(born 1902) Perennial senator from South Carolina. Thurmond was elected as a Democratic governor in 1946, but veered away from Truman’s civil rights agenda to head the splinter Dixiecrat presidential ticket in 1948. Winning a write-in ballot for the Senate in 1954, Thurmond has held onto his seat and beliefs for decades, although he switched to the Republicans in 1964, a watershed year for the transformation of the Democratic South into a conservative Republican enclave. Despite increasing black voter registration and Sunbelt development, Thurmond represents a power broker for his state in addition to his hawkish, moralistic roles in the Senate. As of 1996, he became the oldest person ever to serve in the Senate.