The white flight to the surrounding counties during the forced busing of the 70s is the root of Nashville’s left leanings. Things may have been different had Casey Jenkins, pictured below, won in the hotly-contested mayor's race in 1971. Jenkins bravely stated:
We love our God, our nation, our country, our homes and our children. We must let those men who call themselves Supreme know that we are not going to let them juggle our children around like bowling pins at a circus.
But the liberal political machine defied the will of the people and forced-integration became a sad reality. The creation of Metro in 1962 is what led to a single school district, making the leftist dream of force-integration easier to implement.
Even if Jenkins won in 1971, he would’ve been the last-gasp backlash to the social leftist issues of the day before the inevitable fall. He would’ve lost to Fulton in 1975 most likely.
Remember that even in Detroit, they elected a Conservative Democrat in 1970 as Mayor in backlash to the execrable left-wing White incumbent who contributed to the mass exodus of the productive class of citizens and presided over the riots. It wasn’t enough to stop the horrific Coleman Young from defeating him 4 years later, and the remaining White citizens (numbering nearly a million) left the city.