republicans started shifting from the democratic party to the democratic party simply because the democrats back then, the party of racism, wanted to keep segregation in place and so the only choice that those democrats had were to leave the republican party and first they tried to become what they called dixie crats. that didn t work. and that is how the democrats back then became the republicans of today. and so they were always the party of racism. and back then, there was a group of senators led by senator stevens who really wanted to give blacks the right to vote and all of their rights. and one of the reasons that we have all of these constitutional amendments, the 13th amendment which limg na eliminated slavery, 14th that gave black people the right to be citizens, the 15th amendment