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Paul Geary
David Rogers
By Tom Elia
November 19, 2004
The New Editor
In the run-up to the 2004 presidential election, conventional wisdom held that a large
turnout automatically redounded to the Democratic Party's favor. It's now apparent that the
conventional wisdom didn't hold, as more new voters cast their ballots for Republicans and
President Bush than most observers thought possible.
Of course much of the reason for this large Republican turnout is due to the incredibly
successful "get out the vote" effort by the Republican Party, which may have surprised the
experts.
But there is another factor in the formulation of the conventional wisdom that many have
overlooked: the conventional wisdom regarding voter turnout was simply based on bad
analysis that ignored American electoral history.
Data since 1932 shows that Republicans have more than held their own in high turnout
elections, and even hold a slight advantage in presidential elections over the Democrats
when voters turn out in relatively high numbers.
In order to properly evaluate large turnouts, it is important to divide any discussion of voter
turnout into two periods: one before 1972, and one after, when 18-year-olds got the vote in
1972.
Between 1932 and 1972 there were six elections when turnout equaled or surpassed 57% of
registered voters: 1940, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, and 1968. The results of these elections
were evenly split, with the Democratic candidates winning two, the Republicans winning
two, and two elections finishing in closely contested races, with each political party eking
out a victory.
Democratic candidates won clear majorities in high-turnout elections twice during this
period, in 1940 with FDR (almost 59% turnout) and 1964 with LBJ (almost 62% turnout).
The Republicans won two decisive victories in 1952 with Eisenhower (a little more than
61.5% turnout) and in 1956, again with Ike (a little over 59% turnout). The two tight
elections occurred in 1960, when Kennedy won (a little over 62.5% turnout) and 1968,
when Nixon won (almost 61% turnout).
If one includes the elections of 1936 and 1944, when FDR won in elections where slightly
less than 57% of the electorate voted (56% turnout in both elections), the tally in high-
turnout elections goes 4-2-2 during this period, favoring the Democrats.
After 1972, when 18-year-olds got the right to vote, overall turnouts declined due to the
relatively low percentage turnout of these new young voters. Adjusting for this difference in
the make-up of the electorate after this change, there were five elections where turnout
exceeded 53% of registered voters: 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, and 1992. The results of these
elections favored the Republicans, with the party winning majorities four times to one for
the Democrats.
Republicans won clear majorities in 1972 with Nixon (55% turnout); 1980 with Reagan
(54% turnout); 1984 again with Reagan (53% turnout); and 1992, when even though Bill
Clinton won with 43% of the vote, the Republican coalition split, when George H. W. Bush
and Ross Perot combined to win almost 57% of the vote. The Democrats won a majority in
1976 with Carter (53.5% turnout).
Add the results from 2004 with George W. Bush (around 60% turnout) and the Republicans
have gone 5-1 in high-turnout elections since 1972.
Overall since 1932, Republicans won seven high-turnout elections, the Democrats won five,
and two were very close.
Of course, the GOTV effort engineered by the president's campaign team, led by political
strategist Karl Rove, deserves tremendous credit for the large Republican turnout. The
Republican’s strategy was in direct contrast with the Democrats' effort, as it depended
largely on unpaid volunteers as opposed to the Democrat’s dependence on paid workers.
Many people will correctly point to this GOTV effort as a major reason for this success and
the subsequent upsetting of the conventional wisdom apple cart.
But that nod to operational superiority doesn’t give Rove enough credit for the strategic
knowledge gained from understanding that history clearly showed high turnouts don't
necessarily favor Democrats -– something the purveyors of conventional wisdom
apparently overlooked.
Tom Elia is a contributing editor to The New Editor.