing Districts.

4	OPEN - Duplin, Onslow	unopposed	LEAN D	Tucker D
27	OPEN - Northampton, Warren, Vance	unopposed	SAFE D	Wray D
28	OPEN - Johnston, Sampson	unopposed	SAFE R	Langdon R
48	Bonner-OPEN	unopposed	SAFE D	Pierce D
50	OPEN - Caswell, Orange	unopposed	SAFE D	Faison D
55	G. Allen-OPEN	unopposed	LEAN D	Wilkins D
66	Goodwin-OPEN	unopposed	SAFE D	M. Goodwin D
74	OPEN - Forsyth	contested	SAFE R		Folwell R (63%/37%)
88	OPEN - Alexander Co.	contested	SAFE R		Hollo R (56%/44%)
105	OPEN - Mecklenburg	unopposed	SAFE R	Vinson R
108	OPEN - Gaston	contested	SAFE R		Rayfield R (69%/31%)

Of the 11 open Districts, Democrats took 6 and the Republicans 5. Only 4 Districts were contested, Democrats running against Republicans in Districts rated Safe Republican. No Democrat won in these Districts.

Democrats need to take a hard look at District 88, Alexander County. The Democrat was within 11% in District 88 suggesting that aggressive voter registration and proper candidate recruitment could make this District competitive.

Surprisingly, Republicans failed to mount any opposition in Districts 4 and 55, both rated only as Lead Democrat. It was a mistake that Republicans are now openly regretting.

TPJ has access to one service that rates the Districts based upon historical performance of the District. The service rates Districts as Safe D, Lean D, Swing, Lean Republican and Safe Republican. There are a number of services that rate districts, each with their own criteria. Each service is, however, trying to rate how a District will perform based upon its past performance.

The issue of performance was critical during the redistricting, each Party fighting to gain advantage in the number of Districts that could be won based upon historical performance. The rating service TPJ uses rated the Districts as follows:

Safe Democratic                        31
Lean Democratic                       16
Swing                                       16
Lean Republican                        17
Safe Republican                        39

Looking at TPJ’s rating service, one would suspect that Republicans got the advantage as a result of redistricting. We know that was not the case. Why?

First, neither Party lost a Safe District, giving Republicans an advantage of +8 seats.

Second, Democrats won every Lean Democrat District. In all but 1 District, Democrats were incumbents. In one open Lean Democrat District, Republicans did not mount opposition.

Republicans mounted contests in only 8 of the 16 Lean Democrat Districts. In only one District did the Republican candidate come within 10% of the Democrat:

Third, for Republicans it was a different story. Democrats picked up four Lean Republican seats. As previously noted, Democrats picked up two of these seats because of the Morgan/radical Republican primary contests in which incumbent Republicans were defeated in the primary.

In two Lean Republican Districts, Democrats were the incumbents. The power of incumbency is obvious.

3	Gorman	contested	LEAN R		Underhill D (51%/47%)
11	Pate	unopposed	LEAN R	Pate R
13	Preston	contested	LEAN R		Preston R (65%/32%)
14	K. Williams	contested	LEAN R		Clark R (60%/40%)
15	Grady	unopposed	LEAN R	Grady R
16	Justice	unopposed	LEAN R	Justice R
19	McComas	unopposed	LEAN R	McComas R
25	Daughtridge	unopposed	LEAN R	Daughtridge R
26	Creech-Daughtry	unopposed	LEAN R	Daughtry R
34	Munford	contested	LEAN R		Martin D (51%/49%)
41	Capps	unopposed	LEAN R	Capps R
90	Harrell	contested	LEAN R		Harrell D (58%/42%)
91	Baker	contested	LEAN R		Holloway R (57%/42%)
93	G. Wilson	contested	LEAN R		Wilson