1896 United States presidential election in Colorado

Summary

The 1896 United States presidential election in Colorado took place on November 3, 1896. All contemporary 45 states were part of the 1896 United States presidential election. Voters chose four electors to the Electoral College, which selected the president and vice president.

1896 United States presidential election in Colorado

← 1892 November 3, 1896 1900 →
 
Nominee William Jennings Bryan William McKinley
Party Democratic Republican
Alliance Populist
Home state Nebraska Ohio
Running mate Arthur Sewall Garret Hobart
Electoral vote 4 0
Popular vote 161,005 26,271
Percentage 84.95% 13.86%

County Results

President before election

Grover Cleveland
Democratic

Elected President

William McKinley
Republican

In its early days as a state, Colorado had like the Plains States to its east been solidly Republican. However, with crises emerging in its agricultural sector from low wheat prices[1] and a severe drought in 1888 and 1889,[2] and the state's underdevelopment leading to resentment of the Northeast,[3] the new Populist Party was able to largely take over the state's politics in the early 1890s. Aided by fusion with the minority Democratic Party and strong support for free silver in this state which produced over half of all American silver,[2] the Populist Party under James B. Weaver in 1892 carried the state's presidential electoral votes and won both its congressional seats.[2] After the Republicans gained a 130-seat majority in the House of Representatives following the 1894 elections, five dissident Republicans from the Mountain States who supported free silver jointed together as the “Silver Republicans”[a] They supported nominating Centennial State Senator Henry M. Teller for president at first, but ultimately this was viewed as impractical and the Silver Republicans fused with Democrat/Populist ticket headed by William Jennings Bryan.[4]

Bryan's support for free silver against the existing gold standard supported by Republican nominee William McKinley ensured he had virtually unanimous support from Colorado's silver-dependent business elite.[5] Once a fusion between Democrats, Populists, and Silver Republicans was fully finalized, there was no campaigning in Colorado as all polls showed Bryan would carry the state very easily.[6] Bryan, in the end, carried Colorado by a margin of 71.09%, by over twenty percent the best performance by any presidential candidate in the history of the state.[b][7] Bryan carried all but two of Colorado's counties, and won nineteen with over ninety percent of the vote, with McKinley retaining significant support only on the eastern High Plains, where the power of the silver magnates was much less.

With 84.95% of the popular vote, Colorado would prove to be Bryan's third strongest state in the 1896 presidential election only after Mississippi and South Carolina.[8]

Bryan would win Colorado against William McKinley again in 1900 and would later also win the state against William Howard Taft in 1908, making the state one of just two western states Bryan would carry in all three of his runs (the other being Nevada). This is the first election where the Republican candidate won without the state.

Results edit

1896 United States presidential election in Colorado[9]
Party Candidate Votes Percentage Electoral votes
Democratic William Jennings Bryan 158,614 83.69% 4
Populist William Jennings Bryan 2,391 1.26% 0
Total William Jennings Bryan 161,005 84.95% 4
Republican William McKinley 26,271 13.86% 0
Prohibition Joshua Levering 1,717 0.91% 0
National Prohibition Charles E. Bentley 386 0.20% 0
Socialist Labor Charles H. Matchett 159 0.08% 0
National Democratic John M. Palmer 1 0.00% 0
Totals 189,539 100.00% 4
Voter turnout

Results by county edit

County William Jennings Bryan[10]
Democratic
William McKinley[10]
Republican
Joshua Levering[10]
Prohibition
Various candidates[10]
Other parties
Margin
% # % # % # % # % #
Pitkin 98.97% 3,763 0.71% 27 0.05% 2 0.26% 10 98.26% 3,736
San Juan 98.71% 1,535 1.09% 17 0.13% 2 0.06% 1 97.62% 1,518
Mineral 98.30% 808 1.34% 11 0.24% 2 0.12% 1 96.96% 797
Dolores 98.11% 676 1.60% 11 0.15% 1 0.15% 1 96.52% 665
Ouray 98.08% 2,192 1.70% 38 0.13% 3 0.09% 2 96.38% 2,154
Summit 97.64% 1,243 2.20% 28 0.16% 2 0.00% 0 95.44% 1,215
Clear Creek 96.84% 3,345 2.92% 101 0.23% 8 0.00% 0 93.92% 3,244
Hinsdale 96.40% 697 2.63% 19 0.55% 4 0.41% 3 93.78% 678
La Plata 96.57% 2,729 3.22% 91 0.18% 5 0.04% 1 93.35% 2,638
Montezuma 96.13% 845 3.75% 33 0.11% 1 0.00% 0 92.38% 812
Lake 96.04% 6,518 3.76% 255 0.16% 11 0.04% 3 92.28% 6,263
Conejos 95.98% 2,388 3.86% 96 0.04% 1 0.12% 3 92.12% 2,292
San Miguel 95.70% 2,136 3.90% 87 0.18% 4 0.22% 5 91.80% 2,049
Eagle 95.04% 1,149 4.38% 53 0.41% 5 0.17% 2 90.65% 1,096
Grand 94.72% 251 4.53% 12 0.38% 1 0.38% 1 90.19% 239
Chaffee 94.35% 2,606 5.10% 141 0.25% 7 0.29% 8 89.25% 2,465
Gunnison 93.29% 2,268 6.17% 150 0.25% 6 0.29% 7 87.12% 2,118
Garfield 90.81% 2,065 7.61% 173 1.14% 26 0.44% 10 83.20% 1,892
Delta 89.85% 1,603 7.79% 139 2.13% 38 0.22% 4 82.06% 1,464
Park 90.81% 1,562 8.78% 151 0.35% 6 0.06% 1 82.03% 1,411
Jefferson 88.99% 3,176 8.41% 300 1.79% 64 0.81% 29 80.58% 2,876
Gilpin 89.76% 2,532 9.43% 266 0.64% 18 0.18% 5 80.33% 2,266
Routt 89.62% 1,105 9.89% 122 0.16% 2 0.32% 4 79.72% 983
Rio Blanco 89.55% 454 10.26% 52 0.20% 1 0.00% 0 79.29% 402
Rio Grande 87.71% 1,428 10.81% 176 1.29% 21 0.18% 3 76.90% 1,252
Montrose 86.19% 1,348 11.64% 182 0.96% 15 1.21% 19 74.55% 1,166
Arapahoe 86.54% 42,521 12.33% 6,057 0.76% 374 0.37% 182 74.21% 36,464
Saguache 86.45% 1,155 13.17% 176 0.07% 1 0.30% 4 73.28% 979
Fremont 85.07% 4,267 12.78% 641 2.01% 101 0.14% 7 72.29% 3,626
Pueblo 85.39% 8,373 13.44% 1,318 0.55% 54 0.62% 61 71.95% 7,055
Douglas 85.24% 1,051 13.95% 172 0.65% 8 0.16% 2 71.29% 879
Custer 85.07% 986 14.41% 167 0.35% 4 0.17% 2 70.66% 819
Boulder 83.87% 6,046 14.33% 1,033 1.62% 117 0.18% 13 69.54% 5,013
Weld 82.13% 4,620 15.54% 874 1.69% 95 0.64% 36 66.60% 3,746
Las Animas 82.50% 5,497 16.90% 1,126 0.53% 35 0.08% 5 65.60% 4,371
Mesa 80.04% 2,374 15.81% 469 3.14% 93 1.01% 30 64.23% 1,905
Larimer 78.83% 3,195 18.11% 734 2.79% 113 0.27% 11 60.72% 2,461
Otero 79.12% 2,167 19.13% 524 1.46% 40 0.29% 8 59.99% 1,643
Bent 73.88% 591 24.63% 197 1.38% 11 0.13% 1 49.25% 394
Morgan 72.88% 602 25.54% 211 0.97% 8 0.61% 5 47.34% 391
Costilla 73.36% 1,052 26.08% 374 0.42% 6 0.14% 2 47.28% 678
El Paso 72.84% 17,672 25.75% 6,248 1.22% 296 0.18% 44 47.09% 11,424
Archuleta 73.18% 393 26.26% 141 0.56% 3 0.00% 0 46.93% 252
Elbert 72.70% 751 26.52% 274 0.58% 6 0.19% 2 46.18% 477
Logan 69.23% 603 26.52% 231 3.67% 32 0.57% 5 42.71% 372
Yuma 69.83% 442 28.44% 180 1.74% 11 0.00% 0 41.39% 262
Huerfano 67.45% 1,929 32.48% 929 0.07% 2 0.00% 0 34.97% 1,000
Prowers 63.16% 552 34.78% 304 1.72% 15 0.34% 3 28.38% 248
Lincoln 62.69% 210 36.72% 123 0.30% 1 0.30% 1 25.97% 87
Phillips 62.78% 334 36.84% 196 0.38% 2 0.00% 0 25.94% 138
Sedgwick 60.85% 216 36.62% 130 1.97% 7 0.56% 2 24.23% 86
Cheyenne 54.45% 104 45.55% 87 0.00% 0 0.00% 0 8.90% 17
Kiowa 53.45% 155 45.86% 133 0.69% 2 0.00% 0 7.59% 22
Baca 51.53% 135 47.71% 125 0.76% 2 0.00% 0 3.82% 10
Kit Carson 46.45% 229 51.12% 252 1.62% 8 0.81% 4 -4.67% -23
Washington 42.86% 177 53.75% 222 3.39% 14 0.00% 0 -10.90% -45

Notes edit

  1. ^ Henry M. Teller of Colorado, Fred T. Dubois of Idaho, Frank J. Cannon of Utah and Thomas H. Carter and Lee Mantle of Montana.[4]
  2. ^ The second-best Colorado presidential election performance was by Herbert Hoover in 1928, when, aided by powerful anti-Catholic sentiment against Al Smith in the High Plains, he won 64.72 percent of the vote.

References edit

  1. ^ Gormley, Ken (editor); The Presidents and the Constitution: A Living History, p. 299 ISBN 1479839906
  2. ^ a b c Larson, Robert W.; ‘Populism in the Mountain West: A Mainstream Movement’; Western Historical Quarterly; Vol. 13, No. 2 (April 1982), pp. 143-164
  3. ^ Azari, Julia and Hetherington, Mark J.; ‘Back to the Future? What the Politics of the Late Nineteenth Century Can Tell Us about the 2016 Election’; The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science; Vol 667: Elections in America; (September 2016), pp. 92-109
  4. ^ a b Ellis, Elmer; ‘The Silver Republicans in the Election of 1896’; The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, Vol. 18, No. 4 (March 1932), pp. 519-534
  5. ^ Phillips, Kevin P.; The Emerging Republican Majority, p. 458 ISBN 9780691163246
  6. ^ ‘Ready for the Vote: Campaign Now Closed in Nearly All States of the Union’; Baltimore Sun, November 2, 1896, p. 2
  7. ^ "Presidential General Election Results Comparison – Colorado". Dave Leip's U.S. Election Atlas.
  8. ^ "1896 Presidential Election Statistics". Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. Retrieved March 5, 2018.
  9. ^ "1896 Presidential General Election Results – Colorado". Dave Leip's U.S. Election Atlas.
  10. ^ a b c d Géoelections; Popular Vote at the Presidential Election for 1896 (.xlsx file for €30 including full minor party figures)