1940 United States presidential election in Vermont

Main article: 1940 United States presidential election

1940 United States presidential election in Vermont

←  1936 November 5, 1940 1944  →

Nominee Wendell Willkie Franklin D. Roosevelt Party Republican Democratic Home state New York New York Running mate Charles L. McNary Henry A. Wallace Electoral vote 3 0 Popular vote 78,371 64,269 Percentage 54.78% 44.92%

County results Municipality results Wilkie   40–50%   50–60%   60–70%   70–80%   80–90%   90–100% Roosevelt   50–60%   60–70%   70–80%   90–100% Tie   40–50%   50%

President before election Franklin D. Roosevelt Democratic Elected President Franklin D. Roosevelt Democratic

The 1940 United States presidential election in Vermont took place on November 5, 1940, as part of the 1940 United States presidential election which was held throughout all contemporary 48 states. Voters chose three representatives, or electors to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.

Vermont voted for the Republican nominee, corporate lawyer Wendell Willkie of New York, over the Democratic nominee, incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York. Willkie's running mate was Senate Minority Leader Charles L. McNary of Oregon, while Roosevelt ran with Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace of Iowa.

Willkie took 54.78% of the vote, to Roosevelt's 44.92%, a margin of 9.86%. Vermont historically was a bastion of Northeastern Republicanism, and by 1940 it had gone Republican in every presidential election since the founding of the Republican Party. From 1856 to 1936, Vermont had had the longest streak of voting Republican of any state, having never voted Democratic before, and this tradition continued in 1940. Vermont had been one of only two states (along with nearby Maine) to reject Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt in all 4 of his presidential campaigns, even in the nationwide Democratic landslides of 1932 and 1936.

However 1940 would prove to be Roosevelt's high point in Vermont, and in New England as a whole, even as the rest of the nation shifted toward the GOP. Roosevelt improved on his previous showings in Vermont, coming within just under 10 percentage points of winning the state, the only time he ever got within single digits of a Republican opponent in the state. The results in Maine, the only state to have joined Vermont in voting Republican in 1936, showed a similar but even more dramatic swing toward FDR, with Willkie only holding onto Maine by a narrow 51–49 margin. Roosevelt's gain in Vermont and other New England states, in an election when Willkie carried almost seven hundred counties that the President had won during his landslide four years beforehand, was due to support in the region for helping Britain and France during World War II. Vermont was one of five states that swung more Democratic compared to 1936, alongside New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Maine, and North Carolina. ^[1]

Whereas Vermont had been the most Republican state in the union in the 1930s, a strong swing against Roosevelt in the Midwest pushed Vermont into being only the fifth most Republican state after South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and North Dakota, ^[2] although it still registered as a strong twenty percent more Republican than the national average. Willkie carried ten of the state's 14 counties, breaking 60% in 6. However, the three northwestern counties of Vermont had been Democratic enclaves in an otherwise Republican state throughout the 1930s and 1940s, and Roosevelt once again won Chittenden County, Franklin County and Grand Isle County for the Democrats. Roosevelt also managed to carry for the first time rural Essex County in the northeast of the state, being the first Democrat to do so since Martin Van Buren in 1836. ^[3]

Results

1940 United States presidential election in Vermont [4]
Party		Candidate	Votes	Percentage	Electoral votes
	Republican	Wendell Willkie	78,371	54.78%	3
	Democratic	Franklin D. Roosevelt (incumbent)	64,269	44.92%	0
	Communist	Earl Browder	411	0.29%	0
	N/A	Write-ins	11	0.01%	0
Totals			143,062	100.00%	3

Results by county

County	Wendell Lewis Willkie Republican		Franklin Delano Roosevelt Democratic		Various candidates Other parties		Margin		Total votes cast [5]
	#	%	#	%	#	%	#	%
Addison	4,500	63.22%	2,593	36.43%	25	0.35%	1,907	26.79%	7,118
Bennington	5,845	57.42%	4,308	42.32%	27	0.27%	1,537	15.10%	10,180
Caledonia	5,793	62.56%	3,444	37.19%	23	0.25%	2,349	25.37%	9,260
Chittenden	7,926	41.58%	11,069	58.07%	66	0.35%	-3,143	-16.49%	19,061
Essex	1,365	46.96%	1,531	52.67%	11	0.38%	-166	-5.71%	2,907
Franklin	5,258	41.21%	7,439	58.30%	63	0.49%	-2,181	-17.09%	12,760
Grand Isle	716	41.65%	998	58.06%	5	0.29%	-282	-16.40%	1,719
Lamoille	2,566	63.61%	1,463	36.27%	5	0.12%	1,103	27.34%	4,034
Orange	4,527	68.81%	2,029	30.84%	23	0.35%	2,498	37.97%	6,579
Orleans	4,480	57.52%	3,294	42.29%	15	0.19%	1,186	15.23%	7,789
Rutland	10,829	55.02%	8,798	44.70%	54	0.27%	2,031	10.32%	19,681
Washington	8,426	52.00%	7,727	47.69%	50	0.31%	699	4.31%	16,203
Windham	7,031	63.01%	4,101	36.75%	27	0.24%	2,930	26.26%	11,159
Windsor	9,109	62.34%	5,475	37.47%	28	0.19%	3,634	24.87%	14,612
Totals	78,371	54.78%	64,269	44.92%	422	0.29%	14,102	9.86%	143,062

Counties that flipped from Republican to Democratic

• Essex

See also

• United States presidential elections in Vermont

References

1. Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections; 1940 Presidential General Election Data -- National
2. "1940 Presidential Election Statistics". Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved March 5, 2018.
3. Menendez, Albert J.; The Geography of Presidential Elections in the United States, 1868-2004, pp. 67-68 ISBN   0786422173
4. "1940 Presidential General Election Results - Vermont". Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved August 2, 2013.
5. Scammon, Richard M. (compiler); America at the Polls: A Handbook of Presidential Election Statistics 1920-1964; p. 465 ISBN   0405077114