United States presidential election in Vermont, 1960

United States presidential election in Vermont, 1960

November 8, 1960

Nominee Richard Nixon John F. Kennedy Party Republican Democratic Home state California Massachusetts Running mate Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. Lyndon B. Johnson Electoral vote 3 0 Popular vote 98,131 69,186 Percentage 58.7% 41.3%

County Results   Kennedy—50-60%   Nixon—50-60%   Nixon—60-70%   Nixon—70-80%

President before election Dwight Eisenhower Republican Elected President John F. Kennedy Democratic

The 1960 United States Presidential Election in Vermont took place on November 8, 1960 as part of the 1960 United States Presidential Election which was held throughout all 50 states. Voters chose 3 representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for President and Vice President.

Vermont was won by the Republican nominee, incumbent Vice President Richard Nixon of California, and his running mate Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. of Massachusetts, defeating Democratic Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts and his running mate Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas.

Nixon took 58.65% of the vote to Kennedy's 41.35%, a margin of 17.30%.

Vermont historically was a bastion of liberal Northeastern Republicanism, and by 1960 the Green Mountain State had gone Republican in every presidential election since the founding of the Republican Party. From 1856 to 1956, Vermont had had the longest streak of voting Republican of any state, having never voted Democratic before, and this tradition continued in 1960. This election would prove to be the conclusion of a 104-year winning streak, as Vermont would finally flip to the Democrats four years later in 1964.

As Kennedy won a razor-thin victory over Nixon nationally, Vermont weighed in as about 17% more Republican than the national average, making it the fourth most Republican state in the nation in the 1960 election.

Kennedy, an Irish Catholic Democrat from neighboring Massachusetts, did however improve dramatically on the performance of Democrat Adlai Stevenson in Vermont in 1952 and 1956. In both of those years Stevenson had taken less than 30% of the vote against Republican Dwight Eisenhower, who had received more than 70% of the vote in Vermont and had swept every county in the state.

Nixon won 11 of the 14 counties in Vermont, losing three counties in the northwestern part of the state. The three northwestern counties of Vermont had long been Democratic enclaves in an otherwise Republican state through the 1930s and 1940s, but had gone Republican in the 1950s for Eisenhower. Only the second Roman Catholic to be nominated for president by a major party, Kennedy's appeal to Catholics and ethnic working class voters brought northwestern Vermont back into the Democratic column in 1960. Kennedy won Chittenden County, the most populous county, home to the state's largest city, Burlington. Chittenden County had been the only county in Vermont to flip to the Democrats for the first Roman Catholic nominee Al Smith in 1928. Kennedy also won Franklin County and Grand Isle County, which had joined Chittenden in voting Democratic for Franklin Roosevelt in 1932, even as the rest of the state remained reliably Republican. Thus the split between the northwest and the rest of the state was a familiar result typical of New Deal coalition era elections in Vermont.

Results

United States presidential election in Vermont, 1960[1]
Party		Candidate	Votes	Percentage	Electoral votes
	Republican	Richard Nixon	98,131	58.65%	3
	Democratic	John F. Kennedy	69,186	41.35%	0
	No party	Write-ins	7	0.00%	0
Totals			167,324	100.00%	3
Voter Turnout (Voting age/Registered)					72%/81%

References

1. "1960 Presidential General Election Results - Vermont". Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved 2013-08-02.