1876 United States presidential election in Kentucky

1876 United States presidential election in Kentucky
← 1872 November 7, 1876 1880 →
 
Nominee Samuel J. Tilden Rutherford B. Hayes
Party Democratic Republican
Home state New York Ohio
Running mate Thomas A. Hendricks William A. Wheeler
Electoral vote 12 0
Popular vote 160,060 97,568
Percentage 61.41% 37.44%

County Results

President before election

Ulysses S. Grant
Republican

Elected President

Rutherford B. Hayes
Republican

The 1876 United States presidential election in Kentucky took place on November 7, 1876, as part of the 1876 United States presidential election. Kentucky voters chose twelve representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.

The Civil War would shape Kentucky politically for not merely the rest of the nineteenth century but also for the twentieth by creating entrenched divisions between secessionist, Democratic counties and Unionist, Republican ones.[1] The southern cultural hegemony meant state as a whole leaned Democratic throughout the Third Party System and the GOP would never carry the state during that era at either the presidential[2] or gubernatorial level.[3]

Kentucky had been one of only six states to vote against popular incumbent Ulysses S. Grant in 1872, and the effects of an economic downturn[4] meant that Democratic nominees Samuel J. Tilden and Thomas A. Hendricks increased their margin by nineteen points. Kentucky would prove Tilden's fourth-strongest state behind Georgia, Texas and Mississippi. Only Lyndon Johnson in 1964, Richard Nixon in 1972, and Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 have since exceeded Tilden's percentage for either party in Kentucky.[5]

As of the 2020 presidential election, this is the last occasion when Lewis County voted for a Democratic presidential candidate.[6]

  1. ^ Sullivan, Robert David; ‘How the Red and Blue Map Evolved Over the Past Century’; America Magazine in The National Catholic Review; June 29, 2016
  2. ^ Phillips, Kevin P.; The Emerging Republican Majority, p. 350 ISBN 978-0-691-16324-6
  3. ^ Brown, Thomas J.; ‘The Roots of Bluegrass Insurgency: An Analysis of the Populist Movement in Kentucky’; The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, Vol. 78, No. 3 (Summer 1980), pp. 219-242
  4. ^ See Tiffany, Jordan A.; ‘On How the Republican Party Won Elections: 1860 To 1892’ (thesis), p. 40
  5. ^ "Presidential General Election Results Comparison – Kentucky". Dave Leip’s U.S. Election Atlas.
  6. ^ Menendez, Albert J.; The Geography of Presidential Elections in the United States, 1868-2004; pp. 208-213 ISBN 0786422173