Eastland was a segregationist who led the Southern resistance against racial integration during the civil rights movement, often speaking of African Americans as "an inferior race".

Johnson appointed James Eastland on the condition that he would not run later that year in the special election to complete the term, ensuring that no candidate would have the advantage of incumbency.

"[13] Six weeks before the 1948 United States presidential election, Eastland predicted the defeat of the incumbent President Harry Truman, telling an audience in Memphis, Tennessee that voting for him was a waste.

The Walker campaign was an early Republican effort to attract white conservatives to its ranks, because recently passed civil rights legislation had enabled African Americans in the South to begin participating in the political process, and most of them became active as liberals in the Democratic Party.

Years later, Yerger said that Walker's decision to relinquish his House seat after one term for the vagaries of a Senate race against Eastland was "very devastating" to the growth of the Mississippi Republicans.

His Republican opponent, Gil Carmichael, an automobile dealer from Meridian, was likely aided by President Richard Nixon's landslide reelection in 49 states, including taking 78 percent of Mississippi's popular vote.

Recognizing that Nixon would handily carry Mississippi, Eastland did not endorse the Democratic presidential candidate, George McGovern of South Dakota, who was considered a liberal.

Four years later, Eastland supported the candidacy of fellow Southern Democrat Jimmy Carter of Georgia, rather than Nixon's successor, President Gerald R. Ford.

In January 1970, after G. Harrold Carswell was accused of harboring both sexist and racist beliefs, Eastland told reporters that he believed this was the first instance of a Supreme Court nominee being challenged on his views on the legal rights of women.

During a meeting with reporters, Eastland espoused his view that the Senate would not approve any constitutional amendment reforming the presidential election system that year.

[23] In November, along with fellow Southerners Strom Thurmond and Sam J. Ervin Jr., Eastland was one of three senators to vote against an occupational safety bill that would establish federal supervision to oversee working conditions.

[31] On May 18, 1977, Eastland made a joint appearance with President Jimmy Carter in the Rose Garden in support of proposed foreign intelligence surveillance legislation.

[34] By September 1977, the seventy-three-year-old Eastland was considering retirement, with discussions of Ted Kennedy assuming his position as Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

[38] In August, Newsweek magazine released Eastland's name as one of thirty-six senators who the White House believed would support President Nixon remaining in office in the event of impeachment.

The article mentioned the White House believing some of the supporters were shaky and that thirty-four of them would need to remain firm to override a potential conviction.

He incited protests and comparisons to Hitlerism following a vitriolic speech on the floor of the Senate in July 1945, in which he complained that the Negro soldier was physically, morally, and mentally incapable of serving in combat.

[53] When the Supreme Court issued its decision in the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education, ruling that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, Eastland, like the majority of Southern Democrats, denounced it.

[54] Eastland would become actively involved with the White Citizens' Council, an organization which boasted 60,000 members across the South and was called "the new Klan that enforces thought control by economic pressures.

[58][59] Civil rights workers Mickey Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman went missing in Mississippi on June 21, 1964, during the Freedom Summer efforts to register African American voters.

Its passage caused many Mississippi Democrats to support Barry Goldwater's presidential bid that year, but Eastland did not publicly oppose the election of Johnson.

[66][67] According to Ken Flower, head of the Rhodesian Central Intelligence Operation, Eastland once complained about the fact an hostel of Salisbury was integrated, stating "You've inserted the thin end of the wedge by allowing stinking niggers into such a fine hotel".

[68][69] When he considered running for reelection in 1978, Eastland sought black support from Aaron Henry, civil rights leader and president of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Partly because of the independent candidacy of Charles Evers siphoning off votes from the Democratic nominee, Maurice Dantin, Republican 4th District Representative Thad Cochran won the race to succeed Eastland.

The paper was taking a strong position on its editorial page that Mississippi should adhere to the Brown decision, and claimed that Eastland was persecuting them on that account.

An investigation initiated by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and executed by former FBI agent Walter Sheridan traced some of the unauthorized disclosures to Otto Otepka of the State Department Office of Security.

[79] He maintained friendly personal ties with liberal Democrats such as Ted Kennedy,[80][81] Walter Mondale, Joe Biden[82] and Philip Hart, even though they disagreed on many issues.

[79] In an event recounted by Patrick Leahy in his 2022 memoir, Ted Kennedy once sought to advance in the Judiciary Committee a bill that Eastland opposed.

[85] While at a fundraiser on June 18, 2019, presidential candidate Biden said that one of his greatest strengths was "bringing people together" and pointed to his relationships with Eastland and fellow segregationist senator Herman Talmadge as examples.

'”[86][87] New Jersey Senator Cory Booker was one of many Democrats to criticize Biden for the remarks, issuing a statement that said, "You don't joke about calling black men 'boys.'

Men like James O. Eastland used words like that, and the racist policies that accompanied them, to perpetuate white supremacy and strip black Americans of our very humanity".