1972 United States presidential election

47th quadrennial U.S. presidential election

1972 United States presidential election

* * *

| <- 1968 | November 7, 1972 | 1976 ->

|
|

* * *

538 members of the Electoral College
270 electoral votes needed to win
Turnout| 55.2%[1] 5.6 pp
|  | File:Richard Nixon presidential portrait (1).jpg |

|
|

Nominee  | Richard Nixon | George McGovern |
Party  | Republican | Democratic
Home state  | California | South Dakota
Running mate  | Spiro Agnew | Sargent Shriver[a]
Electoral vote  | 520[b] | 17
States carried  | 49 | 1 + DC
Popular vote  | 47,168,710 | 29,173,222
Percentage  | 60.7% | 37.5%

* * *

Error: Image is invalid or non-existent.

Presidential election results map. Red denotes states won by Nixon/Agnew and Blue denotes those won by McGovern/Shriver. Gold is the electoral vote for Hospers/Nathan by a Virginia faithless elector. Numbers indicate electoral votes cast by each state and the District of Columbia.

* * *

| President before election

Richard Nixon
Republican

| Elected President

Richard Nixon
Republican

|

Watergate scandal

Watergate complex

Events

List

* Presidency of Richard Nixon
* Timeline
* Nixon White House tapes
* Operation Sandwedge
* Operation Gemstone
* 1972 presidential election
* "Saturday Night Massacre"
* Impeachment process against Richard Nixon
* United States v. Nixon
* Resignation speech
* Inauguration of Gerald Ford

People

Watergate burglars

* Bernard Barker
* Virgilio Gonzalez
* Eugenio Martínez
* James W. McCord Jr.
* Frank Sturgis

Groups

* Master list of Nixon's political opponents
* Nixon's Enemies List
* Watergate Babies
* Watergate Seven
* White House Plumbers

CRP

* Committee for the Re-Election of the
President (CRP)

* Fred LaRue
* Jeb Stuart Magruder
* Robert Mardian
* John N. Mitchell
* Kenneth Parkinson
* Hugh W. Sloan Jr.
* Maurice Stans

White House

* President Richard Nixon
* Alexander Butterfield
* Charles Colson
* John Dean
* John Ehrlichman
* Gerald Ford
* H. R. Haldeman
* E. Howard Hunt
* Egil Krogh
* G. Gordon Liddy
* Gordon C. Strachan
* Rose Mary Woods

Judiciary

* Archibald Cox
* Leon Jaworski
* John Sirica

Journalists

* Carl Bernstein
* Bob Woodward
* Barry Sussman
* Harry M. Rosenfeld
* Howard Simons
* Ben Bradlee
* Katharine Graham
* Lesley Stahl
* The Washington Post

Intelligence community

* Mark Felt ("Deep Throat")
* L. Patrick Gray
* Richard Helms
* James R. Schlesinger

Congress

* Howard Baker
* Sam Ervin
* Peter W. Rodino
* U.S. Senate Watergate Committee
* Impeachment process

Related

* Frank Wills (security guard)
* James F. Neal (prosecutor)
* All the President's Men (book, film)
* The Final Days (book, film)
* Blind Ambition (miniseries)
* Dick (1999 film)
* Mark Felt: The Man who Brought
Down the White House (2017 film)
* Slow Burn (2020 series)
* Gaslit (2022 series)

* v
* t
* e

The 1972 United States presidential election was the 47th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 7, 1972. Incumbent Republican President Richard Nixon defeated Democratic Senator George McGovern of South Dakota. Until the 1984 election, this was the largest margin of victory in the Electoral College in a U.S. presidential election, and as of 2022, it remains the last time a presidential candidate captured more than 60% of the popular vote. It was also the first presidential election that would see California move ahead of New York in each state's number of electoral votes, a gap that has since widened.

Nixon swept aside challenges from two Republican congressmen in the 1972 Republican primaries to win renomination. McGovern, who had played a significant role in changing the Democratic nomination system after the 1968 election, mobilized the anti–Vietnam War movement and other liberal supporters to win his party's nomination. Among the candidates he defeated were early front-runner Edmund Muskie, 1968 nominee Hubert Humphrey, Governor George Wallace, and Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, the first African American person to run for a major party's presidential nomination.

Nixon emphasized the strong economy and his success in foreign affairs, while McGovern ran on a platform calling for an immediate end to the Vietnam War, and the institution of a guaranteed minimum income. Nixon maintained a large, and consistent, lead in polling. Separately, Nixon's reelection committee broke into the Watergate complex to wiretap the Democratic National Committee's headquarters, a scandal that would later be known as "Watergate". McGovern's campaign was seriously damaged by the revelation that his running mate, Thomas Eagleton, had undergone electroconvulsive therapy as a treatment for depression. Eagleton was replaced on the ballot by Sargent Shriver.

Nixon won the election in a landslide, taking 60.7% of the popular vote and carrying 49 states, while being the first Republican to sweep the South. McGovern took just 37.5% of the popular vote, while John G. Schmitz of the American Independent Party won 1.4% of the vote. Nixon received almost 18 million more votes than McGovern, and he holds the record for the widest popular vote margin in any post–World War II United States presidential election and the record for widest raw vote margin in any presidential election. The 1972 presidential election was the first since the ratification of the 26th Amendment, which lowered the voting age from 21 to 18, further expanding the electorate. Within two years of the election, both Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned from office: the former in August 1974, due to Watergate; the latter in October 1973, due to a separate corruption charge. Gerald Ford succeeded Agnew as vice president, then, in the following year, succeeded Nixon as president, making him the only U.S. president in history not to be elected to the office on a presidential ticket.

As of 2022[update], this was the last time that Minnesota voted for the Republican candidate in a presidential election, the longest such streak for any state, and only once since then have Rhode Island and Hawaii done so, when they voted for Ronald Reagan in the 1984 election. This was also the most recent presidential election in which the entire Midwest was won by a single candidate.

Despite this election delivering Nixon's greatest electoral triumph, Nixon later wrote in his memoirs that "it was one of the most frustrating and in many ways the least satisfying of all".[2]

## Contents

* 1 Republican nomination
* 1.1 Primaries
* 1.2 Primary results
* 1.3 Convention
* 2 Democratic nomination
* 2.1 Primaries
* 2.2 Primary results
* 2.3 Notable endorsements
* 2.4 1972 Democratic National Convention
* 2.5 Vice presidential vote
* 3 Third parties
* 4 General election
* 4.1 Campaign
* 4.2 Results
* 4.2.1 Results by state
* 4.3 Close states
* 4.3.1 Statistics
* 4.4 Voter demographics
* 5 Post-election investigations into the Watergate break-in
* 6 See also
* 7 Explanatory notes
* 8 Citations
* 9 Bibliography and further reading
* 9.1 Primary sources
* 10 External links

## Republican nomination[edit | edit source]

Main article: 1972 Republican Party presidential primaries

Republican candidates:

* Richard Nixon, President of the United States from California
* Pete McCloskey, Representative from California
* John M. Ashbrook, Representative from Ohio

1972 Republican Party ticket

Richard Nixon | Spiro Agnew
for President | for Vice President

File:Richard Nixon presidential portrait.jpg

37th
President of the United States
(1969–1974) | 39th
Vice President of the United States
(1969–1973)
Campaign
File:Nixon Agnew 1972 campaign logo.svg

### Primaries[edit | edit source]

Nixon was a popular incumbent president in 1972, as he was credited with opening the People's Republic of China as a result of his visit that year, and achieving détente with the Soviet Union. Polls showed that Nixon held a strong lead in the Republican primaries. He was challenged by two candidates: liberal Pete McCloskey from California, and conservative John Ashbrook from Ohio. McCloskey ran as an anti-war candidate, while Ashbrook opposed Nixon's détente policies towards China and the Soviet Union. In the New Hampshire primary, McCloskey garnered 19.8% of the vote to Nixon's 67.6%, with Ashbrook receiving 9.7%.[3] Nixon won 1323 of the 1324 delegates to the Republican convention, with McCloskey receiving the vote of one delegate from New Mexico. Vice President Spiro Agnew was re-nominated by acclamation; while both the party's moderate wing and Nixon himself had wanted to replace him with a new running-mate (the moderates favoring Nelson Rockefeller, and Nixon favoring John Connally), it was ultimately concluded that such action would incur too great a risk of losing Agnew's base of conservative supporters.

### Primary results[edit | edit source]

1972 Republican Party presidential primaries[4] Candidate  | Votes  | %

|
|

Richard M. Nixon (incumbent)  | 5,378,704  | 86.9
Unpledged delegates  | 317,048  | 5.1
John M. Ashbrook | 311,543  | 5.0
Paul N. McCloskey | 132,731  | 2.1
George C. Wallace | 20,472  | 0.3
"None of the names shown"  | 5,350  | 0.1
Others | 22,433  | 0.4
Total votes  | 6,188,281  | 100

### Convention[edit | edit source]

Seven members of Vietnam Veterans Against the War were brought on federal charges for conspiring to disrupt the Republican convention.[5] They were acquitted by a federal jury in Gainesville, Florida.[5]

## Democratic nomination[edit | edit source]

Main article: 1972 Democratic Party presidential primaries

Overall, fifteen people declared their candidacy for the Democratic Party nomination. They were:[6][7]

* George McGovern, senator from South Dakota
* Hubert Humphrey, senator from Minnesota, former vice president, and presidential nominee in 1968
* George Wallace, Governor of Alabama
* Edmund Muskie, senator from Maine, vice presidential nominee in 1968
* Eugene J. McCarthy, former senator from Minnesota
* Henry M. Jackson, senator from Washington
* Shirley Chisholm, Representative of New York's 12th congressional district
* Terry Sanford, former governor of North Carolina
* John Lindsay, Mayor of New York City
* Wilbur Mills, representative of Arkansas's 2nd congressional district
* Vance Hartke, senator from Indiana
* Fred Harris, senator from Oklahoma
* Sam Yorty, Mayor of Los Angeles
* Patsy Mink, representative of Hawaii's 2nd congressional district
* Walter Fauntroy, Delegate from Washington, D. C.

1972 Democratic Party ticket

George McGovern | Sargent Shriver
for President | for Vice President

File:Sargent Shriver 1961.jpg

U.S. Senator
from South Dakota
(1963–1981) | 21st
U.S. Ambassador to France
(1968–1970)
Campaign
File:McGovern Shriver 1972 campaign logo.svg

### Primaries[edit | edit source]

Senate Majority Whip Ted Kennedy, the youngest brother of late President John F. Kennedy and late United States Senator Robert F. Kennedy, was the favorite to win the 1972 nomination, but he announced he would not be a candidate.[8] The favorite for the Democratic nomination then became Senator Ed Muskie,[9] the 1968 vice-presidential nominee.[10] Muskie's momentum collapsed just prior to the New Hampshire primary, when the so-called "Canuck letter" was published in the Manchester Union-Leader. The letter, actually a forgery from Nixon's "dirty tricks" unit, claimed that Muskie had made disparaging remarks about French-Canadians – a remark likely to injure Muskie's support among the French-American population in northern New England.[11] Subsequently, the paper published an attack on the character of Muskie's wife Jane, reporting that she drank and used off-color language during the campaign. Muskie made an emotional defense of his wife in a speech outside the newspaper's offices during a snowstorm. Though Muskie later stated that what had appeared to the press as tears were actually melted snowflakes, the press reported that Muskie broke down and cried, shattering the candidate's image as calm and reasoned.[11][12]

Nearly two years before the election, South Dakota Senator George McGovern entered the race as an anti-war, progressive candidate.[13] McGovern was able to pull together support from the anti-war movement and other grassroots support to win the nomination in a primary system he had played a significant part in designing.

On January 25, 1972, New York Representative Shirley Chisholm announced she would run, and became the first African-American woman to run for the Democratic or Republican presidential nomination. Hawaii Representative Patsy Mink also announced she would run, and became the first Asian American person to run for the Democratic presidential nomination.[14]

On April 25, George McGovern won the Massachusetts primary. Two days later, journalist Robert Novak quoted a "Democratic senator", later revealed to be Thomas Eagleton, as saying: "The people don't know McGovern is for amnesty, abortion, and legalization of pot. Once middle America – Catholic middle America, in particular – finds this out, he's dead." The label stuck, and McGovern became known as the candidate of "amnesty, abortion, and acid". It became Humphrey's battle cry to stop McGovern—especially in the Nebraska primary.[15][16]

Alabama Governor George Wallace, an infamous segregationist who ran on a third-party ticket in 1968, did well in the South (winning nearly every county in the Florida primary) and among alienated and dissatisfied voters in the North.[17] What might have become a forceful campaign was cut short when Wallace was shot in an assassination attempt by Arthur Bremer on May 15. Wallace was struck by five bullets and left paralyzed from the waist down. The day after the assassination attempt, Wallace won the Michigan and Maryland primaries, but the shooting effectively ended his campaign, and he pulled out in July.

In the end, McGovern won the nomination by winning primaries through grass-roots support, in spite of establishment opposition. McGovern had led a commission to re-design the Democratic nomination system after the divisive nomination struggle and convention of 1968. However, the new rules angered many prominent Democrats whose influence was marginalized, and those politicians refused to support McGovern's campaign (some even supporting Nixon instead), leaving the McGovern campaign at a significant disadvantage in funding, compared to Nixon. Some of the principles of the McGovern Commission have lasted throughout every subsequent nomination contest, but the Hunt Commission instituted the selection of Superdelegates a decade later, in order to reduce the nomination chances of outsiders like McGovern and Carter.

### Primary results[edit | edit source]

File:1972DemocraticPresidentialPrimaries.svg

Statewide contest by winner

1972 Democratic Party presidential primaries[4] Candidate  | Votes  | %

|
|

Hubert H. Humphrey | 4,121,372  | 25.8
George S. McGovern | 4,053,451  | 25.3
George C. Wallace | 3,755,424  | 23.5
Edmund S. Muskie | 1,840,217  | 11.5
Eugene J. McCarthy | 553,955  | 3.5
Henry M. Jackson | 505,198  | 3.2
Shirley A. Chisholm | 430,703  | 2.7
James T. Sanford | 331,415  | 2.1
John V. Lindsay | 196,406  | 1.2
Sam W. Yorty | 79,446  | 0.5
Wilbur D. Mills | 37,401  | 0.2
Walter E. Fauntroy | 21,217  | 0.1
Unpledged delegates  | 19,533  | 0.1
Edward M. Kennedy | 16,693  | 0.1
Rupert V. Hartke | 11,798  | 0.1
Patsy M. Mink | 8,286  | 0.1
"None of the names shown"  | 6,269  | 0
Others | 5,181  | 0
Total votes  | 15,993,965  | 100

### Notable endorsements[edit | edit source]

Edmund Muskie

* Former Governor of and Secretary of Commerce W. Averell Harriman from New York[18]
* Senator Harold Hughes from Iowa[19]
* Senator Birch Bayh from Indiana[20]
* Senator Adlai Stevenson III from Illinois[21]
* Senator Mike Gravel of Alaska[22]
* Former Senator Stephen M. Young from Ohio[23]
* Governor Milton Shapp of Pennsylvania[24]
* Former Governor Michael DiSalle of Ohio[23]
* Ohio State Treasurer Gertrude W. Donahey[25]
* Astronaut John Glenn from Ohio[23]

George McGovern

* Senator Frank Church from Idaho[26]

George Wallace

* Former Governor Lester Maddox of Georgia[27]

Shirley Chisholm

* Representative Ron Dellums from California[28]
* Feminist leader and author Betty Friedan[29]
* Feminist leader, journalist, and DNC official Gloria Steinem[30]

Terry Sanford

* Former President Lyndon B. Johnson from Texas[31]

Henry M. Jackson

* Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia[32]

### 1972 Democratic National Convention[edit | edit source]

Video from the Florida conventions

Main article: 1972 Democratic National Convention

Results:

* George McGovern – 1864.95
* Henry M. Jackson – 525
* George Wallace – 381.7
* Shirley Chisholm – 151.95
* Terry Sanford – 77.5
* Hubert Humphrey – 66.7
* Wilbur Mills – 33.8
* Edmund Muskie – 24.3
* Ted Kennedy – 12.7
* Sam Yorty – 10
* Wayne Hays – 5
* John Lindsay – 5
* Fred Harris – 2
* Eugene McCarthy – 2
* Walter Mondale – 2
* Ramsey Clark – 1
* Walter Fauntroy – 1
* Vance Hartke – 1
* Harold Hughes – 1
* Patsy Mink – 1

### Vice presidential vote[edit | edit source]

Most polls showed McGovern running well behind incumbent President Richard Nixon, except when McGovern was paired with Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy. McGovern and his campaign brain trust lobbied Kennedy heavily to accept the bid to be McGovern's running mate, but he continually refused their advances, and instead suggested U.S. Representative (and House Ways and Means Committee chairman) Wilbur Mills of Arkansas and Boston Mayor Kevin White.[33] Offers were then made to Hubert Humphrey, Connecticut Senator Abraham Ribicoff, and Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale, all of whom turned it down. Finally, the vice presidential slot was offered to Senator Thomas Eagleton of Missouri, who accepted the offer.[33]

With hundreds of delegates displeased with McGovern, the vote to ratify Eagleton's candidacy was chaotic, with at least three other candidates having their names put into nomination and votes scattered over 70 candidates.[34] A grass-roots attempt to displace Eagleton in favor of Texas state representative Frances Farenthold gained significant traction, though was ultimately unable to change the outcome of the vote.[35]

The vice-presidential balloting went on so long that McGovern and Eagleton were forced to begin making their acceptance speeches at around 2 am, local time.

After the convention ended, it was discovered that Eagleton had undergone psychiatric electroshock therapy for depression and had concealed this information from McGovern. A Time magazine poll taken at the time found that 77 percent of the respondents said, "Eagleton's medical record would not affect their vote." Nonetheless, the press made frequent references to his "shock therapy", and McGovern feared that this would detract from his campaign platform.[36] McGovern subsequently consulted confidentially with pre-eminent psychiatrists, including Eagleton's own doctors, who advised him that a recurrence of Eagleton's depression was possible and could endanger the country, should Eagleton become president.[37][38][39][40][41] McGovern had initially claimed that he would back Eagleton "1000 percent", only to ask Eagleton to withdraw three days later. This perceived lack of conviction in sticking with his running mate was disastrous for the McGovern campaign.

McGovern later approached six different prominent Democrats to run for vice-president: Ted Kennedy, Edmund Muskie, Hubert Humphrey, Abraham Ribicoff, Larry O'Brien, and Reubin Askew. All six declined. Sargent Shriver, brother-in-law to John, Robert, and Ted Kennedy, former Ambassador to France, and former Director of the Peace Corps, later accepted.[42] He was officially nominated by a special session of the Democratic National Committee. By this time, McGovern's poll ratings had plunged from 41 to 24 percent.

## Third parties[edit | edit source]

1972 American Independent Party ticket

John G. Schmitz | Thomas J. Anderson
for President | for Vice President

File:Thomas J. Anderson.jpg

U.S. Representative from California's 35th district
(1970–1973) | Magazine publisher; conservative speaker
Campaign
Other Candidates

Lester Maddox | Thomas J. Anderson | George Wallace

File:Thomas J. Anderson.jpg

Lieutenant Governor of Georgia
(1971–1975)
Governor of Georgia
(1967–1971) | Magazine publisher; conservative speaker  | Governor of Alabama
(1963–1967), (1971–1979)
1968 AIP Presidential Nominee
Campaign | Campaign | Campaign
56 votes  | 24 votes  | 8 votes

The only major third party candidate in the 1972 election was conservative Republican Representative John G. Schmitz, who ran on the American Independent Party ticket (the party on whose ballot George Wallace ran in 1968). He was on the ballot in 32 states and received 1,099,482 votes. Unlike Wallace, however, he did not win a majority of votes cast in any state, and received no electoral votes, although he did finish ahead of McGovern in four of the most conservative Idaho counties.[43] Schmitz's performance in archconservative Jefferson County was the best by a third-party Presidential candidate in any free or postbellum state county since 1936 when William Lemke reached over twenty-eight percent of the vote in the North Dakota counties of Burke, Sheridan and Hettinger.[44]

John Hospers and Tonie Nathan of the newly formed Libertarian Party were on the ballot only in Colorado and Washington, but were official write-in candidates in four others, and received 3,674 votes, winning no states. However, they did receive one Electoral College vote from Virginia from a Republican faithless elector (see below). The Libertarian vice-presidential nominee Theodora "Tonie" Nathan became the first Jew and the first woman in U.S. history to receive an Electoral College vote.[45]

Linda Jenness was nominated by the Socialist Workers Party, with Andrew Pulley as her running-mate. Benjamin Spock and Julius Hobson were nominated for president and vice-president, respectively, by the People's Party.

## General election[edit | edit source]

### Campaign[edit | edit source]

File:Richard Nixon greeted by children during campaign 1972.png

Richard Nixon during an August 1972 campaign stop

File:George McGovern UH.jpeg

George McGovern speaking at an October 1972 campaign rally

McGovern ran on a platform of immediately ending the Vietnam War and instituting guaranteed minimum incomes for the nation's poor. His campaign was harmed by his views during the primaries (which alienated many powerful Democrats), the perception that his foreign policy was too extreme, and the Eagleton debacle. With McGovern's campaign weakened by these factors, the Republicans successfully portrayed him as a radical left-wing extremist incompetent to serve as president. Nixon led in the polls by large margins throughout the entire campaign. With an enormous fundraising advantage and a comfortable lead in the polls, Nixon concentrated on large rallies and focused speeches to closed, select audiences, leaving much of the retail campaigning to surrogates like Vice President Agnew. Nixon did not, by design, try to extend his coattails to Republican congressional or gubernatorial candidates, preferring to pad his own margin of victory.

### Results[edit | edit source]

File:1972prescountymap2.PNG

Election results by county.

Richard Nixon

George McGovern

Results by congressional district.

Nixon's percentage of the popular vote was only marginally less than Lyndon Johnson's record in the 1964 election, and his margin of victory was slightly larger. Nixon won a majority vote in 49 states, including McGovern's home state of South Dakota. Only Massachusetts and the District of Columbia voted for the challenger, resulting in an even more lopsided Electoral College tally. McGovern garnered only 37.5 percent of the national popular vote, the lowest share received by a Democratic Party nominee since John W. Davis won only 28.8 percent of the vote in the 1924 election. The only major party candidate since 1972 to receive less than 40 percent of the vote was Republican incumbent President George H. W. Bush who won 37.4 percent of the vote in the 1992 election, a race that (as in 1924) was complicated by a strong third party vote.[46]

Although the McGovern campaign believed that its candidate had a better chance of defeating Nixon because of the new Twenty-sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution that lowered the national voting age to 18 from 21, most of the youth vote went to Nixon.[47] This was the first election in American history in which a Republican candidate carried every single Southern state, continuing the region's transformation from a Democratic bastion into a Republican stronghold as Arkansas was carried by a Republican presidential candidate for the first time in a century. By this time, all the Southern states, except Arkansas and Texas, had been carried by a Republican in either the previous election or the one in 1964 (although Republican candidates carried Texas in 1928, 1952 and 1956). As a result of this election, Massachusetts became the only state that Nixon did not carry in any of the three presidential elections in which he was a candidate. This is one of only two elections since 1856 that Massachusetts and Rhode Island did not support the same candidate. The other election which the two states did not do so is 1980.

This presidential election was the first since 1808 in which New York did not have the largest number of electors in the Electoral College, having fallen to 41 electors vs. California's 45. Additionally, through 2020 it remains the last one in which Minnesota was carried by the Republican candidate.[48]

McGovern won a mere 130 counties, plus the District of Columbia and four county-equivalents in Alaska,[c] easily the fewest counties won by any major-party presidential nominee since the advent of popular presidential elections.[49] In nineteen states, McGovern failed to carry a single county;[d] he carried a mere one county-equivalent in a further nine states,[e] and just two counties in a further seven.[f] In contrast to Walter Mondale's narrow 1984 win in Minnesota, McGovern comfortably did win Massachusetts, but lost every other state by no less than five percentage points, as well as 45 states by more than ten percentage points – the exceptions being Massachusetts, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, and his home state of South Dakota. This election also made Nixon the second former vice president in American history to serve two terms back-to-back, after Thomas Jefferson in 1800 and 1804. Since McGovern carried only one state, bumper stickers reading "Nixon 49 America 1",[50] "Don't Blame Me, I'm From Massachusetts", and "Massachusetts: The One And Only" were popular for a short time in Massachusetts.[51]

Nixon managed to win 18% of the African American vote (Gerald Ford would get 16% in 1976).[52] He also remains the only Republican in modern times to threaten the oldest extant Democratic stronghold of South Texas: this is the last election when the Republicans have won Hidalgo or Dimmit counties, the only time Republicans have won La Salle County between William McKinley in 1900 and Donald Trump in 2020, and one of only two occasions since Theodore Roosevelt in 1904[g] that Republicans have gained a majority in Presidio County.[48] More significantly, the 1972 election was the most recent time several highly populous urban counties – including Cook in Illinois, Orleans in Louisiana, Hennepin in Minnesota, Cuyahoga in Ohio, Durham in North Carolina, Queens in New York, and Prince George's in Maryland – have voted Republican.[48]

The Wallace vote had also been crucial to Nixon being able to sweep the states that had narrowly held out against him in 1968 (Texas, Maryland, and West Virginia), as well as the states Wallace won himself (Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia). The pro-Wallace group of voters had only given AIP nominee John Schmitz a depressing 2.4% of its support, while 19.1% backed McGovern, and the majority 78.5% broke for Nixon.

Nixon, who became term-limited under the provisions of the Twenty-second Amendment as a result of his victory, became the first (and, as of 2020, only) presidential candidate to win a significant number of electoral votes in three presidential elections since the ratification of that Amendment. As of 2020, Nixon was the seventh of seven presidential nominees to win a significant number of electoral votes in at least three elections, the others being Thomas Jefferson, Henry Clay, Andrew Jackson, Grover Cleveland, William Jennings Bryan, and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Counting Nixon's successful runs for vice president in the 1950s, he matched Franklin Roosevelt's achievements of winning the presidency or vice presidency in four elections and polling significant electoral votes in five, while over-reaching Roosevelt by winning electoral votes for president or vice president in every state. The 520 electoral votes received by Nixon, added to the 301 electoral votes he received in 1968, gave him the most total electoral votes received by any candidate who had been vice president to be elected to the office of president (821), and the fourth largest number of electoral votes received by any candidate who was elected to the office of the president behind Dwight Eisenhower's 899, Ronald Reagan's 1,014 and Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1,876 total electoral votes.

Electoral results  Presidential candidate  | Party  | Home state  | Popular vote[53] | Electoral
vote[54] | Running mate

|
|
|
|
|

Count  | Percentage  | Vice-presidential candidate  | Home state  | Electoral vote[54]
Richard Milhous Nixon (Incumbent) | Republican | California | 47,168,710  | 60.67%  | 520  |  Spiro Theodore Agnew | Maryland | 520
George Stanley McGovern | Democratic | South Dakota | 29,173,222  | 37.52%  | 17  |  Robert Sargent Shriver | Maryland | 17
John G. Schmitz | American Independent | California | 1,100,896  | 1.42%  | 0  |  Thomas J. Anderson | Tennessee | 0
Linda Jenness | Socialist Workers | Georgia | 83,380[h] | 0.11%  | 0  |  Andrew Pulley | Illinois | 0
Benjamin Spock | People's | California | 78,759  | 0.10%  | 0  |  Julius Hobson | District of Columbia | 0
Louis Fisher | Socialist Labor | Illinois | 53,814  | 0.07%  | 0  |  Genevieve Gunderson | Minnesota | 0
John G. Hospers | Libertarian | California | 3,674  | 0.00%  | 1[i][45] |  Theodora Nathan | Oregon | 1[i][45]
Other | 81,575  | 0.10%  | —  | Other | —
Total  | 77,744,030  | 100%  | 538  |  | 538
Needed to win  | 270  |  | 270

File:John Hospers 1998.jpg

John Hospers received one faithless electoral vote from Virginia.

| Popular vote

|  |
Nixon |

| 60.67%
McGovern |

| 37.52%
Schmitz |

| 1.42%
Others |

| 0.39%

| Electoral vote

|  |
Nixon |

| 96.65%
McGovern |

| 3.16%
Hospers |

| 0.19%

* Results by county, shaded according to winning candidate's percentage of the vote

#### Results by state[edit | edit source]

Legend
Legend  States/districts won by Nixon/Agnew

States/districts won by McGovern/Shriver
† | At-large results (Maine used the Congressional District Method)
Outcomes of the 1972 United States presidential election by state[55] | Richard Nixon
Republican  | George McGovern
Democratic  | John Schmitz
American Independent  | John Hospers
Libertarian  | Margin  | State Total

|
|
|
|
|
|

State  | electoral
votes  | #  | %  | electoral
votes  | #  | %  | electoral
votes  | #  | %  | electoral
votes  | #  | %  | electoral
votes  | #  | %  | #  |
Alabama | 9  | 728,701  | 72.43  | 9  | 256,923  | 25.54  |  | 11,918  | 1.18  |  |  |  |  | 471,778  | 46.89  | 1,006,093  | AL
Alaska | 3  | 55,349  | 58.13  | 3  | 32,967  | 34.62  |  | 6,903  | 7.25  |  |  |  |  | 22,382  | 23.51  | 95,219  | AK
Arizona | 6  | 402,812  | 61.64  | 6  | 198,540  | 30.38  |  | 21,208  | 3.25  |  |  |  |  | 204,272  | 31.26  | 653,505  | AZ
Arkansas | 6  | 445,751  | 68.82  | 6  | 198,899  | 30.71  |  | 3,016  | 0.47  |  |  |  |  | 246,852  | 38.11  | 647,666  | AR
California | 45  | 4,602,096  | 55.00  | 45  | 3,475,847  | 41.54  |  | 232,554  | 2.78  |  | 980  | 0.01  |  | 1,126,249  | 13.46  | 8,367,862  | CA
Colorado | 7  | 597,189  | 62.61  | 7  | 329,980  | 34.59  |  | 17,269  | 1.81  |  | 1,111  | 0.12  |  | 267,209  | 28.01  | 953,884  | CO
Connecticut | 8  | 810,763  | 58.57  | 8  | 555,498  | 40.13  |  | 17,239  | 1.25  |  |  |  |  | 255,265  | 18.44  | 1,384,277  | CT
Delaware | 3  | 140,357  | 59.60  | 3  | 92,283  | 39.18  |  | 2,638  | 1.12  |  |  |  |  | 48,074  | 20.41  | 235,516  | DE
D.C. | 3  | 35,226  | 21.56  |  | 127,627  | 78.10  | 3  |  |  |  |  |  |  | −92,401  | −56.54  | 163,421  | DC
Florida | 17  | 1,857,759  | 71.91  | 17  | 718,117  | 27.80  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 1,139,642  | 44.12  | 2,583,283  | FL
Georgia | 12  | 881,496  | 75.04  | 12  | 289,529  | 24.65  |  | 812  | 0.07  |  |  |  |  | 591,967  | 50.39  | 1,174,772  | GA
Hawaii | 4  | 168,865  | 62.48  | 4  | 101,409  | 37.52  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 67,456  | 24.96  | 270,274  | HI
Idaho | 4  | 199,384  | 64.24  | 4  | 80,826  | 26.04  |  | 28,869  | 9.30  |  |  |  |  | 118,558  | 38.20  | 310,379  | ID
Illinois | 26  | 2,788,179  | 59.03  | 26  | 1,913,472  | 40.51  |  | 2,471  | 0.05  |  |  |  |  | 874,707  | 18.52  | 4,723,236  | IL
Indiana | 13  | 1,405,154  | 66.11  | 13  | 708,568  | 33.34  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 696,586  | 32.77  | 2,125,529  | IN
Iowa | 8  | 706,207  | 57.61  | 8  | 496,206  | 40.48  |  | 22,056  | 1.80  |  |  |  |  | 210,001  | 17.13  | 1,225,944  | IA
Kansas | 7  | 619,812  | 67.66  | 7  | 270,287  | 29.50  |  | 21,808  | 2.38  |  |  |  |  | 349,525  | 38.15  | 916,095  | KS
Kentucky | 9  | 676,446  | 63.37  | 9  | 371,159  | 34.77  |  | 17,627  | 1.65  |  |  |  |  | 305,287  | 28.60  | 1,067,499  | KY
Louisiana | 10  | 686,852  | 65.32  | 10  | 298,142  | 28.35  |  | 52,099  | 4.95  |  |  |  |  | 388,710  | 36.97  | 1,051,491  | LA
Maine † | 2  | 256,458  | 61.46  | 2  | 160,584  | 38.48  |  | 117  | 0.03  |  | 1  | 0.00  |  | 95,874  | 22.98  | 417,271  | ME
Maine-1 | 1 | 135,388 | 61.42 | 1 | 85,028 | 38.58 |  | Unknown | Unknown |  | Unknown | Unknown |  | 50,360 | 22.85 | 220,416 | ME1
Maine-2 | 1 | 121,120 | 61.58 | 1 | 75,556 | 38.42 |  | Unknown | Unknown |  | Unknown | Unknown |  | 45,564 | 23.17 | 196,676 | ME2
Maryland | 10  | 829,305  | 61.26  | 10  | 505,781  | 37.36  |  | 18,726  | 1.38  |  |  |  |  | 323,524  | 23.90  | 1,353,812  | MD
Massachusetts | 14  | 1,112,078  | 45.23  |  | 1,332,540  | 54.20  | 14  | 2,877  | 0.12  |  | 43  | 0.00  |  | −220,462  | −8.97  | 2,458,756  | MA
Michigan | 21  | 1,961,721  | 56.20  | 21  | 1,459,435  | 41.81  |  | 63,321  | 1.81  |  |  |  |  | 502,286  | 14.39  | 3,490,325  | MI
Minnesota | 10  | 898,269  | 51.58  | 10  | 802,346  | 46.07  |  | 31,407  | 1.80  |  |  |  |  | 95,923  | 5.51  | 1,741,652  | MN
Mississippi | 7  | 505,125  | 78.20  | 7  | 126,782  | 19.63  |  | 11,598  | 1.80  |  |  |  |  | 378,343  | 58.57  | 645,963  | MS
Missouri | 12  | 1,154,058  | 62.29  | 12  | 698,531  | 37.71  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 455,527  | 24.59  | 1,852,589  | MO
Montana | 4  | 183,976  | 57.93  | 4  | 120,197  | 37.85  |  | 13,430  | 4.23  |  |  |  |  | 63,779  | 20.08  | 317,603  | MT
Nebraska | 5  | 406,298  | 70.50  | 5  | 169,991  | 29.50  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 236,307  | 41.00  | 576,289  | NE
Nevada | 3  | 115,750  | 63.68  | 3  | 66,016  | 36.32  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 49,734  | 27.36  | 181,766  | NV
New Hampshire | 4  | 213,724  | 63.98  | 4  | 116,435  | 34.86  |  | 3,386  | 1.01  |  |  |  |  | 97,289  | 29.12  | 334,055  | NH
New Jersey | 17  | 1,845,502  | 61.57  | 17  | 1,102,211  | 36.77  |  | 34,378  | 1.15  |  |  |  |  | 743,291  | 24.80  | 2,997,229  | NJ
New Mexico | 4  | 235,606  | 61.05  | 4  | 141,084  | 36.56  |  | 8,767  | 2.27  |  |  |  |  | 94,522  | 24.49  | 385,931  | NM
New York | 41  | 4,192,778  | 58.54  | 41  | 2,951,084  | 41.21  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 1,241,694  | 17.34  | 7,161,830  | NY
North Carolina | 13  | 1,054,889  | 69.46  | 13  | 438,705  | 28.89  |  | 25,018  | 1.65  |  |  |  |  | 616,184  | 40.58  | 1,518,612  | NC
North Dakota | 3  | 174,109  | 62.07  | 3  | 100,384  | 35.79  |  | 5,646  | 2.01  |  |  |  |  | 73,725  | 26.28  | 280,514  | ND
Ohio | 25  | 2,441,827  | 59.63  | 25  | 1,558,889  | 38.07  |  | 80,067  | 1.96  |  |  |  |  | 882,938  | 21.56  | 4,094,787  | OH
Oklahoma | 8  | 759,025  | 73.70  | 8  | 247,147  | 24.00  |  | 23,728  | 2.30  |  |  |  |  | 511,878  | 49.70  | 1,029,900  | OK
Oregon | 6  | 486,686  | 52.45  | 6  | 392,760  | 42.33  |  | 46,211  | 4.98  |  |  |  |  | 93,926  | 10.12  | 927,946  | OR
Pennsylvania | 27  | 2,714,521  | 59.11  | 27  | 1,796,951  | 39.13  |  | 70,593  | 1.54  |  |  |  |  | 917,570  | 19.98  | 4,592,105  | PA
Rhode Island | 4  | 220,383  | 53.00  | 4  | 194,645  | 46.81  |  | 25  | 0.01  |  | 2  | 0.00  |  | 25,738  | 6.19  | 415,808  | RI
South Carolina | 8  | 478,427  | 70.58  | 8  | 189,270  | 27.92  |  | 10,166  | 1.50  |  |  |  |  | 289,157  | 42.66  | 677,880  | SC
South Dakota | 4  | 166,476  | 54.15  | 4  | 139,945  | 45.52  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 26,531  | 8.63  | 307,415  | SD
Tennessee | 10  | 813,147  | 67.70  | 10  | 357,293  | 29.75  |  | 30,373  | 2.53  |  |  |  |  | 455,854  | 37.95  | 1,201,182  | TN
Texas | 26  | 2,298,896  | 66.20  | 26  | 1,154,291  | 33.24  |  | 7,098  | 0.20  |  |  |  |  | 1,144,605  | 32.96  | 3,472,714  | TX
Utah | 4  | 323,643  | 67.64  | 4  | 126,284  | 26.39  |  | 28,549  | 5.97  |  |  |  |  | 197,359  | 41.25  | 478,476  | UT
Vermont | 3  | 117,149  | 62.66  | 3  | 68,174  | 36.47  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 48,975  | 26.20  | 186,947  | VT
Virginia | 12  | 988,493  | 67.84  | 11  | 438,887  | 30.12  |  | 19,721  | 1.35  |  |  |  | 1 | 549,606  | 37.72  | 1,457,019  | VA
Washington | 9  | 837,135  | 56.92  | 9  | 568,334  | 38.64  |  | 58,906  | 4.00  |  | 1,537  | 0.10  |  | 268,801  | 18.28  | 1,470,847  | WA
West Virginia | 6  | 484,964  | 63.61  | 6  | 277,435  | 36.39  |  |  |  |  |  |  |  | 207,529  | 27.22  | 762,399  | WV
Wisconsin | 11  | 989,430  | 53.40  | 11  | 810,174  | 43.72  |  | 47,525  | 2.56  |  |  |  |  | 179,256  | 9.67  | 1,852,890  | WI
Wyoming | 3  | 100,464  | 69.01  | 3  | 44,358  | 30.47  |  | 748  | 0.51  |  |  |  |  | 56,106  | 38.54  | 145,570  | WY
TOTALS:  | 538  | 47,168,710  | 60.67  | 520  | 29,173,222  | 37.52  | 17  | 1,100,868  | 1.42  | 0  | 3,674  | 0.00  | 1  | 17,995,488  | 23.15  | 77,744,027  | US

For the first time since 1828 Maine allowed its electoral votes to be split between candidates. Two electoral votes were awarded to the winner of the statewide race and one electoral vote to the winner of each congressional district. This was the first time the Congressional District Method had been used since Michigan used it in 1892. Nixon won all four votes.[56]

### Close states[edit | edit source]

States where margin of victory was more than 5 percentage points, but less than 10 percentage points (43 electoral votes):

1. Minnesota, 5.51% (95,923 votes)
2. Rhode Island, 6.19% (25,738 votes)
3. South Dakota, 8.63% (26,531 votes)
4. Massachusetts, 8.97% (220,462 votes)
5. Wisconsin, 9.67% (179,256 votes)

Tipping point states:

1. Ohio, 21.56% (882,938 votes) (tipping point for a Nixon victory)
2. Maine-1, 22.85% (50,360 votes) (tipping point for a McGovern victory)[57]

#### Statistics[edit | edit source]

[55]

Counties with highest percentage of the vote (Republican)

1. Dade County, Georgia 93.45%
2. Glascock County, Georgia 93.38%
3. George County, Mississippi 92.90%
4. Holmes County, Florida 92.51%
5. Smith County, Mississippi 92.35%

Counties with highest percentage of the vote (Democratic)

1. Duval County, Texas 85.68%
2. Washington, D. C. 78.10%
3. Shannon County, South Dakota 77.34%
4. Greene County, Alabama 68.32%
5. Charles City County, Virginia 67.84%

Counties with highest percentage of the vote (Other)

1. Jefferson County, Idaho 27.51%
2. Lemhi County, Idaho 19.77%
3. Fremont County, Idaho 19.32%
4. Bonneville County, Idaho 18.97%
5. Madison County, Idaho 17.04%

### Voter demographics[edit | edit source]

Nixon won 36 percent of the Democratic vote, according to an exit poll conducted for CBS News by George Fine Research, Inc.[58] This represents more than twice the percentage of voters who typically defect from their party in presidential elections. Nixon also became the first Republican presidential candidate in American history to win the Roman Catholic vote (53–46), and the first in recent history to win the blue-collar vote, which he won by a 5-to-4 margin. McGovern narrowly won the union vote (50–48), though this difference was within the survey's margin of error of 2 percentage points. McGovern also narrowly won the youth vote (i. e., those aged 18 to 24) 52–46, a narrower margin than many of his strategists had predicted. Early on, the McGovern campaign also significantly over-estimated the number of young people who would vote in the election: They predicted that 18 million would have voted in total, but exit polls indicate that the actual number was about 12 million. McGovern did win comfortably among both African-American and Jewish voters, but by somewhat smaller margins than usual for a Democratic candidate.[58]

## Post-election investigations into the Watergate break-in[edit | edit source]

Main article: Watergate scandal

On June 17, 1972, five months before election day, five men broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate hotel in Washington, D. C.; the resulting investigation led to the revelation of attempted cover-ups of the break-in within the Nixon administration. What became known as the Watergate scandal eroded President Nixon's public and political support in his second term, and he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of probable impeachment by the House of Representatives and removal from office by the Senate.

As part of the continuing Watergate investigation in 1974–1975, federal prosecutors offered companies that had given illegal campaign contributions to President Nixon's re-election campaign lenient sentences if they came forward.[59] Many companies complied, including Northrop Grumman, 3M, American Airlines, and Braniff Airlines.[59] By 1976, prosecutors had convicted 18 American corporations of contributing illegally to Nixon's campaign.[59]

## See also[edit | edit source]

* 1972 United States House of Representatives elections
* 1972 United States Senate elections
* 1972 United States gubernatorial elections
* George McGovern 1972 presidential campaign
* Second inauguration of Richard Nixon
* Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, a collection of articles by Hunter S. Thompson on the subject of the election, focusing on the McGovern campaign.

## Explanatory notes[edit | edit source]

1. ^ Thomas Eagleton had originally been nominated as McGovern's running mate; however, Eagleton withdrew on August 1 and was subsequently replaced by Shriver.
2. ^ A faithless Republican elector voted for the Libertarian ticket: Hospers–Nathan
3. ^ These were North Slope Borough, plus Bethel, Kusilvak and Hoonah-Angoon Census Areas
4. ^ McGovern failed to carry a single county in Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Utah, Vermont or Wyoming
5. ^ McGovern carried only one county-equivalent in Arizona (Greenlee), Illinois (Jackson), Louisiana (West Feliciana Parish), Maine (Androscoggin), Maryland (Baltimore City), North Dakota (Rolette), Pennsylvania (Philadelphia), Virginia (Charles City), and West Virginia (Logan)
6. ^ McGovern carried just two counties in Colorado, Missouri, Montana, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio and Washington State
7. ^ Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952 also obtained a plurality in Presidio County
8. ^ In Arizona, Pima and Yavapai counties had a confusing ballot that resulted in many voters voting for both a major party candidate, and six individual Socialist Workers Party presidential electors. Technically, these were overvotes, and should not have counted for either the major party candidates or the Socialist Workers Party electors. Within two days of the election, the Attorney General and Pima County Attorney had agreed that all votes should count. The Socialist Workers Party had not qualified as a party, and thus did not have a presidential candidate. In the official state canvass, votes for Nixon, McGovern, or Schmitz, are shown as being for the presidential candidate, the party, and the elector slate of the party; while those for the Socialist Worker Party elector candidates were for those candidates only. In the view of the Secretary of State, the votes were not for Linda Jenness. Some tabulations count the votes for Jenness. Historically, presidential candidate names did not appear on ballots, and voters voted directly for the electors. Nonetheless, votes for the electors are attributed to the presidential candidate. Counting the votes in Arizona for Jenness is consistent with this practice. Because of the confusing ballots, Socialist Workers Party electors received votes on about 21 percent and 8 percent of ballots in Pima and Yavapai, respectively. 30,579 of the party's 30,945 Arizona votes are from those two counties.
9. ^ A Virginia faithless elector, Roger MacBride, though pledged to vote for Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew, instead voted for Libertarian candidates John Hospers and Theodora "Tonie" Nathan.

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19. ^ Risser, James (June 9, 1972). "Hughes Stands By Muskie". The Des Moines Register. p. 5. Retrieved May 13, 2022. "Hughes has spent much of this week helping Muskie, whom Hughes endorsed early this year as the candidate most likely to unify the party and defeat President Nixon in November."
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27. ^ "Maddox Against Demo Nominees". The Knoxville News-Sentinel. July 14, 1972. p. 10. Retrieved May 13, 2022. "Maddox, a booster of fellow Democrat Alabama Gov. George Wallace, said Thursday it may be best to turn the present party "over to the promoters of anarchy, Socialism and Communism" and form what he called a New Democratic Party of the People."
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## Bibliography and further reading[edit | edit source]

* Alexander, Herbert E.  Financing the 1972 Election (1976) online

* Giglio, James N. (2009). "The Eagleton Affair: Thomas Eagleton, George McGovern, and the 1972 Vice Presidential Nomination". Presidential Studies Quarterly. 39 (4): 647–676. doi:10.1111/j.1741-5705.2009.03731.x.
* Graebner, Norman A. (1973). "Presidential Politics in a Divided America: 1972". Australian Journal of Politics and History. 19 (1): 28–47. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8497.1973.tb00722.x.
* Hofstetter, C. Richard; Zukin, Cliff (1979). "TV Network News and Advertising in the Nixon and McGovern Campaigns". Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly. 56 (1): 106–152. doi:10.1177/107769907905600117. S2CID 144048423.
* Hofstetter, C. Richard. Bias in the news: Network television coverage of the 1972 election campaign (Ohio State University Press, 1976) online

* Miller, Arthur H., et al. "A majority party in disarray: Policy polarization in the 1972 election." American Political Science Review 70.3 (1976): 753-778; widely cited; online
* Nicholas, H. G. (1973). "The 1972 Elections". Journal of American Studies. 7 (1): 1–15. doi:10.1017/S0021875800012585. S2CID 145606732.
* Perry, James M. Us & them: how the press covered the 1972 election (1973) online

* Simons, Herbert W., James W. Chesebro, and C. Jack Orr. "A movement perspective on the 1972 presidential election." Quarterly Journal of Speech 59.2 (1973): 168-179. online Archived September 23, 2022, at the Wayback Machine
* Trent, Judith S., and Jimmie D. Trent. "The rhetoric of the challenger: George Stanley McGovern." Communication Studies 25.1 (1974): 11-18.

* White, Theodore H. (1973). The Making of the President, 1972. New York: Atheneum. ISBN 0-689-10553-3.

### Primary sources[edit | edit source]

* Chester, Edward W. (1977). A guide to political platforms.
* Porter, Kirk H. and Donald Bruce Johnson, eds. National party platforms, 1840–1972 (1973)

## External links[edit | edit source]

* The Election Wall's 1972 Election Video Page
* 1972 popular vote by counties
* 1972 popular vote by states
* 1972 popular vote by states (with bar graphs)
* Campaign commercials from the 1972 election
* C-SPAN segment on 1972 campaign commercials
* C-SPAN segment on the "Eagleton Affair"
* Election of 1972 in Counting the Votes

* v
* t
* e

(<- 1968) 1972 United States presidential election (1976 ->)

Republican Party|

* Convention
* Primaries

Candidates|

* Incumbent nominee: Richard Nixon
* Incumbent VP nominee: Spiro Agnew

* Other candidates: John M. Ashbrook
* Pete McCloskey

Democratic Party|

* Convention
* Primaries

Candidates|

* Nominee: George McGovern
* campaign
* VP nominee: Sargent Shriver
* replacing Thomas Eagleton

* Other candidates: Shirley Chisholm
* Walter Fauntroy
* Fred R. Harris
* Vance Hartke
* Wayne Hays
* Hubert Humphrey
* Henry M. Jackson
* John Lindsay
* Eugene McCarthy
* Wilbur Mills
* Patsy Mink
* Edmund Muskie
* Terry Sanford
* George Wallace
* Sam Yorty

Third party and independent candidates

American Independent Party|

* Nominee: John G. Schmitz
* VP nominee: Thomas J. Anderson

Communist Party|

* Nominee: Gus Hall
* VP nominee: Jarvis Tyner

Libertarian Party|

* Nominee: John Hospers
* VP nominee: Tonie Nathan

People's Party|

* Nominee: Benjamin Spock
* VP nominee: Julius Hobson

Prohibition Party|

* Nominee: E. Harold Munn

Socialist Labor Party|

* Nominee: Louis Fisher

Socialist Workers Party|

* Nominee: Linda Jenness
* Alternate nominee: Evelyn Reed
* VP nominee: Andrew Pulley

Independent|

* Candidates: Gabriel Green

* Other 1972 elections: House
* Senate
* Gubernatorial

* v
* t
* e

State and district results of the 1972 United States presidential election

* Alabama
* Alaska
* Arizona
* Arkansas
* California
* Colorado
* Connecticut
* Delaware
* District of Columbia
* Florida
* Georgia
* Hawaii
* Idaho
* Illinois
* Indiana
* Iowa
* Kansas
* Kentucky
* Louisiana
* Maine
* Maryland
* Massachusetts
* Michigan
* Minnesota
* Mississippi
* Missouri
* Montana
* Nebraska
* Nevada
* New Hampshire
* New Jersey
* New Mexico
* New York
* North Carolina
* North Dakota
* Ohio
* Oklahoma
* Oregon
* Pennsylvania
* Rhode Island
* South Carolina
* South Dakota
* Tennessee
* Texas
* Utah
* Vermont
* Virginia
* Washington
* West Virginia
* Wisconsin
* Wyoming

Electoral map, 1972 election

* v
* t
* e

(1970 <-)  1972 United States elections (-> 1974)

President|

* 1972 United States presidential election
* Democratic primaries
* Republican primaries
* Democratic convention
* Republican convention

U.S.
Senate|

* Alabama
* Alaska
* Arkansas
* Colorado
* Delaware
* Georgia
* Georgia (special)
* Idaho
* Illinois
* Iowa
* Kansas
* Kentucky
* Louisiana
* Maine
* Massachusetts
* Michigan
* Minnesota
* Mississippi
* Montana
* Nebraska
* New Hampshire
* New Jersey
* New Mexico
* North Carolina
* Oklahoma
* Oregon
* Rhode Island
* South Carolina
* South Dakota
* Tennessee
* Texas
* Vermont (special)
* Virginia
* West Virginia
* Wyoming

U.S.
House|

* Alabama
* Alaska
* Arkansas
* Arizona
* California
* Colorado
* Connecticut
* Delaware
* District of Columbia
* Florida
* Georgia
* Hawaii
* Idaho
* Illinois
* Indiana
* Iowa
* Kansas
* Kentucky
* Louisiana
* Maine
* Maryland
* Massachusetts
* Michigan
* Minnesota
* Mississippi
* Missouri
* Montana
* Nebraska
* Nevada
* New Hampshire
* New Jersey
* New Mexico
* New York
* North Carolina
* North Dakota
* Ohio
* Oklahoma
* Oregon
* Pennsylvania
* Rhode Island
* South Carolina
* South Dakota
* Tennessee
* Texas
* Utah
* Vermont
* Virginia
* Washington
* West Virginia
* Wisconsin
* Wyoming

State
governors|

* Arkansas
* Delaware
* Illinois
* Indiana
* Iowa
* Kansas
* Louisiana
* Missouri
* Lt. Gov
* Montana
* New Hampshire
* North Carolina
* Lt. Gov
* North Dakota
* Rhode Island
* South Dakota
* Texas
* Utah
* Vermont
* Washington
* West Virginia

State
legislatures|

* Iowa Senate

* v
* t
* e

United States presidential elections

Elections by year|

* 1788–89
* 1792
* 1796
* 1800
* 1804
* 1808
* 1812
* 1816
* 1820
* 1824
* 1828
* 1832
* 1836
* 1840
* 1844
* 1848
* 1852
* 1856
* 1860
* 1864
* 1868
* 1872
* 1876
* 1880
* 1884
* 1888
* 1892
* 1896
* 1900
* 1904
* 1908
* 1912
* 1916
* 1920
* 1924
* 1928
* 1932
* 1936
* 1940
* 1944
* 1948
* 1952
* 1956
* 1960
* 1964
* 1968
* 1972
* 1976
* 1980
* 1984
* 1988
* 1992
* 1996
* 2000
* 2004
* 2008
* 2012
* 2016
* 2020
* 2024

Elections by state|

* Alabama
* Alaska
* Arizona
* Arkansas
* California
* Colorado
* Connecticut
* Delaware
* District of Columbia
* Florida
* Georgia
* Hawaii
* Idaho
* Illinois
* Indiana
* Iowa
* Kansas
* Kentucky
* Louisiana
* Maine
* Maryland
* Massachusetts
* Michigan
* Minnesota
* Mississippi
* Missouri
* Montana
* Nebraska
* Nevada
* New Hampshire
* New Jersey
* New Mexico
* New York
* North Carolina
* North Dakota
* Ohio
* Oklahoma
* Oregon
* Pennsylvania
* Rhode Island
* South Carolina
* South Dakota
* Tennessee
* Texas
* Utah
* Vermont
* Virginia
* Washington
* West Virginia
* Wisconsin
* Wyoming

Primaries and caucuses|

* Iowa caucuses
* New Hampshire presidential primary
* Nevada presidential caucuses
* South Carolina presidential primary
* Super Tuesday

Nominating conventions|

* List of nominating conventions
* Brokered convention
* Convention bounce
* Superdelegate

Electoral College
and popular vote|

* Results
* summary
* elections in which the winner lost the popular vote
* Electoral College margins
* Electoral College results by state
* electoral vote changes between elections
* electoral vote recipients
* popular votes received
* popular-vote margins
* Electoral Count Act
* Certificate of ascertainment
* Certificate of vote
* Contingent election
* Faithless elector
* Unpledged elector
* Voter turnout

Related|

* Campaign slogans
* Historical election polling
* Election Day
* Major party tickets
* Major party losers
* Presidential debates
* October surprise
* Red states and blue states
* Swing state
* Tipping-point state
* Election recount
* Guam straw poll
* Vice presidential confirmations:
* 1973
* 1974

* House elections
* Senate elections
* Gubernatorial elections

* v
* t
* e

Richard Nixon

* 37th President of the United States (1969–1974)
* 36th Vice President of the United States (1953–1961)
* U.S. Senator from California (1950–1953)
* U.S. Representative for CA–12 (1947–1950)

Pre-presidency|

* Checkers speech
* Vice presidency
* Presidential transition of Dwight D. Eisenhower
* 1958 motorcade attack
* Kitchen Debate
* Operation 40
* Presidential transition of John F. Kennedy

File:Seal of the President of the United States.svg

Presidency|

* Transition
* First inauguration
* Second inauguration
* Nixon Doctrine
* "Bring Us Together"
* Economic policies
* Bank Secrecy Act
* Fair Credit Reporting Act
* Family Assistance Plan
* Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1973
* Nixon shock
* Revised Philadelphia Plan
* Smithsonian Agreement
* Tar Baby Option
* Education Amendments of 1972
* Title IX
* Council on Environmental Quality
* Environmental Quality Improvement Act
* National Environmental Policy Act
* Environmental Protection Agency
* Clean Air Amendments of 1970
* Clean Water Act
* Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act
* National Ambient Air Quality Standards
* National Emissions Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants
* New Source Performance Standards
* Noise Control Act
* Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1970
* Occupational Safety and Health Act
* National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
* Occupational Safety and Health Administration
* Permissible exposure limit
* U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission
* Consumer Product Safety Act
* Lead-Based Paint Poisoning Prevention Act
* Poison Prevention Packaging Act of 1970
* National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
* Space exploration
* 1971 National Cancer Act
* Vietnam War
* Cambodian bombing
* Paris Peace Accords
* "Peace with Honor"
* Vietnamization
* Silent majority
* Cold War period
* Linkage policy
* Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act
* 1970 Lincoln Memorial visit
* 1972 visit to China
* Shanghai Communiqué
* Détente
* 1972 Moscow Summit
* Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty
* SALT I Treaty
* Prevention of Nuclear War Agreement
* Threshold Test Ban Treaty
* Endangered Species Act
* National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse
* War on Drugs
* Drug Enforcement Administration
* Cannabis policy
* Enemies List
* list of opponents
* Operation CHAOS
* Watergate
* timeline
* White House tapes
* United States v. Nixon
* Senate Watergate Committee
* impeachment process
* "I am not a crook"
* Resignation
* speech
* Pardon
* State of the Union Address (1970
* 1973
* 1974)
* Wilson desk
* Judicial appointments
* Supreme Court
* controversies
* Executive Orders
* Presidential Proclamations

Life and
politics|

* Richard Nixon Foundation
* Presidential Library and Museum
* Birthplace and boyhood home
* "Last press conference"
* Florida White House
* "La Casa Pacifica"
* Nixon Center
* Nixon v. General Services Administration
* Death and state funeral

Books|

* Six Crises (1962)
* Bibliography

Elections|

* U.S. House of Representatives: 1946
* 1948
* U.S. Senate: 1950
* California gubernatorial election: 1962
* GOP presidential primaries: 1960
* 1964
* 1968
* 1972
* GOP national conventions: 1952
* 1956
* 1960
* 1968
* campaign
* 1972
* Presidential elections: 1952
* 1956
* 1960
* debates
* 1968
* 1972

Popular
culture|

* "Nixon goes to China"
* Millhouse (1971 film)
* An Evening with Richard Nixon (1972 play)
* Richard (1972 film)
* Another Nice Mess (1972 film)
* Four More Years (1972 film)
* Impeach the President (1973 song)
* The Werewolf of Washington (1973 film)
* White House Madness (1975 film)
* All the President's Men (1976 film)
* The Public Burning (1977 novel)
* Washington: Behind Closed Doors (1977 miniseries)
* Secret Honor (1984 film)
* Nixon in China (1987 opera)
* The Final Days (1989 film)
* Nixon (1995 film)
* Elvis Meets Nixon (1997 film)
* Futurama (1999 TV series)
* Dick (1999 film)
* Nixon's China Game (2000 film)
* Dark Side of the Moon (2002 film)
* The Assassination of Richard Nixon (2004 film)
* Frost–Nixon interviews (2006 play, 2008 film)
* Black Dynamite (2009 film)
* "The Impossible Astronaut" (2011 TV episode)
* Our Nixon (2013 film)
* X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014 film)
* Crooked (2015 novel)
* Elvis & Nixon (2016 film)
* The Post (2017 film)
* U.S. postage stamp

Related|

* Presidential Recordings and Materials Preservation Act
* Presidential Townhouse
* Richard Nixon mask

Staff|

* Jack Brennan (aide de camp)
* Murray Chotiner (early campaign manager)
* Manolo Sanchez (valet)
* Rose Mary Woods (secretary)

Family|

* Thelma "Pat" Ryan Nixon (wife)
* Tricia Nixon Cox (daughter)
* Julie Nixon Eisenhower (daughter)
* Christopher Nixon Cox (grandson)
* Jennie Eisenhower (granddaughter)
* Francis A. Nixon (father)
* Hannah Milhous Nixon (mother)
* Donald Nixon (brother)
* Edward Nixon (brother)

* ← Lyndon B. Johnson
* Gerald Ford →

* Category

* v
* t
* e

George McGovern

July 19, 1922 – October 21, 2012

United States Senator, South Dakota, 1963–1981

United States House of Representatives, 1957–1961

Political career|

* Director, Food for Peace
* World Food Programme
* McGovern–Fraser Commission
* McGovern–Hatfield Amendment
* United States Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs
* United States Ambassador to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture
* McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program
* World Food Prize

File:George McGovern bioguide.jpg

Electoral history|

* 1968 Democratic National Convention
* 1972 presidential campaign
* primaries
* 1972 Democratic National Convention
* Thomas Eagleton
* Sargent Shriver
* 1000 percent
* 1972 United States presidential election

Legacy|

* In popular culture
* Papers and manuscripts
* George and Eleanor McGovern Library and Center
* Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 (1972 articles, 1973 book)
* One Bright Shining Moment: The Forgotten Summer of George McGovern (2005 film)

Other|

* Awards and honors
* Eleanor McGovern (wife)

* Commons
* Wikiquote

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