Atlanta's black vote stayed Republican longer than most places

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

How many black people were actually voting in Georgia in 1960, though?

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

Is there any data on how Mack Mattingly did with black voters in 1980? He won that election on the strength of his performance in Atlanta.

Based on the county results, I would think he probably won blacks in urban areas and lost them in rural areas, but I'm not really sure. a lot would depend on turnout as well.

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

Is there any data on how Mack Mattingly did with black voters in 1980? He won that election on the strength of his performance in Atlanta.

Based on the county results, I would think he probably won blacks in urban areas and lost them in rural areas, but I'm not really sure. a lot would depend on turnout as well.

I doubt that.  Southern urban whites were some of the first white voters in the South to flip to the GOP - look at Ford's performance in Hinds County, MS, for example.  So I'd imagine white voters were pretty right-wing in Atlanta - not to say he didn't do well with African-American voters, but 1980 just seems too late for it to be an outright majority.

It's possible, though. Talmadge was a notorious segregationist who unapologetically appealed to racists to win the primary over Zell Miller, who won every metro Atlanta area county. It wouldn't shock me if Mattingly narrowly won black Atlantans. I'm going to assume turnout was majorly low, though.

Why did Talmadge seemingly overwhelmingly win rural blacks then?

[Some of My Best Friends Are Gay]

In King's home city of Atlanta, Nixon outpolled Kennedy in black districts, though his 54 percent marked a slip of 12 points from Eisenhower's share in 1956.

https://books.google.com/books?id=jjRNUM3ULukC&pg=PA84&lpg=PA84&dq=%22city+of+atlanta%22+nixon+mcgovern&source=bl&ots=-yh3ItHfFV&sig=ACfU3U1zaQZvIzt1wMMSmbq64QqT5ktrgA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwimtKKn4oziAhXrsFQKHTXoDLoQ6AEwAXoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

Kennedy won Fulton County by 1.7 in 1960, but it was the third worst performance a Democrat has done there in a presidential election. White voters actually led him to victory.

How was it the third worst? I believe Fulton County has only gone Republican once in history, so who was the Democrat who won it by less than 1.7 points?