“Once-only Democratic” counties

[mianfei]

As an aside to Brandt Maxwell’s list of never-Democratic counties at http://www.geographylists.com/list21j.html, I have compiled a list of counties that (at least since the Civil War), have voted for a Democratic Presidential candidate once and only once.

I have listed the counties firstly in reverse chronological order of the election when they cast their solitary Democratic vote, and secondly in the normal order of state and county name.

I have adopted Maxwell’s policy of starring counties that are not rural, but have lowered the threshold for an asterisk to 75,000 people rather than his one hundred thousand.

2008:

• Boone, Illinois
• Kendall, Illinois*

1992:

• Johnson, Illinois
• Warren, Missouri

1964:

• Randolph, Indiana
• Wabash, Indiana
• Knox, Kentucky
• Whitley, Kentucky (LBJ won by just three votes)
• Allegan, Michigan
• Antrim, Michigan
• Hillsdale, Michigan
• Midland, Michigan*
• Newaygo, Michigan
• Allegany, New York
• Genesee, New York
• Livingston, New York
• Orleans, New York
• Tioga, New York
• Wayne, New York*
• Wyoming, New York
• Clinton, Ohio
• Geauga, Ohio*
• Warren, Ohio*
• Bradford, Pennsylvania
• Butler, Pennsylvania*
• Cameron, Pennsylvania
• Huntingdon, Pennsylvania
• Lancaster, Pennsylvania*
• McKean, Pennsylvania
• Potter, Pennsylvania
• Somerset, Pennsylvania*
• Tioga, Pennsylvania
• Preston, West Virginia
• Upshur, West Virginia

1936:

• Lebanon, Pennsylvania*

1932:

• Clark, Idaho
• Ford, Illinois
• Stark, Illinois
• Steuben, Indiana
• Cass, Iowa
• Page, Iowa
• Chautauqua, Kansas
• Camden, Missouri
• Christian, Missouri*
• Stone, Missouri
• Fulton, Ohio
• Major, Oklahoma
• Campbell, South Dakota
• Hutchinson, South Dakota
• Sully, South Dakota
• Turner, South Dakota

1916:

• Kane, Utah

1912:

• Hamilton, Indiana*
• Hendricks, Indiana*
• Brown, Kansas
• Laurel, Kentucky
• Pulaski, Kentucky
• Hawkins, Tennessee
• Ritchie, West Virginia
• Walworth, Wisconsin*

1896:

• Douglas, Missouri§

1876:

• Lewis, Kentucky
• Mitchell, North Carolina
• Wayne, Tennessee

_{* – Contains over 75,000 people
§ – voted for James B. Weaver in 1880
Italics – voted for Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 (except South Dakota where he was official Republican nominee and no Taft ticket on ballot)
Strikethrough – voted for Robert LaFollette in 1924}

Looking at this list, which totals sixty-four counties, there is a little more diversity than the never-Democratic counties.

Firstly, seven counties from postbellum states that approach or are “frontier” counties is a feature completely absent from never-Democratic counties. It should be noted that Clark County, Idaho, which voted Democratic only in 1932, was formed only in 1919, and the areas covered by it almost certainly voted Democratic in 1916 and 1896.

Secondly, there are a larger number of small-city or suburban counties asterisked than with the never-Democratic counties. Thirteen of sixty-four counties which have voted Democratic once and only once since the Civil War have over 75,000 inhabitants currently, as opposed to only five of thirty-eight (Riley County, Kansas and Scott County, Tennessee in addition to those over 100,000) which have never voted Democratic.

Thirdly, whereas in the 1924 election Robert LaFollette received no more than fifteen percent of the vote in any never-Democratic county, he carried two “once-only-Democratic” counties in South Dakota. This difference, though larger than the other two, is of course a reflection of the geography of LaFollette’s support.

The margin of victory when these counties went Democratic for their only time ranges, according to my research, from a mere three votes by Lyndon John over Barry Goldwater in Whitley County, Kentucky up to 40 percentage points by Franklin Roosevelt over Herbert Hoover in Hutchinson County, South Dakota. Whitley is of course adjacent to a large bloc of never-Democratic counties in southeastern Kentucky, so it is certainly a matter of luck that it is not in the never-Democratic club rather than the once-only-Democratic.

[mianfei]

Thanks for the list.

I had expected a lot more under 1964. I wonder how many counties only went Democratic for FDR and LBJ? Probably dozens.

There would be a great many – too many to easily count and compile!

Especially in the Plains there are many more counties that have supported no Democratic nominee bar FDR, but I refuse to qualify any county voting Democratic multiple times even if for just one nominee. There exist counties that have voted Democratic only for Woodrow Wilson (Osborne County, Kansas) and even only for Bill Clinton (Hickory County, Missouri; Johnson County, Kentucky; Pope County, Illinois; Union County, Tennessee) but do not qualify through supporting their sole Democratic candidate twice.

I might note that one near-miss of the “only once Democratic” club is Sweetgrass County, Montana which Bryan won by six votes in 1896 and FDR won in 1936, but which was the only Montana county to never vote for Woodrow Wilson.

[mianfei]

I had expected a lot more under 1964. I wonder how many counties only went Democratic for FDR and LBJ? Probably dozens.

Another point whihc I had meant to say earlier is that quite a number of counties only went Democratic for LBJ in 1964 and for Bill Clinton in 1996. There are if I recall correctly eight of these in New York (e.g. Yates County) and one in New Jersey. Although the never-Democratic club lost just one member at that election (Porter County in Indiana, which last voted for a Democrat before the Republicans formed in 1852) Bill Clinton did dent the once-Democratic club by more than ten percent.