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Utilizing recently opened politically sensitive materials at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, this article shows how welfare reform became increasingly important to the Nixon administration's political ambitions for a new conservative majority, consisting of southern white conservatives and northern working‐ and middle‐class white voters. Welfare reform rose to the top of the president's domestic policy agenda for a number of reasons, but the president selected the Family Assistance Plan (FAP) over more conservative alternatives in keeping with his political aims: the FAP would redistribute federal welfare to the white working poor in northern metropolitan areas, while simultaneously increasing federal welfare spending in southern states. As the 1970 midterm elections approached, however, the predominant political focus for the FAP became the effort to appeal to blue‐collar, northern white‐ethnic voters. In the aftermath of the disappointing results from those elections, President Nixon and his political team became convinced that a New Deal–style redistributive strategy was ineffective in appealing to conservative voters in the "silent majority," especially southern conservatives who were opposed to any expansion of federal welfare, even when they would benefit directly. Instead, Nixon began to emphasize the FAP's value as a platform for launching strong rhetorical attacks on welfare. While the president subsequently pulled back from pushing for FAP's legislative enactment, offering an important explanation for the measure's failure, his antiwelfare rhetoric was politically successful, providing subsequent national conservative leaders with a political formula for utilizing antiwelfare rhetoric to build support among white working‐ and middle‐class voters.

Cover -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Contents -- Introduction -- Part One. National Political Dynasties -- Chapter 1. The Bush Dynasty -- Chapter 2. The Cabot Lodge Dynasty -- Chapter 3. The Clinton Dynasty -- Chapter 4. The Gore Dynasty -- Chapter 5. The Kennedy Dynasty -- Chapter 6. The Paul Dynasty -- Chapter 7. The Rockefeller Dynasty -- Chapter 8. The Romney Dynasty -- Chapter 9. The Roosevelt Dynasty -- Chapter 10. The Taft Dynasty -- Part Two. State Political Dynasties -- Chapter 11. The Brown Dynasty -- Chapter 12. The Byrd Dynasty -- Chapter 13. The Cuomo Dynasty -- Chapter 14. The La Follette Dynasty -- Chapter 15. The Roberts Dynasty -- Chapter 16. The Simpson Dynasty -- Part Three. Regional and Metropolitan Political Dynasties -- Chapter 17. The Daley Dynasty -- Chapter 18. The Dingell Dynasty -- Chapter 19. The Udall Dynasty -- Conclusion: American Democracy and Hereditary Power in the 21st Century -- About the Editors and Contributors -- Index