1920 United States presidential election in Wyoming explained

See main article: 1920 United States presidential election.

Election Name:1920 United States presidential election in Wyoming
Country:Wyoming
Flag Year:1923
Type:presidential
Ongoing:no
Previous Election:1916 United States presidential election in Wyoming
Previous Year:1916
Next Election:1924 United States presidential election in Wyoming
Next Year:1924
Election Date:November 2, 1920
Image1:Warren G Harding-Harris & Ewing crop.jpg
Nominee1:Warren G. Harding
Party1:Republican Party (United States)
Home State1:Ohio
Running Mate1:Calvin Coolidge
Electoral Vote1:3
Popular Vote1:35,091
Percentage1:64.15%
Nominee2:James M. Cox
Party2:Democratic Party (United States)
Home State2:Ohio
Running Mate2:Franklin D. Roosevelt
Electoral Vote2:0
Popular Vote2:17,429
Percentage2:31.86%
Map Size:290px
President
Before Election:Woodrow Wilson
Before Party:Democratic Party (United States)
Before Color:3333FF
After Election:Warren G. Harding
After Party:Republican Party (United States)
After Color:FF3333

The 1920 United States presidential election in Wyoming took place on November 2, 1920, as part of the 1920 United States presidential election. State voters chose three representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.

Wyoming was won by Republican Ohio Senator Warren G. Harding, running with governor of Massachusetts and the future 30th president of the United States Calvin Coolidge, with 64.15 percent of the popular vote, against the Democratic 46th and 48th Governor of Ohio James M. Cox, running with the future Governor of New York and 32nd President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt, with 31.86 percent of the popular vote.[1]

Like all of the Western United States, severe anger at President Woodrow Wilson's failure to maintain his promise to keep the United States out of World War I produced extreme hostility among the strongly isolationist population of remote Wyoming.[2] In addition, by the beginning of 1920 skyrocketing inflation and Wilson's focus upon his proposed League of Nations at the expense of domestic policy had helped make the incumbent president very unpopular[3] – besides which Wilson also had major health problems that had left First Lady Edith effectively running the nation. Political unrest seen in the Palmer Raids and the "Red Scare" further added to the unpopularity of the Democratic Party, since this global political turmoil produced considerable fear of alien revolutionaries invading the country.[4] Demand in the West for exclusion of Asian immigrants became even stronger than it had been before.[5] Another factor hurting the Democratic Party was the migration of many people from the traditionally Republican Upper Midwest into the state.[2]

Because the West had been the chief presidential battleground ever since the "System of 1896" emerged following that election,[6] Governor Cox traveled across the western states in August and September, but he did not visit Wyoming with its tiny population and poverty of electoral votes. No polls were taken in the state, but a Republican success was universally assumed.

Like every Mountain state, Wyoming, which had voted strongly for Woodrow Wilson in 1916 – turned very strongly against Cox, who was to lose the state by a two-to-one majority, after Charles Evans Hughes had lost the state by double digits in 1916. Harding carried every county in Wyoming with an absolute majority, and passed sixty percent in all but three. Socialist Eugene Debs was not on the ballot in Wyoming, but Labor candidate Parley Christensen managed double figures in Sheridan County. This would prove the last time Sweetwater County voted Republican until Richard Nixon's landslide 1972 victory.[7]

Results

Results by county

CountyWarren Gamaliel Harding
Republican
James Middleton Cox
Democratic
Parley Parker Christensen
Labor
MarginTotal votes cast[8]
data-sort-type="number"data-sort-type="number"%data-sort-type="number"data-sort-type="number"%data-sort-type="number"data-sort-type="number"%data-sort-type="number"data-sort-type="number"%
Albany1,76959.16%1,14538.29%762.54%62420.87%2,990
Big Horn2,15765.78%1,08333.03%391.19%1,07432.75%3,279
Campbell1,02766.69%49332.01%201.30%53434.68%1,540
Carbon1,87160.65%1,03933.68%1755.67%83226.97%3,085
Converse1,56169.41%67930.19%90.40%88239.22%2,249
Crook93467.24%45132.47%40.29%48334.77%1,389
Fremont2,19467.61%99430.63%571.76%1,20036.98%3,245
Goshen1,49672.73%55226.84%90.44%94445.89%2,057
Hot Springs1,21264.61%52928.20%1357.20%68336.41%1,876
Johnson1,20269.36%52530.29%60.35%67739.07%1,733
Laramie3,39962.60%1,81033.33%2214.07%1,58929.26%5,430
Lincoln2,04361.06%1,15434.49%1494.45%88926.57%3,346
Natrona2,95766.20%1,15325.81%3577.99%1,80440.39%4,467
Niobrara96973.52%34526.18%40.30%62447.34%1,318
Park1,63070.53%66628.82%150.65%96441.71%2,311
Platte1,40565.68%69432.45%401.87%71133.24%2,139
Sheridan2,64560.43%1,19227.23%54012.34%1,45333.20%4,377
Sweetwater1,74454.14%1,21637.75%2618.10%52816.39%3,221
Uinta1,19155.76%91442.79%311.45%27712.97%2,136
Washakie60964.31%33335.16%50.53%27629.14%947
Weston1,07368.65%46329.62%271.73%61039.03%1,563
Totals35,08864.15%17,43031.87%2,1803.99%17,65832.28%54,698

Counties that flipped from Democratic to Republican

See also

Notes and References

  1. Web site: 1920 Presidential Election Results – Wyoming.
  2. Phillips, Kevin P.; The Emerging Republican Majority, pp. 461–462
  3. Goldberg, David Joseph; Discontented America: The United States in the 1920s, p. 44
  4. Leuchtenburg, William E.; The Perils of Prosperity, 1914-1932, p. 75
  5. Vought, Hans P. ; The Bully Pulpit and the Melting Pot: American Presidents And The Immigrant, 1897-1933, p. 167
  6. Faykosh, Joseph D., Bowling Green State University; The Front Porch of the American People: James Cox and the Presidential Election of 1920 (thesis), p. 68
  7. Menendez, Albert J.; The Geography of Presidential Elections in the United States, 1868-2004, pp. 342-343
  8. Scammon, Richard M. (compiler); America at the Polls: A Handbook of Presidential Election Statistics 1920-1964; p. 514