Mississippi 1964?

[Kantakouzenos]

To expand on what some other people have said, African American votes were very intensely suppressed.  Only 6 or 7 % of Mississippi blacks were registered to vote in 1961, and in some heavily black counties there weren't any registered African Americans.  The people in power held a lot of control over who they would let register to vote.  In many urban counties for instance, they would let honored or token blacks like lawyers, doctors, veterans and the like to register, but not anyone else, and certainly not enough to influence the election outcome.  Also, of those who were registered to vote, even fewer would dare turn out to vote.  Of all the Southern States, Mississippi was the worst in this regard.  Most of those votes for Johnson probably came from white's who either weren't put off by his opposition to segregation, or understood that segregation was wrong and wanted to see it ended.

Even with Mississippi being the worst offender in this regard, 87% for Goldwater is still pretty extreme.  It's also important to consider that the way Johnson handled the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Delegation at the convention did him no favors.  For those who don't know, two delegations from Mississippi showed up at the 1964 convention, the Democratic Party of Mississippi's delegation, who was selected by an all white primary, and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegation, comprised of black and white activists seeking to claim that that the Mississippi Democratic Party was illegitimate.  Johnson was upset by the MFDP's presence, but he tried to be diplomatic by letting them have a few seats.  The Mississippi Democratic Party delegation walked out unhappy, and the MFDP felt like they got the short end of the stick.  This probably had an affect on Mississippi being much more Republican than Alabama where Johnson wasn't even allowed on the ballot.