Are election results in Shelby Co. ‘climate change’ or just weather?
In the debate over global climate change, we are warned not to confuse weather with climate. Weather is local and temporary. Climate is global and long term.
Something similar is true of elections. The tendency among pundits is to over-analyze the results. They ascribe more meaning to the results than is really there. In essence, they act as though a weather event of one election is a climate event destined to be the norm for the ages.
Following the recent Democratic victories in Shelby County, a local pundit asked me: “Will a Republican ever win an election Shelby County again?” This reminds me of an exchange I had with a Democratic friend 30 years ago.
He opined, after the election of President George H.W. Bush, that he did not expect to see another Democratic president in his lifetime. I told him that politics is cyclical and that he could expect the political world to change again.
Behold, since then he has seen two Democratic presidents. After Barack Obama was elected, many predicted that the Republican coalition was doomed to permanent minority status. James Carville, who had managed the Clinton campaigns, even wrote a book entitled: “Forty More Years, How the Democrats will Rule the Next Generation”. Then along came Trump.
Politics in America doesn’t give us lasting coalitions. Coalitions are constantly shifting and changing. Sean Trende, the insightful writer for RealClearPolitics, says in his book, “The Lost Majority”, that “parties tend to overinterpret their mandate and overreach.” This overreach gives the opposition an opportunity to reestablish itself.
So with Shelby County. The Republicans dominated county government for the better part of three decades. During that time, the local Democratic party was a shambles. Its candidates often had questionable backgrounds. The local party was plagued by scandal.
Republicans were able to win majorities by generating a strong turnout of their own base and getting a significant cross over vote from Democrats.
In fact, things got so bad for the Democrats, that in 2017, the Tennessee Democratic Party disbanded the Shelby County Democratic Party. After that, the state party supervised a reorganization of the local Democrats, which proved successful.
This year, the Republicans fielded good candidates, raised sufficient funds, and ran competent campaigns. But the Democrats matched them, step for step.
The Democrats got organized, had strong leadership at the local level, and fielded a good slate of candidates. Furthermore, the current highly polarized state of national politics made crossover voting less acceptable. The result was a Democratic sweep. Is this weather or climate? The Democrats, basking in the glow of victory would like to believe it is climate. The Republicans, groaning under the dark clouds of defeat, are hoping it is just weather.
The burden will be on the Republicans to make it one or the other. They can retreat into fortress suburbia and concede the countywide offices, or they can change and adapt their coalition to meet the current circumstances of Shelby County.
As people often say about Memphis weather, if you don’t like, just stick around and it will change in the next few hours. Wait a couple more elections and we may know if we are looking at a weather event or climate change.
John Ryder is a Memphis attorney with Harris Shelton, and chairman of the Republican National Lawyers Association. He previously served as General Counsel to the Republican National Committee. He can be reached at ryderontheriver@gmail.com.