"Let’s face it. Our ass is in a crack. We’re gonna have to let this nigger bill pass." —Lyndon Johnson to Sen. John Stennis, 1957 The transformation of the Democratic Party from the party of racism and segregation to the party of civil rights is, according to historian Eric Rauchway, the central political arc of the 20th century. Rauchway is a left-wing historian, and what he means is that it is the central theme of progressive history about the twentieth century. Yet progressive history has become conventional wisdom, and it is that conventional wisdom I challenge in this article, excerpted...