Joseph B. Parker,
Politics in Mississippi
Second Edition
|
Description:
Time flies in politics. Since the first edition of Politics in
Mississippi was published in 1993 a great deal has changed in
Mississippi. This long overdue revision addresses those changes in a
straightforward, readable manner.
The contributors to Politics in Mississippi, Second Edition
and its editor, Joseph B. Parker, have succeeded in capturing Mississippi’s
distinctiveness in this book. Mississippi has a long and colorful political
history. This updated book presents an honest, descriptive analysis of the
politics of Mississippi without going to the extreme of being either a
whitewash or an exposé.
Features of Second Edition:
Many
important revisions have been made. Three new chapters have been
added.
-
Includes in-depth discussion of casino
gambling in Mississippi
-
Contains many helpful figures, maps, tables
and graphs
-
Text is clearly written with a minimum of
professional jargon
-
Examines the formal institutions and the
dynamics of the state’s political process.
-
Of interest to academicians, journalists,
practicing politicians and students within and outside
the state of Mississippi
Excerpt:
Preface to First Edition
Books are a product, and to be considered for publication and
to be marketed successfully, they require consumers. When I began
considering the editing of this book, I first had to convince myself,
and then a publisher, that there were readers who would be willing to
purchase it. I had no difficulty in ascertaining the need for this
product. The American states are semi-autonomous units of political
activity that interest an extensive audience. As a consequence, a
veritable cottage industry has sprung up to produce writings that will
satisfy the demands of such a widespread readership.
With a chapter devoted to each state, some books examine the
politics of all the states—the best known of these comprehensive books
is Neal Pierce and Jerry Hagstrom's The Book of America: Inside the Fifty States Today. Other works examine state politics within the
context of a region. The southern states have been written about most
in these regional works because of the South's unique history and its
colorful political style. Finally, some books examine the politics of
only one state. Some states stimulate more books concerning their
politics than do others. My impressionistic view is that Texas has
more books devoted to its politics than does any other state.
Considering Mississippi's size, its turbulent political history, and
its distinctive politics, it is difficult to understand why more has
not been written concerning its politics.
This book on Mississippi politics is in the mainstream of the
traditional works on the politics of one state in that it examines the
formal institutions of government and the dynamics of the political
process. Mississippi, as does every other state, has a distinct way in
which its political system works, and it is my desire, as well as that
of the writer of each chapter, to capture the essence of this
distinctiveness in this book.
Who is the potential readership of this book? Authors and
editors generally want everyone to buy and read their works, but such
an expectation is not realistic. Not every Mississippian is interested
enough in politics to read a book on this state's politics. But I am
convinced that many people in Mississippi have a sufficiently
sustained interest in their state's politics to do so, along with many
people outside of Mississippi. Mississippi has a long and colorful
political history that stirs the interests of academicians,
journalists, and practicing politicians along with "political junkies"
who have no professional need to read about it, but do have
intellectual curiosity. My goal in organizing and editing this book
was to produce a work that would be of interest to a broad audience. I
hope that anyone interested in Mississippi politics will find this
book informative and readable.
I selected a group of writers (most of whom were my friends
when this enterprise began and, hopefully, still are) whom I judged to
be know-ledgeable on particular aspects of Mississippi's politics and
capable of writing readable chapters. I did not tell them what to
write or how to write. Certain risks flow from such a decision because
their interpretations are frequently quite different from mine and
each contributing author has her or his own unique writing style. I
edited with a light hand in order not to reinterpret inadvertently
while rewriting. My principle task was to compel my associates to be
more concise; since they were convinced of the importance of the
subject on which they wrote, they tended to produce chapters that were
a bit too long. With cajolery and persuasion I was able to cut the
length of this book by about one-fourth, hopefully without diluting
its substance. My other task was to push for consistency in language.
Political scientists are afflicted with their own lingo which does not
always add to the illumination of the lay reader's mind. I have sought
to minimize the use of professional jargon in this work.
During the early 1960s, I frequently saw bumper stickers
which said "Mississippi: The Most Lied About State in the Union."
Mississippians as much as, if not more than, other Americans are
sensitive to criticism of their home state. As a naturalized
Mississippian I have come to understand this sensitivity of
Mississippians to the "image" of their state. Rightly or wrongly, many
Mississippians feel that national media coverage of their state is
almost always negative in tone. Reassurance that good news is not news
does not reassure. Readers of this book will likely find it too
critical in places and not critical enough in others. The purpose of
this book is not meant to be an exposé or a whitewash, but rather to
present an honest descriptive analysis of that system, "warts and
all." If we have done that, our work is a success.
Joseph B. Parker
Preface to Second Edition
Time flies in politics. Since the first edition of Politics in Mississippi was published in 1993, a great deal has changed in
Mississippi. At that time the state had only recently elected its
first 20th century Republican governor and lieutenant
governor. GOP Governor Fordice was reelected in 1995 while the GOP
lieutenant governor was narrowly defeated. Mississippi returned a
Democrat to the governor’s office in 1999 with the smallest margin in
the state’s history. Two-party competition evolved in the 1990s in
peculiar fashion.
Twice in the 1990s (1995 and 1999) Mississippi voters were
confronted with term limit initiatives aimed at legislators. On both
occasions term limits were rejected. That alone should prove that
politics in Mississippi is truly different since term limit proposals
have succeeded virtually everywhere they have been submitted.
The decade of the 1990s saw Mississippi become the third
largest casino state in the nation with the Gulf Coast and Tunica
County looking more like Las Vegas than the Bible Belt. Mississippi
has increasingly depended on casino taxes to supply a significant
portion of its revenue stream.
The aforementioned developments plus many others called for a
new edition of Politics in Mississippi. This second edition
updates the first to reflect developments in the interim; plus three
new chapters have been added. The result, I believe, is a bigger,
better, and more up-to-date book.
Joseph B.
Parker
Table of Contents:
Back to Top
