THE SOUTH: Tumult in Dixie

Three days after their walkout at Philadelphia, the rebellious Southerners met in Birmingham's red brick municipal auditorium. There they snake-danced under a portrait of Robert E. Lee, flourished Confederate battle flags, and shouted their defiance of Harry Truman and the rest of the Democratic Party.

But the meeting had more lung power than political strength. The delegates, except for those from Mississippi and Alabama, were political outs and has-beens. Most bigwig Southern politicos pointedly stayed away. Even Arkansas' Governor Ben Laney, who had withdrawn as the rebels' favorite son at Philadelphia, remained aloof in his downtown hotel room, contented himself...

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