1960 United States presidential election Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! {{Short description|44th quadrennial U.S. presidential election}} {{pp-dispute|small=yes}} {{Use mdy dates|date=March 2023}} {{Infobox election | election_name = 1960 United States presidential election | country = United States | flag_year = 1960 | type = presidential | previous_election = 1956 United States presidential election | previous_year = 1956 | election_date = November 8, 1960 | next_election = 1964 United States presidential election | next_year = 1964 | votes_for_election = 537 members of the [[United States Electoral College|Electoral College]] | needed_votes = 269 electoral | turnout = 63.8%<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.electproject.org/national-1789-present|title=National General Election VEP Turnout Rates, 1789βPresent|work=United States Election Project|publisher=[[CQ Press]]}}</ref> {{increase}} 3.6 [[percentage point|pp]] | image_size = x200px <!-- John F. Kennedy -->| image1 = <!--DO NOT CHANGE.--> File: Jfk2 (3x4).jpg | nominee1 = '''[[John F. Kennedy]]''' | party1 = Democratic Party (United States) | home_state1 = [[Massachusetts]] | running_mate1 = '''[[Lyndon B. Johnson]]''' | electoral_vote1 = '''303''' | states_carried1 = 22 | popular_vote1 = '''34,220,984'''{{efn|Official tallies for the popular vote are complicated by unpledged electors in Alabama. The voters of Alabama were faced with voting each of the 11 presidential electors in individual races; while each of the 11 races featured a Republican elector pledged to Nixon, only five races featured a Democratic elector pledged to Kennedy, and the remaining six races featured a Democratic elector that was unpledged. Kennedy is commonly provided the popular votes of the highest-voted Kennedy-pledged elector in Alabama, while the popular vote for the unpledged electors is usually determined by subtracting that highest-voted Kennedy-pledged elector's votes from the highest-voted unpledged elector's votes (as a means to align the total votes with the estimated number of Alabama voters).<ref>[http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=1960&f=0&off=0&elect=0&fips=1&submit=Retrieve 1960 Presidential General Election Results β Alabama] Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections</ref> See the [[Unpledged elector]] page for clarification.}} | percentage1 = '''{{percent|<!-- KENNEDY: --> 34,220,984|<!-- TOTAL: --> 68,832,482|2|pad=yes}}''' <!-- Richard Nixon -->| image2 = <!--DO NOT CHANGE.--> Richard Nixon official portrait as Vice President (cropped).tiff | nominee2 = [[Richard Nixon]] | party2 = Republican Party (United States) | home_state2 = [[California]] | running_mate2 = [[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.]] | electoral_vote2 = 219 | states_carried2 = '''26''' | popular_vote2 = 34,108,157 | percentage2 = {{percent|<!-- NIXON: --> 34,108,157|<!-- TOTAL: --> 68,832,482|2|pad=yes}} | map_size = 350px | map = {{1960 United States presidential election imagemap}} | map_caption = Presidential election results map. <span style="color:blue;">Blue</span> denotes states won by Kennedy/Johnson, <span style="color:red;">red</span> denotes those won by Nixon/Lodge, <span style="color:#C3D1EE;">light blue</span> denotes the electoral votes for [[Harry F. Byrd|Byrd]]/[[Strom Thurmond|Thurmond]] by Alabama and Mississippi [[unpledged elector]]s, and a vote for Byrd/[[Barry Goldwater|Goldwater]] by an Oklahoma [[faithless elector]]. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state. | title = President | before_election = [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] | before_party = Republican Party (United States) | after_election = [[John F. Kennedy]] | after_party = Democratic Party (United States) | ongoing = no }} The '''1960 United States presidential election''' was the 44th quadrennial [[United States presidential election|presidential election]]. It was held on Tuesday, November 8, 1960. In a closely contested election, [[History of the Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]] Senator [[John F. Kennedy]] defeated the incumbent [[History of the Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] Vice President [[Richard Nixon]]. This was the first election in which 50 states participated, marking the first participation of Alaska and Hawaii, and the last in which the District of Columbia did not. This made it the only presidential election where the threshold for victory was 269 [[Electoral College (United States)|electoral votes]]. It was also the first election in which an incumbent presidentβin this case, [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]βwas ineligible to run for a third term because of the term limits established by the [[Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution|22nd Amendment]]. [[File:Dwight D. Eisenhower, White House photo portrait, February 1959.jpg|thumb|189x189px|The [[incumbent]] in 1960, Dwight D. Eisenhower. His second term expired at noon on January 20, 1961.]] This was the most recent election in which three of the four major party nominees for president and vice president were eventually elected president. Kennedy won the election, but [[Assassination of John F. Kennedy|was assassinated in 1963]] and succeeded by Johnson, who won the election in [[1964 United States presidential election|1964]]. Then, Nixon won the [[1968 United States presidential election|1968 election]]. Only Republican vice-presidential nominee [[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.]] failed to succeed to the presidency. As such, this was also the most recent election in which the defeated presidential nominee would later win the presidency. The election saw the first time that a candidate won the presidency while carrying fewer states than the other candidate, something that would not occur again until [[1976 United States presidential election|1976]]. When Kennedy was elected, he became the youngest president elected to the presidency at 43 years, while [[Theodore Roosevelt]] was still the youngest president inaugurated to the presidency at 42 years and 10 months in [[First inauguration of Theodore Roosevelt|September 1901]] following the death of president [[William McKinley]]. No matter which candidate won, America would elect its first president born in the 20th century (Kennedy was born in 1917, Nixon in 1913). Nixon faced little opposition in the Republican race to succeed popular incumbent [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]. Kennedy, a junior senator from [[Massachusetts]], established himself as the Democratic front-runner with his strong performance in the [[Democratic Party presidential primaries, 1960|1960 Democratic primaries]], including key victories in Wisconsin and West Virginia over Senator [[Hubert Humphrey]]. He defeated Senate Majority Leader [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] on the first presidential ballot of the [[1960 Democratic National Convention]], and asked Johnson to serve as his running mate. The issue of the [[Cold War]] dominated the election, as tensions were high between the United States and the [[Soviet Union]]. Kennedy won 303 to 219 in the [[Electoral College (United States)|Electoral College]], and he won the reported national popular vote by 112,827, a margin of 0.17 percent. Fourteen [[unpledged elector]]s from Mississippi and Alabama cast their vote for Senator [[Harry F. Byrd]], as did a [[faithless elector]] from Oklahoma. The 1960 presidential election was the closest election since [[1916 United States presidential election|1916]], and this closeness can be explained by a number of factors.<ref>Rorabaugh (2009)</ref> Kennedy benefited from the [[Recession of 1958|economic recession of 1957β1958]], which hurt the standing of the incumbent Republican Party, and he had the advantage of 17 million more registered Democrats than Republicans.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Ann Mari |last=May |title=President Eisenhower, Economic Policy, and the 1960 Presidential Election |journal=[[Journal of Economic History]] |volume=50 |issue=2 |year=1990 |pages=417β427 |jstor=2123282 |doi=10.1017/s0022050700036536|s2cid=45404782 |url=http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1023&context=cbafacpub }}</ref> Furthermore, the new votes that Kennedy, a [[Roman Catholic]], gained among Catholics almost neutralized the new votes Nixon gained among [[Protestantism in the United States|Protestants]].<ref>Casey (2009)</ref> Nixon's advantages came from Eisenhower's popularity, and the economic prosperity of the past eight years. Kennedy strategically focused on campaigning in populous [[swing states]], while Nixon exhausted time and resources campaigning in all fifty states. Kennedy emphasized his youth, while Nixon focused heavily on his experience. Kennedy relied on Johnson to hold the South, and used television effectively. Despite this, Kennedy's popular vote margin was the second narrowest in presidential history, only surpassed by the 0.11% margin of the [[1880 United States presidential election|election of 1880]] and the smallest ever for a Democrat (notwithstanding the presidential elections where [[List of United States presidential elections in which the winner lost the popular vote|the winners lost the popular vote]]). ==Nominations== ===Democratic Party=== {{main|1960 Democratic Party presidential primaries}} {{John F. Kennedy series}} {{Lyndon B. Johnson series}} {| class="wikitable" style="font-size:90%; text-align:center;" |- | style="background:#f1f1f1;" colspan="30"|[[File:Democratic Disc.svg|65px|center|link=Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party (United States)]]<big>'''1960 Democratic Party ticket '''</big> |- ! style="width:3em; font-size:135%; background:{{party color|Democratic Party (United States)}}; width:200px;"|{{colored link|white|John F. Kennedy}} ! style="width:3em; font-size:135%; background:{{party color|Democratic Party (United States)}};"|{{colored link|white|Lyndon B. Johnson}} |- style="color:#000; font-size:100%; background:#c8ebff;" | style="width:3em; width:200px;"|'''''for President''''' | style="width:3em; width:200px;"|'''''for Vice President''''' |- |- | [[File:John F. Kennedy, White House photo portrait, looking up.jpg|center|219x219px]] | [[File:Vice President LBJ.jpg|center|219x219px]] |- | [[United States Senate|U.S. Senator]] from [[Massachusetts]]<br /><small>(1953β1960)</small> | [[United States Senate|U.S. Senator]] from [[Texas]]<br /><small>(1949β1961)</small> |- | colspan=2 |[[John F. Kennedy 1960 presidential campaign|'''Campaign''']] |- | colspan=2 |[[File:Kennedy Johnson 1960 campaign logo.svg|200x200px]] |- |} ====Democratic candidates==== <gallery perrow="6"> File:John F. Kennedy - NARA - 518134.jpg|Senator '''[[John F. Kennedy]]''' from [[Massachusetts]] File:Senator Lyndon Johnson.jpg| [[Senate Majority Leader]] '''[[Lyndon B. Johnson]]''' from [[Texas]] File:Stuart Symington.jpg|Senator '''[[Stuart Symington]]''' from [[Missouri]] File:Hubert Humphrey crop.jpg|Senator '''[[Hubert Humphrey]]''' from [[Minnesota]] File:Wayne Morse.jpg|Senator '''[[Wayne Morse]]''' from [[Oregon]] File:George smathers.jpg|Senator '''[[George Smathers]]''' from [[Florida]] File:AdlaiEStevenson1900-1965.jpg|Former [[Governor of Illinois|Governor]] '''[[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]]''' of [[Illinois]] </gallery> The major candidates for the 1960 Democratic presidential nomination were [[United States Senate|United States Senator]] [[John F. Kennedy]] from Massachusetts, Governor [[Pat Brown]] of California, Senator [[Stuart Symington]] from Missouri, Senator [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] from Texas, former nominee [[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]], Senator [[Wayne Morse]] from Oregon, and Senator [[Hubert Humphrey]] from Minnesota. Several other candidates sought support in their home state or region as "[[favorite son]]" candidates, without any realistic chance of winning the nomination. Symington, Stevenson, and Johnson all declined to campaign in the presidential primaries. While this reduced their potential delegate count going into the Democratic National Convention, each of these three candidates hoped that the other leading contenders would stumble in the primaries, thus causing the convention's delegates to choose him as a "compromise" candidate acceptable to all factions of the party. Kennedy was initially dogged by suggestions from some [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] elders (such as former United States President [[Harry S. Truman]], who was supporting Symington) that he was too youthful and inexperienced to be president; these critics suggested that he should agree to be the [[running mate]] for another Democrat. Realizing that this was a strategy touted by his opponents to keep the public from taking him seriously, Kennedy stated frankly, "I'm not running for vice president; I'm running for president."<ref>[[Jeff Zeleny|Zeleny, Jeff]]; Bosman, Julie (March 11, 2008). [https://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/11/us/politics/11clinton.html "Obama Rejects Idea of Back Seat on Ticket"]. ''The New York Times''.</ref> [[File:1960 Dem Primaries.svg|thumb|400px|1960 Democratic primaries results<br> {{legend|#81B5FF|John F. Kennedy}} {{legend|#D40000|Lyndon B. Johnson}} {{legend|#FFA500|Hubert H. Humphrey}} {{legend|#916F6F|Various{{efn|[[Favorite son]]s received the support of Missouri ([[Stuart Symington]]), Florida ([[George Smathers]]), New Jersey ([[Robert Meyner]]), Mississippi ([[Carroll Gartin]]), and Hawaii.}}}}]] The next step was the primaries. Kennedy's [[Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] religion was an issue. Kennedy first challenged Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey in the Wisconsin primary, and defeated him. Kennedy's sisters, brothers, and wife Jacqueline combed the state, looking for votes, leading Humphrey to complain that he "felt like an independent merchant competing against a chain store."<ref>Humphrey, Hubert H. (1992). Kennedy also defeated Morse in the Maryland and Oregon primaries. ''The Education of a Public Man'', p. 152. University of Minnesota Press. {{ISBN|0-8166-1897-6}}.</ref> However, some political experts argued that Kennedy's margin of victory had come almost entirely from Catholic areas, and, thus, Humphrey decided to continue the contest in the heavily Protestant state of West Virginia. The first televised debate of 1960 was held in West Virginia. Kennedy outperformed Humphrey and, in the days following, Kennedy made substantial gains over Humphrey in the polls.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Reston |first=James |date=May 5, 1960 |title=Sen. Kennedy More Effective in TV Debate |pages=2 |work=[[The Los Angeles Times]] |agency=New York Times News Service |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/381119120/?terms=%22made%20a%20more%20vivid%20and%20effective%20presentation%20of%20his%20case%22&match=1 |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Lawrence |first=W. H. |date=May 6, 1960 |title=West Virginia Poll Finds Kennedy Gain |pages=1 |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1960/05/06/archives/west-virginia-poll-finds-kennedy-gain-kennedy-gaining-a-poll.html |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> Humphrey's campaign was low on funds, and could not compete for advertising and other "get-out-the-vote" drives with Kennedy's well-financed and well-organized campaign, which was not above using dirty tricks to win; prior to the Wisconsin primary, Catholic neighborhoods in [[Milwaukee]] were flooded with anti-Catholic pamphlets postmarked from Minnesota. It was assumed Humphrey's campaign had sent them, and it may have helped tilt voters in the Badger State away from him (it later came out that [[Robert F. Kennedy]] had deployed an assistant to mail the pamphlets). In the end, Kennedy defeated Humphrey with over 60% of the vote, and Humphrey ended his presidential campaign. West Virginia showed that Kennedy, a Catholic, could win in a heavily Protestant state. Although Kennedy had only competed in nine presidential primaries,<ref name="N&O">{{cite news |title=Another Race To the Finish |url=http://www.newsobserver.com/news/q/story/1278451.html |url-status=dead |newspaper=[[The News & Observer]] |date=November 2, 2008 |access-date=November 24, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090115040630/http://www.newsobserver.com/news/q/story/1278451.html |archive-date=January 15, 2009}}</ref> Kennedy's rivals, Johnson and Symington, failed to campaign in any primaries. Even though Stevenson had twice been the Democratic Party's presidential candidate, and retained a loyal following of liberals, his two landslide defeats to [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] United States President [[Dwight Eisenhower|Dwight D. Eisenhower]] led most party leaders and delegates to search for a "fresh face" who could win a national election. Following the primaries, Kennedy traveled around the nation, speaking to state delegations and their leaders. As the Democratic Convention opened, Kennedy was far in the lead, but was still seen as being just short of the delegate total he needed to win. ====Democratic convention==== The [[1960 Democratic National Convention]] was held in Los Angeles, California. In the week before the convention opened, Kennedy received two new challengers, when Lyndon B. Johnson, the powerful Senate Majority Leader, and Adlai Stevenson, the party's nominee in 1952 and 1956, officially announced their candidacies. However, neither Johnson nor Stevenson was a match for the talented and highly efficient Kennedy campaign team led by Robert Kennedy. Johnson challenged Kennedy to a televised debate before a joint meeting of the Texas and Massachusetts delegations, which Kennedy accepted. Most observers believed that Kennedy won the debate, and Johnson was unable to expand his delegate support beyond the South. Stevenson's failure to launch his candidacy publicly until the week of the convention meant that many liberal delegates who might have supported him were already pledged to Kennedy, and Stevenson β despite the energetic support of former First Lady [[Eleanor Roosevelt]] β could not break their allegiance. Kennedy won the nomination on the first ballot. Then, in a move that surprised many, Kennedy asked Johnson to be his running mate. He realized that he could not be elected without the support of traditional [[Southern Democrats]], most of whom had backed Johnson. He offered Johnson the vice presidential nomination at the [[Millennium Biltmore Hotel|Los Angeles Biltmore Hotel]] at 10:15 a.m. on July 14, 1960, the morning after being nominated for president.<ref name="Caro 2012, pp. 121β135. JFK offers vice presidency to LBJ">[[Robert Caro|Caro, Robert A.]] (2012). ''[[The Passage of Power]]'', pp. 121β135. Alfred A. Knopf, New York. {{ISBN|978-0-679-40507-8}}</ref> [[Robert F. Kennedy]], who hated Johnson for his attacks on the Kennedy family, and who favored labor leader [[Walter Reuther]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://time.com/3491219/behind-the-picture-jfk-and-rfk-los-angeles-july-1960/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141114201919/http://time.com/3491219/behind-the-picture-jfk-and-rfk-los-angeles-july-1960/|url-status=dead|archive-date=November 14, 2014|title=Head to Head: JFK and RFK, Los Angeles, July 1960|last=Cosgrave|first=Ben|date=May 24, 2014|website=Time Magazine|access-date=March 19, 2018}}</ref> later said that his brother offered the position to Johnson as a courtesy and did not predict him to accept it. When he did accept, Robert Kennedy tried to change Johnson's mind, and failed.<ref>[[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]], ''Robert Kennedy and His Times'' (1978), pp. 206β211.</ref> Biographers [[Robert Caro]] and [[W. Marvin Watson]] offer a different perspective: they write that the Kennedy campaign was desperate to win what was forecast to be a very close race against Nixon and Lodge. Johnson was needed on the ticket to help carry votes from Texas and the Southern United States. Caro's research showed that on July 14, Kennedy started the process, while Johnson was still asleep. At 6:30 a.m., Kennedy asked his brother to prepare an estimate of upcoming electoral votes, "including Texas".<ref name="Caro 2012, pp. 121β135. JFK offers vice presidency to LBJ"/> Robert Kennedy called [[Pierre Salinger]] and [[Kenneth O'Donnell]] to assist him. Realizing the ramifications of counting Texas votes as their own, Salinger asked him whether he was considering a KennedyβJohnson ticket, and Robert replied, "Yes".<ref name="Caro 2012, pp. 121β135. JFK offers vice presidency to LBJ"/> Between 9 and 10 am, John Kennedy called Pennsylvania governor [[David L. Lawrence]], a Johnson backer, to request that Lawrence nominate Johnson for vice president if Johnson were to accept the role, and then went to Johnson's suite to discuss a mutual ticket at 10:15 am. John Kennedy then returned to his suite to announce the KennedyβJohnson ticket to his closest supporters and Northern political bosses. He accepted the congratulations of Ohio Governor [[Michael DiSalle]], Connecticut Governor [[Abraham A. Ribicoff]], New York City mayor [[Robert F. Wagner Jr.]], and Chicago mayor [[Richard J. Daley]]. Lawrence said that "Johnson has the strength where you need it most"; he then left to begin writing the nomination speech.<ref name="Caro 2012, pp. 121β135. JFK offers vice presidency to LBJ"/> O'Donnell remembers being angry at what he considered a betrayal by John Kennedy, who had previously cast Johnson as anti-labor and anti-liberal. Afterward, Robert Kennedy visited with labor leaders who were extremely unhappy with the choice of Johnson, and, after seeing the depth of labor opposition to Johnson, he ran messages between the hotel suites of his brother and Johnson, apparently trying to undermine the proposed ticket without John Kennedy's authorization and to get Johnson to agree to be the Democratic Party chairman, rather than vice president. Johnson refused to accept a change in plans, unless it came directly from John Kennedy. Despite his brother's interference, John Kennedy was firm that Johnson was who he wanted as running mate, and met with staffers such as [[Larry O'Brien]], his national campaign manager, to say Johnson was to be vice president. O'Brien recalled later that John Kennedy's words were wholly unexpected, but that, after a brief consideration of the electoral vote situation, he thought "it was a stroke of genius".<ref name="Caro 2012, pp. 121β135. JFK offers vice presidency to LBJ"/> ===Republican Party=== {{main|1960 Republican Party presidential primaries}} {{Richard Nixon series}} {| class="wikitable" style="font-size:90%; text-align:center;" |- | style="background:#f1f1f1;" colspan="30"|[[File:Republican Disc.svg|65px|center|link=Republican Party (United States)|Republican Party (United States)]]<big>'''1960 Republican Party ticket'''</big> |- ! style="width:3em; font-size:135%; background:#E81B23; width:200px;"| [[Richard Nixon|{{color|white|Richard Nixon}}]] ! style="width:3em; font-size:135%; background:#E81B23; width:200px;"| [[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.|{{color|white|Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.}}]] |- style="color:#000; font-size:100%; background:#ffd0d7;" | style="width:3em; width:200px;"|'''''for President''''' | style="width:3em; width:200px;"|'''''for Vice President''''' |- | [[File:Richard Nixon official portrait as Vice President (cropped).tiff|center|200x200px]] | [[File:Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. as US ambassador to the United Nations(cropped).jpg|center|201x201px]] |- |[[List of vice presidents of the United States|36th]]<br />[[Vice President of the United States]]<br /><small>(1953β1961)</small> |[[United States Ambassador to the United Nations#List of Ambassadors|3rd]]<br />[[United States Ambassador to the United Nations|U.S. Ambassador to the UN]]<br /><small>(1953β1960)</small> |- | colspan=2 |[[Richard Nixon 1960 presidential campaign|'''Campaign''']] |- | colspan=2 |[[File:Nixon Lodge 1960 campaign logo.svg|200x200px]] |- |} ====Republican candidates==== <gallery perrow="6"> File:Richard_Nixon_official_portrait_as_Vice_President.tiff|Vice President '''[[Richard Nixon]]''' File:George Bender.jpg|Former [[US Senate|Senator]] '''[[George H. Bender]]''' from [[Ohio]] File:James_M._Lloyd.jpg|State Senator '''[[James M. Lloyd]]''' from [[South Dakota]] File:Aankomst Rockefeller op Schiphol tijdens doorreis naar Noorwegen, Rockefeller ti, Bestanddeelnr 910-6196 (cropped).jpg|Governor '''[[Nelson Rockefeller]]''' of [[New York (state)|New York]] File:Cecil H. Underwood.jpg|Governor '''[[Cecil H. Underwood]]''' of [[West Virginia]] </gallery> With the ratification of the [[Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution|22nd Amendment]] in 1951, President Dwight D. Eisenhower could not run for the office of president again; he had been elected in 1952 and 1956. In 1959, it looked as if Vice President [[Richard Nixon]] might face a serious challenge for the [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] nomination from New York Governor [[Nelson Rockefeller]], the leader of the Republican moderate-to-liberal wing. However, Rockefeller announced that he would not be a candidate for president, after a national tour revealed that the great majority of Republicans favored Nixon.<ref>(White, pp. 91β92)</ref> After Rockefeller's withdrawal, Nixon faced no significant opposition for the Republican nomination. At the [[1960 Republican National Convention]] in [[Chicago|Chicago, Illinois]], Nixon was the overwhelming choice of the delegates, with conservative Senator [[Barry Goldwater]] from Arizona receiving 10 votes from conservative delegates. In earning the nomination, Nixon became the first sitting vice president to be nominated for president since [[John C. Breckinridge]] [[1860 United States presidential election|exactly a century prior]]. Nixon then chose former Massachusetts Senator and United Nations Ambassador [[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.]], as his vice presidential running mate. Nixon chose Lodge because his foreign-policy credentials fit into Nixon's strategy to campaign more on foreign policy than domestic policy, which he believed favored the Democrats. Nixon had previously sought Rockefeller as his running mate, but the governor had no ambitions to be vice president. However, he later served as [[Gerald Ford]]'s vice president from 1974 to 1977.<ref>(White, pp. 242β243)</ref> ==General election== ===Campaign promises=== [[File:Dwight David Eisenhower, photo portrait by Bachrach, 1952.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Dwight D. Eisenhower]], the incumbent president in 1960, whose term expired on January 20, 1961]] During the campaign, Kennedy charged that under Eisenhower and the Republicans, the nation had fallen behind the [[Soviet Union]] in the [[Cold War]], both militarily and economically, and that, as president, he would "get America moving again". The Eisenhower administration had established NASA in 1958, but Kennedy believed that the Republican Party had ignored the need to catch up to the Soviet Union in the [[Space Race]]. He promised that the new Democratic administration would fully appreciate the importance of space accomplishments for the national security and international prestige of the United States. Nixon responded that, if elected, he would continue the "peace and prosperity" that Eisenhower had brought the nation in the 1950s. Nixon also argued that, with the nation engaged in the Cold War with the Soviets, Kennedy was too young and inexperienced to be trusted with the presidency. Had Nixon been elected, at 48 years, 11 days, he would have been [[List of presidents of the United States by age|the fourth-youngest]] president at the date of inauguration. Kennedy, by contrast, was 43 years, 236 days, on the date of his inauguration; the second-youngest man to begin a Presidency. (At 42 [[Theodore Roosevelt]], who [[First inauguration of Theodore Roosevelt|assumed the Presidency]] upon the [[Assassination of William McKinley|assassination of United States President William McKinley]] 60 years previously, was (and remains) the youngest.) During Kennedy's campaign, he relied on his youth and promised to bring about change. Kennedy had a slogan emphasizing his youth, reading, "who's seasoned through and through/but not so dog-gone seasoned that he won't try something new." He was also endorsed by celebrities such as [[Frank Sinatra]], [[Henry Fonda]], and [[Harry Belafonte]]. Nixon asserted that his experience in politics made him more qualified to hold the office of president. He wanted voters to know that he had the abilities to take on communist threats.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Lee|first=Byung Joon|date=September 2016|title=Attacking the Airwaves: How Television Changed the American Presidential Campaign|journal=The New England Journal of History|volume=73|pages=1β27}}</ref> ===Campaign events=== [[File:John F. Kennedy campaigns in LaGrange, Georgia 1960.jpg|thumb|left|Kennedy campaigning in [[LaGrange, Georgia]], October 1960]] Kennedy and Nixon both drew large and enthusiastic crowds throughout the campaign.<ref>[[E. Thomas Wood]], {{cite news|url=http://www.nashvillepost.com/news/2007/10/5/nashville_now_and_then_5oct2007|title=Nashville now and then: Nixon paints the town red|work=NashvillePost.com|access-date=October 6, 2007|date=October 5, 2007|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080927034101/http://www.nashvillepost.com/news/2007/10/5/nashville_now_and_then_5oct2007|archive-date=September 27, 2008}}</ref> In August 1960, most polls gave Nixon a slim lead over Kennedy, and many political [[Pundit (expert)|pundits]] regarded him as the favorite to win. However, Nixon was plagued by bad luck throughout the fall campaign. In August, President Eisenhower, who had long been ambivalent about Nixon, held a televised press conference in which a reporter, [[Charles Mohr (journalist)|Charles Mohr]] of ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'', mentioned Nixon's claims that he had been a valuable administration insider and adviser. Mohr asked Eisenhower if he could give an example of a major idea of Nixon's that he had heeded. Eisenhower responded with the flip comment, "If you give me a week, I might think of one."<ref>Ambrose, Stephen E. (1991). ''Eisenhower: Soldier and President'', p. 525. Simon and Schuster. {{ISBN|0-671-74758-4}}.</ref> Although both Eisenhower and Nixon later claimed that he was merely joking with the reporter, the remark hurt Nixon, as it undercut his claims of having greater decision-making experience than Kennedy. The remark proved so damaging to Nixon that the Democrats turned Eisenhower's statement into a television commercial.<ref>{{cite web|title=Nixon's Experience? (Kennedy, 1960)|url=http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/commercials/1960/nixons-experience|website=The Living Room Candidate|publisher=[[Museum of the Moving Image (New York City)|Museum of the Moving Image]]|access-date=August 25, 2016}}</ref> At the Republican National Convention, Nixon had pledged to campaign in all fifty states. This pledge backfired when, in August, Nixon injured his knee on a car door, while campaigning in North Carolina. The knee became infected, and Nixon had to cease campaigning for two weeks, while the infection was treated with [[Antibacterial|antibiotics]]. When he left [[Walter Reed Army Medical Center|Walter Reed Hospital]], Nixon refused to abandon his pledge to visit every state; he thus wound up wasting valuable time visiting states that he had no chance of winning, that had few electoral votes and would be of little help at the election, or states that he would almost certainly win regardless. In his effort to visit all 50 states, Nixon spent the vital weekend before the election campaigning in Alaska, which had only three electoral votes, while Kennedy campaigned in more populous states such as New Jersey, Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Throughout the campaign, Nixon's unfriendly relations with the media, which dated back to the [[Checkers speech|"Fund" scandal]] eight years earlier, were a persistent liability to him. The Washington D.C. press corps, around 100 members, were largely liberal Democrats and by nature inclined to favor Kennedy, but Nixon often made things worse with his mutually antagonistic attitude towards them. Many of Nixon's stump speeches were filled with folksy homilies that resonated with rural and small town Americans, but were distasteful to the elitist D.C. reporters. [[Mary McGrory]] of ''[[The Washington Post]]'' said he was "just so icky, so yucky, humorless, self-righteous and smarmy." However, more important than that was the adulation the press had for Kennedy; as the campaign drew to its terminal phase, this love of the Massachusetts Senator took on an almost messianic fervor. Kennedy was expert at using this to his advantage and flattered reporters instead of arguing with them. Nixon visited [[Atlanta]], Georgia, on August 26, and acquired a very large turnout to his event. He rode through a parade in Atlanta, and was greeted by 150,000 people.<ref>{{Cite news|title=The Nixon-Kennedy Campaigns In Georgia|last=Fleming|first=K|date=November 1960|work=The Atlanta-Journal and Constitution}}</ref> Nixon mentioned in his speech in Atlanta, "In the last quarter of a century, there hasn't been a Democratic candidate for President that has bothered to campaign in the State of Georgia."<ref name="presidency.ucsb.edu">{{Cite web|url=http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=25759|title=John F. Kennedy: Speech by Senator John F. Kennedy, the Little White House, Warm Springs, GA|website=www.presidency.ucsb.edu|access-date=2017-03-01|archive-date=March 2, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170302031116/http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=25759|url-status=dead}}</ref> However, Kennedy would not let Nixon take the Democratic states that easily. Kennedy would change that statistic, and visit some surprising states, including Georgia. He visited the cities of [[Columbus, Georgia|Columbus]], [[Warm Springs, Georgia|Warm Springs]], and [[LaGrange, Georgia|LaGrange]] on his campaign trail in Georgia. In his visit to Warm Springs, state troopers tried to keep Kennedy from an immense crowd; however, Kennedy reached out to shake hands of those who were sick with [[polio]].<ref>{{Cite news|title=Cheering Throng Engulfs Kennedy|last=Galphin|first=B|date=October 11, 1960|work=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution}}</ref> He also visited small towns across Georgia and saw a total of about 100,000 people in the state. Kennedy also spoke at a rehabilitation facility in Warm Springs. Warm Springs was near and dear to Kennedy's heart, due to the effects the facility had on [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]. Roosevelt spent time at the rehabilitation facility, and died there in 1945.<ref name="presidency.ucsb.edu"/> In Warm Springs, Kennedy spoke to supporters at the facility, and mentioned Roosevelt in his speech. He admired Roosevelt, and commended him for sticking up for the farmers, workers, small towns, big cities, those in poverty, and those who were sick.<ref name="presidency.ucsb.edu" /> He said Roosevelt had a "spirit of strength and progress, to get America moving".<ref name="presidency.ucsb.edu"/> Kennedy discussed his six-point plan for health care. He wanted a medical program set up for retirement, and federal funding for the construction of medical schools and hospitals. He also planned for the government to loan students money to attend medical school, and provide grants to renovate old hospitals. He called for more money to be spent on medical research and, finally, expand effort for rehabilitation and come up with new ways to assist those in need.<ref name="presidency.ucsb.edu"/> Many Republicans disapproved of Kennedy's plans and described them as an "appeal to socialism".<ref>{{Cite news|title=Kennedy's Plans Altered: Crowd of 50,000 Is Seen|last=Gaines|first=Marion|date=October 6, 1960|work=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution}}</ref> Nevertheless, many residents of Warm Springs were supportive of Kennedy, with women wearing hats reading "Kennedy and Johnson" and<ref>{{Cite news|title=Women Dressed in Support of John F. Kennedy's Presidential Campaign, Little White House, Warm Springs, Georgia|last=Johnson|first=Marion|date=October 10, 1960|work=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution}}</ref> signs around the town saying "Douglas County For Kennedy, Except 17 Republicans 6 Old Grouches".<ref>{{Cite news|title=A Sign of Votes at Warm Springs|last=Stovall|first=Hugh|date=October 11, 1960|work=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution}}</ref> Joe O. Butts, the mayor of Warm Springs during Kennedy's visit, said: "He must've shaken hands with everybody within two miles of him, and he was smiling all the time."<ref name=":1"/> Eisenhower remained out of the fray until the general election in the fall, when it was agreed that he should take to the campaign trail in support of Nixon. The president was very much a party man, and although he had some antipathies towards his vice president, he badly wanted the White House to remain in Republican control and also feared that Kennedy was too young and inexperienced for the job. Eisenhower came out in a "cyclonic" campaign, making a series of fiery speeches in the swing states of New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania in support of Nixon and denouncing Democrat charges that he had neglected military preparedness. As the poll numbers with Kennedy narrowed to a close, Eisenhower's "fall offensive" was cut short by his own wife. [[Mamie Eisenhower]] was horrified to hear of this and became convinced that he would kill himself due to his bad heart. She phoned Nixon and told him he'd better tell the president to stop this right now, before something happened. Nixon had a luncheon with Eisenhower on October 3, but he was unable to explain exactly why his help in this campaign wasn't needed, instead clumsily beating around the bush. Eisenhower was surprised and slightly annoyed, but agreed to stop campaigning. Despite the reservations [[Robert F. Kennedy]] had about Johnson's nomination, choosing Johnson as Kennedy's running mate proved to be a master stroke. Johnson vigorously campaigned for Kennedy, and was instrumental in helping the Democrats to carry several Southern states skeptical of him, especially Johnson's home state of Texas. Johnson made a "last-minute change of plans, and scheduled two 12-minute whistlestop speeches in Georgia".<ref>{{Cite news|title=Johnson Due in State Tonight|date=October 11, 1960|work=The Atlanta Constitution}}</ref> One of these visits included stopping in Atlanta to speak from the rear of a train at [[Terminal Station (Atlanta)|Terminal Station]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite news|title=New President Johnson An Old Friend to Georgia|date=November 23, 1963|work=The Atlanta Constitution}}</ref> On the other hand, Ambassador Lodge, Nixon's running mate, ran a lethargic campaign and made several mistakes that hurt Nixon. Among them was a pledge, made without approval, that Nixon would name at least one African American to a [[Cabinet of the United States|Cabinet]] post. Nixon was furious at Lodge and accused him of spending too much time campaigning with minority groups instead of the white majority.<ref>{{cite book |last=White |first=Theodore H. |title=The Making of the President, 1960 |date=2009 |publisher=HarperCollins |location=Pymble, NSW |isbn=978-0-061-98601-7 |page=297}}</ref> Nixon's inability to carry the African-American vote was another of many missteps in his campaign. Eisenhower had scored 40% of black votes four years earlier, and Nixon assumed he would perform as well with his strong support of civil rights. However, several missteps including the Lodge "pledge" and Nixon's refusal to comment on Martin Luther King Jr.'s arrest in Atlanta harmed his support with black voters. Attempts by the Nixon campaign to counter this were not very successful as they were out-spent three to one. Ultimately, Nixon won just 30% of the black vote (compared to Eisenhower's 40%) on Election Day and strong black turnout for Kennedy in several important states including Illinois and South Carolina may have contributed to his defeat. Nixon was endorsed by 731 English-language newspapers while Kennedy was endorsed by 208. This was the largest amount of endorsements for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1932.{{sfn|Williams|1961|p=28}} ===Debates=== {{Main|1960 United States presidential debates}} There were [[1960 United States presidential debates|four presidential debates]] and no vice presidential debates during the 1960 general election.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=https://www.debates.org/index.php?page=1960-debates|title=CPD: 1960 Debates|website=www.debates.org|access-date=2019-01-08}}</ref> {| class="wikitable" |+'''Debates among candidates for the 1960 U.S. presidential election''' !No. !Date !Host !Location !Panelists !Moderator !Participants !Viewership<br/>(millions) |- |P1 |Monday, September 26, 1960 |[[WBBM-TV]] |[[Chicago|Chicago, Illinois]] |[[Sander Vanocur]]<br>Charles Warren<br>[[Stuart Novins]] |[[Howard K. Smith]] |[[John F. Kennedy|Senator John F. Kennedy]]<br>[[Richard Nixon|Vice President Richard Nixon]] |66.4<ref name=":2" /> |- |P2 |Friday, October 7, 1960 |[[WRC-TV]] |Washington, D.C. |Paul Niven<br>[[Edward P. Morgan]]<br>Alan Spivak<br>Harold R. Levy |[[Frank McGee (journalist)|Frank McGee]] |[[John F. Kennedy|Senator John F. Kennedy]]<br>[[Richard Nixon|Vice President Richard Nixon]] |61.9<ref name=":2" /> |- | rowspan="2" |P3 | rowspan="2" |Thursday, October 13, 1960 |[[The Prospect Studios|ABC Studios Los Angeles]] (Nixon) |Los Angeles, California | rowspan="2" |[[Frank McGee (journalist)|Frank McGee]]<br>Charles Van Fremd<br>[[Douglass Cater]]<br>[[Roscoe Drummond]] | rowspan="2" |[[Bill Shadel]] | rowspan="2" |[[John F. Kennedy|Senator John F. Kennedy]]<br>[[Richard Nixon|Vice President Richard Nixon]] | rowspan="2" |63.7<ref name=":2" /> |- |[[ABC Studios|ABC Studios New York]] (Kennedy) |[[New York City]] |- |P4 |Friday, October 21, 1960 |[[ABC Studios|ABC Studios New York]] |[[New York City]] |Frank Singiser<br>John Edwards<br>[[Walter Cronkite]]<br>[[John Chancellor]] |[[Quincy Howe]] |[[John F. Kennedy|Senator John F. Kennedy]]<br>[[Richard Nixon|Vice President Richard Nixon]] |60.4<ref name=":2" /> |} [[File:Kennedy Nixon debate first Chicago 1960.jpg|thumb|Senator [[John F. Kennedy]] (left) and vice president [[Richard Nixon]] (right), prior to their first presidential debate.]] [[File:Kennedy Nixon Debat (1960).jpg|thumb|Second of the four Kennedy and Nixon debates, which took place at [[WRC-TV]] in [[Washington, D.C.|Washington, D. C.]], on October 7, 1960<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.debates.org/index.php?page=1960-debates|title=1960 debates|publisher=Commission on Presidential Debates|access-date=December 30, 2014}}</ref>]] [[File:TNC-172 Kennedy-Nixon First Presidential Debate, 1960.webm|thumb|Full broadcast of the September 26 debate]] The key turning point of the campaign came with the four Kennedy-Nixon debates; they were the first presidential debates ever (the [[LincolnβDouglas debates]] of 1858 had been the first for senators from Illinois), also the first held on television and thus attracted enormous publicity. Nixon insisted on campaigning until just a few hours before the first debate started. He had not completely recovered from his stay in hospital, and thus looked pale, sickly, under-weight, and tired.<ref name="Nixon, p. 270">(Nixon, p. 270)</ref> His eyes moved across the room during the debate, and at various moments, sweat was visible on his face. He also refused make-up for the first debate, and as a result, his facial stubble showed prominently on black-and-white TV screens. Furthermore, the debate set appeared darker once the paint dried up, causing Nixon's suit color to blend in with the background, reducing his stature.<ref name="Nixon, p. 270"/> Nixon's poor appearance on television in the first debate was reflected by the fact that his mother called him immediately following the debate to ask if he was sick.<ref>(Nixon, p. 271)</ref> Kennedy, by contrast, rested and prepared extensively beforehand and thus appeared tanned,{{efn|name="addisons"|His tanned appearance was likely darkening hyper-pigmentation of the skin due to [[Addison's disease#Notable cases|Addison's disease]].<ref>O'Brien, Michael. ''John F. Kennedy: A Biography'' (2005), pp. 407β408.</ref>}} confident, and relaxed during the debate.<ref name=schlinder /> An estimated 70 million viewers watched the first debate.<ref name="museum.tv">{{cite web |url=http://www.museum.tv/eotvsection.php?entrycode=kennedy-nixon |title=THE KENNEDY-NIXON PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES, 1960 β The Museum of Broadcast Communications |publisher=[[The Museum of Broadcast Communications]] (MBC) |access-date=October 8, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100821064309/http://www.museum.tv/eotvsection.php?entrycode=kennedy-nixon |archive-date=August 21, 2010 |url-status=dead }}</ref> It is often claimed that people who watched the debate on television overwhelmingly believed Kennedy had won, while radio listeners (a smaller audience) thought Nixon had ended up defeating him.<ref name="museum.tv"/><ref>{{cite episode|title=Nixon|series=American Experience|series-link=American Experience|network=[[PBS]]|station=[[WGBH-TV|WGBH]]|date=October 15, 1990|season=3|number=2|url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/nixon/|access-date=June 15, 2022}}</ref><ref>{{cite episode|title=JFK (Part 1)|series=American Experience|network=PBS|station=WGBH|date=November 11, 2013|season=25|number=7|url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/jfk/|access-date=September 24, 2019}}</ref> However, that has been disputed.<ref>Campbell, W. Joseph (September 24, 2016), "[https://mediamythalert.wordpress.com/2016/09/24/debate-myth-emerges-anew-2nd-edition-of-getting-it-wrong-out-soon/ Debate myth emerges anew]", Media Myth Alert.</ref> Indeed, one study has speculated that the viewer/listener disagreement could be due to sample bias, in that those without TV could be a skewed subset of the population:<ref>{{cite journal|title=The myth of viewer-listener disagreement in the first Kennedy-Nixon debate|year= 1987 |doi=10.1080/10510978709368226 |volume=38 |journal=Central States Speech Journal |pages=16β27 | last1 = Vancil | first1 = David L.}}</ref> {{blockquote|Evidence in support of this belief [''i. e.'', that Kennedy's physical appearance over-shadowed his performance during the first debate] is mainly limited to sketchy reports about a market survey, conducted by Sindlinger & Company, in which 49% of those who listened to the debates on radio said Nixon had won, compared to 21% naming Kennedy, while 30% of those who watched the debates on television said Kennedy had won, compared to 29% naming Nixon. Contrary to popular belief, the Sindlinger evidence suggests not that Kennedy won on television, but that the candidates tied on television, while Nixon won on radio. However, no details about the sample have ever been reported, and it is unclear whether the survey results can be generalized to a larger population. Moreover, since 87% of American households had a television in 1960 [and that the] fraction of Americans lacking access to television in 1960 was concentrated in rural areas, and particularly in southern and western states, places that were unlikely to hold significant proportions of Catholic voters.<ref name=schlinder>{{cite web|url=http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/salthaus/Publications/media%20and%20politics%20encyclopedia_kennedy-nixon%20debates.pdf|author=Scott L. Althaus|author-link=Scott Althaus|title=''Encyclopedia of Media and Politics''|page=Kennedy-Nixon debates|editor=Todd Schaefer and Tom Birkland|location=Washington, D. C.|publisher=C.Q. Press|access-date=May 25, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121203011711/http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/salthaus/Publications/media%20and%20politics%20encyclopedia_kennedy-nixon%20debates.pdf|archive-date=December 3, 2012|url-status=dead}}</ref>}} Nonetheless, [[Gallup, Inc.|Gallup]] polls in October 1960 showed Kennedy moving into a slight but consistent lead over Nixon after the candidates were in a statistical tie for most of August and September.<ref name=gallup>{{cite web|title=Gallup Presidential Election Trial-Heat Trends, 1936β2008|url=http://www.gallup.com/poll/110548/gallup-presidential-election-trialheat-trends-19362004.aspx#4|work=gallup.com|date=September 24, 2008 |publisher=Gallup, Inc.|access-date=September 18, 2020}}</ref> For the remaining three debates, Nixon regained his lost weight, wore television make-up, and appeared more forceful than in his initial appearance. However, up to 20 million fewer viewers watched the three remaining debates than the first. Political observers at the time felt that Kennedy won the first debate,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Kraus |first=Sidney |date=Autumn 1996 |title=Winners of the first 1960 televised presidential debate between Kennedy and Nixon |url=https://academic.oup.com/joc/article-abstract/46/4/78/4160281 |journal=Journal of Communication |volume=46 |issue=4 |pages=78β96 |doi=10.1111/j.1460-2466.1996.tb01507.x |via=Oxford Academic}}</ref> Nixon won the second<ref>{{Cite news |last=Reston |first=James |date=October 8, 1960 |title=The Second Debate; Vice President Apparently Came Out Ahead in a More Informative Show |pages=10 |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1960/10/08/archives/the-second-debate-vice-president-apparently-came-out-ahead-in-a.html |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> and third debates,<ref>{{Cite news |last=Wicker |first=Tom |date=October 15, 1960 |title=G.O.P. Ledaers Say Kennedy 'Cribbed' |pages=12 |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1960/10/15/archives/gop-leaders-say-kennedy-cribbed-alcorn-and-hall-assail-use-of.html |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> while the fourth debate,<ref>{{Cite news |date=October 23, 1960 |title=Kennedy-Nixon Debates Viewed as Draw in 23 Major Cities |pages=70 |work=[[The New York Times]] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1960/10/23/archives/kennedynixon-debates-viewed-as-draw-in-23-major-cities-audience.html |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> which was seen as the strongest performance by both men, was a draw. The third debate has been noted, as it brought about a change in the debate process. This debate was a monumental step for television. For the first time ever, split-screen technology was used to bring two people from opposite sides of the country together so they were able to converse in real time. Nixon was in Los Angeles, while Kennedy was in New York. The men appeared to be in the same room, thanks to identical sets. Both candidates had monitors in their respective studios, containing the feed from the opposite studio, so that they could respond to questions. Bill Shadel moderated the debate from a different television studio in Los Angeles.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/60737674/the-record/|title=Clipped From The Record|website=The Record|date=October 13, 1960|page=41}}</ref> The main topic of this debate was whether military force should be used to prevent [[Kinmen|Quemoy]] and [[Matsu Islands|Matsu]], two island archipelagos off the Chinese coast, from falling under Communist control.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.debates.org/index.php?page=october-13-1960-debate-transcript|title=October 13, 1960 Debate Transcript|publisher=Debates.org |access-date=December 5, 2013}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=October 14, 1960 |title=Here Are Kennedy And Nixon Answers On Major Issues |pages=22 |work=[[The Tampa Tribune]] |agency=Associated Press |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/330339595/?terms=Kennedy%20Nixon%20debate%20Quemoy%20Matsu%20Islands&match=1 |access-date=May 13, 2022}}</ref> ===Campaign issues=== A key concern in Kennedy's campaign was the widespread skepticism among Protestants about his [[20th century history of the Catholic Church in the United States|Roman Catholic]] religion. Some Protestants, especially Southern Baptists and Lutherans, feared that having a Catholic in the White House would give undue influence to the Pope in the nation's affairs.<ref>{{cite book|author=Shaun Casey|title=The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960|url=https://archive.org/details/makingofcatholic00case|url-access=registration|year=2009|publisher=Oxford University Press|pages=[https://archive.org/details/makingofcatholic00case/page/143 143]β46|isbn=9780199743636}}</ref> Radio evangelists such as [[G. E. Lowman]] wrote that, "Each person has the right to their own religious belief ... [but] ... the Roman Catholic ecclesiastical system demands the first allegiance of every true member, and says in a conflict between church and state, the ''church'' must prevail".<ref>{{cite book|last=Lowman|first=G. E.|author-link=G. E. Lowman|title=Should a Roman Catholic Be President?|work=Prophecies for the Times|volume=8|pages=83β89|year=1960|url=http://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/Archives/JFKCAMP1960-1020-024.aspx}} Archived at the [[John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum]].</ref> The religious issue was so significant that Kennedy made a speech before the nation's newspaper editors in which he criticized the prominence they gave to the religious issue over other topics β especially in foreign policy β that he felt were of greater importance.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Ready-Reference/JFK-Speeches/Remarks-of-Senator-John-F-Kennedy-at-American-Society-of-Newspaper-Editors-Washington-DC-April-21-19.aspx |title=Remarks of Senator John F. Kennedy at American Society of Newspaper Editors, Washington, D. C., April 21, 1960, "The Religion Issue in American Politics" β John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum |publisher=Jfklibrary.org |date=April 21, 1960 |access-date=June 24, 2012 |archive-date=April 19, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120419122244/http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Ready-Reference/JFK-Speeches/Remarks-of-Senator-John-F-Kennedy-at-American-Society-of-Newspaper-Editors-Washington-DC-April-21-19.aspx |url-status=dead }}</ref> To address fears among Protestants that his Roman Catholicism would impact his decision-making, Kennedy told the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on September 12, 1960: "I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party's candidate for president who also happens to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my Church on public matters β and the Church does not speak for me."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jfkhoustonministers.html|title=Address to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association|access-date=September 17, 2007|last=Kennedy|first=John F.|date=June 18, 2002|work=American Rhetoric}}</ref> He promised to respect the separation of church and state, and not to allow Catholic officials to dictate public policy to him.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Carty |first1=Thomas J. |title=A Catholic in the White House? Religion, Politics, and John F. Kennedy's Presidential Campaign |date=2004 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |location=New York City}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Casey |first1=Shaun A. |title=The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon 1960 |date=2009 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=New York City}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Lacroix |first1=Patrick |title=John F. Kennedy and the Politics of Faith |date=2021 |publisher=University Press of Kansas |location=Lawrence |pages=21β44}}</ref> Kennedy also raised the question of whether one-quarter of Americans were relegated to second-class citizenship just because they were Roman Catholic. Kennedy would become the first Roman Catholic to be elected presidentβit would be 60 years before another Roman Catholic, [[Joe Biden]], was elected.<ref>{{cite book|author=Fleegler, Robert L|title=Ellis Island Nation: Immigration Policy and American Identity in the Twentieth Century|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UpkAJo3vOWYC&pg=PA148|year=2013|publisher=U of Pennsylvania Press|page=148|isbn=978-0812208092}}</ref> Kennedy's campaign took advantage of an opening when Rev. [[Martin Luther King Jr.]], the civil-rights leader, was arrested in Georgia while taking part in a [[Sit-in#Civil Rights Movement|sit-in]].<ref>{{cite book|last1=White|first1=Theodore H.|title=The Making of the President 1960|url=https://archive.org/details/makingofpresiden1960whit|url-access=registration|date=1961|page=[https://archive.org/details/makingofpresiden1960whit/page/385 385]|publisher=New York, Atheneum Publishers }}</ref> Nixon asked President [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] to intervene, but the President declined to do so (as the matter was under state jurisdiction, the President did not have the power to pardon King). Nixon refused to take further action, but Kennedy placed calls to local political authorities to get King released from jail, and he also called King's father and wife. As a result, King's father endorsed Kennedy, and he received much favorable publicity among the black electorate.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Farrington|first=Joshua D.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ig8cDQAAQBAJ&q=%22king+sr%22+nixon+kennedy+republican&pg=PA111|title=Black Republicans and the Transformation of the GOP|date=September 20, 2016|publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press|isbn=978-0-8122-9326-5|language=en}}</ref> A letter to the Governor of Georgia regarding Martin Luther King Jr.'s, arrest also helped Kennedy garner many African American votes. John F. Kennedy asked Governor Ernest Vandiver to look into the harsh sentencing, and stated his claim that he did not want to have to get involved in Georgia's justice system.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/JFK-Fast-Facts/Vandiver-Letter.aspx|title=President Kennedy's Letter to Georgia Governor Ernest Vandiver, October 26, 1960 β John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum|website=www.jfklibrary.org|access-date=2017-03-01|archive-date=March 1, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170301180442/https://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/JFK-Fast-Facts/Vandiver-Letter.aspx|url-status=dead}}</ref> A member of Kennedy's civil rights team and King's friend, Harris Wofford, and other Kennedy campaign members passed out a pamphlet to black churchgoers the Sunday before the presidential election that said, ""''No Comment" Nixon versus a Candidate with a Heart, Senator Kennedy.''"<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Kuhn|first=Clifford|year=1997|title="There's a Footnote to History!" Memory and the History of Martin Luther King's October 1960 Arrest and Its Aftermath|journal=The Journal of American History|pages=586}}</ref> On election day, Kennedy won the black vote in most areas by wide margins, and this may have provided his margin of victory in states such as New Jersey, South Carolina, Illinois, and Missouri.{{citation needed|date=July 2017}} Researchers found that Kennedy's appeal to African American voters appears to be largely responsible for his receiving more African-American votes than Adlai Stevenson in the 1956 election.<ref>{{Cite web |last= |first= |date=Spring 2014 |title=Lincoln M. Fitch: Throwing the Switch: Eisenhower, Stevenson and the African-American Vote in the 1956 Election |url=https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1295&context=student_scholarship |access-date=July 16, 2023 |website=cupola.gettysburg.edu}}</ref> The same study conducted found that white voters were less influenced on the topic of civil rights than black voters in 1960. The Republican national chairman at the time, [[Thruston Ballard Morton]], regarded the African-American vote as the single most crucial factor.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Middleton|first=Russell|date=March 1962|title=The Civil Rights Issue And Presidential Voting Among Southern Negroes And Whites|journal=Social Forces|volume=40|issue=3|pages=209β215|doi=10.2307/2573630|jstor=2573630}}</ref> The issue that dominated the election was the rising Cold War tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union.<ref name="jfk1960">{{cite web|url=http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK-in-History/Campaign-of-1960.aspx|title=Campaign of 1960 β John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum|website=www.JFKLibrary.org|access-date=July 26, 2017}}</ref> In 1957, the Soviets had launched Sputnik, the first man-made satellite to orbit Earth.<ref name="jfk1960" /> Soon afterwards, some American leaders warned that the nation was falling behind communist countries in science and technology.<ref name="jfk1960" /> In Cuba, the revolutionary regime of Fidel Castro became a close ally of the Soviet Union in 1960, heightening fears of communist subversion in the Western Hemisphere.<ref name="jfk1960" /> Public opinion polls revealed that more than half the American people thought that war with the Soviet Union was inevitable.<ref name="jfk1960" /> Kennedy took advantage of increased Cold War tension by emphasizing a perceived "[[missile gap]]" between the United States and Soviet Union. He argued that under the Republicans, the Soviets had developed a major advantage in the numbers of nuclear missiles.<ref>(Ambrose, p. 562)</ref> He proposed a bi-partisan congressional investigation about the possibility that the Soviet Union was ahead of the United States in developing missiles.<ref name=":1">{{Cite news|title=A Friendly Georgia Greeted Kennedy During His 5 Visits|last=Hal|first=Gulliver|date=November 23, 1963|work=The Atlanta Constitution}}</ref> He also noted in an October 18 speech that several senior US military officers had long criticized the Eisenhower Administration's defense spending policies.<ref>[http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=74096 Speech of Senator John F. Kennedy, American Legion Convention, Miami Beach, FL] accessed November 17, 2013</ref> Both candidates also argued about the economy and ways in which they could increase the economic growth and prosperity of the 1950s, and make it accessible to more people (especially minorities). Some historians criticize Nixon for not taking greater advantage of Eisenhower's popularity (which was around 60β65% throughout 1960 and on election day), and for not discussing the prosperous economy of the Eisenhower presidency more often in his campaign.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-08/uoc--int081409.php |title=It's not the economy, stupid β it's what you do with it |publisher=Eurekalert.org |date=August 14, 2009 |access-date=June 24, 2012}}</ref> As the campaign moved into the final two weeks, the polls and most political pundits predicted a Kennedy victory. However, President Eisenhower, who had largely sat out the campaign, made a vigorous campaign tour for Nixon over the last 10 days before the election. Eisenhower's support gave Nixon a badly needed boost. Nixon also criticized Kennedy for stating that [[Quemoy]] and [[Matsu Islands|Matsu]], two small islands off the coast of Communist China that were held by Nationalist Chinese forces based in Taiwan, were outside the treaty of protection the United States had signed with the Nationalist Chinese. Nixon claimed the islands were included in the treaty, and accused Kennedy of showing weakness towards Communist aggression.<ref>(Ambrose, pp. 579β580)</ref> Aided by the Quemoy and Matsu issue, and by Eisenhower's support, Nixon began to gain momentum, and by election day, the polls indicated a virtual tie.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Perry|first=Paul|date=1962|title=Gallup Poll Election Survey Experience, 1950 to 1960|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2747357|journal=The Public Opinion Quarterly|volume=26|issue=2|pages=272β279|doi=10.1086/267097|jstor=2747357|issn=0033-362X}}</ref> ==Results== [[Image:PresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|thumb|right|400px|Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage for the winning candidate. Shades of blue are for Kennedy (Democratic), shades of red are for Nixon (Republican), and shades of green are for [[Unpledged elector]]s (Democratic/States' Rights).]] [[File:1960 US Presidential election by congressional district.svg|thumb|400x400px|Results by congressional district]] The election was held on November 8, 1960. Nixon watched the election returns from his suite at the [[Ambassador Hotel (Los Angeles)|Ambassador Hotel]] in Los Angeles, while Kennedy watched them at the [[Kennedy Compound]] in [[Hyannis Port, Massachusetts]]. As the early returns poured in from large Northeastern and Midwestern cities, such as [[Boston]], New York City, [[Philadelphia]], [[Pittsburgh]], [[Cleveland]], Detroit, and Chicago, Kennedy opened a large lead in the popular and electoral votes, and appeared headed for victory. However, as later returns came in from rural and suburban areas in the [[Midwestern United States|Midwest]], the Rocky Mountain states, and the Pacific Coast states, Nixon began to steadily close the gap on Kennedy.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/30/business/media/no-concession-no-sleep-glued-to-the-tv-on-election-night-1960.html|title=No Concession, No Sleep: Glued to the TV on Election Night 1960|last=Beschloss|first=Michael|date=October 29, 2016|work=The New York Times|access-date=2019-01-28|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> Before midnight, ''[[The New York Times]]'' had gone to press with the headline, "Kennedy Elected President". As the election again became too close to call, ''Times'' managing editor [[Turner Catledge]] hoped that, as he recalled in his memoirs, "a certain Midwestern mayor would steal enough votes to pull Kennedy through", thus allowing the ''Times'' to avoid the embarrassment of announcing the wrong winner, as the ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'' had [[Dewey Defeats Truman|memorably done twelve years earlier]] in announcing that [[Thomas E. Dewey]] had defeated President [[Harry S. Truman]].<ref name="wash post">{{cite news |title=Another Race To the Finish |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/11/17/another-race-to-the-finish/c810a41c-7da9-461a-927b-9da6d36a65dc/ |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=November 17, 2000 |access-date=May 12, 2016}}</ref> Nixon made a speech at about 3 am, and hinted that Kennedy might have won the election. News reporters were puzzled, as it was not a formal concession speech. He talked of how Kennedy would be elected if "the present trend continues".<ref>{{Cite web |title=Remarks Conceding the Presidential Election in Los Angeles, California {{!}} The American Presidency Project |url=https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-conceding-the-presidential-election-los-angeles-california |access-date=2022-03-17 |website=www.presidency.ucsb.edu}}</ref> It was not until the afternoon of the next day that Nixon finally conceded the election, and Kennedy claimed his victory. Kennedy won in twenty-seven of the thirty-nine largest cities, but lost in Southern cities that had voted for [[Adlai Stevenson II]] although he maintained [[Atlanta]], [[New Orleans]], and [[San Antonio]]. New Orleans and San Antonio were the only cities in the Southern United States to have large Catholic populations and Atlanta was a traditional Democratic stronghold.<ref>{{cite book |last=Murphy |first=Paul |date=1974 |title=Political Parties In American History, Volume 3, 1890βpresent |publisher=[[G. P. Putnam's Sons]]}}</ref> Of the 3,129 counties and county-equivalents making returns, Nixon won in 1,857 (59.35%), while Kennedy carried 1,200 (38.35%). "Unpledged" electors came first in 71 counties and parishes (2.27%) throughout Mississippi and Louisiana, and one borough (0.03%) in Alaska split evenly between Kennedy and Nixon. The Kennedy-Johnson ticket was the first successful all Senator ticket, which would only be replicated in 2008. This election marked the beginning of a decisive realignment in the Democratic presidential coalition; whereas Democrats had until this point relied on dominating in Southern states to win the electoral college, Kennedy managed to win without carrying a number of these states. As such, this marked the first election in history in which a Republican candidate carried any of Oklahoma, Tennessee, Kentucky, Florida, Virginia, or Idaho without winning the presidency, and the first time since statehood that Arizona backed any losing candidate in a presidential election. This in many ways foreshadowed the results of subsequent elections, in which Democratic candidates from northern states would rely on their performance in the northeast and midwest to win, while Republican candidates would rely on success in the former [[Solid South]] and the [[Mountain states|Mountain West]]. This is the last time a Democrat won without Wisconsin. [[File:John F. Kennedy voting 1960.jpg|thumb|left|Kennedy casts his ballot at his [[polling place]] at a branch of the [[Boston Public Library]].]] A sample of how close the election was can be seen in California, Nixon's home state. Kennedy seemed to have carried the state by 37,000 votes when all of the voting precincts reported, but when the [[absentee ballots]] were counted a week later, Nixon came from behind to win the state by 36,000 votes.<ref name="salon">{{cite web |last1=Posner |first1=Gerald |title=The fallacy of Nixon's graceful exit |url=https://www.salon.com/2000/11/10/nixon_4/ |work=Salon |access-date=March 8, 2021 |date=November 11, 2000}}</ref> Similarly, [[1960 United States presidential election in Hawaii|in Hawaii]], official results showed Nixon winning by a small margin of 141 votes, with the state being called for him early Wednesday morning. Acting Governor [[James Kealoha]] certified the Republican electors, and they cast Hawaii's three electoral votes for Nixon. However, clear discrepancies existed in the official electoral tabulations, and Democrats petitioned for a recount in Hawaii circuit court.<ref name="tuttle1961">{{cite journal|title=The 1960 Election in Hawaii|last=Tuttle|first=Daniel W. Jr.|jstor=443854|pages=331β338|volume=14|number=1, Part 2|journal=[[The Western Political Quarterly]]|publisher=[[University of Utah]]|doi=10.2307/443854|date=March 1961|series=The 1960 Elections in the West|editor-last=Anderson|editor-first=Totton J.|url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/106591296101400106|format=PDF|via=[[SAGE Journals]]}}</ref> The court challenge was still ongoing at the time of the [[Electoral Count Act]]'s [[Electoral Count Act#Safe harbor|safe harbor deadline]], but Democratic electors still convened at the [[{{Okina}}Iolani Palace]] on the constitutionally-mandated date of December 19 and cast their votes for Kennedy.<ref name="tuttle1961" /> The recount, completed before Christmas, resulted in Kennedy being declared winner by 115 votes. On December 30, the circuit court ruled that Hawaii's three electoral votes should go to Kennedy. It was decided that a new certificate was necessary, with only two days remaining before Congress convened on January 6, 1961, to count and certify the Electoral College votes. A letter to Congress saying a certificate was on the way was rushed out by registered air mail. Both Democrat and Republican electoral votes from Hawaii were presented for counting on January 6, 1961, and Vice President Nixon who presided over the certification, graciously, and saying "without the intent of establishing a precedent",<ref>{{cite book|author= Brookings Institution |title=The Presidential Election and Transition, 1960β1961: Brookings Lectures and Additional Papers |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=b-2GAAAAMAAJ |publisher=Brookings Institution |year=1961 |page=152}}</ref> requested unanimous consent that the Democratic votes for Kennedy to be counted.<ref name="honolulu">Burlingame, Burl. "[http://archives.starbulletin.com/2000/11/18/editorial/special.html Hawaii was the 'Florida' of 1960 election]." ''Honolulu Star-Bulletin''. November 18, 2000. Retrieved 2020-12-19.</ref><ref name="order">Stern, Michael. "[http://www.pointoforder.com/2016/01/04/what-the-1960-hawaii-presidential-election-meant-for-bush-v-gore/ What the 1960 Hawaii Presidential Election Meant for Bush v. Gore]." Point of Order. January 4, 2016. Retrieved 2020-12-19.</ref> In the national popular vote, Kennedy beat Nixon by less than two-tenths of one percentage point (0.17%), the closest popular-vote margin of the 20th century. So close was the popular vote that a shift of 18,838 votes in Illinois and Missouri, both won by Kennedy by less than 1%, would have left both Kennedy and Nixon short of the 269 electoral votes required to win, thus forcing a contingent election in the House of Representatives. Furthermore, had all five of the states Kennedy won by a margin of less than 1% (Hawaii, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, and New Mexico) gone to Nixon instead, it would have been enough for Nixon to win the election with 283 electoral votes (not accounting for a faithless elector in Oklahoma). In the [[Electoral College (United States)|Electoral College]], Kennedy's victory was larger, as he took 303 electoral votes, to Nixon's 219. A total of 15 electors β eight from Mississippi, six from Alabama, and one from Oklahoma β all refused to vote for either Kennedy or Nixon, and instead cast their votes for Senator [[Harry F. Byrd]] of Virginia, a conservative Democrat, even though he had not been a candidate for president.<ref name="Dudley Shiraev 2008">{{cite book |last1=Dudley |first1=Robert L. |last2=Shiraev |first2=Eric |title=Counting Every Vote: The Most Contentious Elections in American History |url=https://archive.org/details/countingeveryvot0000dudl |url-access=registration |publisher=Potomac Books |location=Dulles, VA |year=2008 |page=[https://archive.org/details/countingeveryvot0000dudl/page/83 83] |isbn=978-1-59797-224-6}}</ref> Kennedy carried 12 states by three percentage points or less, while Nixon won six by similarly narrow margins. Kennedy carried all but three states in the populous [[Northeastern United States|Northeast]], and he also carried the large states of Michigan, Illinois, and Missouri in the Midwest. With Lyndon Johnson's help, he also carried most of the South, including the large states of North Carolina, Georgia, and Texas. Nixon carried all but three of the Western states (including California), and he ran strong in the farm belt states, where his biggest victory was in Ohio. ''[[The New York Times]]'', summarizing the discussion in late November, spoke of a "narrow consensus" among the experts that Kennedy had won more than he lost "as a result of his Catholicism",<ref>''The New York Times'', November 20, 1960, Section 4, p. E5</ref> as Northern Catholics flocked to Kennedy because of attacks on his religion. Interviewing people who voted in both 1956 and 1960, a [[University of Michigan]] team analyzing the election returns discovered that people who voted Democratic in 1956 split 33β6 for Kennedy, while the Republican voters of 1956 split 44β17 for Nixon. That is, Nixon lost 28% ({{sfrac|17|61}}) of the Eisenhower voters, while Kennedy lost only 15% of the Stevenson voters. The Democrats, in other words, did a better job of holding their 1956 supporters.<ref>{{cite book |last=Campbell |first=Angus |display-authors=etal |title=Elections and the Political Order |year=1966 |page=83 |publisher=Wiley |isbn=978-0-471-13340-7}}</ref> Kennedy said that he saw the challenges ahead and needed the country's support to get through them. In his victory speech, he declared: "To all Americans, I say that the next four years are going to be difficult and challenging years for us all; that a supreme national effort will be needed to move this country safely through the 1960s. I ask your help, and I can assure you that every degree of my spirit that I possess will be devoted to the long-range interest of the United States and to the cause of freedom around the world."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Kennedy Wins 1960 Presidential Election - 1960 Year In Review - Audio - UPI.com |url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/Audio/Events-of-1960/Kennedy-Wins-1960-Presidential-Election/ |access-date=2022-06-30 |website=UPI |language=en}}</ref> This was the last time [[Ohio]] voted for the losing candidate until [[2020 United States presidential election|2020]]. === Allegations of vote fraud === There were widespread allegations of [[vote fraud]], especially in Texas, where Kennedy's running mate [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] was Senator, and Illinois, home of Mayor [[Richard J. Daley|Richard Daley]]'s powerful [[Chicago political machine]].<ref name="salon"/> These two states were important because if Nixon had carried both, he would have earned 270 electoral votes, one more than the 269 needed to win the presidency. Republican senators such as [[Everett Dirksen]] and [[Barry Goldwater]] claimed vote fraud "played a role in the election",<ref name="wash post"/> and that Nixon actually won the national popular vote. Republicans tried, and failed, to overturn the results in both Illinois and Texas at the time, as well as in nine other states.<ref name="greenberg slate">{{Cite journal| url = http://www.slate.com/id/91350/| last = Greenberg| first = David| title = Was Nixon Robbed?| journal = [[Slate (magazine)|Slate]]| date = October 16, 2000 }}</ref> [[Earl Mazo]], a journalist who was Nixon's biographer, made accusations of voter fraud.<ref>{{cite news| title=Another Race To the Finish |newspaper=The Washington Post | date=17 November 2000 | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/11/17/another-race-to-the-finish/c810a41c-7da9-461a-927b-9da6d36a65dc/ | access-date=17 July 2023}}</ref> [[File:Richard Nixon 1960 Campaign Button.png|thumb|right|1960 Nixon campaign button]] Nixon's campaign staff urged him to pursue recounts and challenge the validity of Kennedy's victory in several states, especially Illinois, Missouri, and New Jersey, where large majorities in Catholic precincts handed Kennedy the election.<ref name="wash post"/> Nixon gave a speech three days after the election, stating that he would not contest the election.<ref name="wash post"/> The Republican National chairman, Senator [[Thruston Ballard Morton]] of Kentucky, visited [[Key Biscayne, Florida]], where Nixon had taken his family for a vacation, and pushed for a recount.<ref name="wash post"/> Morton challenged the results in 11 states,<ref name="salon"/> keeping challenges in the courts into mid-1961, but the only result of these challenges was the loss of Hawaii to Kennedy on a recount. Kennedy won Illinois by less than 9,000 votes, out of 4.75 million cast, a margin of 0.2%.<ref name="salon"/> Nixon carried 92 of the state's 101 counties. Kennedy's victory in Illinois came from Chicago, which had favorable demographics for Kennedy, with its large populations of [[Catholic]] and African-American voters.<ref name="wash post von hippel">{{Cite news| url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/08/08/heres-a-voter-fraud-myth-richard-daley-stole-illinois-for-john-kennedy-in-the-1960-election/| last = von Hippel| first = Paul| title = Here's a voter fraud myth: Richard Daley "stole" Illinois for John Kennedy in the 1960 election?| newspaper = [[The Washington Post]]| date = August 8, 2017 }}</ref> His victory margin in the city was 318,736, and 456,312 in Cook County. Daley was alleged to have phoned the Kennedy campaign with the promise "With a little bit of luck and the help of a few close friends, you're going to carry Illinois."<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.sfgate.com/magazine/article/Politics-Chicago-Style-3088070.php | title=Politics, Chicago Style | newspaper=Sfgate | date=April 11, 1999 | last1=Matthews | first1=- Christopher }}</ref> When the Republican ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'' went to press, 79% of Cook County precincts had reported, compared with just 62% of Illinois's precincts overall. Moreover, Nixon never led in Illinois, and Kennedy's lead merely shrank as election night went on.<ref name="wash post von hippel"/> In Texas, Kennedy defeated Nixon by a 51 to 49% margin, or 46,000 votes.<ref name="salon"/> Some Republicans argued that Johnson's formidable political machine had stolen enough votes in counties along the [[MexicoβUnited States border|Mexican border]] to give Kennedy the victory. Kennedy's defenders, such as his speechwriter and special assistant [[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]], argued that Kennedy's margin in Texas was simply too large for vote fraud to have been a decisive factor. [[Earl Mazo]], writing in the ''[[New York Herald Tribune]]'', argued that in Texas, "a minimum of 100,000 votes for the Kennedy-Johnson ticket simply were nonexistent."{{citation needed|date=January 2024}} Allegations of voter fraud were made in Texas. [[Fannin County, Texas|Fannin County]] had only 4,895 registered voters; yet 6,138 votes were cast in that county, three-quarters for Kennedy.<ref name="wash post"/> In an [[Angelina County, Texas|Angelina County]] precinct, Kennedy received 187 votes, to Nixon's 24, though there were only 86 registered voters in the precinct.<ref name="wash post"/> When Republicans demanded a statewide recount, they learned that the state Board of Elections, whose members were all Democrats, had already certified Kennedy as the winner.<ref name="wash post"/> This analysis has been challenged, since registered voter figures only counted people who had paid the [[Poll taxes in the United States|poll tax]], and "veterans and senior citizens and some other isolated groups" were exempt from that tax.<ref>''The Houston Chronicle'', April 13, 2012, [https://www.chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Vote-ID-law-is-a-waste-of-money-3481335.php "Vote ID law is a waste of money"] by Terri Burke</ref> Earl Mazo's analysis produced evidence of voters casting up to six ballots at once, precinct chiefs bribing voters, and pre-primed voting machines, one of which was caught recording 121 ballots when 43 people voted.{{citation needed|date=January 2024}} Schlesinger and others have pointed out that even if Nixon had carried Illinois, the state would not have given him a victory, for Kennedy would still have won 276 electoral votes, to Nixon's 246. More to the point, Illinois was the site of the most extensive challenge process, which fell short, despite repeated efforts spearheaded by Cook County state's attorney Benjamin Adamowski, a Republican, who also lost his re-election bid. Despite demonstrating net errors favoring both Nixon and Adamowski (some precincts, 40% in Nixon's case, showed errors favoring them, a factor suggesting error, rather than fraud), the totals found fell short of reversing the results for the candidates. While a Daley-connected circuit judge, Thomas Kluczynski (later appointed a federal judge by Kennedy, at Daley's recommendation), threw out a federal lawsuit "filed to contend" the voting totals,<ref name="wash post"/> the Republican-dominated State Board of Elections unanimously rejected the challenge to the results. Furthermore, there were signs of possible irregularities in downstate areas controlled by Republicans, which Democrats never seriously pressed, since the Republican challenges went nowhere.<ref>''Slate'', October 16, 2000, [http://www.slate.com/id/91350/ "Was Nixon Robbed? The legend of the stolen 1960 presidential election"] by David Greenberg</ref> More than a month after the election, the Republican National Committee abandoned its Illinois voter fraud claims.<ref name="salon"/> An academic study in 1985<ref>{{cite journal |last=Kallina |first=Edmund F. |title=Was the 1960 Presidential Election Stolen? The Case of Illinois |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/27550168 |journal=Presidential Studies Quarterly |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=113β118 |date=Winter 1985 |access-date=November 19, 2020 |jstor=27550168}}</ref> later analyzed the ballots of two disputed precincts in Chicago which were subject to a recount. It found that while there was a pattern of miscounting votes to the advantage of Democratic candidates, Nixon suffered less from this than Republicans in other races, and, furthermore, the extrapolated error would only have reduced his Illinois margin from 8,858 votes (the final official total) to just under 8,000. It concluded there was insufficient evidence that he had been cheated out of winning Illinois. A special prosecutor assigned to the case brought charges against 650 people, but charges were later dropped.<ref name="wash post"/> Three Chicago election workers were convicted of voter fraud in 1962, and served short terms in jail.<ref name="wash post"/> Mazo later said that he "found names of the dead who had voted in Chicago, along with 56 people from one house".<ref name="wash post"/> He also found cases of Republican voter fraud in southern Illinois, but said that the totals "did not match the Chicago fraud he found."<ref name="wash post"/> After Mazo had published four parts of an intended 12-part voter fraud series documenting his findings, which was re-published nationally, he said: "Nixon requested his publisher stop the rest of the series so as to prevent a [[constitutional crisis]]."<ref name="wash post"/> Nevertheless, the ''Chicago Tribune'' (which routinely endorsed GOP presidential candidates, including Nixon in 1960, 1968, and 1972) wrote that "the election of November 8 was characterized by such gross and palpable fraud as to justify the conclusion that [Nixon] was deprived of victory".<ref name="wash post"/> Nixon's personal decision not to challenge the electoral results came despite pressure from Eisenhower, his wife [[Pat Nixon|Pat]], and others. He explained in his memoirs that he did not do it for a number of reasons, one of them being that every state had different electoral laws, and some had no provisions for a vote recount. Consequently, a recount of the votes, if it was even possible, would take months, during which time the nation would be left without a president. Furthermore, Nixon feared that it would set a bad precedent for other countries, especially the Latin American states ("every pipsqueak politician down there would start claiming fraud when he lost an election"). "I had no doubt that had the results been the other way around, Kennedy wouldn't have hesitated to challenge the election." === Popular votes === ==== Alabama ==== {{See also|1960 United States presidential election in Alabama|United States presidential elections in which the winner lost the popular vote#1960 Alabama results ambiguity}} The situation in Alabama was controversial, as the number of popular votes that Kennedy received in Alabama is difficult to determine because of the unusual situation there. Instead of having the voters use one vote to choose from a slate of electors, the Alabama ballot had voters choose the [[US Presidential Electors|electors]] individually with up to 11 votes. In such a situation, a given candidate is traditionally assigned the popular vote of the elector who received the most votes. For instance, all 11 Republican candidates in Alabama were pledged to Nixon, and the 11 Republican electors received anywhere from as low as 230,951 votes (for George Witcher) to as high as 237,981 votes (for Cecil Durham); Nixon is therefore assigned 237,981 popular votes from Alabama. The situation was more complicated on the Democratic side. The Alabama statewide Democratic primary had chosen 11 candidates for the Electoral College, five of whom were pledged to vote for Kennedy, but the other six of whom were unpledged and could therefore vote for anyone that they chose to be president. All 11 of these Democratic candidates won in the general election in Alabama, from as low as 316,394 votes for Karl Harrison, to as high as 324,050 votes for [[Frank M. Dixon]]. All six of the unpledged Democratic electors ended up voting against Kennedy, and instead voted for the Dixiecrat segregationist [[Harry F. Byrd]]. The number of popular votes that Kennedy received is therefore difficult to calculate. There are typically three methods that can be used. The first method, which is mostly used and the method used on the results table on this page below, is to assign Kennedy 318,303 votes in Alabama (the votes won by the most popular Kennedy elector, C.G. Allen), and to assign 324,050 votes in Alabama (the votes won by the most popular unpledged Democratic elector, Frank M. Dixon) to unpledged electors. However, using this method gives a combined voting total that is much higher than the actual number of votes cast for the Democrats in Alabama. The second method that can be used is to give Kennedy 318,303 votes in Alabama, and count the remaining 5,747 Democratic votes as unpledged electors. The third method would give a completely different outlook in terms of the popular vote in both Alabama and in the USA overall. The third method is to allocate the Democratic votes in Alabama between Kennedy electors and unpledged electors on a percentage basis, giving 5/11s of the 324,050 Democratic votes to Kennedy (which comes to 147,295 votes for Kennedy) and 6/11s of the 324,050 Democratic votes to unpledged electors (which comes to 176,755 votes for unpledged electors). Bearing in mind that the highest Republican/Nixon elector in Alabama got 237,981 votes, this third method of calculating the Alabama vote means that Nixon wins the popular vote in Alabama, and wins the popular vote in the USA overall, as it would give Kennedy 34,049,976 votes nationally, and Nixon 34,108,157 votes nationally.<ref name="trende">{{cite news| title = Did JFK Lose the Popular Vote?| publisher = RealClearPolitics| date = October 22, 2012| url = http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/10/19/did_jfk_lose_the_popular_vote_115833.html| access-date = October 23, 2012 }}</ref> ==== Georgia ==== {{see also|1960 United States presidential election in Georgia}} The number of popular votes Kennedy and Nixon received in Georgia is also difficult to determine because voters voted for 12 separate electors.<ref name=":3">{{cite journal|last1=Novotny|first1=Patrick|title=John F. Kennedy, the 1960 Election, and Georgia's Unpledged Electors in the Electoral College|journal=Georgia Historical Quarterly|date=2004|volume=88|issue=3|pages=375β397|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=14658910&site=eds-live&scope=site|access-date=February 15, 2018}}</ref> The vote totals of 458,638 for Kennedy and 274,472 for Nixon reflect the number of votes for the Kennedy and Nixon electors who received the highest number of votes. The Republican and Democratic electors receiving the highest number of votes were [[outliers]] from the other 11 electors from their party. The average vote totals for the 12 electors were 455,629 for the Democratic electors, and 273,110 for the Republican electors. This shrinks Kennedy's election margin in Georgia by 1,647 votes, to 182,519.<ref>{{cite journal| last=Gaines| first=Brian J.| date=March 2001| title=Popular Myths About Popular VoteβElectoral College Splits| journal=PS: Political Science & Politics| page=74| url=http://www.apsanet.org/imgtest/PopularMythsPopularVote-Gaines.pdf| access-date=April 2, 2006| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060523234634/http://www.apsanet.org/imgtest/PopularMythsPopularVote-Gaines.pdf| archive-date=May 23, 2006| url-status=dead}}</ref> === Unpledged Democratic electors === {{main|Unpledged elector}} [[File:Harry F. Byrd.jpg|thumb|200px|Senator Harry F. Byrd Sr. received 15 electoral votes]] Many Southern Democrats were opposed to voting rights for African Americans living in the South. There was a call from segregationists for electoral votes to be withheld, or to be cast for Virginia senator [[Harry F. Byrd]], a segregationist Democrat, as an independent candidate.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Novotny|first=Patrick|date=Fall 2004|title=John F. Kennedy, the 1960 Election, and Georgia's Unpledged Electors in the Electoral College|journal=The Georgia Historical Quarterly|volume=88}}</ref> Both before and after the convention, they attempted to put [[unpledged elector|unpledged Democratic electors]] on their states' ballots, in the hopes of influencing the race; the existence of such electors might influence which candidate would be chosen by the national convention, and in a close race, such electors might be in a position to extract concessions from either the Democratic or Republican presidential candidates in return for their electoral votes. Most of these attempts failed. The Democrats in Alabama put up a mixed slate of five electors loyal to Kennedy and six unpledged electors. The Democrats in Mississippi put up two distinct slates β one of Kennedy loyalists, and one of unpledged electors. Louisiana also put up two distinct slates, although the unpledged slate did not receive the "Democratic" label. Georgia freed its Democratic electors from pledges to vote for Kennedy, although all 12 Democratic electors in Georgia did end up voting for Kennedy. Governor [[Ernest Vandiver]] wanted the Democratic electors to vote against Kennedy. Former governor Ellis Arnall supported Kennedy getting the electoral votes, with Arnall calling Vandiver's stand "utterly disgraceful".<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Novotny|first=Patrick|date=Fall 2004|title=John F. Kennedy, the 1960 Election, and Georgia's Unpledged Electors in the Electoral College|journal=The Georgia Historical Quarterly|volume=88|pages=383}}</ref> In total, 14 [[Unpledged elector|unpledged Democratic electors]] won election from the voters and chose not to vote for Kennedy, eight from Mississippi and six from Alabama. Because electors pledged to Kennedy had won a clear majority of the Electoral College, the unpledged electors could not influence the results. Nonetheless, they refused to vote for Kennedy. Instead, they voted for Byrd, even though he was not an announced candidate and did not seek their votes. In addition, Byrd received one electoral vote from a faithless Republican elector in Oklahoma, for a total of 15 electoral votes. The faithless Republican elector in Oklahoma voted for [[Barry Goldwater]] as vice president; whereas the 14 unpledged Democratic electors from Mississippi and Alabama voted for [[Strom Thurmond]] as vice president. {{start U.S. presidential ticket box}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name= [[John F. Kennedy]]| party=[[United States Democratic Party|Democratic]]| state=Massachusetts | pv=34,220,984{{ref|box-a|(a)}} |pv_pct=49.72%| ev=303| vp_name=[[Lyndon B. Johnson]]| vp_state=Texas}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Richard Nixon]]| party=[[United States Republican Party|Republican]]| state=California| pv=34,108,157| pv_pct=49.55%| ev=219| vp_name=[[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.]]| vp_state=Massachusetts}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box rowspan| name=[[Harry F. Byrd]]| party=[[United States Democratic Party|Democratic]]| state=Virginia| pv=β{{ref|box-b|(b)}}| pv_pct=β{{ref|box-b|(b)}}| ev=15| vp_count=2| vp_name=[[Strom Thurmond]]| vp_state=South Carolina| vp_ev=14|}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box vp subrow| vp_name=[[Barry Goldwater]]{{ref|box-c|(c)}}| vp_state=Arizona| vp_ev=1{{ref|box-c|(c)}}}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row |name= (''[[unpledged elector]]s'') | party= [[United States Democratic Party|Democratic]] | state= (''n/a'') | pv=286,359| pv_pct=0.42% | ev=β{{ref|box-d|(d)}}| vp_name= (''n/a'') | vp_state= (''n/a'') | vp_ev=β{{ref|box-d|(d)}}}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Eric Hass]]| party=[[Socialist Labor Party of America|Socialist Labor]]| state=New York| pv=47,522| pv_pct=0.07%| ev=0| vp_name=[[Georgia Cozzini]]| vp_state=Wisconsin}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Rutherford Decker]]| party=[[Prohibition Party|Prohibition]]| state=Missouri| pv=46,203| pv_pct=0.07%| ev=0| vp_name=[[E. Harold Munn]]| vp_state=Michigan}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Orval Faubus]]| party=[[National States' Rights Party|States' Rights]]| state=Arkansas| pv=44,984| pv_pct=0.07%| ev=0| vp_name=[[John G. Crommelin]]| vp_state=Alabama}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Farrell Dobbs]]| party=[[Socialist Workers Party (United States)|Socialist Workers]]| state=New York| pv=40,175| pv_pct=0.06%| ev=0| vp_name=[[Myra Tanner Weiss]]| vp_state=New York}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[Charles L. Sullivan]]| party=[[Constitution Party (United States 1952)|Constitution]]| state=Mississippi| pv= (TX) 18,162| pv_pct=0.03%| ev=0| vp_name=[[Merritt B. Curtis]]| vp_state=California}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box row| name=[[J. Bracken Lee]]| party=Conservative| state=Utah| pv= (NJ) 8,708| pv_pct=0.01%| ev=0| vp_name=Kent Courtney| vp_state=Louisiana|}} {{U.S. presidential ticket box other| pv=11,128| pv_pct=0.02%}} {{end U.S. presidential ticket box| pv=68,832,482| ev=537| to_win=269}} {{ubl|a.{{note|box-a||''This figure is problematic; see [[#Alabama|Alabama popular vote]] above.''}} |b.{{note|box-b||''Byrd was not directly on the ballot. Instead, his electoral votes came from [[Unpledged Elector|unpledged Democratic electors]] and a faithless elector.''}} |c.{{note|box-c||''Oklahoma [[faithless elector]] [[Henry D. Irwin]], though pledged to vote for Richard Nixon and Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., instead voted for non-candidate [[Harry F. Byrd]]. However, unlike other electors who voted for Byrd and [[Strom Thurmond]] as vice president, Irwin cast his vice presidential electoral vote for Arizona Republican Senator Barry Goldwater.''}} |d.{{note|box-d||''In Mississippi, the slate of unpledged Democratic electors won. They cast their 8 votes for Byrd and Thurmond.''}}}} '''Source (Popular Vote):''' {{Leip PV source 2| year=1960| as of= February 18, 2012}}Note: Sullivan / Curtis ran only in Texas. In Washington, the Constitution Party ran Curtis for president and B. N. Miller for vice president, receiving 1,401 votes. '''Source (Electoral Vote):''' {{National Archives EV source| year=1960| as of=August 2, 2005}} There were 537 electoral votes, up from 531 in 1956, because of the addition of two U.S. senators and one U.S. representative from each of the new states of Alaska and Hawaii. The House of Representatives was temporarily expanded from 435 members to 437, to accommodate this, and went back to 435 when re-apportioned, according to the 1960 census. The re-apportionment took place after the 1960 election. {{bar box |title=Popular vote |titlebar=#ddd |width=600px |barwidth=410px |bars= {{bar percent|'''Kennedy'''|{{party color|Democratic Party (US)}}|49.72}} {{bar percent|Nixon|{{party color|Republican Party (US)}}|49.55}} {{bar percent|Unpledged (Byrd)|{{party color|Democratic Party (US)}}|0.42}} {{bar percent|Others|#777777|0.31}} }} {{bar box |title=Electoral vote |titlebar=#ddd |width=600px |barwidth=410px |bars= {{bar percent|'''Kennedy'''|{{party color|Democratic Party (US)}}|56.42}} {{bar percent|Nixon|{{party color|Republican Party (US)}}|40.78}} {{bar percent|Byrd|{{party color|Democratic Party (US)}}|2.79}} }} ===Geography of results=== [[File:1960 Electoral Map.png|650px|thumb|left]] <gallery perrow="3" widths="500px" heights="317px"> File:1960 United States presidential election results map by county.svg|Results by county, shaded according to winning candidate's percentage of the vote </gallery> ====Cartographic gallery==== <gallery perrow="5" widths="185px" heights="113px"> File:PresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|Presidential election results by county File:DemocraticPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|Democratic presidential election results by county File:RepublicanPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|Republican presidential election results by county File:UnpledgedElectorsPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|Unpledged electors presidential election results by county File:OtherPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|"Other" presidential election results by county File:CartogramPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|[[Cartogram]] of presidential election results by county File:CartogramDemocraticPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|[[Cartogram]] of Democratic presidential election results by county File:CartogramRepublicanPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|[[Cartogram]] of Republican presidential election results by county File:CartogramUnpledgedElectorsPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|[[Cartogram]] of unpledged electors presidential election results by county File:CartogramOtherPresidentialCounty1960Colorbrewer.gif|[[Cartogram]] of "Other" presidential election results by county </gallery> ===Results by state=== Source:<ref name="auto">{{cite web|url=http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/data.php?year=1960&datatype=national&def=1&f=0&off=0&elect=0|title=1960 Presidential General Election Data β National|access-date=March 18, 2013}}</ref> {|class="wikitable" |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} |States won by [[John F. Kennedy|Kennedy]]/[[Lyndon B. Johnson|Johnson]] |-{{Party shading/Dixiecrat}} |States won by [[Harry F. Byrd|Byrd]]/[[Strom Thurmond|Thurmond]] |-{{Party shading/Republican}} |States won by [[Richard Nixon|Nixon]]/[[Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.|Lodge]] |}<div style="overflow:auto"> {| class="wikitable sortable" style="text-align:right" |- !colspan=2| ! align=center colspan=3 | John F. Kennedy<br>Democratic ! align=center colspan=3 | Richard Nixon<br>Republican ! align=center colspan=3 | Unpledged Electors<br>Unpledged Democratic ! align=center colspan=3 | Eric Hass<br> Socialist Labor ! align=center colspan=2 | Margin ! align=center colspan=2 | State Total |- ! align=center | State ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | electoral<br>votes ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | # ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | % ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | electoral<br>votes ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | # ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | % ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | electoral<br>votes ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | # ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | % ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | electoral<br>votes ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | # ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | % ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | electoral<br>votes ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | # ! align=center data-sort-type="number" | % ! style="text-align:center; font-size: 60%" data-sort-type="number" | # ! |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Alabama|Alabama]] | style="text-align:center;" | 11 | 318,303 | 56.39 | 5 | 237,981 | 42.16 | β | 324,050 | 0.00 | 6 | β | β | β | 80,322 | 14.23 | 564,478 | style="text-align:center;" | AL |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Alaska|Alaska]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 29,809 | 49.06 | β | 30,953 | 50.94 | 3 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β1,144 | β1.88 | 60,762 | style="text-align:center;" | AK |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Arizona|Arizona]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 176,781 | 44.36 | β | 221,241 | 55.52 | 4 | β | β | β | 469 | 0.12 | β | β44,460 | β11.16 | 398,491 | style="text-align:center;" | AZ |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Arkansas|Arkansas]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 215,049 | 50.19 | 8 | 184,508 | 43.06 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 30,541 | 7.13 | 428,509 | style="text-align:center;" | AR |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in California|California]] | style="text-align:center;" | 32 | 3,224,099 | 49.55 | β | 3,259,722 | 50.10 | 32 | β | β | β | 1,051 | 0.02 | β | β35,623 | β0.55 | 6,506,578 | style="text-align:center;" | CA |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Colorado|Colorado]] | style="text-align:center;" | 6 | 330,629 | 44.91 | β | 402,242 | 54.63 | 6 | β | β | β | 2,803 | 0.38 | β | β71,613 | β9.73 | 736,246 | style="text-align:center;" | CO |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Connecticut|Connecticut]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 657,055 | 53.73 | 8 | 565,813 | 46.27 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 91,242 | 7.46 | 1,222,883 | style="text-align:center;" | CT |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Delaware|Delaware]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 99,590 | 50.63 | 3 | 96,373 | 49.00 | β | β | β | β | 82 | 0.04 | β | 3,217 | 1.64 | 196,683 | style="text-align:center;" | DE |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Florida|Florida]] | style="text-align:center;" | 10 | 748,700 | 48.49 | β | 795,476 | 51.51 | 10 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β46,776 | β3.03 | 1,544,176 | style="text-align:center;" | FL |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Georgia|Georgia]] | style="text-align:center;" | 12 | 458,638 | 62.54 | 12 | 274,472 | 37.43 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 184,166 | 25.11 | 733,349 | style="text-align:center;" | GA |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Hawaii|Hawaii]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 92,410 | 50.03 | 3 | 92,295 | 49.97 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 115 | 0.06 | 184,705 | style="text-align:center;" | HI |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Idaho|Idaho]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 138,853 | 46.22 | β | 161,597 | 53.78 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β22,744 | β7.57 | 300,450 | style="text-align:center;" | ID |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Illinois|Illinois]] | style="text-align:center;" | 27 | 2,377,846 | 49.98 | 27 | 2,368,988 | 49.80 | β | β | β | β | 10,560 | 0.22 | β | 8,858 | 0.19 | 4,757,409 | style="text-align:center;" | IL |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Indiana|Indiana]] | style="text-align:center;" | 13 | 952,358 | 44.60 | β | 1,175,120 | 55.03 | 13 | β | β | β | 1,136 | 0.05 | β | β222,762 | β10.43 | 2,135,360 | style="text-align:center;" | IN |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Iowa|Iowa]] | style="text-align:center;" | 10 | 550,565 | 43.22 | β | 722,381 | 56.71 | 10 | β | β | β | 230 | 0.02 | β | β171,816 | β13.49 | 1,273,810 | style="text-align:center;" | IA |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Kansas|Kansas]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 363,213 | 39.10 | β | 561,474 | 60.45 | 8 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β198,261 | β21.35 | 928,825 | style="text-align:center;" | KS |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Kentucky|Kentucky]] | style="text-align:center;" | 10 | 521,855 | 46.41 | β | 602,607 | 53.59 | 10 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β80,752 | β7.18 | 1,124,462 | style="text-align:center;" | KY |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Louisiana|Louisiana]] | style="text-align:center;" | 10 | 407,339 | 50.42 | 10 | 230,980 | 28.59 | β | 169,572 | 20.99 | β | β | β | β | 176,359 | 21.83 | 807,891 | style="text-align:center;" | LA |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Maine|Maine]] | style="text-align:center;" | 5 | 181,159 | 42.95 | β | 240,608 | 57.05 | 5 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β59,449 | β14.10 | 421,767 | style="text-align:center;" | ME |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Maryland|Maryland]] | style="text-align:center;" | 9 | 565,808 | 53.61 | 9 | 489,538 | 46.39 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 76,270 | 7.23 | 1,055,349 | style="text-align:center;" | MD |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Massachusetts|Massachusetts]] | style="text-align:center;" | 16 | 1,487,174 | 60.22 | 16 | 976,750 | 39.55 | β | β | β | β | 3,892 | 0.16 | β | 510,424 | 20.67 | 2,469,480 | style="text-align:center;" | MA |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Michigan|Michigan]] | style="text-align:center;" | 20 | 1,687,269 | 50.85 | 20 | 1,620,428 | 48.84 | β | 539 | 0.02 | β | 1,718 | 0.05 | β | 66,841 | 2.01 | 3,318,097 | style="text-align:center;" | MI |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Minnesota|Minnesota]] | style="text-align:center;" | 11 | 779,933 | 50.58 | 11 | 757,915 | 49.16 | β | β | β | β | 962 | 0.06 | β | 22,018 | 1.43 | 1,541,887 | style="text-align:center;" | MN |-{{Party shading/Dixiecrat}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Mississippi|Mississippi]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 108,362 | 36.34 | β | 73,561 | 24.67 | β | 116,248 | 38.99 | 8 | β | β | β | β7,886 | β2.64 | 298,171 | style="text-align:center;" | MS |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Missouri|Missouri]] | style="text-align:center;" | 13 | 972,201 | 50.26 | 13 | 962,221 | 49.74 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 9,980 | 0.52 | 1,934,422 | style="text-align:center;" | MO |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Montana|Montana]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 134,891 | 48.60 | β | 141,841 | 51.10 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β6,950 | β2.50 | 277,579 | style="text-align:center;" | MT |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Nebraska|Nebraska]] | style="text-align:center;" | 6 | 232,542 | 37.93 | β | 380,553 | 62.07 | 6 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β148,011 | β24.14 | 613,095 | style="text-align:center;" | NE |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Nevada|Nevada]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 54,880 | 51.16 | 3 | 52,387 | 48.84 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 2,493 | 2.32 | 107,267 | style="text-align:center;" | NV |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in New Hampshire|New Hampshire]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 137,772 | 46.58 | β | 157,989 | 53.42 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β20,217 | β6.84 | 295,761 | style="text-align:center;" | NH |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in New Jersey|New Jersey]] | style="text-align:center;" | 16 | 1,385,415 | 49.96 | 16 | 1,363,324 | 49.16 | β | β | β | β | 4,262 | 0.15 | β | 22,091 | 0.80 | 2,773,111 | style="text-align:center;" | NJ |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in New Mexico|New Mexico]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 156,027 | 50.15 | 4 | 153,733 | 49.41 | β | β | β | β | 570 | 0.18 | β | 2,294 | 0.74 | 311,107 | style="text-align:center;" | NM |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in New York|New York]] | style="text-align:center;" | 45 | 3,830,085 | 52.53 | 45 | 3,446,419 | 47.27 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 383,666 | 5.26 | 7,291,079 | style="text-align:center;" | NY |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in North Carolina|North Carolina]] | style="text-align:center;" | 14 | 713,136 | 52.11 | 14 | 655,420 | 47.89 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 57,716 | 4.22 | 1,368,556 | style="text-align:center;" | NC |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in North Dakota|North Dakota]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 123,963 | 44.52 | β | 154,310 | 55.42 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β30,347 | β10.90 | 278,431 | style="text-align:center;" | ND |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Ohio|Ohio]] | style="text-align:center;" | 25 | 1,944,248 | 46.72 | β | 2,217,611 | 53.28 | 25 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β273,363 | β6.57 | 4,161,859 | style="text-align:center;" | OH |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Oklahoma|Oklahoma]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 370,111 | 40.98 | β | 533,039 | 59.02 | 7 | 0 | 0.00 | 1 | β | β | β | β162,928 | β18.04 | 903,150 | style="text-align:center;" | OK |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Oregon|Oregon]] | style="text-align:center;" | 6 | 367,402 | 47.32 | β | 408,060 | 52.56 | 6 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β40,658 | β5.24 | 776,421 | style="text-align:center;" | OR |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Pennsylvania|Pennsylvania]] | style="text-align:center;" | 32 | 2,556,282 | 51.06 | 32 | 2,439,956 | 48.74 | β | β | β | β | 7,185 | 0.14 | β | 116,326 | 2.32 | 5,006,541 | style="text-align:center;" | PA |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Rhode Island|Rhode Island]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 258,032 | 63.63 | 4 | 147,502 | 36.37 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 110,530 | 27.26 | 405,535 | style="text-align:center;" | RI |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in South Carolina|South Carolina]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 198,129 | 51.24 | 8 | 188,558 | 48.76 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 9,571 | 2.48 | 386,688 | style="text-align:center;" | SC |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in South Dakota|South Dakota]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 128,070 | 41.79 | β | 178,417 | 58.21 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β50,347 | β16.43 | 306,487 | style="text-align:center;" | SD |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Tennessee|Tennessee]] | style="text-align:center;" | 11 | 481,453 | 45.77 | β | 556,577 | 52.92 | 11 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β75,124 | β7.14 | 1,051,792 | style="text-align:center;" | TN |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Texas|Texas]] | style="text-align:center;" | 24 | 1,167,567 | 50.52 | 24 | 1,121,310 | 48.52 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 46,257 | 2.00 | 2,311,084 | style="text-align:center;" | TX |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Utah|Utah]] | style="text-align:center;" | 4 | 169,248 | 45.17 | β | 205,361 | 54.81 | 4 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β36,113 | β9.64 | 374,709 | style="text-align:center;" | UT |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Vermont|Vermont]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 69,186 | 41.35 | β | 98,131 | 58.65 | 3 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β28,945 | β17.30 | 167,324 | style="text-align:center;" | VT |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Virginia|Virginia]] | style="text-align:center;" | 12 | 362,327 | 46.97 | β | 404,521 | 52.44 | 12 | β | β | β | 397 | 0.05 | β | β42,194 | β5.47 | 771,449 | style="text-align:center;" | VA |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Washington (state)|Washington]] | style="text-align:center;" | 9 | 599,298 | 48.27 | β | 629,273 | 50.68 | 9 | β | β | β | 10,895 | 0.88 | β | β29,975 | β2.41 | 1,241,572 | style="text-align:center;" | WA |-{{Party shading/Democratic}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in West Virginia|West Virginia]] | style="text-align:center;" | 8 | 441,786 | 52.73 | 8 | 395,995 | 47.27 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β | 45,791 | 5.47 | 837,781 | style="text-align:center;" | WV |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Wisconsin|Wisconsin]] | style="text-align:center;" | 12 | 830,805 | 48.05 | β | 895,175 | 51.77 | 12 | β | β | β | 1,310 | 0.08 | β | β64,370 | β3.72 | 1,729,082 | style="text-align:center;" | WI |-{{Party shading/Republican}} | style="text-align:center;" | [[1960 United States presidential election in Wyoming|Wyoming]] | style="text-align:center;" | 3 | 63,331 | 44.99 | β | 77,451 | 55.01 | 3 | β | β | β | β | β | β | β14,120 | β10.03 | 140,782 | style="text-align:center;" | WY |- ! TOTALS: ! 537 ! 34,220,984 ! 49.72 ! 303 ! 34,108,157 ! 49.55 ! 219 ! 286,359 ! 0.42 ! 15 ! 47,522 ! 0.07 ! β ! 112,827 ! 0.16 ! 68,832,482 | style="text-align:center;" | US |}</div> ====States that flipped from Republican to Democratic==== *[[Connecticut]] *[[Delaware]] *[[Illinois]] *[[Louisiana]] *[[Maryland]] *[[Massachusetts]] *[[Michigan]] *[[Minnesota]] *[[Nevada]] *[[New Jersey]] *[[New Mexico]] *[[New York (state)|New York]] *[[Pennsylvania]] *[[Rhode Island]] *[[Texas]] *[[West Virginia]] ====States that flipped from Democratic to Unpledged==== *[[Alabama]] *[[Mississippi]] ===Close states=== Margin of victory less than 1% (95 electoral votes): # <span style="color:blue;">'''Hawaii, 0.06% (115 votes)''' </span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Illinois, 0.19% (8,858 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Missouri, 0.52% (9,980 votes)'''</span> (tipping point state for Kennedy win) # <span style="color:red;">'''California, 0.55% (35,623 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''New Mexico, 0.74% (2,294 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''New Jersey, 0.80% (22,091 votes)'''</span> (tipping point state if Nixon wins) Margin of victory less than 5% (161 electoral votes): # <span style="color:blue;">'''Minnesota, 1.43% (22,018 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Delaware, 1.64% (3,217 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Alaska, 1.88% (1,144 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Texas, 2.00% (46,257 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Michigan, 2.01% (66,841 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Nevada, 2.32% (2,493 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Pennsylvania, 2.32% (116,326 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Washington, 2.41% (29,975 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''South Carolina, 2.48% (9,571 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Montana, 2.50% (6,950 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:orange;">'''Mississippi, 2.64% (7,886 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Florida, 3.03% (46,776 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Wisconsin, 3.72% (64,370 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''North Carolina, 4.22%''' '''(57,716 votes)'''</span> Margin of victory over 5%, but under 10% (160 electoral votes): # <span style="color:red;">'''Oregon, 5.24% (40,658 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''New York, 5.26% (383,666 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''West Virginia, 5.46% (45,791 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Virginia, 5.47% (42,194 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Ohio, 6.57% (273,363 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''New Hampshire, 6.84% (20,217 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Arkansas, 7.13% (30,541 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Tennessee, 7.15% (75,124 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Kentucky, 7.18% (80,752 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Maryland, 7.22% (76,270 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:blue;">'''Connecticut, 7.46% (91,242 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Idaho, 7.56% (22,744 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Utah, 9.64% (36,113 votes)'''</span> # <span style="color:red;">'''Colorado, 9.73% (71,613 votes)'''</span> ==== Statistics ==== <ref name="auto"/> Counties with Highest Percent of Vote (Democratic) # '''<span style="color:blue;">[[Seminole County, Georgia]] 95.35%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:blue;">[[Miller County, Georgia]] 94.74%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:blue;">[[Hart County, Georgia]] 93.51%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:blue;">[[Starr County, Texas]] 93.49%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:blue;">[[Madison County, Georgia]] 92.18%</span>''' Counties with Highest Percent of Vote (Republican) # '''<span style="color:red;">[[Jackson County, Kentucky]] 90.35%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:red;">[[Johnson County, Tennessee]] 86.74%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:red;">[[Owsley County, Kentucky]] 86.24%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:red;">[[Hooker County, Nebraska]] 86.19%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:red;">[[Sevier County, Tennessee]] 85.05%</span>''' Counties with Highest Percent of Vote (Other) # '''<span style="color:green;">[[Amite County, Mississippi]] 72.72%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:green;">[[Wilkinson County, Mississippi]] 68.09%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:green;">[[Jefferson County, Mississippi]] 66.54%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:green;">[[Franklin County, Mississippi]] 66.37%</span>''' # '''<span style="color:green;">[[Rankin County, Mississippi]] 65.12%</span>''' == Voter demographics == {| class="wikitable sortable" |- ! colspan="7" | The 1960 presidential vote by demographic subgroup |- ! Demographic subgroup ! {{party shading/Democratic}}|Kennedy ! {{party shading/Republican}}|Nixon |- | Total vote | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 50.1 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 49.9 |- ! colspan=4|Gender |- | Men | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 52 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 48 |- | Women | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 49 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 51 |- ! colspan=4|Age |- | 18β29 years old | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 54 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 46 |- | 30β49 years old | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 54 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 46 |- | 50 and older | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 46 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 54 |- ! colspan=4|Race |- | [[White American|White]] | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 49 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 51 |- | [[African American|Black]] | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 68 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 32 |- ! colspan=4|Religion |- | Protestants | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 38 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 62 |- | Catholics | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 78 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 22 |- ! colspan=4|Party |- | [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrats]] | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 84 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 16 |- | [[Republican Party (United States)|Republicans]] | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 5 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 95 |- | [[Independent (voter)|Independents]] | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 43 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 57 |- ! colspan=4|Education |- | Less than high school | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 55 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 45 |- | High school | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 52 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 48 |- | College graduate or higher | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 39 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 61 |- ! colspan=4|Occupation |- | Professional and business | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 42 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 58 |- | White-collar | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 48 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 52 |- | Blue-collar | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 60 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 40 |- | Farmers | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 48 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 52 |- ! colspan=4|Region |- | [[Northeastern United States|Northeast]] | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 53 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 47 |- | [[Midwestern United States|Midwest]] | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 48 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 52 |- | [[Southern United States|South]] | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 51 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 49 |- | [[Western United States|West]] | style="text-align:right; background:#f0f0ff;"| 49 | style="text-align:right; background:#ffb6b6;"| 51 |- ! colspan=4|Union households |- | [[Labor unions in the United States|Union]] | style="text-align:right; background:#b0ceff;"| 65 | style="text-align:right; background:#fff3f3;"| 35 |} '''Source:''' <ref>{{cite web |title=Election Polls β Vote by Groups, 1960β1964 |url=http://www.gallup.com/poll/9454/Election-Polls-Vote-Groups-19601964.aspx |website=[[Gallup (company)|Gallup]] |access-date=June 30, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110726155334/http://www.gallup.com/poll/9454/Election-Polls-Vote-Groups-19601964.aspx |archive-date=July 26, 2011}}</ref> ==See also== * [[History of the United States (1945β1964)]] * [[Inauguration of John F. Kennedy]] * [[Primary (film)|''Primary'' (film)]] * [[1960 United States House of Representatives elections]] * [[1960 United States Senate elections]] * [[1960 United States presidential debates]] * [[Contested elections in American history]] ==Notes== {{notelist}} ==References== {{reflist}} ==Works cited== * {{cite journal|last=Williams |first=John |title=Aspects of the American Presidential Election of 1960 |journal=[[Australian Quarterly]] |publisher=Australian Institute of Policy and Science |date=1961 |volume=33 |issue=1 |pages=25β36 |doi=10.2307/20633678 |jstor=20633678 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/20633678}} ==Further reading== * {{cite book |last=Alexander |first=Herbert E. |title=Financing the 1960 Election |year=1962 |oclc=249214383}} * [[Stephen E. Ambrose|Ambrose, Stephen]], ''Nixon: The Education of a Politician, 1913β1962'' (1987), ch. 25β26 * [[Angus Campbell (psychologist)|Campbell, Angus]] et al., ''Elections and the Political Order'' (1966), statistical studies of survey data [https://archive.org/details/electionspolitic0000unse online] * Casey, Shaun A., ''The Making of a Catholic President: Kennedy vs. Nixon, 1960'' (Oxford University Press, 2009), 261 pp. * [[Philip Converse|Converse, Philip E.]], Angus Campbell, Warren E. Miller, [[Donald E. Stokes]]. "Stability and change in 1960: a reinstating election", ''American Political Science Review'' 55.2 (1961): 269β280. [https://doi.org/10.2307/1952237 online] * Cosman, Bernard, "Presidential Republicanism in the South, 1960", ''Journal of Politics'' 24.2 (1962): 303β322. * Cosman, Bernard, "Religion and Race in Louisiana Presidential Politics, 1960", ''Southwestern Social Science Quarterly'' (1962): 235β241. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/42866856 online] * {{cite book |last=Dallek |first=Robert Gold |author-link=Robert Dallek |chapter=Chapter 16: The Making of a Vice President |title=Lone Star Rising: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1908β1960 |url=https://archive.org/details/lonestarrisingly00dall_0 |year=1991 |isbn=978-0-19-505435-4}} * Divine, Robert A., ''Foreign Policy and U.S. Presidential Elections, 1952β1960'' (1974) [https://archive.org/details/foreignpolicyus00robe online]. * Donaldson, Gary A., ''The First Modern Campaign: Kennedy, Nixon, and the Election of 1960'' (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 199 pp. * Gellman, Irwin F., ''Campaign of the Century: Kennedy, Nixon, and the Election of 1960'' (Yale University Press, 2022) [https://www.amazon.com/Campaign-Century-Kennedy-Nixon-Election/dp/0300218265/ excerpt]. * Ingle, H. Larry, "Billy Graham: The Evangelical in Politics, 1960s-Style", in Peter Bien and Chuck Fager, eds., ''In Stillness there is Fullness: A Peacemaker's Harvest'' (Kimo Press, 2000) * Johnstone, Andrew, and Andrew Priest, eds., ''US Presidential Elections and Foreign Policy: Candidates, Campaigns, and Global Politics from FDR to Bill Clinton'' (2017), pp. 128β153. [https://muse.jhu.edu/book/50578/ online] * {{cite book |last=Kallina |first=Edmund F. |title=Courthouse Over White House: Chicago and the Presidential Election of 1960 |year=1988 |publisher=University Presses of Florida, University of Central Florida Press |isbn=978-0-8130-0864-6}} * {{cite book |last=Kraus |first=Sidney |title=The Great Debates: Kennedy vs. Nixon, 1960 |year=1977 |publisher=Indiana University Press |isbn=978-0-253-32631-7}} * {{cite book |last=Lacroix |first=Patrick |title=John F. Kennedy and the Politics of Faith |publisher=University Press of Kansas |location=Lawrence, KS |date=2021}} * Lee, Eugene C., and William Buchanan, "The 1960 Election in California", ''Western Political Quarterly'' 14#1 (1961), pp. 309β326. [https://doi.org/10.2307/443852 online] * {{cite book |last=Lisle |first=T. David |chapter=Southern Baptists and the Issue of Catholic Autonomy in the 1960 Presidential Campaign |editor=Paul Harper |editor2=Joann P. Krieg |title=John F. Kennedy: The Promise Revisited |url=https://archive.org/details/johnfkennedyprom00t196 |url-access=registration |year=1988 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/johnfkennedyprom00t196/page/273 273]β285 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |isbn=9780313262012}} * {{cite journal |last=Massa |first=Mark S. |title=A Catholic for President: John F. Kennedy and the Secular Theology of the Houston Speech, 1960 |journal=Journal of Church and State |volume=39 |issue=2 |pages=297β317 |year=1997 |doi=10.1093/jcs/39.2.297 |doi-access=free}} * {{cite book |last=Matthews |first=Chris |author-link=Chris Matthews |title=Kennedy and Nixon: The Rivalry That Shaped Postwar America |url=https://archive.org/details/kennedynixonriva00matt |location=New York |publisher=Simon & Schuster |year=1996 |isbn=978-0684810300}} * Menendez, Albert J., ''The Religious Factor in the 1960 Presidential election: an analysis of the Kennedy victory over anti-Catholic prejudice'' (McFarland, 2014). * {{cite book |last=O'Brien |first=Michael |title=John F. Kennedy: A Biography |url=https://archive.org/details/johnfkennedybiog00obri |at=Ch. 21β24 |year=2005 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=978-0312281298}} * {{cite book |last=Pietrusza |first=David |author-link=David Pietrusza |title=1960: LBJ vs. JFK vs. Nixon: The Epic Campaign That Forged Three Presidencies |url=https://archive.org/details/1960lbjvsjfkvsni0000piet |url-access=registration |publisher=Union Square Press |year=2008 |isbn=9781402761140}} * Rorabaugh, William J., "The Election of 1960", in ''A Companion to John F. Kennedy'' (2014): 51β73. * {{cite book |last=Rorabaugh |first=W.J. |author-link=W. J. Rorabaugh |title=The Real Making of the President: Kennedy, Nixon, and the 1960 Election |url=https://archive.org/details/realmakingofpres0000rora |url-access=registration |publisher=University Press of Kansas |year=2009 |isbn=978-0-7006-1887-3}} * Savage, Sean J., ''JFK, LBJ, and the Democratic Party'' (SUNY Press, 2012) pp. 39β89. * Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr., ''Robert Kennedy and His Times'' (1978), pp. 192β221. * Wagner, Stanley P., "The Polish-American Vote in 1960", ''Polish American Studies'' (1964): 1β9. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/20147659 online] * {{cite book |last=White |first=Theodore H. |author-link=Theodore H. White |title=[[The Making of the President 1960]] |location=New York |publisher=Atheneum |year=1980 |orig-year=1961 |isbn=978-0-689-70600-4}} ===Primary sources=== * [[George Gallup|Gallup, George H.]], ed., ''The Gallup Poll: Public Opinion, 1935β1971''. 3 vols. Random House, 1972. poll results * {{cite book |last=Nixon |first=Richard M. |author-link=Richard Nixon |title=RN: The Memoirs of Richard Nixon |year=1978 |publisher=Simon & Schuster |isbn=978-0-671-70741-5}} [https://archive.org/details/rnmemoirsofricha00nixo online] * Chester, Edward W., ''A guide to political platforms'' (1977) [https://archive.org/details/guidetopolitical0000ches online] * Porter, Kirk H. and Donald Bruce Johnson, eds., ''National party platforms, 1840β1972'' (1973) ===Historiography=== * {{cite journal |last=Brands |first=Hal |author-link=Hal Brands |title=Burying Theodore White: Recent Accounts of the 1960 Presidential Election |journal=[[Presidential Studies Quarterly]] |volume=40 |issue=2 |pages=364β367 |date=June 2010 |jstor=23044826 |doi=10.1111/j.1741-5705.2010.03761.x}} ==External links== * [https://web.archive.org/web/20120129064418/http://electionwall.org/1960.php The Election Wall's 1960 Election Video Page] * [http://geoelections.free.fr/USA/elec_comtes/1960.htm 1960 popular vote by counties] * [http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/datagraph.php?year=1960&fips=0&f=1&off=0&elect=0 1960 popular vote by states (with bar graphs)] * {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071107192848/http://www.singularfilms.com/singular/gallery2/jfkbuttons/default.asp |date=November 7, 2007 |title=Gallery of 1960 Election Posters/Buttons}} * [http://www.livingroomcandidate.org/commercials/1960 Campaign commercials from the 1960 election] * [http://www.wvculture.org/history/1960presidentialcampaign/1960presidentialcampaign.html Battleground West Virginia: Electing the President in 1960] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210616043052/http://www.wvculture.org/history/1960presidentialcampaign/1960presidentialcampaign.html |date=June 16, 2021}}βWest Virginia Archives and History On-Line Exhibit * [https://web.archive.org/web/20151016063716/http://www.countingthevotes.com/1960/ Election of 1960 in Counting the Votes] {{1960 United States presidential election}} {{State results of the 1960 U.S. presidential election}} {{United States elections, 1960}} {{US Third Party Election}} {{John F. Kennedy}} {{Lyndon B. Johnson}} {{Richard Nixon}} {{USPresidentialElections}} {{Authority control}} [[Category:1960 United States presidential election| ]] [[Category:Irish-American history]] [[Category:Anti-Catholicism in the United States]] [[Category:Presidency of John F. Kennedy|1960 presidential election]] [[Category:Richard Nixon]] [[Category:Lyndon B. Johnson]] [[Category:November 1960 events in the United States]] [[Category:Articles containing video clips]] Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! 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