The anniversary of RFK’s murder is coming up on June 4th, and I was talking about the tenor of the times with a couple of people who would have been much more politically aware than me (I was 4) at the time. They are all convinced that Kennedy would have defeated Nixon in the 1968 election.
RFK is killed after winning CA, Humphrey goes on to claim the ticket in Chicago (“THE WHOLE WORLD IS WATCHING!”) and Nixon unveils his Southern Strategy. George Wallace runs and siphons off enough votes to give the election to Nixon 301-191 (43.4% to 42.7%).
The question for debate is: Would RFK have defeated Nixon for the office of President in 1968?
Could be. Humphrey very nearly won despite being tied to the disastrously-unpopular LBJ administration’s war in Vietnam that drove the power-lusting LBJ himself out of the race. A candidate who professed the same commitment to civil rights but without the baggage, and who could effectively counter Nixon’s “secret plan” to end the war, would have had a very good chance.
I don’t know, though. Kennedy had baggage of his own.
He could have been tied to the war through his association with his brother’s administration. The assassination of Diem happened during the Kennedy administration, and a lot could have been made of that.
Kennedy’s civil rights record absolutely would not have negated the Wallace factor, the biggest reason the Democrats lost that year.
The race was so close, and the times so turbulant, that this question may well be unanswerable. I think Kennedy had a good shot at beating Nixon had he lived, but I don’t think he was unbeatable.
Wouldn’t RFK had had Vietnam baggage too, though? He was in his brother’s cabinet when we got into Vietnam in the first place, and he had spoken out in favor of continuing the war until the Vietcong was defeated, as far as I know.
I think he’d have had a reasonably good chance. The anti-war McCarthy voters would have supported Kennedy much better than they did Humphrey. A lot of them were put off both by Humphrey grabbing the nomination from McCarthy and the convention violence. Given the closeness of the 1968 election, I think it’s quite likely that an anti-war Dem would have won the presidency.
Kennedy was a tremendously polarizing figure. A lot of people - even a lot of Democrats - did not like him at all. A lot of people who might have supported him felt he had gotten into the race after Gene McCarthy showed it was possible to oppose U.S. involvement in Vietnam and still get a respectable vote total. Plus, in 1968 there was still a Democratic machine in many areas, and the machine politicians didn’t like Kennedy.
Despite being portrayed as Johnson’s toady, Humphrey had a long and consistent legislative record. He had strong support from the Civil Rights movement, organized labor and senior citizens, and those groups did turn out for him. Kennedy had alienated the Teamsters, and it’s unlikely he would have gotten any more support from labor than Humphrey did.
Kennedy had certainly attracted more passionate support, particularly among the young. But in 1968 the voting age was 21, so Kennedy’s support among the young wouldn’t have translated into votes.
When it’s all taken together, I don’t think Kennedy could have gotten the nomination, much less won the election. He would, however, have been in great shape for a run in 1972 or even 1976.
I don’t see how Kennedy would have fared significantly better than Humphrey. Kennedy might well have lost Texas (which Humphrey won). What states would he have won that Humphrey did not?
The “swingable states”, which I’m defining as states which one candidate won by 3% or less, and who historically won, were:
Alaska (Nixon)
Illinois (Nixon)
Maryland (Humphrey)
Missouri (Nixon)
New Jersey (Nixon)
Ohio (Nixon)
Texas (Humphrey)
Washington (Humphrey)
If Humphrey (or Kennedy, or whoever our Democrat is) had won all of those states, he would have had just barely enough electoral votes to win.
Remove Wallace from the equation, and things change drastically. However, Kennedy getting the nomination wouldn’t have removed Wallace from the equation. In fact, of all of the serious candidates for the 1968 democratic nomination, only Wallace was segregationist or anti-integration, and there was no way Wallace was going to get the nomination. So, Wallace would have been a factor no matter who got nominated.
If Humphrey had been willing to distance himself from Johnson with more vigor, he could have won the election. He had more support from the establishment than either Kennedy or McCarthy, was a more effective politician, and a more traditional politician. I believe many voters would not have had the comfort level of voting for Kennedy or McCarthy that they did for Humphrey. I think either of the former would have lost by a larger margin than did the latter.
That’s all hindsight - I did do everything I could to gain Kennedy the nomination, i.e., strongly urge my parents to vote for him in the California primary.
The question is moot, because Robert Kennedy had no chance of winning the Democratic nomination.
He waited far too long to enter the race for the Democratic nomination, and was hopelessly behind in delegates. His victory in the California primary was really anticlimactic, because it gave him too few delegates, far too late.
RFK entered the race in March, after McCarthy’s close call against LBJ in the New Hampshire primary. California was three months later. Kennedy won every primary he entered, with the exception of Oregon. And guess how many primaries eventual candiate Hubert Humphrey won? Zero.
I think he had a chance, I think some people look back in retrospect and want to repaint things so it seems like RFK was kept out of his guaranteed Presidency by an assassin.
I think he definitely could have won, I don’t know if he would have though. For the record I would have voted Nixon then (remember no one had any idea something like Watergate was going to happen.)
If RFK gets shot and survives I think his chances of winning go through the roof.
There also was the Catholic factor. In no state wostate. uld RFK have gotten less votes from Catholics because the Irish Catholic voters wouldn’t have turned their backs on Kennedy, Italian, Polish, French etc would have supported RFK but not by the Irish numbers.
Also consider the JFK Camelot factor for better or worse but more likely for better.
To know the answer you have to consider each close state on its own. NJ and IL goes for RFK, TX for Nixon. You wouldn’t see any big shifts in the states. NY for ex would have gone bigger for RFK than for HHH but HHH took the state anyway.
RFK’s death was one reason Nixon won – he campaigned on the notion of ending the widespread criminality and chaos that had led to, among other things, three major American political figures within the previous five years being murdered by random people deciding to get up and kill them one day. So, like all alternate history, the question can’t be looked at in a vacuum, but has to address the factors that would make the counterfactual happen.
Since the thread has been resurrected, I would like to expand on the OP. I have heard that the Kennedy family, or at least the father, wanted to create a large political dynasty, with all the sons in turn being President.
The conventional wisdom is that Joseph Kennedy Sr. had political ambitions for his son, Joe Jr., up to and including his being President. When Joe Jr. was killed in World War II, those ambitions were transfered to John, the second son.
Papa Joe loved having power and influence, but I don’t know of anything that showed he expected all his sons to be President, though. He suffered a stroke shortly after JFK took office and was severely limited after that.