Reagan Restoration:

The Conservative Turn of the White Working

Class in America, 1968-1984

Jefferson Cowie
Andrew J. Nathanson Professor
Cornell University
 1968 1972
Humphrey Nixon Wallace McGovern Nixon
NATIONAL 43.0% 43.4% 13.6% 38.0% 62.0%
SEX
Men 41 43 16 37 63
Women 45 43 12 38 62
RACE
White 38 47 15 32 68
Non-white 85 12 3 87 13
EDUCATION
College 37 54 9 37 63
High School 42 43 15 34 66
Grade School 52 33 15 49 51
OCCUPATION
Prof. & Business 34 56 10 31 69
White Collar 41 47 12 36 64
Manual 50 35 15 43 57
AGE
Under 30 years 47 38 15 48 52
30-49 years 44 41 15 33 67
50 years & older 41 47 12 36 64
RELIGION
Protestants 35 49 16 30 70
Catholics
POLITICS
59 33 8 48 52
Nixon and Colson discuss the New Majority Dec 1972
Republicans 9 86 5 5 95
Democrats 74 12 14 67 33
Independents 31 44 25 31 69 Mrs. Gualtieri, (Andrew) Jackson thing, New Majority, John McCarrel (UAW), Frank
REGION
East 50 43 7 42 58
Fitz(simmons) of the Teamsters, (Harold) GibbonsTeamsters reformer, your
Midwest 44 47 9 40 60 count, the strategy, American flag, Pete (Brennan), (John) Scali, get me a Pol
South 31 36 33 29 71
West 44 49 7 41 59
LABOR UNION
Union families 56 29 15 46 54

Mad as Hell

OPEC/Gas Crisis
Stagflation Reagan electrifies Conservative Political
Trade/Globalization Action Conference in 1977, declaring:
Nixon Shock most Americans are basically conservative
Vietnam
He called for a New Republican Party that
Watergate will not be, and cannot be, one limited to the
country-club big business image that, for
Andrewas Killen: 1973 as the year of the collec8ve nervous breakdown, a reasons both fair and unfair, it is burdened with
year full of dire news but also alive with a sense of new possibili8es and today.the new party would welcome the social
conservative on whom the Democratic Party
openings to the future, harbingers of an emerging new postmodern cultural turned its back in the 1960s: the factory
congura8on. It was a deeply schizophrenic moment, he found, in which workers, the farmer, the cop on the beat and the
reality itself seemed to be up for grabs. millions of Americans who may never have
thought of joining our party before, but whose
Wri8ng in 1974, Michael Harrington noted a collec8ve sadness that had interests coincide with those represented by
principled Republicanism.
descended upon the na8on as if it were in mourning for a dying era. The
dominant mood is one of scrambling to make the best of a bad lot. This
corrodes what solidarity does exist; it priva8zes social struggles and it makes
people sad. It also creates the basis for a similar disintegra8on in our poli8cal
life.
 New Deal that
Never Happened

Labor Law Reform

Full Employment Legislation
National Health Insurance
Industrial Policy
Perhaps the most important, and then highly controversial, domestic initiative was the firing
of the air traffic controllers in August 1981. The President invoked the law that striking
government employees forfeit their jobs, an action that unsettled those who cynically
believed no President would ever uphold that law. President Reagan prevailed, as you know,
but far more importantly his action gave weight to the legal right of private employers,
previously not fully exercised, to use their own discretion to both hire and discharge
workers.
Alan Greenspan, 2003

Mackay Radio (1938) paradox

Historical$Income$Inequality$in$the$United$States$Since$1947$

0.500$$

0.480$$

Old New Deal Coalition New Right Coalition 0.460$$

Gini$Coecient$(Closer$to$0$Means$More$Equal)$
industrial workers cultural conservatives 0.440$$

African Americans fiscal conservatives/libertarians 0.420$$

Total$Races$

liberals/progressives foreign policy hawks 0.400$$ White$

Black$

white South white South 0.380$$

0.360$$

0.340$$

0.320$$

0.300$$
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
19 $
20 $
20 $
20 $
20 $
20 $
$
47
49
51
53
55
57
59
61
63
65
67
69
71
73
75
77
79
81
83
85
87
89
91
93
95
97
99
01
03
05
07
09
19

Year$

16
 The Great Exception
1936-1978

17 18

The Great Exception

1936-1978

The Long Exception for American

Labor: The Long Exception

Forward into the Past for Organizing and

the Law

19 20
 Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal
1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015 1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015

politics of mixed politics of

politics of mixed politics of

Race carrying water on both Race carrying water on both

exclusion shoulders inclusion exclusion shoulders inclusion
large and
monolithic large and
large and
monolithic large and

Immigration Immigration
racialized whiteness racialized racialized whiteness racialized

Individualism strong checked revived Individualism strong checked revived

social Darwinist rights consciousness social Darwinist rights consciousness

Culture Wars defining religious truce defining Culture Wars defining religious truce defining

Class and legitimate but repression within Class and legitimate but repression within
state repression state repression
Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime
Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool

21 22

Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal
1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015 1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015

politics of mixed politics of

politics of mixed politics of

Race carrying water on both Race carrying water on both

exclusion shoulders inclusion exclusion shoulders inclusion
large and
monolithic large and
large and
monolithic large and

Immigration Immigration
racialized whiteness racialized racialized whiteness racialized

Individualism strong checked revived Individualism strong checked revived

social Darwinist rights consciousness social Darwinist rights consciousness

Culture Wars defining religious truce defining Culture Wars defining religious truce defining

Class and legitimate but repression within Class and legitimate but repression within
state repression state repression
Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime
Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool

23 24
 Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal Pre New Deal New Deal Order Post New Deal
1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015 1877-1933 1933-1978 1978-2015

politics of mixed politics of

politics of mixed politics of

Race carrying water on both Race carrying water on both

exclusion shoulders inclusion exclusion shoulders inclusion
large and
monolithic large and
large and
monolithic large and

Immigration Immigration
racialized whiteness racialized racialized whiteness racialized

Individualism strong checked revived Individualism strong checked revived

social Darwinist rights consciousness social Darwinist rights consciousness

Culture Wars defining religious truce defining Culture Wars defining religious truce defining

Class and legitimate but repression within Class and legitimate but repression within
state repression state repression
Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime Labor rule by injunction contained labor rights regime
Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool Wagner, Taft-Hartley management tool

25

The New Deal order was an exception to many of

the main currents in American history

Irony of American History?

New Deal is a problematic metaphor for the future of

U.S. politics

Allows us to reconsider what Barrington Moore called

suppressed historical alternatives

Many of those might be found more in the Progressive

Era than in the New Deal

Foreseeable future of U.S. reform will most likely take place outside traditional
federal politics or union organizing structures and include approaches such as:
worker centers, municipal minimum wage campaigns, immigrant rights struggles,
consumer boycotts, and state reform.