Unpledged Elector
Encyclopedia
In United States presidential election
s, an unpledged elector is a member of the Electoral College who has not pledged to support any particular candidate for President. Presidential elections are indirect
, with voters in each state
choosing electors on Election Day
in November, and these electors choosing the President in December. Electors today are elected in every state by popular vote, and in practice have since the 19th century almost always agreed in advance to vote for a particular candidate — that is, they are said to have been pledged to that candidate. In the 20th century, however, several elections were contested by unpledged electors, who made no such promise to any candidate before the election. These anomalies largely arose over fissures within the Democratic Party
over the issues of civil rights
and segregation
.
The phenomenon should not be confused with that of faithless elector
s, who pledge their vote to a candidate before the election but ultimately vote for someone else.
was written, the Founding Fathers
intended the Electoral College to be a truly deliberative body whose members would choose a President based on their own preferences. They also left the method for selecting the electors for each state to the discretion of that state's legislature. Thus, the Constitution places no restriction on the behavior of the electors, and assumes that each is an independent agent.
While the electors in the first few U.S. presidential elections may have cast their votes along these lines, U.S. politics very quickly became dominated by strong political party
organizations, and by the 1830s most states chose their electors by popular vote. As a result, the electors who appeared on ballots were nominated by the state chapters of national parties with the understanding that they would cast their votes for their party's candidate if elected. This became such a given in Presidential elections that most states eventually stopped listing the names of the electors on ballots, listing the candidate to whom those electors were pledged instead.
and Reconstruction, the Democratic Party gained an almost unbreakable dominance in the Southern United States
, and the Republican
s, associated with Abraham Lincoln
and the Union
cause, were correspondingly unelectable. While the leaders of the Democratic Party in the South were in many aspects conservative
, especially in regard to segregation and civil rights for African Americans, the nationwide Democratic party became increasingly liberal
in early 20th century, a movement that accelerated with the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt
. In several mid-20th century elections, Democrats put slates of unpledged electors on the ballots in several Southern states; in some cases they ran in opposition to electors pledged to the nationwide Democratic candidate, and in others they were the only Democratic electors that appeared on the ballot. The goal was to have electors who could act as kingmaker
s in a close election, extracting concessions that would favor conservative Southern Democrats in exchange for their votes.
and support for desegregation
. In Texas
, a splinter group of Democrats known as the Texas Regulars
fielded a slate of electors not pledged to any candidate; similar slates were on the ballot in South Carolina
and Mississippi
. While they won or placed second in several counties, none of the groups met much success.
(20,150 votes, 4.1% of the vote), Louisiana
(44,520 votes, 7.2% of the vote and they won four parishes), Mississippi
(42,266 votes, 17.3% of the vote and they won seven counties
) and South Carolina (88,509 votes, 29.5% of the vote and 21 counties).
, who had won the state's popular vote, and six of whom were unpledged; this slate won the election in that state. Louisiana's popular vote went to a slate of electors pledged to Kennedy, but a slate of unpledged electors on the ballot there won 169,572 votes (21% of the vote).
When the electoral college cast its vote, all of the unpledged electors cast their votes for conservative Democrat Harry F. Byrd
for President and Strom Thurmond
for Vice President. They were joined by faithless Republican elector Henry D. Irwin
, though Irwin cast his Vice Presidential vote for Barry Goldwater
. Irwin had attempted to broker a coalition between the unpledged electors and other Republican electors, but to no avail: Kennedy won a majority of the electoral vote, though the unusual situation with the mixed elector slate in Alabama makes it difficult to say that he won the popular vote.
, did not appear on Alabama ballots. The electors won 30.6%, but the state was ultimately won by Republican Barry Goldwater.
Goldwater's victory in Alabama was a herald of a trend that would put an end to the practice of nominating unpledged electors. As a strategy, it had been largely ineffective, and southern conservatives, once loath to vote Republican, began doing so in increasing numbers. As such, the practice of nominating unpledged electors can be seen as a transitional phase between the Democrats' traditional hold on the south to the modern environment, where the area is a Republican stronghold.
United States presidential election
Elections for President and Vice President of the United States are indirect elections in which voters cast ballots for a slate of electors of the U.S. Electoral College, who in turn directly elect the President and Vice President...
s, an unpledged elector is a member of the Electoral College who has not pledged to support any particular candidate for President. Presidential elections are indirect
Indirect election
Indirect election is a process in which voters in an election don't actually choose between candidates for an office but rather elect persons who will then make the choice. It is one of the oldest form of elections and is still used today for many upper houses and presidents...
, with voters in each state
U.S. state
A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...
choosing electors on Election Day
Election Day (United States)
Election Day in the United States is the day set by law for the general elections of public officials. It occurs on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The earliest possible date is November 2 and the latest possible date is November 8...
in November, and these electors choosing the President in December. Electors today are elected in every state by popular vote, and in practice have since the 19th century almost always agreed in advance to vote for a particular candidate — that is, they are said to have been pledged to that candidate. In the 20th century, however, several elections were contested by unpledged electors, who made no such promise to any candidate before the election. These anomalies largely arose over fissures within the Democratic Party
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
over the issues of civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
and segregation
Racial segregation
Racial segregation is the separation of humans into racial groups in daily life. It may apply to activities such as eating in a restaurant, drinking from a water fountain, using a public toilet, attending school, going to the movies, or in the rental or purchase of a home...
.
The phenomenon should not be confused with that of faithless elector
Faithless elector
In United States presidential elections, a faithless elector is a member of the Electoral College who does not vote for the candidate they have pledged to vote for...
s, who pledge their vote to a candidate before the election but ultimately vote for someone else.
Constitutional background
When the United States ConstitutionUnited States Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It is the framework for the organization of the United States government and for the relationship of the federal government with the states, citizens, and all people within the United States.The first three...
was written, the Founding Fathers
Founding Fathers of the United States
The Founding Fathers of the United States of America were political leaders and statesmen who participated in the American Revolution by signing the United States Declaration of Independence, taking part in the American Revolutionary War, establishing the United States Constitution, or by some...
intended the Electoral College to be a truly deliberative body whose members would choose a President based on their own preferences. They also left the method for selecting the electors for each state to the discretion of that state's legislature. Thus, the Constitution places no restriction on the behavior of the electors, and assumes that each is an independent agent.
While the electors in the first few U.S. presidential elections may have cast their votes along these lines, U.S. politics very quickly became dominated by strong political party
Political party
A political party is a political organization that typically seeks to influence government policy, usually by nominating their own candidates and trying to seat them in political office. Parties participate in electoral campaigns, educational outreach or protest actions...
organizations, and by the 1830s most states chose their electors by popular vote. As a result, the electors who appeared on ballots were nominated by the state chapters of national parties with the understanding that they would cast their votes for their party's candidate if elected. This became such a given in Presidential elections that most states eventually stopped listing the names of the electors on ballots, listing the candidate to whom those electors were pledged instead.
Unpledged electors in the 20th century
After the American Civil WarAmerican Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
and Reconstruction, the Democratic Party gained an almost unbreakable dominance in the Southern United States
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
, and the Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
s, associated with Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...
and the Union
Union (American Civil War)
During the American Civil War, the Union was a name used to refer to the federal government of the United States, which was supported by the twenty free states and five border slave states. It was opposed by 11 southern slave states that had declared a secession to join together to form the...
cause, were correspondingly unelectable. While the leaders of the Democratic Party in the South were in many aspects conservative
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
, especially in regard to segregation and civil rights for African Americans, the nationwide Democratic party became increasingly liberal
Liberalism
Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...
in early 20th century, a movement that accelerated with the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...
. In several mid-20th century elections, Democrats put slates of unpledged electors on the ballots in several Southern states; in some cases they ran in opposition to electors pledged to the nationwide Democratic candidate, and in others they were the only Democratic electors that appeared on the ballot. The goal was to have electors who could act as kingmaker
Kingmaker
Kingmaker is a term originally applied to the activities of Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick — "Warwick the Kingmaker" — during the Wars of the Roses in England. The term has come to be applied more generally to a person or group that has great influence in a royal or political succession,...
s in a close election, extracting concessions that would favor conservative Southern Democrats in exchange for their votes.
1944 election
The first modern slates of unpledged electors were fielded in the 1944 election as a protest against FDR's New DealNew Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
and support for desegregation
Desegregation
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups usually referring to races. This is most commonly used in reference to the United States. Desegregation was long a focus of the American Civil Rights Movement, both before and after the United States Supreme Court's decision in...
. In Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
, a splinter group of Democrats known as the Texas Regulars
Texas Regulars
The Texas Regulars was a group based in Texas which was formed in 1944 to deny Franklin D. Roosevelt a majority of the Electoral College in the 1944 presidential election....
fielded a slate of electors not pledged to any candidate; similar slates were on the ballot in South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...
and Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...
. While they won or placed second in several counties, none of the groups met much success.
1956 election
In 1956, unpledged slates were on the ballot in AlabamaAlabama
Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...
(20,150 votes, 4.1% of the vote), Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
(44,520 votes, 7.2% of the vote and they won four parishes), Mississippi
Mississippi
Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...
(42,266 votes, 17.3% of the vote and they won seven counties
County (United States)
In the United States, a county is a geographic subdivision of a state , usually assigned some governmental authority. The term "county" is used in 48 of the 50 states; Louisiana is divided into parishes and Alaska into boroughs. Parishes and boroughs are called "county-equivalents" by the U.S...
) and South Carolina (88,509 votes, 29.5% of the vote and 21 counties).
1960 election
The 1960 election was the only election that saw unpledged electors actually elected to the electoral college. In that year, a slate of eight unpledged electors in Mississippi won a plurality of the vote there (116,248 votes, or 39% of the total). In Alabama, the state Democratic party nominated a mixed slate of electors, five of whom were pledged to Democratic nominee John F. KennedyJohn F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
, who had won the state's popular vote, and six of whom were unpledged; this slate won the election in that state. Louisiana's popular vote went to a slate of electors pledged to Kennedy, but a slate of unpledged electors on the ballot there won 169,572 votes (21% of the vote).
When the electoral college cast its vote, all of the unpledged electors cast their votes for conservative Democrat Harry F. Byrd
Harry F. Byrd
Harry Flood Byrd, Sr. of Berryville in Clarke County, Virginia, was an American newspaper publisher, farmer and politician. He was a descendant of one of the First Families of Virginia...
for President and Strom Thurmond
Strom Thurmond
James Strom Thurmond was an American politician who served as a United States Senator. He also ran for the Presidency of the United States in 1948 as the segregationist States Rights Democratic Party candidate, receiving 2.4% of the popular vote and 39 electoral votes...
for Vice President. They were joined by faithless Republican elector Henry D. Irwin
Henry D. Irwin
Henry D. Irwin was a Republican Presidential Elector for the 1960 U.S. presidential election who became a "faithless elector" when he declined to vote as pledged...
, though Irwin cast his Vice Presidential vote for Barry Goldwater
Barry Goldwater
Barry Morris Goldwater was a five-term United States Senator from Arizona and the Republican Party's nominee for President in the 1964 election. An articulate and charismatic figure during the first half of the 1960s, he was known as "Mr...
. Irwin had attempted to broker a coalition between the unpledged electors and other Republican electors, but to no avail: Kennedy won a majority of the electoral vote, though the unusual situation with the mixed elector slate in Alabama makes it difficult to say that he won the popular vote.
1964 election and after
The last slate of unpledged electors to date was filed in Alabama in the 1964 election. The slate was supported by Democratic Alabama Governor George C. Wallace, and the national Democratic nominee, Lyndon B. JohnsonLyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
, did not appear on Alabama ballots. The electors won 30.6%, but the state was ultimately won by Republican Barry Goldwater.
Goldwater's victory in Alabama was a herald of a trend that would put an end to the practice of nominating unpledged electors. As a strategy, it had been largely ineffective, and southern conservatives, once loath to vote Republican, began doing so in increasing numbers. As such, the practice of nominating unpledged electors can be seen as a transitional phase between the Democrats' traditional hold on the south to the modern environment, where the area is a Republican stronghold.