 Originally, the Republican Party was favored by African Americans after the end of the civil war and emancipation of black slaves.This trend started to gradually change in the 1930s, with Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs that gave economic relief to all minorities including African Americans and Hispanics.Support for the civil rights movement in the 1960s by Democratic presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson helped give the Democrats even larger support among the African-American community, although their position also alienated the Southern white population.