re: Alabama falls to #49 in ranking of all 50 States. Drops 3 spots from #46 in 2018.

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You can't back up any of your statements with any factual evidence. It's all wrong.

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OK let's go into detail.

First,yeah, for the longest time the Democratic party was the more right wing, populist party of the two majors, holding views diametrically opposed to the mercantilist whigs or the industrialist Republicans. Anti-tariff, pro-slavery, pro-segregation etc.

The shift to the left came in two waves, first with Wilson, then with FDR and his New Deal coalition. The New Deal coalition was unique in that the suggestion of more government intervention was almost universally agreed upon by several factions with differing social views, and had the benefit of pulling black voters away from the Republican party, which the weight of their vote had been directed toward since Reconstruction. The factions agreed upon little else.

Then the push for civil rights happened.

In the 60s, the Republicans learned of these cracks in the so called "solid south" during the election of '64, when Goldwater did the unthinkable and won several states for the Republicans in the south with a campaign almost exclusively against the CRA. The party at large took notice of this, pruned the liberal Rs from their ranks and birthed the "southern strategy."

As for the Democrats, well, the defections in their ranks speak for themselves, Thurmond probably being the most notable example, the "Dixiecrats" being another.