Who was the last republican nominee to win new york city?

[Matty]

Did it happen at all in the 20th century?

[Mr. Smith]

Calvin Coolidge, 1924.

Between Davis the arch-conservative and La Follette the Populist, New Englander Coolidge was prime for it.

[CountryClassSF]

Staten Island alone is usually the only borough we are competitive in

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Coolidge won a plurality of the vote in New York City.  He had a relatively strong appeal with Catholics, and La Follette won a lot of the immigrant community vote, leaving less for the Democrats.

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

[Matty]

Coolidge won a plurality of the vote in New York City.  He had a relatively strong appeal with Catholics, and La Follette won a lot of the immigrant community vote, leaving less for the Democrats.

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

Republicans did not win NYC between 1860 and 1896? I thought for sure they would have. I know that the democratic NYC machine was very very well known and strong (Tammany Hall), but still. I guess I have somewhat of a wrong view of what type of people voted republican back then.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Coolidge won a plurality of the vote in New York City.  He had a relatively strong appeal with Catholics, and La Follette won a lot of the immigrant community vote, leaving less for the Democrats.

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

Republicans did not win NYC between 1860 and 1896? I thought for sure they would have. I know that the democratic NYC machine was very very well known and strong (Tammany Hall), but still. I guess I have somewhat of a wrong view of what type of people voted republican back then.

What type of people did you believe voted Republucan back then?

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

They won it in 1896, but not 1900 or 1904? That seems...strange.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

They won it in 1896, but not 1900 or 1904? That seems...strange.

Bryan's 1896 bimetalist populism campaign failed spectacularly in the Northeast.  Once the focus turned to other issues (imperialism, tariffs), the Democrats bounced back a bit there.

[KCDem]

Calvin Coolidge.

Richard Nixon came close though.

Lol no

[Nichlemn]

Calvin Coolidge.

Richard Nixon came close though.

Lol no

1972? Nixon won Staten Island and Queens and came close in Brooklyn.

[ElectionsGuy]

Calvin Coolidge.

Richard Nixon came close though.

Lol no

3 points isn't close?

[TDAS04]

Coolidge in 1924, but it was close in 1956 and 1972.

[Nichlemn]

Hmm, which borough is more Democratic: Manhattan or Brooklyn? They've differed in their relative ranking in previous elections, with Manhattan going more D at the Presidential election, but Brooklyn more D at the mayoral level. Definitely Manhattan is more elastic, with a lot of Bloomberg/Obama voters in the Upper East Side and the like, while Brooklyn is pretty polarised with a good number of 99% Obama precincts (heavily minority) and 90% Romney precincts (heavily ultra-Orthodox Jewish).

[Mr.Phips]

I can't even think of a time a Republican won it in a statewide race.  Even in Pataki's two reelections he got blown out in NYC even as he was winning in a landslide statewide.

[Nichlemn]

I can't even think of a time a Republican won it in a statewide race.  Even in Pataki's two reelections he got blown out in NYC even as he was winning in a landslide statewide.

Maybe Dewey or Rockefeller won it once? (Though looking at their performances, although they each won multiple terms, they never won by especially large margins, so probably not).

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

The only other times the GOP won NYC were 1896 and 1920.

They won it in 1896, but not 1900 or 1904? That seems...strange.

Bryan's 1896 bimetalist populism campaign failed spectacularly in the Northeast.  Once the focus turned to other issues (imperialism, tariffs), the Democrats bounced back a bit there.

Yeah, I can see where Bryan would be the kind of Democrat who wouldn't do well in NYC, but I'm just surprised he carried it in 1900 and 1908 but not in 1896 when his margin of defeat nationally was smaller. As you said though, different issues.

[Matty]

It surprises me that both the "progressive/liberal" republican party of the 19th and early 20th century and the conservative republican party of today both get crushed there.

Did NYC switch from conservatism to liberalism at the same time the Rs switched from liberalism to conservativism?

[Goldwater]

It surprises me that both the "progressive/liberal" republican party of the 19th and early 20th century and the conservative republican party of today both get crushed there.

Did NYC switch from conservatism to liberalism at the same time the Rs switched from liberalism to conservativism?

The shifting of political issues and coalitions over the years isn't quite as simplistic as you make it out to be. Even when the Republican party was "liberal", which isn't exactly the same type of "liberal" as the modern Democratic party, it didn't really perform well with the various demographics of New York City, such as Irish Catholics.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It surprises me that both the "progressive/liberal" republican party of the 19th and early 20th century and the conservative republican party of today both get crushed there.

Did NYC switch from conservatism to liberalism at the same time the Rs switched from liberalism to conservativism?

The Republicans have generally always been the party of business and of religiously (Protestant) motivated crusades (In those day's abolition and prohibition/temperance, as well as the public schools).

All of those reforms were opposed by the German and Irish Catholic immigrant groups. Abolition would bring blacks into competition for their jobs whilst slavery kept them safely down south (Dred Scott is in my view the key that causes this viewpoint to shift as it raised the specter of slavery itself bringing about that very competition. Hence why Lincoln emphasized "all Slave or all free". It was brilliant political strategy as it forced these pro-slavery northerns to flip and vote for a moderate anti-slavery Republian like Lincoln both in 1858 [he won the collective popular vote but lost since Senators were elected by state legislature] and 1860. This did not include NYC where Lincoln lost and barely carried the state by a narrow margin thanks to solid support upstate and NYC was one of the hotbeds of copperhead sympath during the war (Fernando Wood?) as well as the site of the NYC draft riots (those same pro-slavery working class Irish Democrats against the blacks)). Prohibition of alcohol interferred with the strong heritage of strong spirits and beer amongst those immigrant groups. Also the Republicans being of Congregational (Puritan) New England and Midwestern stock largely, preferred that the King James Bible be read in said public schools and Catholic immigrants wanted nothing to do with that. So instead they opened parochial schools and Republicans tried to ban school choice to force them to go to public schools and be tought the "good (Protestant) Christian education lest they be condemned to hell for eternity".

You also had the nativist element from both the Whigs and Know-Nothings, which in the north was folded into the Republican Party. From the Whigs and before them, The Federalists, you inherited those that opposed the extension of the vote to all white males (they preferred property and wealth requirements).

In contrast, as far back as Jefferson, the Democrats ascribed to be the Party of the common man against the elites and the Party of immigrants. They supported the extension of the franchise to all white males and welcomed the immigrants from Ireland and elsewhere, particularly in NY, where they used the corruption of Tammany Hall to get them jobs and other forms of assistance.

Therefore, heavily Catholic and immigrant heavy New York City was the Democratic base whilst, WASP upstate NY was the Republican one. The wealthy in NYC voted Republican as did large segments of the middle class but after the franchise was extended, they were outvoted and more so with each new boatload of Irishmen coming in. Also, demographics have changed areas of the country dramatically. New England's puritanical nature was frowned upon by Southerners who consider it overbearing and controlling (I ran across a quote from a Southern Congressmen in the 1880's expressing this sentiment regarding a Senator from Vermont). Federalists also tried to contrast Jefferson as an atheist compared to the devout Adams. Only the mid 20th century brings this to a complete end in its last holdouts in rural New England.

This notion of the the Parties simply flipping is one of the worst distortions and oversimplifications that is being put out there in American History in the modern era. Very little of the core aspirations of either Party has changed (save maybe for The Democrats with their embrace of Wall Street as part of the DLC and Clinton in 1992) much in the past two hundred years. What has changed is that ethnic, religious and geographic based voting has given way to ideological based voting.

[Nichlemn]

It surprises me that both the "progressive/liberal" republican party of the 19th and early 20th century and the conservative republican party of today both get crushed there.

Did NYC switch from conservatism to liberalism at the same time the Rs switched from liberalism to conservativism?

The Republicans have generally always been the party of business and of religiously (Protestant) motivated crusades (In those day's abolition and prohibition/temperance, as well as the public schools).

All of those reforms were opposed by the German and Irish Catholic immigrant groups. Abolition would bring blacks into competition for their jobs whilst slavery kept them safely down south (Dred Scott is in my view the key that causes this viewpoint to shift as it raised the specter of slavery itself bringing about that very competition. Hence why Lincoln emphasized "all Slave or all free". It was brilliant political strategy as it forced these pro-slavery northerns to flip and vote for a moderate anti-slavery Republian like Lincoln both in 1858 [he won the collective popular vote but lost since Senators were elected by state legislature] and 1860. This did not include NYC where Lincoln lost and barely carried the state by a narrow margin thanks to solid support upstate and NYC was one of the hotbeds of copperhead sympath during the war (Fernando Wood?) as well as the site of the NYC draft riots (those same pro-slavery working class Irish Democrats against the blacks)). Prohibition of alcohol interferred with the strong heritage of strong spirits and beer amongst those immigrant groups. Also the Republicans being of Congregational (Puritan) New England and Midwestern stock largely, preferred that the King James Bible be read in said public schools and Catholic immigrants wanted nothing to do with that. So instead they opened parochial schools and Republicans tried to ban school choice to force them to go to public schools and be tought the "good (Protestant) Christian education lest they be condemned to hell for eternity".

You also had the nativist element from both the Whigs and Know-Nothings, which in the north was folded into the Republican Party. From the Whigs and before them, The Federalists, you inherited those that opposed the extension of the vote to all white males (they preferred property and wealth requirements).

In contrast, as far back as Jefferson, the Democrats ascribed to be the Party of the common man against the elites and the Party of immigrants. They supported the extension of the franchise to all white males and welcomed the immigrants from Ireland and elsewhere, particularly in NY, where they used the corruption of Tammany Hall to get them jobs and other forms of assistance.

Therefore, heavily Catholic and immigrant heavy New York City was the Democratic base whilst, WASP upstate NY was the Republican one. The wealthy in NYC voted Republican as did large segments of the middle class but after the franchise was extended, they were outvoted and more so with each new boatload of Irishmen coming in. Also, demographics have changed areas of the country dramatically. New England's puritanical nature was frowned upon by Southerners who consider it overbearing and controlling (I ran across a quote from a Southern Congressmen in the 1880's expressing this sentiment regarding a Senator from Vermont). Federalists also tried to contrast Jefferson as an atheist compared to the devout Adams. Only the mid 20th century brings this to a complete end in its last holdouts in rural New England.

This notion of the the Parties simply flipping is one of the worst distortions and oversimplifications that is being put out there in American History in the modern era. Very little of the core aspirations of either Party has changed (save maybe for The Democrats with their embrace of Wall Street as part of the DLC and Clinton in 1992) much in the past two hundred years. What has changed is that ethnic, religious and geographic based voting has given way to ideological based voting.

Interesting overview, thanks.

[Nichlemn]

It surprises me that both the "progressive/liberal" republican party of the 19th and early 20th century and the conservative republican party of today both get crushed there.

Did NYC switch from conservatism to liberalism at the same time the Rs switched from liberalism to conservativism?

The Republicans have generally always been the party of business and of religiously (Protestant) motivated crusades (In those day's abolition and prohibition/temperance, as well as the public schools).

All of those reforms were opposed by the German and Irish Catholic immigrant groups. Abolition would bring blacks into competition for their jobs whilst slavery kept them safely down south (Dred Scott is in my view the key that causes this viewpoint to shift as it raised the specter of slavery itself bringing about that very competition. Hence why Lincoln emphasized "all Slave or all free". It was brilliant political strategy as it forced these pro-slavery northerns to flip and vote for a moderate anti-slavery Republian like Lincoln both in 1858 [he won the collective popular vote but lost since Senators were elected by state legislature] and 1860. This did not include NYC where Lincoln lost and barely carried the state by a narrow margin thanks to solid support upstate and NYC was one of the hotbeds of copperhead sympath during the war (Fernando Wood?) as well as the site of the NYC draft riots (those same pro-slavery working class Irish Democrats against the blacks)). Prohibition of alcohol interferred with the strong heritage of strong spirits and beer amongst those immigrant groups. Also the Republicans being of Congregational (Puritan) New England and Midwestern stock largely, preferred that the King James Bible be read in said public schools and Catholic immigrants wanted nothing to do with that. So instead they opened parochial schools and Republicans tried to ban school choice to force them to go to public schools and be tought the "good (Protestant) Christian education lest they be condemned to hell for eternity".

You also had the nativist element from both the Whigs and Know-Nothings, which in the north was folded into the Republican Party. From the Whigs and before them, The Federalists, you inherited those that opposed the extension of the vote to all white males (they preferred property and wealth requirements).

In contrast, as far back as Jefferson, the Democrats ascribed to be the Party of the common man against the elites and the Party of immigrants. They supported the extension of the franchise to all white males and welcomed the immigrants from Ireland and elsewhere, particularly in NY, where they used the corruption of Tammany Hall to get them jobs and other forms of assistance.

Therefore, heavily Catholic and immigrant heavy New York City was the Democratic base whilst, WASP upstate NY was the Republican one. The wealthy in NYC voted Republican as did large segments of the middle class but after the franchise was extended, they were outvoted and more so with each new boatload of Irishmen coming in. Also, demographics have changed areas of the country dramatically. New England's puritanical nature was frowned upon by Southerners who consider it overbearing and controlling (I ran across a quote from a Southern Congressmen in the 1880's expressing this sentiment regarding a Senator from Vermont). Federalists also tried to contrast Jefferson as an atheist compared to the devout Adams. Only the mid 20th century brings this to a complete end in its last holdouts in rural New England.

This notion of the the Parties simply flipping is one of the worst distortions and oversimplifications that is being put out there in American History in the modern era. Very little of the core aspirations of either Party has changed (save maybe for The Democrats with their embrace of Wall Street as part of the DLC and Clinton in 1992) much in the past two hundred years. What has changed is that ethnic, religious and geographic based voting has given way to ideological based voting.

Interesting overview, thanks.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

The idea that the core aspirations of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party haven't changed much over the past two centuries is utter rubbish and that's putting it rather politely. Unless you believe that political philosophy is irrelevant, there's no basis for that claim. It's one thing to say that there is some kind of continuum between the Democratic Party of Jackson and the Democratic Party of Obama and quite another to say that the Democratic Party's core aspirations are the same. That strikes me as historical revisionism in its worst form.

Former plantation owners, who always voted for Democrats, certainly aren't "common men". Neither are Yankee smallholding farmers or Lutheran machinists/craftsmen, who tended to vote for Republicans. The proletarian "commen men" of immigrant stock in the North didn't care all that much about two party politics. This is why the New Deal transformed Americans: they finally had a reason to lay claim to American civic life. Before this, the two parties didn't stand for much besides patronage jobs, contacts with various bureaucrats within party machines and standing up for cultural traditions, either of the Old World (Papist, Democrats) or of the New World (Yankee Puritan, GOP).

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The idea that the core aspirations of the Democratic Party and the Republican Party haven't changed much over the past two centuries is utter rubbish and that's putting it rather politely. Unless you believe that political philosophy is irrelevant, there's no basis for that claim. It's one thing to say that there is some kind of continuum between the Democratic Party of Jackson and the Democratic Party of Obama and quite another to say that the Democratic Party's core aspirations are the same. That strikes me as historical revisionism in its worst form.

Republicans aren't the Party of business? The Republicans Aren't the Party of Religious Zealotry? The Republicans aren't the Party of nativism in the modern era? Democrats aren't the Party of Workers and Immigrants (at least relative to the Republicans, as I said they surrendered some of there core in 1992 with the DLC and Clinton)?  You mistake tools for objectives, you mistake contextual histocial realities as being the whole affair, and you place rhetorical flavor over interests served (It is not what and how, but for who and why). A Southern Party was going to be pro-slavery and anti-NAtive American, a New England Party was going to be nativist, elitist and dogmatically Protestant. History is won by imperfect men. The former established the concept of people other then the elities running society and the latter ended slavery.

Former plantation owners, who always voted for Democrats, certainly aren't "common men".

lol, no. That is completely incorrect. Notice I emphasized northern in my previous post and that analysis is limited to the north for this reason. Slave owners (with some variances by states) were elites and were drawn to the Party of elites against the party of the populist mob. Where the hell do you think Pinkney came from?  The Deep South Whigs?  Only just before and following the Civil War did they get folded into the Democrats as part of the regionalization of politics.

Lord have mercy where in the world do you get the nerve to say "always", a rather obvious trap in any historical discussion.      

Neither are Yankee smallholding farmers or Lutheran machinists/craftsmen, who tended to vote for Republicans. The proletarian "commen men" of immigrant stock in the North didn't care all that much about two party politics. This is why the New Deal transformed Americans: they finally had a reason to lay claim to American civic life. Before this, the two parties didn't stand for much besides patronage jobs, contacts with various bureaucrats within party machines and standing up for cultural traditions, either of the Old World (Papist, Democrats) or of the New World (Yankee Puritan, GOP).

The New Deal had a transforming effect, but the rise of JAckson was cosnidered just as transforming to the immigrants of the 1820's and 1830's, which meant they could actually vote, unlike before. History is incrementally won by imperfect men. But of course Democrats have been throwing the baby out with the bathwater for two decades now, so it comes as no surprise that you would reject the progress made pre-1932, without which, 1932 would not be possible.

Without the expansion of suffrage in the 1830's, you don't get FDR in the 1930's.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Where have you gone, Mechaman,
we need you now more then you will know....


He would share you cynicism regarding the Democratic Party, but he would agree with my narrative as it is largely in line with the points he made in his inconvenient history thread.

[TheDeadFlagBlues]

The Republican Party isn't the party of business, the Republican Party is not the party of religious zealotry, the Republican Party is not the party of nativism etc. These terms strike me as being very imprecise, especially when you're describing the core values of a diverse party that has existed for 170 years.

The Republican Party is a sprawling big tent coalition that serves many interests and goals depending on the locale and its support base. A few decades it was an entirely different beast than it was in 2014, just as the Republican Party of the 1950s was an entirely different beast than the Republican Party of the 1980s. I think you're making the classic mistake of treating interests in a big tent, two-party system as static variables. In the American two party system, there has always been the presence of dynamic push-pull factors that destroy the notion of static coalitions, which are constantly shifting.

As for the comment about plantation owners, there's a reason why I used the term "former plantation owners": I was clearly alluding to the period after Reconstruction in the South.