1963 Mississippi Gubernatorial Race

[RBH]

I entered the results in America Votes 7 into a spreadsheet. And on comparing them to the 1964 Presidential results from Mississippi, I made these breakdowns of how counties voted in the 1963 Gubernatorial race and the 1964 Presidential race.

Counties which went for Phillips went 54/46 for him and 81/19 for Goldwater.

Counties which went for Johnson but gave him less than 60% went 55/45 for Johnson and 85/15 for Goldwater

Counties which went for Johnson and gave him more than 60% went 69/31 for Johnson and 90/10 for Goldwater

The vote distribution in those counties-
Phillips: 15% of the vote in 1963, 16% in 1964
Johnson 50-59: 28% in 1963, 29% in 1964
Johnson 60+: 57% in 1963, 55% in 1964

Here's the manually-drawn county map for the 1963 election (with the county totals not entered here since the only source is America Votes):



62/38 Johnson, but it was the first time a Republican had run for Governor in around 80 years.

Info on Phillips/Johnson:

http://www.cresswellslist.com/ballots2/phillips.htm

You must be logged in to read this quote.

[RBH]

I think that some of the 50s/60s splits in Mississippi were hinted at in the primary returns for guys like Bilbo in the 40s.

Prentiss Walker faced James Eastland in 1966 and got whupped. Eastland won 66/27 after Walker tried to paint Eastland as being too liberal and being too supportive of LBJ and Kennedy.

Walker won Claiborne, Jefferson, Simpson, and Smith Counties in 1966.

James Carmichael produced the following map in a 58/39 loss in 1972 (where Carmichael probably ran to the left of Eastland, and Nixon refused to support Carmichael):



Carmichael was the only Winthrop Rockefeller Republican of note in Mississippi. Even if Phillips did run to the left of John Bell Williams in 1967.

[RBH]

if I ever end up having the endurance to type in results from 159 counties for 4 candidates, I could make a manual map for Carmichael/Talmadage, where Carmichael won a plurality of 45/43, and lost the County Unit vote 244 to 144.

And here's a quick uplifting Rockefeller/Johnson map (1966 AR Gov) and the 1964 Presidental map from Arkansas

[RBH]

It's from a book.

And here's a quick map attempt for Maddox/Callaway, where Callaway won a plurality, and since he didn't win a majority, the Democratic legislature elected Maddox.

And the green county is where the votes for other outnumbered the votes for either candidate.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

The Democratic Congressional delegation of Mississippi either openly or quietly backed Goldwater

[RBH]

The Mississippi Congressional districts from 1963 to 1967



The Gubernatorial results by CD
CD01 (Yellow, Whitten): 61/39 Johnson
CD02 (Skyblue, Abernathy): 57/43 Johnson
CD03 (Pink, Williams): 63/37 Johnson
CD04 (Red, Winstead): 72/28 Johnson
CD05 (Green, Colmer): 59/41 Johnson

And in 1964, Goldwater's best district was the 4th district.

Goldwater won that district 93/7 and Prentiss Walker was elected there as the first Republican to represent Mississippi in 90 years.

This map was tossed in 1966 due to malapportionment. So Mississippi drew a map that just split the delta between Whitten and Abernathy's districts.

[RBH]

How the hell did Goldwater get 87% of the vote?  That never happens except for in Washington D.C.  This explains way a handful of Republican Congressmen were elected for the first time in the Bible belt that year.

Very few black Mississippians actually voted in the election.

Examples

Jefferson County
1964: 1327 votes, 95% Goldwater
1968: 3380 votes, 63% Humphrey

Claiborne County
1964: 1310 votes, 94% Goldwater
1968: 3502 votes, 61% Humphrey

Holmes County
1964: 3225 votes, 97% Goldwater
1968: 7409 votes, 52% Humphrey