Earliest Signs of Red-State Blue-State Divide

[SPC]

Many think that the red state-blue state divide originated in 2000, but I think that its origins date way before then. Take the election of 1968. In itself, the 1968 map might not look like a redstate-bluestate divide, but when you manipulate the results of all states >5%, the results look like this:

And if we were to give all of Wallace's votes to Nixon, we get something like this:

These early signs are also evident in the 1976 and 1988 election results when skewed:
1976:

This shows that by the 70's, the divide had pretty much developed everywhere but the south and the northeast.

Now, by the 80's, the divide has developed everywhere but parts of the northeast.

1992 will be the most evident of all:

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

A lot has changed since 1976. Here is a losing Republican winning Marin, San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Contra Costa counties. I think Ford actually got a majority in the SF Bay area, while losing the election.

[George W. Hobbes]

Well, in 1976 the evangelical vote came out for Carter.  The heavy religious message behind Carter's campaign might have turned away voters in the Bay Area from the Democrats.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Absurd and (especially as far as '68 goes; the idea that all Wallace's voters would have gone for Nixon over Humphrey is absurd) hackish. This is a typical example of the tendency of people to look for evidence to back up an already reached conclusion rather than to look at evidence in order to come to a conclusion.

Oh as for California, this is the '68 map:

[CARLHAYDEN]

Absurd and (especially as far as '68 goes; the idea that all Wallace's voters would have gone for Nixon over Humphrey is absurd) hackish. This is a typical example of the tendency of people to look for evidence to back up an already reached conclusion rather than to look at evidence in order to come to a conclusion.

Oh as for California, this is the '68 map:

The general consenus is that in the southern states the Wallace vote would have split 70/30 for Nixon and elsewhere 60/40 for Nixon.

[Adlai Stevenson]

In the South most Wallace voters would have voted for Nixon; in the North it was almost a 50-50 split between Nixon and Humphrey - Humphrey gained in September and October when the Wallace campaign faltered, and those gains came in the Industrial Northern states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

[Verily]

This is 1964 with an 11% swing to Goldwater (making the popular vote 50-50). Johnson wins the electoral vote 301-237, but the map, with a few oddities, looks very familiar.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

If anyone actually needs any proof that "South Park Conservative" is but a hack, this is the result that'd you'd actually get if you add all of Wallace's voters to Nixon:



Oh and here's a map of HHH's vote:



He took 43% nationally (for those interested, in much (but not all) of the U.S, there's a correlation (not perfect o/c) between union strength and HHH's map).

[WalterMitty]

1896, obviously. 

[nclib]

Even the 1972 map (in a 50-50 race) shows some divide:

[jokerman]

And if we were to give all of Wallace's votes to Nixon

Let's go ahead and give all of Badnarik's votes to Kerry in 04.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

I always thought 1964 and 1972 were aberrations. Not only did the losing candidate really lose big, but the issues were unusual in those years, so the normal patterns didn't necessarily apply then. As recently as Dukakis and Clinton, Democrats did very well in a lot of rural areas.

I trace the modern red state/blue state divide to the spittle wave of 1994. Although the country generally trended to the far right, the urban areas recovered by 2000. The rural areas did not.

[DWPerry]

I think as you look at the Electoral College maps from 1789 until now, you will notice shifts from regional/political divisions to national unity. The current divisions started probably in 1994, but in 10 years there will probably be unity, then a new division on regional/political lines.

[memphis]

In presidential elections, the Reps have been doing best in the South and the Dems have been best in the NE for decades now. All this talk of "red state" and "blue state" is still a bunch of oversimplied crap though. I can't wait for a landslide to get this term out of the layperson's vocabulary.

[Mr.Phips]

I always thought 1964 and 1972 were aberrations. Not only did the losing candidate really lose big, but the issues were unusual in those years, so the normal patterns didn't necessarily apply then. As recently as Dukakis and Clinton, Democrats did very well in a lot of rural areas.

I trace the modern red state/blue state divide to the spittle wave of 1994. Although the country generally trended to the far right, the urban areas recovered by 2000. The rural areas did not.

I think you mean the suburban areas.  The urban areas were very Democratic even in 1994.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

I think you mean the suburban areas.  The urban areas were very Democratic even in 1994.

Even a very heavily Democratic district in Chicago "elected" a conservative Republican to Congress that year. Everyone was shocked that this could happen.

I know New York elected Giuliani (a very conservative Republican) as mayor just a year earlier, and Los Angeles also had a conservative mayor. Other big cities, such as Cincinnati, were adopting very conservative public policies (although the mayor wasn't exactly conservative).

[Mr.Phips]

I think you mean the suburban areas.  The urban areas were very Democratic even in 1994.

Even a very heavily Democratic district in Chicago "elected" a conservative Republican to Congress that year. Everyone was shocked that this could happen.

I know New York elected Giuliani (a very conservative Republican) as mayor just a year earlier, and Los Angeles also had a conservative mayor. Other big cities, such as Cincinnati, were adopting very conservative public policies (although the mayor wasn't exactly conservative).

That is true, but none of these areas other than Chicago elected Republicans to national office, unless you count Steve Chabot in Cincinnati.

[ag]

1896, obviously. 

Actually, the best answe so far. Only 7 states (of those then in existence), I believe, have gone the same way in 1896 and 2004. Dems only kept WA, Reps still have KY, WV, ND, IN, OH, IA. Everybody else flipped, meaning the partisan divide then and now (at least, outside the Midwest) was pretty much the same.

[Gustaf]

The truth of the matter is of course that to an extent the Northeast, Midwest and West were divided along the modern lines back in the 60s. However, this only held as long as the GOP were aiming for the South and the Democrats for the aforementioned areas. Carter v Ford looked completely different. Also, there are a number of important exceptions, in that the West and Northeast both were much more Republican in those days than they are now. California, New Hampshire, Maine, Vermont. Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa also come to mind.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

Right. the Rockefeller GOP rump was MUCH more influential in party policy up until 1968 and more finally 1980.

[jokerman]

1896, obviously. 

Actually, the best answe so far. Only 7 states (of those then in existence), I believe, have gone the same way in 1896 and 2004. Dems only kept WA, Reps still have KY, WV, ND, IN, OH, IA. Everybody else flipped, meaning the partisan divide then and now (at least, outside the Midwest) was pretty much the same.

It's not so clear, though, when you actually look inside the individual states.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

The General is right that things inside the state haven't switched so cleanly.

Anyways, 1916 and 2000 are another interesting pair of elections to look at, or for one state worse, 1916 and 2004.

[CARLHAYDEN]

1796.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

1860, 1948, and 1988. These dates changed the course of history. Abe Lincoln's election, Truman's election, and Duikakis election. The north went blue and the south went red due to the passage of the 14th amendment in the 1860's and due to the Strom Thurmond defection in 1948 which eventually lead to the end of Jim Crow in 1954 with the Brown v Board of Ed. And the final turning point came with Dukakis, coming off of the Equal Rights Amendment that failed in the Senate in 1984. That bill further alienated the South from the Democratic party and thus the transformation was complete.