Why was Virginia so reliably Republican for over 50 years?

[Cyrusman]

It is stunning how reliably Republican the state was. It voted for the GOP nominee in every election from 1952- 2004 except in 1964.
This is state that voted for Gerald Ford over Jimmy carter and Bob dole over Bill Clinton.

[If my soul was made of stone]

Suburbanization and racial tension. The main suburban counties of Richmond, at the time one of the white-flightiest parts of the country, gave Goldwater double-digit victories, and were the key to Ford squeaking by. The Byrd Organization controlled state politics for much of that period and broke with the national Democrats early on, as exemplified by "massive resistance" and Harry Byrd Jr. leaving the party in 1970. The suburbs diversifying and becoming more aligned with their respective cities was key to Obama breaking that streak.

[TML]

During the same time period, Southwestern VA was a Democratic stronghold, as it was part of Appalachia (just like WV, eastern KY, western NC, etc.). However, the suburbs of Richmond and Washington DC were more populous than the rural parts of the state, so Republicans were able to dominate this state from the second half of the 20th century to the first few years of the 2000s (they were the dominant party in most of the nation's suburbs during much of this time period), but by the late 2000s, realignment meant that the more populous suburbs had shifted Democratic while the sparsely populated Southwest had shifted Republican, thereby handing the state to the Democrats.

[Skill and Chance]

1952-66: Machine politics with several nominally Democratic county poll tax collectors backing Republicans, and a handful of suburban counties managing to organize reasonably high turnout and wrest control from the local machine by voting near unanimously Republican.  We would not recognize what was happening in this period as free elections today.

1967-2004: Standard suburban vaguely socially conservative Republican majority, with lots of highly educated businesspeople relative to the rest of the South 

[One Term Floridian]

Honestly makes you see how bad of a candidate Goldwater must have been to lose VA even after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Ford winning in 1976 isn’t as surprising since he did well in suburbs generally and VA is so suburban

[Alben Barkley]

Honestly makes you see how bad of a candidate Goldwater must have been to lose VA even after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Ford winning in 1976 isn’t as surprising since he did well in suburbs generally and VA is so suburban

Ford also barely won it, as did Dole.

[Skill and Chance]

Honestly makes you see how bad of a candidate Goldwater must have been to lose VA even after the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Ford winning in 1976 isn’t as surprising since he did well in suburbs generally and VA is so suburban

There was some local success in breaking through the racist voting system by that point.  Turnout was up 30% in VA from 1960 to 1964.

[Bootes Void]

For the same reason it is the only southern state that votes for democrats. It's is a highly suburbanite/urbanite that is white collar compared to the rest of the south.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Because D's won WVA due to Robert C Byrd and it's a Tobacco state, now VA is a D state due to Unions

[GregTheGreat657]

Because D's won WVA due to Robert C Byrd and it's a Tobacco state, now VA is a D state due to Unions

VA is a pretty white collar state that has historically been more anti-union than most, so unions aren't a big factor there. IMO Virginia's shift is because the state is becoming more diverse and well educated, and also a greater suburban shift in recent years.

[CascadianIndy]

Virginia is the quintessential suburban state, and that means before the shift began under Clinton, they were rock solid R.

[Schiff for Senate]

Northern Virginia was red / only marginally blue, until 2008 onwards.

[Vice President Christian Man]

GOP strength in NOVA area during that period

[Non Swing Voter]

Virginia is an extremely suburban state.  It doesn't have a big city within its boundaries.  It has a few medium sized ones and a decent amount of rural area but it's basically a solid majority suburban depending on how the suburbs are defined.  In normal times this would be advantageous to Republicans, but now it helps Democrats more (though not to the extent it used to help Republicans).