Election thoughts

This isn’t as political as it sounds.

Top 10 closest elections, by popular vote in since 1876. These are the times in our history that we were the most divided as a nation.


1876 Tilden beat Hayes by 252,224 votes, but Hayes won the Electoral College vote.

1880 Garfield beat Hancock by 7018 votes.

1884 Cleveland beat Blaine by 62,683 votes.

1888 Harrison beat Cleveland by 98,017 votes, but Cleveland won the Electoral College vote.

1892 Cleveland beat Harrison by 380,810 votes.

1896 McKinley beat Bryan by 567,692 votes.

1916 Wilson beat Hughes by 591,385 votes.

1960 Kennedy beat Nixon by 118,574 votes.

1968 Nixon beat Humphrey by 510,314 votes.

2000 Gore beat Bush by 540,895 votes, but Bush Jr. won Electoral College vote.


Top 10 Elections that were the farthest apart.

1920 Harding beat Cox by 7,004,847 votes.

1924 Coolidge beat Davis by 7,339,430 votes.

1932 F. Roosevelt beat Hoover by 7,060,016 votes.

1952 Eisenhower beat Stevenson by 6,621,249 votes.

1956 Eisenhower beat Stevenson by 9,587,720 votes.

1964 Johnson beat Goldwater by 15,951,296 votes.

1972 Nixon beat McGovern by 17,999,528 votes.

1980 Regan beat Carter by 7,497,819 votes.
1988 Bush Sr. beat Dukakis by 7,077,023 votes.

1996 Clinton beat Dole by 8,203,602 votes.


Out of the Presidents elected during the times we were the most divided Garfield, Mckinley, and Kennedy were all assassinated. There were 3 elections, the only 3 in history that the Electoral votes differed for the popular vote; Harrison vs. Cleveland, Tilden vs. Hayes, and of course Gore vs. Bush Jr. We the Spanish American war, WWI, and Vietnam.

During the times that we have been at our least divided Nixon got impeached, Clinton got impeached.

I could go on and on, but I really do have a point. This election was about average really Bush took the popular vote by about 3,582,326 give or take. I think we are just divided enough to keep everyone else on their toes, but we still are open enough to change that we don’t shut out other people’s views, and that is a good thing. We need to challenge our government, we all have a voice and we have the freedom to use it.