How Reagan won 49 states

[old timey villain]

Hello all and happy holidays! I'll admit, I'm pretty young, 22 years old (even though that seems old to me) and in the current era of intense political polarization, it still amazes me to look at the 1984 election map and look at all of the states Reagan won, and won handily. Some I can understand

California- An obvious win for Reagan, since he was Gov of California and it was much more republican during that time.

Vermont- at the time, history still pulled most voters here to the republican candidate, since the state still has a long long legacy of supporting Republicans

Washington and Oregon- weren't the liberal bastions they are today, and proximity to California helped Reagan

But there are some states that I just can't figure out how Reagan won! Such as...

Massachusetts- By this time, Massachusetts has transitioned to being a solidly democratic state, with two democratic senators, a democratic governor and was still filled with the sort of liberal intellectuals who would have hated Reagan's rhetoric.  So how did Reagan win the state by 3 points. For that matter, how did Dukakis only win Massachusetts by less than 8 points??

New Jersey- I'm not surprised that Reagan won New Jersey, but I'm surprised he won it by as much as he did. What has changed in New Jersey that has totally changed its political lean

Hawaii- he won it handily. How?


So, I was wondering if you guys could give me some answers, especially those of you who remember the election very well. Besides the obvious advantage Reagan had in 1984, what else brought on this landslide? Did he just get a large chunk of the white vote or did a large number of minorities support him as well? What states did the Reagan democrats have the most effect on?

I NEED ANSWERS

[Antonio the Sixth]

For the most parts, I share your doubts. I don't know how Reagan managed to win in MA, RI, or even NY. For New Jersey though, it's not that surprising. Remember that even in 1992 Clinton almost lost it. Its democratic realignment only dates back to the late 90s AFAIK. As for Hawaii, its voting patterns have never been extremely clear. Sure, it's usually more democratic than the nation as a whole, and in 2008 it's given Obama a stalinian victory, but it's used to pretty weird swings (from giving Humphrey a landslide in 1968 to supporting Nixon by an even more commanding margin in 1972, to narrowly voting for Carter when he won in 1976, to still narrowly supporting him when he got trounced nationwide, etc...). My guess is that Alaska and Hawaii, being recent State, have taken a few decades to "stabilize" their voting patterns, after experiencing wild swings in both directions (remember LBJ also won Alaska with 66% !).

[Mechaman]

You guys wanna know how Reagan won Massachusetts and Rhode Island?

Two words:

Reagan.  Democrats.

Know where that term comes from?  It comes from normally working class Democratic voters who shift over to Reagan in large numbers in 1984 because the guy had sex appeal amongst them.  To get even more specific I should note that in 1980 Ronald Reagan, at least according to what I read on wikipedia, won South Boston with 53% of the vote.
For some reason the staunch Irish and Italian Catholic Democratic voting blocs in the Northeast had a love affair with Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984.  This, combined with moderate and liberal Republicans who felt too turned off by Mondale to consider jumping ship, is probably why he did so well in traditionally Democratic bastions like MA and RI.
Not sure about New York though.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

New Jersey? Rich people.

[NY Jew]

You guys wanna know how Reagan won Massachusetts and Rhode Island?

Two words:

Reagan.  Democrats.

Know where that term comes from?  It comes from normally working class Democratic voters who shift over to Reagan in large numbers in 1984 because the guy had sex appeal amongst them.  To get even more specific I should note that in 1980 Ronald Reagan, at least according to what I read on wikipedia, won South Boston with 53% of the vote.
For some reason the staunch Irish and Italian Catholic Democratic voting blocs in the Northeast had a love affair with Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984.  This, combined with moderate and liberal Republicans who felt too turned off by Mondale to consider jumping ship, is probably why he did so well in traditionally Democratic bastions like MA and RI.
Not sure about New York though.

Reagan Democrats were big in NY (i think he won big with Orthodox Jews and Irish and Italian Catholics (there were a lot more Catholics then and around half as many Orthodox jews as there are now))
Ford almost beat Carter in NY.  there were less democratic only minorities (Black plus Hispanic) in NY then and the upstate cities had more people.  And most importantly those pesky Hipsters, and other low lives of the country didn't start moving to NY till later.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

NJ wasn't a solid Democratic state in presidential election until 1990s.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

As for Hawaii, its voting patterns have never been extremely clear. Sure, it's usually more democratic than the nation as a whole, and in 2008 it's given Obama a stalinian victory, but it's used to pretty weird swings (from giving Humphrey a landslide in 1968 to supporting Nixon by an even more commanding margin in 1972, to narrowly voting for Carter when he won in 1976, to still narrowly supporting him when he got trounced nationwide, etc...). My guess is that Alaska and Hawaii, being recent State, have taken a few decades to "stabilize" their voting patterns, after experiencing wild swings in both directions (remember LBJ also won Alaska with 66% !).

Hawaii seems to have, despite it's liberal nature, a strong pro-incumbent bias in elections. Just four years before Obama, a native son after all, won it by a sweeping margin, it was relatively close between Kerry and Bush. At some point (which was even mentioned by Polish press) Hawaii appeared to be a tossup.

[RosettaStoned]

 Reagan was at the height of his popularity in 1984, the economy was making a turnaround and his opponent, Walter Mondale made a big mistake by saying he would raise taxes.

[MIKESOWELL]

The country was not as polarized as it is right now. Conservative Democrats liked Reagan, and a great number of them defected in the Presidential election and voted for Reagan, while at the lower election levels continued to vote Democratic. This is one reason why Reagan's coattails were not that long. Many areas that are Democratic bastions were either still Republican during the 1980s, or competitive.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

Because he was the most charismatic president in American history.

[Tidewater_Wave]

Hawaii- wasn't as blue as it is today and even now wouldn't be as blue if not for Obama

Massachusetts- Reagan did very well with unions there.

New Jersey- This state was a reddish purple until the 90's and even now is purplish blue. Suburban voters were very Republican until the 90's and now only lean GOP whereas small towns used to be very Democratic and now only lean Democratic. 

Keep in mind too demographic changes due to migration. Many voters have moved from NY to NJ to avoid such high taxes which has torn away at moderation there as a whole.  The same has happened to Virginia with the voters who moved there from Maryland in order to avoid the millionaire tax.  This is why high taxes don't work.  Those who pay high taxes can always afford to move. One other thing is that Walter Mondale was a horrendous candidate.

[I'm JewCon in name only.]

Hawaii LOVES incumbent presidents. Like a lot.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Because Roe wasn't clearly a divisive issue until Kennedy was appointed in 1988 and it clearly divided the country during the Kennedy and Bork confirmation along secular and traditional lines after those nomination fights on the Supreme Crt. Before then fitness was more important than ideology and it transformed into the prez race then when Jesse Jackson ran for prez in 1988.

[krazen1211]

http://gqrr.com/index.php?ID=1952


Democratic defectors left the Democrats because they believed the party had turned away from them, prioritizing special interests, particularly unions and minorities over middle class interests.
Democrats who abandoned the party in l980 and 1984 are open again to the Democratic Party. Although they have not returned to the fold, for many of them the Democrats offer the best route to the future.
Democratic defectors have not mellowed in their view of minorities as a “special interest,” though their feelings now seem somewhat less personal and somewhat more detached politically.
Democratic defectors who, two years ago, felt economically vulnerable now seem relatively confident about their jobs and economic prospects.
The Democratic defectors look back on the Reagan era without regret, as a period when America got “straightened out.” Reagan set the country in a “better direction."

[SingingAnalyst]

Going into the 84 election, the US had voted out of office 2 incumbent Presidents in a row (Ford and then Carter), which hadn't happened in nearly 100 years. Plus we had 5 Presidents in 20 years and were coming off of nearly 20 years of turmoil. Sincer Carter was fresh in everyone's mind, Reagan was able (with his communication skills) to blame the Dems. More to the point though Americans wanted stability. I believe Americans were ready to re-elect anyone who did even a halfway decent job in 1981-84-- and many Americans felt Reagan had done more than halfway decent. Sure, plenty of Americans opposed Reagan, but they were simply outvoted by those who supported Reagan, even with reservations (the Dems retained the House that year and picked up 2 Senate seats). At least that was a factor in my '84 vote for Reagan, even while I voted to re-elect my Dem Senator (Carl Levin).

I think it's great you take an interest in public affairs at such a young age. And yes, 22 is very young. I wish you all the best. Remember no political decision is perfect and we all do the best we can, shaped by the events that define our time.

[SingingAnalyst]

The real surprise was not Massachusetts, but rather Rhode Island and also Maryland to a certain extent.

I was surprised too, but even if Mondale had won MA, RI, MD (all the states he lost by less than 7%) he still would have suffered the 2nd worst electoral defeat in US history.

[Fuzzy Says: "Abolish NPR!"]

Several reasons apply here:

1.  The improving economy.  This has been mentioned.

2.  Mondale explicitly saying he'd raise taxes.  That was stupid.

3.  The continuing Cold War conflict with the Soviets, coupled with the perception of the dominant faction of the Democratic Party as naïve peaceniks, gave the Presidential GOP a huge structural advantage.

4.  Continuing white racism in suburbia kept the suburbs Republican.  Blacks moving into white neighborhoods in suburbia was a huge issue for "dog whistle politics" through the 1980s.

5.  America was far, far more socially conservative in 1984 than it is today, and on every front.  Reagan was a master at telling ordinary Americans that there was nothing wrong with their social worldview, and a master at pointing out Democratic criticism of that worldview.

6.  Mondale and Ferraro (who was a terrible candidate) came off as pandering on more than one occasion.  The Ferraro pick was viewed as pandering to women, and came after Mondale interviewed candidates of a wide-ranging span of ethnic origins, some of whom were royally unqualified (e. g. Philadelphia Mayor Wilson Goode, who had only been on the job less than a year, and was not considered a successful Mayor.)

7.  Reagan was likeable and projected strength in ways that social media makes impossible today.

Those are the generalities.  Now for some specifics:

In MASSACHUSETTS and RHODE ISLAND, Reagan benefitted greatly from his Irish heritage.  Though not Catholic, Reagan was descended from a line of Irish Kings, a fact made known at the beginning of his Presidency.  Reagan got the votes of Yankee Republicans far less conservative than he was, but he also got the votes of socially conservative Irish Democrats in Boston and throughout New England. 

In HAWAII, Reagan was an incumbent President.  Hawaii had high support for incumbents, and was very pro-military during the Cold War.  Hawaii's margins for Nixon in 1972 were above his national averages.

NJ, MI, MD, and most Northeast and Midwest suburban communities had major issues with school busing for racial integration in the 1960s and 1970s.  This issue was a real non-starter for white Democrats and something that many white Democrats blamed the Democratic Party for. 

NJ also had tax issues.  NYC middle class folks fled the city for NJ and its absence of a state income tax, only to have a Democratic Governor impose on in the late 1970s.  Through the 1980s, tax issues galvanized NJ suburban voters in what was an almost entirely suburban state.

[Kingpoleon]

I imagine he won a good deal of Humphrey 1968/Ford 1976 moderate voters, some of whom stayed home in 1972. By voting for Ford, they became less hesitant to support Republicans. Combined with Reagan's natural charisma and great campaign, he managed to unite his own 1980 coalition, Ford 1976/Carter 1980, and Ford/Anderson voters into three groups(1. conservative Republicans, Democrats, and independents; 2. moderate Republicans and independents; 3. Hawkish Democrats and moderately liberal Republicans).

[Intell]

Regan Democrats, were not working class, they were white ethnic middle class people that lived in the suburbs of a city, which had increasing am mount of black people moving to where they lived.

[sg0508]

1) The economy was better. Reagan was elected in '80 to fix stagflation. His economic team did after the bad recession of '81-82.

2) Mondale was a old Democrat.  Their party had no base anymore.  The southern democrats were switching (i.e. Reagan Democrats) and the party wasn't strong enough in the Midwest and northeast.

3) Reagan's charisma.

4) The country was still solidly "white" for the most part.  Remember that Reagan did very badly amongst minorities, but it didn't matter given the '84 demographics.  There were plenty of people who supported him or Anderson in '80 that voted for Mondale in '84.

5) Given the GOP strength in '80, they had a near lock from the get go on the south and west from the start. 

6) Mondale being on the ticket from the '80 electoral debacle couldn't have helped his cause.

7) The economy, and while you say the Reagan Revolution started the shift in power from small business to corporations, which has doomed many Americans today, back then, the economic recovery was a short-term breath of fresh air.