The Year of the Incumbent

Where were President Johnson's coattails when every Republican governor in the running was re-elected last fall? Most commentators have a ready answer. American voters, it appears, showed a new high level of intelligence by splitting their tickets and electing many responsible, moderate Republicans. Some of these worthy Republicans were swept under by the Johnson tide, but on the whole, 1964 was the year of the Split Ticket.

The trouble with this analysis is that it has nothing to do with what most voters were actually thinking. It sees last year's election as an isolated fluke. To understand why American voters split their tickets--or, in many cases, failed to do so--it is necessary to go back and look at the state politics of the mid-fifties and early sixties, and at the tremendous difference between the political atmosphere of those years and that of 1964.

Numbers illustrate this difference better than words. In 1962, 10 incumbent Governors--62% of those running for re-election were defeated. In 1964, only 2 Governors--15% of those running for re-election--were defeated.

The attrition rate for state Governors had become notorious well before 1962. Commentators noticed that increasingly large numbers of Governors were rejected by the voters between 1956 and 1963, although most U.S. Senators, Representatives, and state legislators were routinely re-elected. But fewer observers noticed that Governors, unlike Congressmen, had to bear the brunt of rising costs in education.

Ever since the post-war baby boom, student population has been growing much more rapidly than the working population. And the recessions of 1957-58 and 1960-61, combined with rising construction costs and demands for better salaries, have kept per capita costs of education growing at a much faster rate than any single tax base.

Politics has put the problem of rising costs squarely on the Governor's shoulders. Congressional obstruction--until this week--has prevented all but piecemeal federal aid to local school systems. As a result Governors have been forced to go before their legislatures begging for money, forced to haggle with entrenched nineteenth-century types for higher taxes, forced to portray themselves in the voter's minds as the officials who personally raise their taxes.

Tax rises were especially painful, and especially necessary, during the recessions of 1957-1962 when people could least afford to pay. And as even these increased taxes often failed to keep pace with rising costs, people were asked to vote themselves higher local taxes too.

No wonder, then, that voters took revenge on the one scapegoat available--the Governor. Such was the Governor's plight through the disastrous elections of 1962. What happened, then, to rescue the Governors in November, 1964?

First, the prosperity induced by the economic policies of the Kennedy-Johnson Administration made higher taxes less necessary and more bearable.

But more important were the effects of President Kennedy's assassination. The shock of losing a President made most Americans wary of sudden changes in command and eager for continuity and stability. The bitter "Throw the bums out!" atmosphere of so many 1962 (and 1960 and 1963) state campaigns was replaced by a "Things are O.K.--keep the incumbents in" attitude.

Senator Goldwater's foolish insistence on depicting his policies as sharp departures from current practices did not help his cause. But it was incumbent Governors and Senators--of both parties--who received the greatest aid from the electorate's new mood. Most incumbent Governors and Senators--unlike most Representatives and state legislators--are celebrities of a kind, and the public did not want their familiar, reassuring faces replaced.

Only two Governors--Reynolds of Wisconsin and Rossellini of Washington, both involved in 1962-style battles with their legislatures--were defeated. Democratic Governors Hughes of Iowa (with 69% of the vote), Morrison of Nebraska (60%), and King of New Hampshire (67%) were re-elected with pluralities astonishing for Democrats in their states. And they all ran ahead of President Johnson.

Nevertheless, such Democratic victories are generally explained by the "coattails factor." But if the coattails theory is correct, then Republican Governors ought to have been driven from office in large numbers.

In fact, they were all re-elected, and many by amazing margins. Governors Romney of Michigan and Chafee of Rhode Island won Republican majorities unprecedented in the recent political histories of their states. In doing so, they ran far ahead of Barry Goldwater: Romney 55% to Goldwater's 33% in Michigan, Chafee 61% to 19%.

There successors are all the more striking when compared to the failure of Charles Percy in Illinois. Percy received the sort of mass media treatment that only goes to those whom Henry Luce would like to see in the White House. He campaigned for two years and was probably better known than Otto Kerner, who had occupied the Governor's office for four years.

And yet Percy lost, although Goldwater ran much better (41%) in Illinois than in Michigan or Rhode Island: Percy's 48% of the vote was only 7% higher than Goldwater's, compared to differences of 22% for Romney and 42% for Chafee.

Why didn't more people switch from the Democratic column to vote for Percy? Kerner had not been an outstandingly successful Governor; he had had his troubles with the malapportioned Republican legislature; he had ties to that old ogre, Mayor Daley of Chicago. Nevertheless, far fewer voters in Illinois than in Michigan or Rhode Island split their tickets. The voters wanted to keep Kerner: he had, after all, done an adequate job; times were good, and with all the upheavals lately, why change?

Kerner was not the only beneficiary of such feelings. Throughout the country, voters preferred the incumbent Governor or Senator, regardless of party. Incumbent Republican Governors and Senators ran an average of 17% ahead of Goldwater. At the same time, non-incumbent Republicans running against incumbent Democratic Governors and Senators ran only 1 1/2% ahead of their Presidential candidate, 1964 was not the Year of the Split Ticket; it was the Year of the Incumbent.

But what about 1966? Inevitably, the post-Kennedy desire for continuity and stability will fade to some extent. Education costs will continue to rise, and new taxes will be necessary in many states--notably Massachusetts and New York. Already, Governors are grappling with hostile legislatures in what has become an annual rite of spring.

Three facts, however, will tend to lighten Governors' burdens. The Kennedy-Johnson prosperity, if it continues, will obviate the need for some tax rises and make others more palatable, as it has during the past two years. And the President's education bill will provide considerable sums to needy states and localities.

Reapportionment of state legislatures--already accomplished in many states, and scheduled for 1965 in others--will probably take much of the pressure off the Governors. The areas gaining the most representation, suburbs and middle-class neighborhoods in large cities, are just those where constituent pressures for better education are strongest. The Democrats, who stand to gain most from redistricting, have shown more initiative than the Republicans in supporting education and levying the necessary taxes. Therefore the old tax fights between Governor and legislature should become less common.

The first real test of voters' attitudes will come in the gubernatorial election this fall in New Jersey. Governor Richard J. Hughes, a Democrat, in many ways resembles Governor Kerner. Hughes has an unremarkable personality, is a good family man, and has done a satisfactory but not sparkling job as Governor of New Jersey. He has had (and is having) his spats with a malapportioned Republican legislature, and will probably have to push for a tax increase this year.

Neither of the two State Senators who are sparring for the Republican nomination is material for a Time cover; but if 1965 were 1962, the Republican candidate would be an odds-on favorite to win. The result should tell how much voters' attitudes will have changed between November 1964 and November 1965.

If the 1964 mood is still lingering, Hughes will probably win in a landslide, with something like 60% of the vote. If Hughes wins by a relatively small margin (as he did in 1961), then we may assume that the feelings engendered by President Kennedy's death have largely faded. And if Hughes loses, then many of the state Governors up for re-election in 1966 would be wise to line up other jobs for 1967.