TheCommentator
AL098
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« on: June 26, 2006, 08:37:46 PM » |
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This year's Independence Day issue of TIME features a cover and long, in-depth story on the impact of Theodore Roosevelt. That got me thinking of Roosevelt's landslide reelection of 1904. That year Roosevelt defeated Alton Parker, 56.4% to 37.6%, a spread of about 19 points, and by a more than two-to-one 336-140 in the electoral college. As it turns out, this election was one of the biggest landslides in American history (at the time, it was the biggest, if you exclude the period before 1828 when property requirements, participation traditions, and selection of electors without a popular vote massively suppressed turnout), often overlooked, and a harbinger of the coming "Era of Landslides" of 1920-1936.
In 1832 Jackson wins a landslide in the electoral vote with 219 to a combined 67 for his opponents and in the popular vote 54% against his opponents Clay, with 37%, and William Wirt, with 8%, for a spread of about 17 points. Between 1832 and 1904, we see an extremely long pattern of closer elections. I've highlighted all of the years in which there was a two-way race with a spread of 15 points or more.
1828: 56%-44%, 12 point spread (effective birth of the popular vote)
1832: 54%-37%, 17 point spread
1836: 51%-37%, 14 point spread
1840: 53%-47%, 6 point spread
1844: 50%-48%, 2 point spread
1848: 47%-43%, 3 point spread
1852: 51%-44%, 7 point spread (death of the Whigs)
1856: 45%-33%, 12 point spread (3-way race)
1860: 40%-30%, 10 point spread (4-way race)
1864: 55%-45%, 10 point spread
1868: 53%-47%, 6 point spread
1872: 56%-44%, 12 point spread (followed by Panic of 1873, ending CW alignment)
1876: 48%-51%, 3 point spread
1880: 48%-48%, 0 point spread
1884: 49%-48%, 1 point spread
1888: 49%-48%, 1 point spread
1892: 46%-43%, 3 point spread
1896: 51%-47%, 4 point spread
1900: 52%-46%, 6 point spread
1904: 56%-37%, 19 point spread
1908: 52%-43%, 9 point spread
1912: 42%-27%, 15 point spread (3-way race)
1916: 49%-46%, 3 point spread
1920: 60%-34%, 26 point spread (beginning of the "Era of Landslides")
1924: 54%-29%, 25 point spread
1928: 58%-41%, 17 point spread
1932: 57%-40%, 17 point spread
1936: 61%-37%, 24 point spread (end of the "Era of Landslides")
1940: 55%-45%, 10 point spread
1944: 53%-46%, 7 point spread
1948: 50%-45%, 5 point spread
1952: 55%-44%, 11 point spread
1956: 57%-42%, 15 point spread
1960: 50%-50%, 0 point spread
1964: 61%-39%, 22 point spread
1968: 43%-43%, 0 point spread
1972: 61%-38%, 23 point spread
1976: 50%-48%, 2 point spread
1980: 51%-41%, 10 point spread
1984: 59%-41%, 18 point spread
No landslides since 1984 (in fact, all spreads under 10 points) the longest streak since 1884-1900, just prior to the 1904 election.
From 1824 to 1904, only 5 two-way races were decided with 10 percentage points or more, 3 of them clustered at the birth of the second party system, before the Whigs were fully organized. Only one was more than 15 points. None were more than 20 points. 8 were less than 5 points.
From 1904 to 1984, 13 two-way races were decided with 10 percentage points or more. 10 were more than 15 points. 5 were more than 20 points. Only 4 were less than 5 points.
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