Who were the Dixiecrats?

The Dixiecrats were a group that emerged in the 1940s primarily in response to the growing civil rights movement and federal efforts aimed at desegregation and promoting racial equality. This group was composed largely of Southern Democrats who sought to maintain white supremacy and resist changes to the established racial order in the United States.

The Dixiecrats formed during the 1948 Democratic National Convention as a breakaway faction when they opposed the party's platform, which included civil rights proposals. Their candidacy in that election, led by Strom Thurmond, sought to protect what they viewed as Southern values and way of life, explicitly standing against federal intervention in racial matters. This historical context underscores why the option identifying them as a group opposing federal efforts to change white supremacy is accurate.

The other options do not align with the core beliefs and actions of the Dixiecrats. For example, their stance was fundamentally against civil rights advancement, making the option suggesting they supported civil rights inaccurate. They were not a northern liberal faction, as they represented a distinctly Southern conservative ideology that clashed with broader Democratic Party values at the time. Lastly, advocating for international peace was not a priority for the Dixiecrats; their focus rested squarely on issues of race