This is one in a continuing series of Presidential trivia / history that I'm writing to sublimate my anxiety over the upcoming Presidential election.
I've skirted the topic before but I've never have written specifically about the elections where the popular vote winner and the electoral count winner were different. By my count, there have been fifty-nine Presidential elections between 1788 and 2020, inclusive. In five of them, the candidate winning the popular vote ended up losing in the electoral college. That means that, in eight percent of our elections, the Constitutional Convention compromise that no one really liked (ie electoral college) ended up thwarting the will of the people.
I've written about this just a little while ago. The electoral collage wasn't some big state / small state compromise. There were people at the convention with the now seemingly ridiculous notion that the President, our Commander in Chief with his finger on the button that could end the world, should be selected solely by Congress. President Mitch McConnell or President Newt Gingrich or President Nancy Pelosi, anyone? The nonsense of having each state legislature nominate its own slate of electors was the compromise that, nearly 250 years later, we're still having to live with.
I've written about most of these elections before but let's see if we can determine a pattern among the five Presidents that won by losing. Spoiler alert: three of the Presidents will be ones that nearly invariably come up when I write about presidential anomalies.
1824 - The Corrupt Bargain
The first case is one of those anomalies. If you're a fan of this blog, you'll know by now what a freak show this one was. Here's the situation. In 1824, the Federalist party had long since gone away. The only party in town was the Democratic-Republican. All was well and good during the previous President's (James Monroe) two terms, known generally as the Era of Good Feelings.
When Monroe stepped down, this opened up the opportunity for ambitious candidates. Party discipline not being quite what it is now, in the general election there were not one, not two, not even three, but four candidates all claiming the Democratic-Republican party mantle. Looking back at it from the current day, this seems like madness. In fact, the Democratic-Republican party had already fractured in all but name. This was just a manifestation of that fracture.
Not shocking, none of the four candidates were able to get a majority in the electoral college. It was going to be decided by the House. I'd written about this before, but one of the candidates, Speaker of the House Henry Clay, had a five-dimensional chess plan to win the election once it went to the House. Alas, he finished fourth in the electoral college voting and only the top three made the cut.
Andrew Jackson had the clear plurality of both the popular vote and the electoral college, so he probably thought that naturally he'd get the nod. However, Henry Clay had other ideas. He threw his support to John Quincy Adams and performed some House magic. Adams ended up getting the electoral college majority.
If this didn't leave Jackson, already not exactly a happy man, disgruntled, just imagine how he felt when Adams announced Clay as his Secretary of State. In those days, Secretary of State was seen as a stepping stone to the Presidency. Clearly Jackson thought that there was some shifty quid pro quo taking place and screamed Corrupt Bargain!
Although that didn't change the fact that Adams became President, it did result in the new Democratic party being formed with Jackson as its figurehead. Four years later, Jackson got his revenge, became President, and ushered in the Jacksonian era of American history.
1876 - Rutherfraud Hayes
This is another famous anomaly. As I've written about before, this is probably the most likely case of someone illicitly becoming President.
In 1876, the Democratic party was still smarting over being seen as the pro-Southern party. They hadn't won a presidential election since 1856 and were desperate. On the other hand, the Republican party had gotten used to being in power and weren't going to easily give it up.
In 1876, the wind appeared to be in the Democrat's favor. Samuel Tilden was a good, clean candidate. On the other hand, the Republican party had been engulfed in scandals during the Grant administration. The economy was in poor shape. The Southern states were chafing under Republican Reconstruction efforts and politicians in the North were getting sick of funding it. It was the first election in some time in which the Democrats stood a chance.
On election night, Tilden was the clear winner in the popular vote. He was also leading in the electoral college. He had 184 votes. The only problem was that he needed 185. There were four states, with a total of twenty electoral votes, that were still in doubt. During the voting, there were widespread reports of fraud, violence, and disenfranchisement.
In this crisis, an electoral commission was established. Composed of Representatives, Senators, and Supreme Court Justices, there were fifteen members. Of the fifteen members, eight were Republican and seven were Democrats. Knowing that, I'm guessing that you can see where this is headed.
In case the lock wasn't already in, another salient fact was that three of the four states were states that were previously in the Confederacy (Louisiana, Florida, and the usually troublesome South Carolina). In private negotiations, members of Rutherford Hayes' election team promised to halt Reconstruction in the Southern states if Hayes was elected.
With Republicans holding a clear majority on the commission and with the promise of ending Reconstruction, the electoral commission voted eight to seven, along party lines, to give all twenty electoral votes to Hayes, thus handing him the Presidency.
As I said, all pretty shady. Hayes became known forever after as Rutherfraud Hayes.
As a result of all of this, there was a shadow hanging over Hayes' presidency. Despite the shenanigans, he seemed to be a decent man. He pledged to only serve one term. True to his word, he did not seek reelection.
1888 - Cleveland / Harrison Death Match
Grover Cleveland is the anomaly among even anomalous Presidents. He's the only President (at least so far, gulp!) that has served non-consecutive terms. He's therefore the only President with two numbers. He's the 22nd and the 24th President.
In 1888, Cleveland was the sitting President. He was running against the Republican Benjamin Harrison. In a competition that seems familiar now, it all came down to four swing states (once again showing how stupid the electoral college is, why should one person's Presidential vote being any more or less valuable depending upon the state that they reside in?). Both parties apparently engaged in all kinds of chicanery. The Democrats were suppressing Black voters in the North while the Republicans were committing acts of fraud in other states. Be that as it may, although Cleveland won the popular vote, he lost in the electoral college.
In an echo to another election that I'm about to talk about, if Cleveland had just managed to win his home state, New York, he would have run the electoral college as well as the popular vote.
Instead, the Republican Benjamin Harrison became President. Undaunted, Cleveland challenged Harrison in 1892. In that election, he won both the popular vote and the electoral college.
To summarize, Cleveland won the popular vote in three straight elections but lost the electoral college in the second.
If we think about the present day, Trump is trying to do a bizarro Cleveland. There's a very good chance that, in his Biden rematch, he will once again lose the popular vote but squeak through in the electoral college. That would mean that we'd have a President that lost the popular vote in three straight elections but managed to serve as President twice.
Is this a great country or what?
2000 - Don't Get Snippy
Now we're in familiar territory. Well, at least for me. In 2000 we have the stiff, wooden Al Gore going up against the Republican crown prince, George W Bush. It was a tight election that came down to Florida. At one point, a network called Florida for Bush. Gore called him to concede. Later returns changed the picture and the network revoked its call. Accordingly, Gore called Bush to unconcede, leaving Bush much unamused (leading to Gore telling him not to get snippy).
This leads to an extended period of chaos. There were multiple recounts. There were allegations of poorly designed ballots. There were allegations of, yet again, Black voter disenfranchisement in the South. This led to a bunch of overdressed frat boys protesting to shut down the recount (the hilariously named Brooks Brothers Riot).
Ultimately, the Supreme Court weighed in, on a partisan 5-4 vote, to stop the last recount. Gore conceded (if only Trump could learn just one thing from history) and Bush was confirmed and inaugurated.
Interestingly, just like Cleveland, if Gore had won his home state of Tennessee he would have won the electoral college.
Four years later Bush was able to win both the popular vote and the electoral college in his reelection. To this date, he is the only sitting President that lost the popular vote and then went on to win reelection.
2016 - America's Carnage
And now here we are in the almost present. I don't think that I really need to say much here. Hillary Clinton, a campaigner with all of the charisma of Al Gore and with a last name that a good chunk of our population considered radioactive managed to win the popular vote but lose the electoral college to Donald Trump, a grifter television entertainer with the comedic timing of Triumph the Insult Dog. Trump won, with a very able assist from the then FBI Director James Comey (who within a year would be fired by Trump, of course).
Lessons Learned?
Make sure to win your home state! In two of the five states, if the candidate had just managed to protect their home turf they would not be in this state.
It's no surprise that the Republican party is a big fan of the electoral college while the Democratic party, not so much. In the last four of these anomalous elections, it has been the Republican party that has benefited. The Democratic party has not benefited even once. In fact, it was originally formed as a result of anger over the first anomalous election.
If you're a President that won the electoral college but lost the popular vote, to quote Shakespeare, "Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown". You're probably not going to have a fun time getting re-elected. John Quincy Adams, Benjamin Harrison, and Donald Trump all lost re-election. Only George W Bush actually ran again and run. Given that sitting Presidents typically win re-election, that's pretty telling.
Get rid of the fucking electoral college! It was a shitty compromise. It has no practical purpose. There is no earthly reason why, now that I live in Pennsylvania, my vote is so much more important than when I was living in Washington (where Presidential candidates only show up to vacuum money that they will then spend in places like Pennsylvania).
Vote in November!!!
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