Strange stat I found "Since the Civil War only four Democrats have won a popular vote majority"

[tritsofme]

This statistic just really jumped out at me as odd in an article I was reading

Since the Civil War only four Democrats -- Jimmy Carter, Lyndon Johnson, Franklin Roosevelt and Samuel Tilden -- have won a majority of the popular vote. (Tilden in 1876, lost the Electoral College vote and never became president.)

I don't really have a comment about it, it just seems like an exceedingly low number.

[DFW]

1. Perot and Nader didn't run in those days

[ThomWV]

7. Even in the years they ran the Democrat still had the majority of votes.

[MonkeyFunk]

10. No

they had a plurality, not a majority.

[fasttense]

2. They forgot Al Gore and John Kerry.

But of course they don't count cause the bushes count the vote or they hand it over to their packed supreme court.

[ColbertWatcher]

3. Good one! n/t

[MonkeyFunk]

9. John Kerry didn't get the majority of votes

no matter what you think happened in Ohio.

[Richard Steele]

12. Self delete- no bait for me today. nm

[El Pinko]

13. Not by a long shot - he lost by 3 million in the popular vote.

Gore is another story - a clear electoral college win & massive disenfranchisement that was proven in Florida Supreme Court when Choicepoint was forced to put most of the people they scrubbed back on the voter rolls.

Also, an official complete hand count was never performed thanks to SCOTUS - Several newspaper studies did show that had they been counted the ballots would have shown Gore the winner in Florida as well.



I personally detest the electoral college and would prefer a straight popular vote - even though it might mean repukes winning instead of dems.

[ThomWV]

4. Dewey Beats Truman? Go check your facts

1948 Popular vote:

Harry S, Truman 24,179,374
Thomas E, Dewey 21,991,292
Strom Thurman 1,175,930

1960

John F. Kennedy 34,220,984
Richard Nixon 34,108,157
Harry F. Byrd 286,359


1992

Bill Clinton 44,909,806
George Bush 39,104,550
Ross Perot 19.743,821

1996

Bill Clinton 47,400,125
Bob Dole 39,198,755

[tritsofme]

16. In all of those cases the Democrat won the largest plurality of the vote.

Not over 50%.

I just found it to be an interesting figure.

[hoosier_lefty]

5. I would love to see that link

Sound like wishful right wing fantasy.

[rock]

6. You've got me confused

What about Clinton and Kennedy? Remember, I'm easily confused.

[ThomWV]

8. You're not confused, the simple fact is that the title of this post is dead wrong.

[Crabby Appleton]

11. The key word in the OP is "majority"

a majority is defined as more than half of the total votes cast, not who has the most votes. An election where the the candidate has less than 50% of the total votes cast but has the most votes is called a plurality.

see: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plurality

In the example of Truman v Dewey there was the following results:

Harry S. Truman 24,179,345
Thomas E. Dewey 21,991,291
J. Strom Thurmond 1,176,125
Henry A. Wallace 1,157,326
Norman Thomas 139,572

Truman won the election (based on electoral college vote totals actually), but had less than 50% of the total popular vote for president.

[ThomWV]

14. So, once again we see a manipulation of words to confuse and distort perception

The distortion is in the implication that Democrats do not legitimately win elections and it comes from finding exactly the right word that conveys that perception even though it bears no relevence to the success of Democrats in taking the popular vote time after time. It is done purposfully, make no mistake about that.

[gratuitous]

15. Figures don't lie, but liars always figure

Yeah, it's as if someone were to say, "Yeah, the Burgville Bully Boys beat the Home Town Heroes 99-97 last night, but what everyone fails to notice is that the Heroes made four more free throws." Or hit a higher percentage of their 3-pointers. Or had more offensive rebounds.

The only rational response is to say, "So if Clinton (for example) didn't win a 'majority' of the votes, you think that the guy who had even fewer votes should have been awarded the election?"