Good Towns/Counties For John Anderson

[© Tweed the Younger]

Here I will list some towns in which my man John Anderson did well in in 1980 (Above 19%).

Rhode Island (Towns):

New Shoreham- 22.22%
Jamestown- 21.71%
South Kingstown- 19.89%

[© Tweed the Younger]

Massachusetts (Counties):

Nantucket- 21.63%
Dukes- 20.88%
Barnstable- 19.39%

[© Tweed the Younger]

ANDERSON DID FINISH IN SECOND PLACE IN A TOWN!!!!!!

Gosnold, MA:

Reagan (R)- 46.05%, 35 Votes
Andseron (I)- 30.26%, 23 Votes
Carter (D)- 23.68%, 18 Votes

And Gay Head, MA:

Carter (D)- 61.15%, 85 Votes
Anderson (I)- 18.71%, 26 Votes
Reagan (R)- 16.55%, 23 Votes

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Yay!

[dazzleman]

Anderson did best in New England and a couple of states out west, like Colorado and Hawaii.  Generally, third party candidates do best in New England.

Anderson's best state was Massachusetts, with Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine and Connecticut all states in which he did better than he did in the rest of the country, generally.

It is almost definite that it is the Anderson vote that allowed Reagan to carry Massachusetts, by a razor-thin margin of about 4,000 votes.  The Anderson vote was a bout 400,000, so if a little over half of it had gone to Carter and a little under half to Reagan (which is generous to Reagan since Anderson was considered liberal), Carter would have carried Massachusetts.  This 1980 election was one of the few times that Massachusetts and Rhode Island voted differently (1972 being the other time, and in the other direction).

The other New England states mentioned, with the exception of Rhode Island, probably would have voted for Reagan even without Anderson, since they voted for Gerald Ford in 1976, and I can't think of any state where Carter improved upon his 1976 vote in 1980.

Another state that Anderson probably helped Reagan carry was New York.  It was not as close as Massachusetts, but Reagan's plurality over Carter was somewhat smaller than the Anderson vote.  Reagan's vote exceeded Carter's in New York by about 170,000 votes, but Anderson received almost 500,000 votes there.  So if, as is presumably likely, a good portion of the Anderson votes had gone to Carter, he would have also carried New York rather than Reagan.

I don't think that Anderson really affected the outcome of the 1980 election, although he did make it more of an electoral landslide for Reagan.  Reagan sensed this outcome, which is why he insisted on having Anderson in the debates (which Carter then refused to participate in), and wouldn't agree to debate Carter one-on-one until immediately before the election.  It turned out to be a smart move, since by that time, a majority of voters were looking only for a plausible alternative to Carter, since they regarded Carter as a poor president.  This gave Reagan a huge advantage going into the debate.

[Vasall des Midas]

Carter scored less in 1980 than in 1976 in every single state. There is only one state where the margin of victory improved in the Democrats' favor: Vermont, won by Ford with 11,2% to spare, by Reagan with just 6,0%. There are a number of states where Reagan's margin was only marginally more than Ford's (or Carter's 1980 margin only marginally less than in 1976).
There are a number of states Anderson theoretically cost Carter, tha tis, where Carter & Anderson together outpolled Reagan. They are Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont and Wisconsin.
As some of the Anderson vote would have likely gone to Reagan or to other third party candidates, it is absurd to imply Carter would have carried all of these without Anderson around.
Here's a comparison of Reagan's margin of Victory with Anderson's percentage, sorted by approximate likelihood of state going to Carter.
MA 0,2 15,2
TN 0,3 2,2
AR 0,6 2,7
ME 3,3 10,2
NY 2,7 7,5
DE 2,3 6,9
VT 6,0 14,9
KY 1,5 2,4
WI 4,7 7,1
NC 2,1 2,8
CT 9,7 12,2
MI 6,5 7,0
MS 1,3 1,3
SC 1,6 1,6
If I venture a guess, I'd say that without Anderson Carter would have held Massachusetts, Tennessee, Arkansas, New York and Delaware, and gained Maine and possibly Vermont. The others would have gone to Reagan anyway.
Of course, like Perot to Bush, Anderson probably did more damage to Carter thanthese numbers convey. If Perot or Anderson had somehow dropped out a week before the election, the result would have been almost the same as it was, but if they had never run the incumbent would have done a whole lot better. (Carter would still have lost, by a respectable margin, but Bush might well have beaten Clinton, though it  would probably have been close)

[dazzleman]

Carter scored less in 1980 than in 1976 in every single state. There is only one state where the margin of victory improved in the Democrats' favor: Vermont, won by Ford with 11,2% to spare, by Reagan with just 6,0%. There are a number of states where Reagan's margin was only marginally more than Ford's (or Carter's 1980 margin only marginally less than in 1976).
There are a number of states Anderson theoretically cost Carter, tha tis, where Carter & Anderson together outpolled Reagan. They are Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont and Wisconsin.
As some of the Anderson vote would have likely gone to Reagan or to other third party candidates, it is absurd to imply Carter would have carried all of these without Anderson around.
Here's a comparison of Reagan's margin of Victory with Anderson's percentage, sorted by approximate likelihood of state going to Carter.
MA 0,2 15,2
TN 0,3 2,2
AR 0,6 2,7
ME 3,3 10,2
NY 2,7 7,5
DE 2,3 6,9
VT 6,0 14,9
KY 1,5 2,4
WI 4,7 7,1
NC 2,1 2,8
CT 9,7 12,2
MI 6,5 7,0
MS 1,3 1,3
SC 1,6 1,6
If I venture a guess, I'd say that without Anderson Carter would have held Massachusetts, Tennessee, Arkansas, New York and Delaware, and gained Maine and possibly Vermont. The others would have gone to Reagan anyway.
Of course, like Perot to Bush, Anderson probably did more damage to Carter thanthese numbers convey. If Perot or Anderson had somehow dropped out a week before the election, the result would have been almost the same as it was, but if they had never run the incumbent would have done a whole lot better. (Carter would still have lost, by a respectable margin, but Bush might well have beaten Clinton, though it  would probably have been close)

Pretty good analysis.  I do think Reagan probably would have carried Vermont, Connecticut and Maine even without Anderson, since it was hard to picture Carter doing better in these states than he did in 1976, when they were carried by Ford.

Without Anderson, the electoral vote would have been closer, but I see no way Carter could have won that election, unless he had been able to get the hostages out of Iran within a few weeks of the election.  Even if he had gotten them out in the spring, by the fall a disillusionment would have set in because of other pressing problems, like 18% inflation and an out-of-control Soviet Union, that were not affected by the hostage release.

[Gustaf]

New England, Maine in particular, and the Northern states, Michigan, Wisconsin, the Dakotas, etc as well as the South-West, with Arizona, New Mexico and so on seem to vote consistently more 3rd party than other states. As well as Alaska. The South and the industrial states seem more anti-3rd party.

[Vasall des Midas]

Dazzleman, that Reagan carries Connecticut goes without saying. He might well have carried Vermont anyways. But Reagan was obviously less popular than Ford in Northern New England, Maine had voted for Ford only by a narrow margin, and looking at those figures up there I must say I don't believe Reagan would have carried it without Anderson.
Maine has a recent history of voting for losers: Gore in 2000, Ford in 76, Humphrey in 68, Nixon in 1960. One more in 1980 and they'd be tied with Washington for the anti-bellwehter crown...We had a thread on that somewhere.

[Gustaf]

Dazzleman, that Reagan carries Connecticut goes without saying. He might well have carried Vermont anyways. But Reagan was obviously less popular than Ford in Northern New England, Maine had voted for Ford only by a narrow margin, and looking at those figures up there I must say I don't believe Reagan would have carried it without Anderson.
Maine has a recent history of voting for losers: Gore in 2000, Ford in 76, Humphrey in 68, Nixon in 1960. One more in 1980 and they'd be tied with Washington for the anti-bellwehter crown...We had a thread on that somewhere.

Yeah, up in thé presidentrial elections of all times-section.

[Nym90]

Regarding 1992, Perot was out of the race for over 3 months (July through October) and Clinton led Bush that entire time. Right after Perot dropped out, Clinton surged in the polls, and right after Perot reentered the race, Clinton's lead did not change (both Clinton and Bush went down in the polls by equal percentages).