County That Most Closely Mirrors State Results?

[nclib]

For 2004, these two come close:

Haywood:

George W. Bush 56.09%
John Kerry 43.33%

New Hanover:

George W. Bush 55.82%
John Kerry 43.78%

North Carolina:

George W. Bush 56.02%
John Kerry 43.58%

[Jaggerjack]

Probably a bay area suburb type like Contra Costa.

But there is probably no county that can capture 'California as a whole'.

QFT. Seems like that's the only Bay Area county still experiencing healthy growth (but with communities like Brentwood, it's really no suprise)

[nclib]

The following NC counties have predicted which way NC has gone through 1972:

Alamance
Alexander
Ashe
Beaufort
Burke
Caldwell
Carteret
Cherokee
Clay
Craven
Dare
Forsyth
Gaston
Graham
Iredell
Johnston
Lincoln
McDowell
Macon
Nash
New Hanover
Onslow
Polk
Rowan
Rutherford
Stanly
Stokes
Surry
Transylvania
Wilson

[WalterMitty]

The following NC counties have predicted which way NC has gone through 1972:

Alamance
Alexander
Ashe
Beaufort
Burke
Caldwell
Carteret
Cherokee
Clay
Craven
Dare
Forsyth
Gaston
Graham
Iredell
Johnston
Lincoln
McDowell
Macon
Nash
New Hanover
Onslow
Polk
Rowan
Rutherford
Stanly
Stokes
Surry
Transylvania
Wilson

im somewhat amazed at the gains kerry made in alamance county.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Minnesota's bellwether since 1960 is Pine. But the actual best gauge of how the state goes are Washington and Dakota counties, although the Democrat can still win fairly easily and lose those counties, they just have to lose by less than roughly 8-10 points. A Republican needs to win those counties by a very wide margin to carry the state.

[HappyWarrior]

I'd say Prince George's, it almost always goes Democrat as does the state as a whole.  If P.G. goes Republican, so will the rest of the state.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I'd say Prince George's, it almost always goes Democrat as does the state as a whole.  If P.G. goes Republican, so will the rest of the state.

Prince George's hasn't voted Republican since 1972, yet Maryland did 1980-1988. It also voted overwhelmingly for Townsend in 2002 despite her losing the election.

Better bellwethers are Baltimore COUNTY and Howard. Of course O'Malley won without winning Baltimore, but that means you just have to hold the GOP margin of victory below 5 points or so.

[Padfoot]

I'd say that Pike and Scioto counties are probably the best predictors for Ohio.

What about Stark County? Doesn't it have a bellwether reputation?

Well it did until 2004:

Kerry: 50.59%
Bush: 48.93%

Which is almost the exact opposite of the statewide result.  Also, if you add Nader to Gore in 2000, Gore wins Stark by about 1% but still loses statewide by the same margin.  Stark is moving slowly to the left which is why OH-16 is going to be one of the hottest House contests next year.

Also, I choose Scioto and Pike because the Southeast is the region most prone to swinging back and forth between parties.  This is also why Zack Space (D) OH-18 isn't as vulnerable as Republicans would like to think he is.  OH-18 contains enough Democrat friendly ground for Space to be re-elected comfortably in 2008.

I was originally going to choose Ross County because the premiere Ohio bellwether city (and former state capital) Chillicothe is located there but the county as a whole isn't a very good bellwether.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

California's bellwether is San Benito county.

[minionofmidas]

California's bellwether is San Benito county.

By what measure? (You may very well be right, strange as it sounds at first glance.)

Four Calif. counties have gone with the state winner at all times since 1960: San Benito, Monterey, Santa Barbara, Imperial. (Of the six counties that have done so since 1988, Sacramento voted for Carter and Napa for Humphrey. Actually, Sacramento voted for Humphrey as well. And for Kennedy, too.)

San Benito also was the county most closely mirroring the state result in both 1996 and 2000. By 2004, it moved into fourth place due to Bush's above average improvement among Hispanics in the state. The 2004 top bellwether in the state is utterly bizarre.

Top 5 bellwethers, California (dem margins)
1996                      2000                      2004
state 12.89            state 11.80            state 9.95
San Benito 11.97   San Benito 12.57   Alpine 8.88
Lake 13.93             Mendocino 12.68   Lake 8.28
Napa 14.80            Imperial 10.25       Santa Barbara 7.95
Mendocino 15.87    Lake 9.65              San Benito 6.16
Monterey 16.49      Napa 14.43           Solano 15.31

Notice that Mendocino was Nader's best county in 2000 so its inclusion here is somewhat accidental.

However, that's just presidential elections. I wondered if the pattern holds downballot... so I checked the 2006 statewide races. That is, I checked them statewide and in San Benito, I didn't check if there were any better predictors.
Left column is state, right column is San Benito
24.1 D US Senator 27.2 D
16.9 R Governor 19.5 R
4.1 D   Lt. Gov.    1.0 D
10.5 D Controller 5.2 D
17.1 D Treasurer 19.3 D
18.1 D Att.Gen.    23.7 D
12.4 R Ins. Com.  11.6 R

Pretty damn good. The one turd in the punchbowl is
3.1 D Secretary of State 16.3 R
Bruce McPherson once represented the area in the State Senate though, so this explains the result to my satisfaction (well. except that I'm not sure how a Republican came to represent Santa Cruz, Monterey, San Benito, and parts of Santa Clara in the State Senate.)

Then I went on the statewide ballot measures, and boyee, in 2006 at least, they're good at the bellwethering business in San Benito: Off by less than 2%points on average! With a maximum deviation of just 3.6points, and getting one result spot on, too.

So there it is. Despite 2004, jfern's right as usual.
A rural county with less than a fifth of California's population density and a Hispanic majority (but subaverage immigrant proportion... they've been there for a while, it would seem) is California's bellwether.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I've analyzed Minnesota a bit closer, and looked at all statewide elections since 2002.

There is no county that voted as a bellwether in every one. The closest is probably Le Sueur, picking the winner every time except State Auditor in 2002 and President in 2004.

What's interesting is the Secretary of State results. Even though Humphrey III lost in 2002 and Ritchie won in 2006, Le Sueur was one of only two counties (the other being Houston) to flip from Kiffmeyer in 2002 to Ritchie in 2006. Lots of rural counties however flipped to Kiffmeyer. Odd.

When I have more time I might actually list how many times each county in Minnesota voted for the winner in every statewide election from 2000 on.

[Hash]

Sarnia—Lambton federally. Peterborough seems more or less bellwetherly too, but Sarnia—Lambton voted with the winners since the 1963 election. Surprisingly, it's not at all bellwether provincially.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Surprisingly, it's not at all bellwether provincially.

Much closer to being the reverse actually. Its provincial voting patterns are just weird.

[DownWithTheLeft]

Burlington is a bit too Republican leaning to serve as a good bellweather for New Jersey.  Bergen used to be too Republican, but it's much closer now to mirroring the statewide results as a whole.  (Corzine won it by 13.4, a bit better than his statewide; Menendez won it by 8.3, almost imperceptibly worse than his statewide.)  If I had to pick, I'd pick Bergen.

As a bonus, Bergen has a little bit of every kind of New Jersey town (save for the shore resort type): the northern super-rich commuter exurbs, the small towns like Ridgewood (which has a beautiful little "downtown" area), the ethnic Italian suburban-style towns of south Bergen, even the "big city" towns along the Hudson, like Fort Lee.  It's a great cross section.

I'll also throw Gloucester County into the mix.  Recently, Gloucester has been pretty close to approximating statewide results.  Corzine won it by 10.2, Kerry won it by 5.3, Menendez won it by 7.8, and Lautenberg won it by 13.4.

That spread is what allows it to serve as a bellweather, there really aren't many counties like it, especially not in NJ.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

OK, here's how many times each county voted for the winner in every statewide race since 2000:

9 times:
Crow Wing
Todd
Chisago
Isanti
Washington
Dakota
Kandiyohi
Nicolett

8 times:
Cottonwood
Blue Earth
Le Sueur
Rice
Winona

7 times:
Roseau
St. Louis
Lake
Itasca
Aitkin
Cass
Hubbard
Stearns
Benton
Mille Lacs
Goodhue
Wabasha
Freeborn
Mower
Nobles
Sibley
Meeker
Kanabec
Douglas
Stevens
La Qui Parle
Big Stone
Swift
Hennepin
Ramsey
Anoka

6 times:
Kittson
Koochiching
Beltrami
Cook
Mahnomen
Norman
Clay
Becker
Morrison
Pope
Chippewa
Renville
Yellow Medicine
Lincoln
Lyon
Watonwan
Waseca
Steele
Fillmore
Houston
Jackson
Martin
Faribault

5 times:
Otter Tail
Rock
Pipe Stone
Wadena
Brown
Redwood
Olmsted
Dodge
Sherburne
Wright
McLeod
Carver
Scott
Wilkin

4 times:
Traverse
Clearwater
Lake of the Woods

3 times:
Grant
Marshall
Polk
Pennington
Red Lake

[nclib]

The following NC counties have predicted which way NC has gone through 1972:

Alamance
Alexander
Ashe
Beaufort
Burke
Caldwell
Carteret
Cherokee
Clay
Craven
Dare
Forsyth
Gaston
Graham
Iredell
Johnston
Lincoln
McDowell
Macon
Nash
New Hanover
Onslow
Polk
Rowan
Rutherford
Stanly
Stokes
Surry
Transylvania
Wilson

im somewhat amazed at the gains kerry made in alamance county.

I'm not too familiar with Alamance's politics, Walter. What do you think was the reason for Kerry's gains?

These three counties have predicted NC's winner since at least 1960:

Carteret
Dare
New Hanover

[12th Doctor]

I guess Erie County would be close to a bellweather for PA.  Though it voted against the state in 1988.  It generally votes with the state and within 2-3 points of the state average.

[Verily]

Okay, here's a brief numeric analysis for New Jersey.

1996
State: 17.9
1. Atlantic: 17.9 (0.0)
2. Burlington: 16.9 (-1.0)
3. Gloucester: 19.7 (+1.8)
4. Passaic: 21.1 (+3.2)
5. Bergen: 13.8 (-4.1)

2000
State: 15.84
1. Burlington: 15.35 (-0.49)
2. Gloucester: 17.50 (+1.66)
3. Bergen: 13.62 (-2.22)
4. Passaic: 18.70 (+2.86)
5. Atlantic: 18.97 (+3.13)

2004
State: 6.68
1. Cumberland: 6.60 (-0.08)
2. Burlington: 6.96 (+0.31)
3. Atlantic: 5.90 (-0.78)
4. Gloucester: 5.32 (-1.36)
5. Bergen: 4.45 (-2.23)


This non-rigorous analysis indicates that Bergen is not the bellwether county, having been less accurate than Burlington in predicting New Jersey's partisanship in all of the last three Presidential elections. Gloucester also consistently outperformed Bergen while always underperforming Burlington. Additionally, Atlantic averages out to being a better indicator than Bergen though it performed worse than Bergen in 2000.

Bergen has also consistently been 2-4 points more Republican than the state as a whole.

[Cubby]

Middlesex County. In Presidential Elections, its voted for the state winner in every election since 1900 except for two (1940 and 1944).

For Rhode Island, its Bristol County. Same as the state in every election since 1880 except one (1912, which as we all know, was a wild year).

[Хahar 🤔]

LA County, probably.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

LA County, probably.

No, jfern had the answer. Rather surprising.

[Erc]

Are there any examples of anti-bellwethers?  Counties that are somewhat *negatively* correlated with the statewide results, and one that you hope you lose?

Obviously, these would be much rarer. On a national level, at least, every state has gotten at least *one* of the last three elections right, as Bush won all the Dole states.
In fact, no state has voted consecutively for losing candidates of different (major) parties in the past century--the last being 1892, when WA/MT/WY/SD/NE voted for Harrison and then for Bryan.  And even that case was due in large part to the presence of Weaver in 1892 and anti-Cleveland sentiment.  Of those, only WY flipped from majority Republican to majority Democrat.
Before then, CA & NV flipped from Hancock to Blaine (1880 -> 1884), Ohio flipped from Clay to Cass (1844/1848), NJ from Jackson to Adams (1824/1828)

In terms of the popular vote winner, NH 2000/2004 was the first state to take this dubious honor since 1892.

[Hash]

Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River went from Conservative in 2004 to Liberal in 2006, but there was some accusations of fraud/something bad going on about the victory (both parties gained % in 2006)

[Verily]

Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River went from Conservative in 2004 to Liberal in 2006, but there was some accusations of fraud/something bad going on about the victory (both parties gained % in 2006)

The fraud accusations were made by the Conservative candidate, Jeremy Harrison, and found to have no merit at all. After he only just barely won running for the Sask Party in the 2007 election in a conservative area of his former federal riding, I find it unlikely that there really was any fraud. Much more likely that higher First Nations turnout did him in.

[Хahar 🤔]

LA County, probably.

No, jfern had the answer. Rather surprising.

Well, LA County is fairly liberal, but is more apt to vote Republican than the Bay Area.