JFK vs. Goldwater

[Lincoln Republican]

Kennedy        328     52%
Goldwater      210     48%

My vote would have been for Goldwater.

[Lincoln Republican]

Kennedy        328     52%
Goldwater      210     48%

My vote would have been for Goldwater.

My map is being generous to Goldwater, based on my understanding Kennedy's popularity was heading down going into 1964.  That was the reason for his trip to Texas in Nov, 1963.

It's true, Kennedy would likely have won several more states against Goldwater in 1964, giving Kennedy an EV total in the high 300s, based on Kennedy's approvals going up between Nov 1963 and Nov 1964.   

[Lincoln Republican]

Kennedy        328     52%
Goldwater      210     48%

My vote would have been for Goldwater.

My map is being generous to Goldwater, based on my understanding Kennedy's popularity was heading down going into 1964.  That was the reason for his trip to Texas in Nov, 1963.

It's true, Kennedy would likely have won several more states against Goldwater in 1964, giving Kennedy an EV total in the high 300s, based on Kennedy's approvals going up between Nov 1963 and Nov 1964.   

I’m afraid your map is being more than generous to Goldwater, you seem to assuming that the political geography of the country in 1964 is the same as it is today… Goldwater would have won, then, republican heartland states such as NH, VT long before he won TN, KY or NC. As the Democratic candidate Kennedy would have done well in the upper South, mid Atlantic and the Midwest. Goldwater’s only potential areas for expansion lay in the west and potentially in holding on the bedrock GOP states in the northeast.

I see no evidence that Kennedy was unpopular going into 1964, his advisors where worried about the party’s base in the deep south and hence his visit to Texas, but by and large Kennedy was well regarded and very popular. Kennedy and Goldwater where friends from their time in the senate and a campaign between them would have been far more amicable than the campaign LBJ waged against Goldwater… but this would not have meant that most Americans would not still have rejected Goldwater who most viewed as extremist in favour of Kennedy and by a very big margin, though I’d expect not as huge as that which LBJ enjoyed.           

My map is based on 1960, with switches in 1964 from GOP to Dem that I believe Kennedy could have picked up, and with switches in 1964 from Dem to GOP that I believe Goldwater could have picked up. 

But, your analysis and reasoning make much more sense than mine, and are no doubt more accurate. 

[Lincoln Republican]

Ben, your analysis is excellent.  Thank you.

Just one point though, Goldwater's running mate in 1964 was conservative Republican New York Congressman William Miller.

Curtis LeMay was George Wallace's running mate on the American Independent Party ticket in 1968.

Just one question, don't you think Goldwater would have won Utah, of all places, against Kennedy, in 1964?

[Lincoln Republican]

Goldwater/JFK

Landslide for JFK, but a bit less than LBJ's:

I'd agree, but I think CO, NM would be more likely to swing to Goldwater than any other western states what’s more I think that the Dakotas and Montana would have stuck with the Democrats and I doubt that Kennedy would have lost any more southern states than LBJ, so I doubt TN would have also been lost (LBJ won 55% of the vote in reality).

Kennedy would have come out from a mildly successful first term, tax cuts, facing down the USSR over Cuba, slow progress towards greater civil rights for African Americans and economic growth. Kennedy knew and respected Goldwater and would have been less likely that LBJ was to go so highly negative so while it might have been a better natured campaign than it actually was, Kennedy as a popular incumbent facing an opponent seen as extreme, and abandoned by much of his own party leadership, would have cruised to re-election…



Kennedy/ Johnson (Democrat): 475 EV, 58%PV.
Goldwater/ LeMay (Republican): 63 EV, 41%PV. 

Using Ben's map, I would add to Goldwater, at the very least, Utah, Colorado, South Dakota, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma.  Still a JFK landslide, as Ben has said.  JFK was not the knight in shining armour of Camelot that some would have us believe.