 | |||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||
| Turnout | 73% [2]  2 pp | ||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||
| Elections in Pennsylvania |
|---|
 |
 Government |
The 1967 Philadelphia mayoral election saw the reelection of James Tate, who narrowly defeated Republican challenger Arlen Specter in the general election. Specter would later be elected to the U.S. Senate in 1980, where he served until 2011.
In the Democratic primary, Tate successfully fended off a challenge by Alexander Hemphill, who had the backing of Philadelphia Democratic Party Chairman Francis R. Smith.
Chairman of the Philadelphia Democratic Party Francis R. Smith made an attempt to replace Tate on the ticket with City Controller Alexander Hemphill, [1] but Tate refused to drop out of the election and defeated Hemphill in the Democratic primary. [1]
Incumbent District Attorney of Philadelphia Arlen Specter won the Republican primary. [3]
At the opening of the general election campaign, Specter was viewed as the frontrunner. [1]
Tate faced the obstacle of a divided Democratic Party. [1]
Tate supported legislation also endorsed by Cardinal John Krol which would allow state funding of parochial and other private schools, while Specter did not take a stance of this issue. [1]
During the campaign, Tate received heavy media attention by being in Tel Aviv during the outbreak of the Six-Day War and being in Rome when Archbishop Krol was elevated to Cardinal. [1]
Tate benefited from positive regards for the city's ability to keep greater peace amid the long, hot summer of 1967 than many other major cities had been able to. [1]
Tate thought he needed to send a "law and order" message to secure reelection, and therefore appointed Frank Rizzo as Philadelphia Police Commissioner. [4] [5] During the campaign, Tate was asked many times whether he planned to keep Rizzo in this position if reelected. [6]
Since Specter was a former liberal member of the Democratic party, he was able to receive the backing of much of Philadelphia's political establishment, as well as many liberal Democrats, such as the group Americans for Democratic Action. [1]
Specter presented himself as being able to usher in a continuance of the liberal reform policies of Tate's immediate two predecessors, Richardson Dilworth and Joseph S. Clark Jr. [1] Tate countered this by having Clark make appearances on the campaign trail with him. [1]
Polls anticipated a Specter victory. [1]
Tate won reelection by a narrow margin. [1]
It is believed that Tate, the city's first Catholic mayor, received strong support from the Catholic electorate. [1] He performed well in Catholic wards of the city. [1] It is also believed that Tate benefited from strong turnout among labor voters. [1]
While Tate carried the city's African American wards, he received less support in these wards than was typical at the time for the Democratic Party. [1]
Specter, who would have become the city's first Jewish mayor had he won, carried the city's wards with a primarily Jewish population. [1]
Specter won a majority of the white vote. [7]
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Democratic | James Tate (incumbent) | 353,326 | 48.98% | |
| Republican | Arlen Specter | 342,398 | 47.47% | |
| Constitutionial | Joseph J. Frieri | 9,931 | 1.38% | |
| Political Freedom Rights | Cecil B. Moore | 9,031 | 1.25% | |
| Conservative | Leonard L. Smalls | 6,675 | 0.93% | |
| Turnout | 721,361 | 100.00 | ||
Arlen Specter was an American lawyer, author and politician who served as a United States Senator from Pennsylvania from 1981 to 2011. Specter was a Democrat from 1951 to 1965, then a Republican from 1965 until 2009, when he switched back to the Democratic Party. First elected in 1980, he was the longest-serving senator from Pennsylvania, having represented the state for 30 years.
Francis Lazarro Rizzo was an American police officer and politician. He served as commissioner of the Philadelphia Police Department (PPD) from 1967 to 1971 and mayor of Philadelphia from 1972 to 1980. He was a member of the Democratic Party throughout the entirety of his career in public office. He switched to the Republican Party in 1986 and campaigned as a Republican for the final five years of his life.
James Hugh Joseph Tate was an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 92nd Mayor of Philadelphia from 1962 to 1972. He was also a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and the Philadelphia City Council. He was the first Roman Catholic to serve as mayor of Philadelphia.
The 1980 United States Senate elections were held on November 4, coinciding with Ronald Reagan's victory in the presidential election. The 34 Senate seats of Class 3 were contested in regular elections. Reagan's large margin of victory over incumbent Jimmy Carter gave a huge boost to Republican Senate candidates, allowing them to flip 12 Democratic seats and win control of the chamber for the first time since the end of the 83rd Congress in January 1955.
William Joseph Green III is an American politician from Pennsylvania. A Democrat, Green served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1964 to 1977 and as the 94th Mayor of Philadelphia from 1980 to 1984.
Francis Silvestri Rizzo, commonly known as Frank Rizzo Jr., is an American politician. He is the son of former Philadelphia Mayor Frank Rizzo and served as a Republican and briefly as an Independent member of the Philadelphia City Council for a combined sixteen years.
The 2010 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania took place on November 2, 2010, during the 2010 midterm elections. Incumbent Republican-turned-Democrat U.S. Senator Arlen Specter ran for reelection to a sixth term, but lost in the Democratic primary to Joe Sestak. Republican nominee Pat Toomey then won the seat.
The 2004 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 2, 2004. Incumbent Republican Senator Arlen Specter won re-election to a fifth term. As of 2024, this is the last time a Republican statewide candidate won Montgomery and Delaware Counties and won more than 25% of the vote in Philadelphia. Specter later lost renomination in 2010 as a Democrat, having joined the party in April 2009.
The 1992 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 3, 1992. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter narrowly won re-election to a third term, garnering just forty-nine percent of the vote in what was described by The Philadelphia Inquirer as a "massive turnout for Bill Clinton."
The 1986 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 4, 1986. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter won re-election to a second term.
The 1980 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 4, 1980. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Richard Schweiker decided to retire, instead of seeking a third term.
The Chicago mayoral election of 1991 resulted in the re-election of incumbent Democrat Richard M. Daley to his first full-term. Daley had previously been elected to serve the remainder of Harold Washington's unexpired term in a special election held following Washington's death in office.
The 1979 Chicago mayoral election was first the primary on February 27, 1979, which was followed by the general on April 3, 1979. The election saw the election of Chicago, Illinois' first female mayor, and the first female mayor of any major American city, Jane M. Byrne. Byrne defeated Republican Wallace Johnson by a landslide 66 percent margin of victory, winning more than 82 percent of the vote. Byrne's 82% of the vote is the most any candidate has received in a Chicago mayoral election.
Gaetano Paul "Tommy" Giordano Sr. was a Philadelphia businessman who served three terms on the Philadelphia City Council as a Democrat.
Alexander Hemphill was a Democratic lawyer and politician from Philadelphia who served as City Controller from 1958 to 1968. After service in World War II and graduation from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Hemphill embarked on a legal career before running for office. In his three terms as city controller, he exposed corruption and malfeasance, often to the discomfort of his fellow Democrats. He ran for mayor of Philadelphia in 1967 against the incumbent Democrat, James Tate, but was unsuccessful, and retired to a private law practice until his death in 1986.
The 1963 Philadelphia's municipal election, held on November 5, involved contests for mayor, all seventeen city council seats, and several other executive and judicial offices. The Democrats lost vote share citywide and the Republicans gained one seat in City Council, but the Democratic acting mayor, James Tate, was elected to a full term and his party maintained their hold on the city government. The election was the first decline in the Democrats' share of the vote since they took control of the city government in the 1951 elections, and showed the growing tension between the reformers and ward bosses within their party.
The Chicago mayoral election of 1963 was held on April 2, 1963. The election saw Richard J. Daley elected to a third term as mayor, defeating Republican Ben Adamowski by a double-digit margin.
The 1983 Philadelphia mayoral election saw the election of Wilson Goode.
The 1971 Philadelphia mayoral election took place on November 2, 1971, to fill the 182nd mayoral term in Philadelphia, with Democratic nominee Frank Rizzo defeating Republican Thacher Longstreth. While Longstreth received many split ticket votes from Democrats, Rizzo found support among unions and the white working-class electorate.
Elections are held in Evansville, Indiana to elect the city's mayor. Currently, such elections are regularly scheduled to be held every four years, in the year immediately preceding that of United States presidential elections.
