North Carolina

F

The 20th Century

After 1900 the state’s farmers enjoyed an improved market. Because of this and the defeats of 1898 and 1900, the populist movement disappeared. The loss of the black vote reduced the Republican Party to impotence for many years. From 1901 to 1973 the Democratic Party maintained an unbroken record of dominance in state government. The Democrats also controlled both houses of the legislature by overwhelming majorities in every session. From the end of the Fusionists’ terms to 1973, every U.S. senator from North Carolina was a Democrat.

F

1

Economic Development

By the 1920s North Carolina was a national leader in the manufacture of textiles, tobacco products, and furniture. The state suffered economic hardship during the Great Depression, the hard times of the 1930s, but after 1933 public works projects funded by the federal government provided jobs for thousands of people, and federal programs aided cotton and tobacco farmers. In World War II (1939-1945) the unemployment problem was significantly reduced as 362,000 North Carolinians went into the armed services and the federal government spent almost $2 billion in the state for war materials. Defense agencies were supplied by 83 industrial plants in the state; among these were the North Carolina Ship Corporation at Wilmington, which turned out 358 ships; and the Ethyl-Dow Plant at Kure Beach, which manufactured all the tetraethyl lead used by the United States in the war. After World War II many Northern businesses, attracted by North Carolina’s restrictions on labor unions, relocated in the state. Many people seeking jobs moved from the farms to the cities, and industry expanded.

By the 1970s an urban way of life and culture had emerged in North Carolina. Nevertheless, problems of poverty persisted, and labor still lacked effective bargaining power. However, in 1974 the right to unionize was won at eight plants belonging to the giant J. P. Stevens Textile Company after an 11-year organizing drive by the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union.

F

2

The Civil Rights Movement

An important part of the civil rights movement—mass sit-ins—originated in Greensboro in February 1960. The tactic was this: A body of blacks and whites together would crowd into a segregated lunch counter and ask for service. If service was refused, they would remain in their seats, taking up most of the available space so that the counter could do little other business until the police came and removed the demonstrators. From Greensboro, this tactic spread throughout the South during the early 1960s. Some establishments closed down their lunch counters, some changed to a stand-up operation, and others began integrated service. Many of the larger cities of North Carolina began to serve blacks and whites together, but in many of the smaller towns, segregated service continued until it was outlawed by the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964.

---

---

When the U.S. Supreme Court in 1954 decided, in Brown v. Board of Education, that segregated schools were unconstitutional, the state was less resistant than most Southern states to desegregation, but proceeded slowly. The legislature in 1955 voted to eliminate any reference to race from the laws of the state but would not go beyond that. By unanimous vote, the legislators approved a resolution stating that:

However, desegregation began in the fall of 1955 on the university undergraduate level, when three black applicants were admitted to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. These were the first in the university’s 160-year history, other than a few who had been specially admitted to the law, medical, and graduate schools. They were admitted under federal court order after the university’s board of trustees initially voted not to process their applications. Integration at lower levels began in the fall of 1957 with three school boards—Charlotte, Winston-Salem, and Greensboro—and gradually spread. After some initial protests by white segregationists, the process was a peaceful one. Busing of pupils to achieve racial desegregation began in the early 1970s in several cities in the state, following a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court in a case involving a Charlotte school district. In 1981 the U.S. Department of Education and North Carolina authorities agreed on a plan for the full desegregation of the state university system by 1986. The agreement ended an 11-year dispute.

Although North Carolina’s black citizens advanced in rights, opportunities, and influence after World War II, they suffered the effects of years of economic, social, legal, and educational inequality. Various organizations advocating white supremacy were still active in the state. In November 1979, five members of the Communist Workers Party were shot to death by a group of Ku Klux Klansmen and American Nazis while holding an anti-Klan protest rally in Greensboro. The six men accused in the killings were found not guilty by a state court jury in November 1980.

F

3

End of One-Party Rule

In the 1960s the Republican Party became stronger in North Carolina, partly in reaction to the liberalism of the Democratic-controlled U.S. Congress. In 1972 the Republicans elected a governor, James E. Holshouser, Jr. (1973-1977), their first since 1901, and a U.S. senator, Jesse A. Helms, their first since 1895. Many other Republican candidates have been elected to Congress since 1972. In 1992 Republicans won control of the state House of Representatives (formerly the house of commons) and many county courthouses. Also in 1992, however, Democrat James B. Hunt, Jr., was elected governor; and Representative Eva M. Clayton, a Democrat, became the first black U.S Congress member from North Carolina since 1901.

Two North Carolina senators got large shares of the national limelight in the late 20th century—Republican Jesse Helms and Democrat Sam J. Ervin, Jr. Helms was first elected senator in 1972 and served until 2003, when he retired. He was outspoken on his stands in favor of traditional moral values. The son of the police chief of Monroe, Helms stuck to his early convictions about law and order, respect for elders, religious faith, and patriotism. He was an opponent of abortion and an advocate of prayer in public schools. Sam Ervin was a North Carolina Supreme Court justice when he was appointed to the U.S. Senate in 1954 to serve the unexpired term of the deceased Clyde R. Hoey. Ervin, who served in the Senate until 1974, was a Democrat of the old school. He opposed most civil rights legislation, generally supported business over labor, and supported U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War (1959-1975). Ervin headed the Senate committee investigating the Watergate Affair (1973-1974) and fought President Richard M. Nixon’s efforts to withhold evidence and testimony on the ground of executive privilege.

North Carolina’s prominence in national politics continued in the 21st century as one of its two U.S. senators, John Edwards, ran for the presidency and eventually became the Democratic party’s vice-presidential candidate in the 2004 elections. Although the ticket of Edwards and presidential candidate John F. Kerry lost nationally and within the state, North Carolina reelected Democrat Mike Easley as governor. The Democrats’ effort to retain Edwards’ Senate seat for the party failed as Republican representative Richard Burr defeated Erskine Bowles, who won the Democratic nomination for the Senate after Edwards decided not to seek reelection.

F

4

Economic Expansion and Diversification

As the 20th century came to a close, North Carolina was at an economic crossroads, as long-established industries slowed and were overtaken by new ones. Tobacco revenues, for years a major part of North Carolina’s economy, began to fall in the 1980s and 1990s. Although the state still led the nation in 1996 in tobacco production and sales, findings about the health hazards of smoking lessened profits, and the industry faced an uncertain future. At the same time, textile mills, once a mainstay of North Carolina’s economy, began to suffer from competition by foreign operators with lower production costs.

Many of these older industries began to be overtaken by high-tech and research and development industries in the 1990s. The driving force behind this change was the Research Triangle Park, which opened in 1959. The park was a cooperative research center created by three North Carolina universities—Duke University in Durham, the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, and North Carolina State University in Raleigh. A unique complex for organizations engaged in institutional, governmental, and industrial research, the park employed in 1998 more than 42,000 people working for more than 100 companies and organizations. The largest single employer at the park in 1998 was International Business Machines Corporation (IBM), a leading manufacturer of computers, which employed about 14,000 people at its facility in the park. Other major employers included Nortel Networks Corporation, a telecommunications company; Glaxo Wellcome Inc., a pharmaceutical concern; and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, a biomedical research institute. The Research Triangle Park has brought prosperity to Durham, Chapel Hill, and Raleigh.

Largely because of the success of endeavors such as the Research Triangle Park, North Carolina’s economy has grown and diversified, and the number of professional and high-tech jobs has increased rapidly. From 1990 to 1997 the state’s economy grew by 31 percent, compared to 20 percent for the United States as a whole in the same period. The state seemed poised to continue its growth well into the 21st century, spurred in part by Dell Computer Corporation’s decision in 2004 to build a manufacturing plant in North Carolina.

This article, except for the history section, was contributed by W. Frank Ainsley.

	More from Encarta
	•  Presidential Myths Quiz •  Coffee break: Recharge your brain