Black voters were very loyal to the party of Lincoln, which after all fought to end slavery and insisted on rights for the newly freed Americans. I haven't studied this extensively to know when it started changing, but I do know that black Americans were grateful to FDR, and maybe even more so to Eleanor. Many New Deal programs gave black folks a share, and that wasn't common or expected at that time. FDR was getting around 70% of black votes for president, which is quite impressive.
In 1948, Truman integrated the military, and got 77% of the black vote and that carried over to 1952. Eisenhower must have been relatively popular with black folks because he raised his take from 24% in 1952 to 39% in 1956.
But this didn't carry over to Nixon, and here's why. Nixon decided to court the white southern vote instead. Maybe this happened because in 1948, white southern Democrats rebelled and formed their own party, the Dixiecrats. This showed the cracks in their loyalty, and probably Nixon took notice, no doubt along with others. So Nixon hoped to court white southern votes, and he did it at the cost of the hopes for equality of black Americans. Martin Luther King felt betrayed. There's little doubt that others did too. Nixon was calculating, and let southern white folks know that they could run their schools their way.
Also, Kennedy stepped up to support Martin Luther King when he was jailed in Georgia in October '60, and get him released. Be sure to read these last two links because the stories are more emotional than I can convey.
Kennedy got 68% of the black vote in 1960. In 1964, that surged to 94% for Johnson, and it hasn't dropped back into the 60s yet. For the complex reasons why, ask black folks and read a lot. But I don't think it's an accident. There are reasons for electoral shifts, and it's wise to pay attention to them.
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