There was no economic infrastructure outside the plantation system, and power remained in the hands of a small minority of white and mixed-race individuals.
The plantation system was the only economic infrastructure at the time.
Finally, lest their opponents' weakness not suffice to produce a landslide, both incumbents got further help from a third-party  Nixon from George Wallace, who drained white Southern support from the Democrats, and Clinton from Ross Perot, who likely will drain white suburbanites from Dole.