In the research that led up to The Emerging Republican Majority, Kevin Phillips helped to orchestrate the development of a Southern Strategy to exploit white resentment of the Civil Rights Movement.  Here is an excellent New York Times profile of Phillips from May 1970:  Nixon’s Southern Strategy ‘It’s All in the Charts’

The highlight, for present purposes, is this:

The more Negroes who register as Democrats in the South, the sooner the Negrophobe whites will quit the Democrats and become Republicans. That’s where the votes are.

Crossposted at StopDogWhistleRacism.com