The intermittent perusal of Safire’s Political Dictionary led to this discovery today:
Coinage of Dixiecrat was attributed to William Weismer, telegraph editor of the Charlotte (N.C.) News, who had difficulty squeezing States Rights Democrats into a headline. Alabama Governor Frank Dixon did not like the new nickname: “Dixiecrats leaves the wrong impression,” he complained. “Our contention is that we are returning to the original concepts of the founding fathers of our nation and the Democratic Party.” Harry Truman was having none of that.
For those unfamiliar with the term, William Safire tells us a Dixiecrat was a “Southern Democrat who bolted the national party in 1948 in opposition to President Truman’s civil rights platform.”
