However, unlike the Deep South, the Republican Party had sufficient historic Unionist white support from the mountains and northwestern Piedmont to gain one-third of the statewide vote total in most general elections,[4] where turnout was higher than elsewhere in the former Confederacy due substantially to the state's early abolition of the poll tax in 1920.

[6] Following the banning of white primaries by the Supreme Court, North Carolina in 1948 offered less support to the Dixiecrat bolt than any other former Confederate state, due to the economic liberalism of its Black Belt and solid Democratic party discipline due to consistent Republican opposition.

[7] Although there was little satisfaction with Harry S. Truman during his second term,[8] the loyalty of the white voters of the state’s Black Belt and the previously anti-Al Smith Outer Banks meant that unlike Texas, Florida and Virginia, urban middle-class Republican voting was inadequate to carry North Carolina for Eisenhower.

The state would largely escape the overt “Massive Resistance” seen in neighbouring Virginia,[11] and four of its congressmen did not sign the Southern Manifesto.

[22][23] As in 1952, the key to Stevenson’s victory was the powerful loyalty of Black Belt and Outer Banks white voters.