RNC Chair: White Southerners Need Not Apply?

The recent controversy surrounding RNC Chair candidate Chip Saltsman (pictured to the right) -- coupled with recent news that RNC Chair candidate Katon Dawson was a member of a "whites only" country club in South Carolina (he resigned upon learning of the rule) -- have guaranteed that "race" will be an important issue as Republicans choose a new chairman.

With Republicans continuing to lose minority votes at an alarming rate, perhaps it should be.

And because of the inner-connectedness involved, geography will also play a role in this debate. In fact, for a variety of reasons, being a white southern male may -- for the first time in years -- be a career-limiting factor for Republicans seeking to make a name for themselves nationally.

This, of course, would be a role reversal. In recent years, southern politicians have dominated national politics. During much of the Bill Clinton presidency, for example, we had a president from Arkansas, a Speaker of the House from Georgia, and a Majority Leader from Mississippi.

Prior to Barack Obama's 2008 victory, only southern Democrats, it seemed, could win the presidency -- and even then -- it wasn't a guarantee. Al Gore's defeat in 2000, for example, was attributable to his having lost his home state of Tennessee (interestingly, Chip Saltsman was the TN GOP chairman in 2000).

But the days of southern hegemony appear to be coming to an end. To be sure, these recent RNC Chair candidate scandals are self inflicted, yet is is clear they are also being spread and advanced by Republican foes. These opponents will carefully seek to make political hay from this, while also attempting to avoid leaving any fingerprints. Already, I've heard from supporters of other candidates who are arguing off-the-record that "even if Saltsman isn't a racist" -- for PR purposes, this scandal should "disqualify" him from being elected to this important and symbolic position.

The message is unstated, but simple; with an African-American president, Republicans simply cannot afford to tolerate even the appearance of racism. Along those lines, there is an unspoken, but implicit notion that -- no matter how talented or qualified -- Republicans must avoid elevating a white southerner to the position of chairman (obviously, racists are not solely relegated to the south, but our nations history of slavery plays an obvious role in this).

This notion was becoming prevalent even prior to these racially-tinged scandals, but these incidents have only served to advance the idea.

To be sure, some of the people who hold this view legitimately believe it is for the good of the Republican Party. Others have conveniently come to this view, because they support someone else for RNC chairman.

Several non-southern, non-white candidates are also vying to become RNC Chair. In fact, two prominent African-Americans are in the race, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell -- whom I've endorsed -- and former Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele -- could benefit from this phenomenon -- as could RNC chairman Mike Duncan, as well as MI GOP Chair Saul Anuzis (the son of Lithuanian immigrants).

Even prior to the Dawson country club scandal, many of us wondered whether or not electing someone with a southern drawl would be smart politically, considering the new RNC Chair would be the face of the GOP during the Obama years. To be sure, this is unfair, but politics is often unfair.

In a recent conference call I participated in, Michael Steele warned that Republicans shouldn't "soft-pedal" attacks on Barack Obama, "just because the President of the United States is a Black man." Though he did not explicitly say so, the impression was that because Steele is black, he believed he would be better positioned to criticize Obama. Though not publicly stated, this opinion is shared by many Republicans, by the way, of diverse races and backgrounds.

For a party that has traditionally eschewed quotas and identity politics, the notion that white southerners (or any group, for that matter) "need not apply" for party leadership positions during the Obama Administration is controversial -- and in many ways counter to conservative philosophy -- but it does seem to be a growing consensus among a surprising number of Republicans to whom I've spoken.

And while race is at the heart of the backlash against southerners, other factors are converging, as well.

Many traditional Republicans -- who were more comfortable with the western brand of libertarian-conservatism displayed by Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan -- believe the GOP was hijacked by social conservatives from the south (it is interesting that the GOP ticket in 2008 was led by an Arizonan and an Alaskan). They are, to a certain extent, "prejudiced" against southern candidates, and will use this turn of fortune as an opportunity to "re-take" the GOP from those southern "Theo-Cons"...

There is also an elitist strand of the GOP which views southerners as rubes. This is largely an overreaction to the George W. Bush years, where anyone who speaks with a twang or a drawl is viewed as being "slow". It is, of course, a huge mistake to assume that southerners are any less intellectual or intelligent than their northern or western counterparts, but it is obvious a stereotype has developed, and perception is reality. Besides, the people who hold these views can always rationalize them away by saying, "I know southerners aren't stupid, but from a PR standpoint, I just don't think it would play well on TV..."

Lastly, this phenomenon may simply be a product of the 2008 election, which clearly demonstrated the reality that merely winning the south won't be enough to elect Republicans in the future.

Regardless of the reasons, it is clear that an anti-southern backlash has developed, and is being greatly aided by these recent, self-inflicted scandals. As a result, some southern Republicans who might have been seen as rising stars a decade ago, will likely have major obstacles to overcome if they hope to be prominent leaders in the New GOP.