Well, there is a fair bit of debate, yes, and I don't think that Nixon was trying to use racism to change the vote there, but I do think there was a strategy to try and improve the republican vote there - but seemed more around state rights / law and order / stronger border controls, but as an unintended result it does seem to me that people that were racist and previously voted Democrat, started voting Republican instead - and while not necessarily the intent of the leaders, does mean that people who are racist towards people of colour at least these days are more likely to vote Republican than Democrat, and unintended consequence or not, I think it means the Republican party doesn't have quite the clean sheet that they used to have.
How do you define racism? And what are examples of racism today?
Also, have you examined the southern strategy of the democrats? Why the majority of blacks switched from the republican party to the democratic party?
Re racism - I tend to take the view of:
prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group
examples today - remnants of the KKK, various white supremacist groups across the world, the treatment of white farmers in Zimbabwe, people who happily paint all people of one group a particular way, people who evince views of people 'not being white enough' or 'not being black enough'
Regarding the democrat strategy, not a southern one as such, but yes I'm aware of their strategy of painting themselves as the saviours(?) of marginalized groups, with conflict of interest being that only way to be sure of vote long term is to be sure they are always marginalized as such.