Political quiz for US voters

[womzilla]

Can you name all of the losing major-ticket Vice Presidential candidates in the elections since you were born? How about since you reached voting age? (By "major ticket", I mean "received at least 2% of the national vote". By that standard, there have been major third- or non-party candidates in five vice-presidential elections since 1968.)

Answers back to 1960 1948 below the cut, including the parties of the candidates during the elections:



2008: Sarah Palin (R) lost to Joe Biden (D), and you can't imagine the pleasure it gives me to type that
2004: John Edwards (D) lost to Dick Cheney (R)
2000: Dick Cheney (R) and Winona LaDuke (Green) lost* to Joe Lieberman (D)
1996: Jack Kemp (R) and Pat Choate (Reform) lost to Al Gore, Jr. (D)
1992: Dan Quayle (R) and Adm. James Stockdale (Reform) lost to Al Gore, Jr. (D)
1988: Lloyd Bentsen (D) lost to Dan Quayle (R)
1984: Geraldine Ferraro (D) lost to George H. W. Bush (R)
1980: Walter Mondale (D) and Patrick Lucey (I) lost to George H. W. Bush (R)
1976: Bob Dole (R) lost to Walter Mondale (D)
1972: Sargent Shriver (D) lost to Spiro Agnew (R)
1968: Edmund Muskie (D) and Curtis LeMay (American Independent) lost to Spiro Agnew (R)
1964: William Miller (R) lost to Hubert Humphrey (D)
1960: Henry Cabot Lodge (R) lost to Lyndon Johnson (D); Strom Thurmond (I) received 14 electoral votes but no significant portion of the national popular vote
1956: Estes Kefauver (D) lost to Richard Nixon (R)
1952: John Sparkman (D) lost to Richard Nixon (R)
1948: Earl Warren (R), Fielding Wright (Dixiecrat), and Glen Taylor (Progressive/American Labor) lost to Alben Barkley (D)

*If you have to ask about this, you haven't been paying attention.

[List extended to 1952 because of baron_dave's comment below about Stephenson's running mates. Then I found myself wondering, "Who was Strom Thurmond's Dixiecrat running mate?" and I realized that I had no idea who the other VP candidates were in 1948 either. Earl Warren, huh. I also had no idea that there was a Progressive ticket in 1948 that got 2.4% of the popular vote.]

My first presidential election was 1984. It took me a long time to remember Kemp, and I couldn't remember Bentsen (which I misspelled in the list), LaDuke, or Choate without looking them up. On the other hand, I still remember a "Winthrop" comic from 1976: "Are you supporting Carter/Mondale or Ford/Dole?" "Ford/Dole, because it's easier to spell."

Comments

[redbird]

Stockdale is probably the only third-party one of those who many people will remember, because he got up on national television and said something many people were probably thinking: "Who am I? What am I doing here?"

[cantkeepsilent.livejournal.com]

It's all I can do to remember John Anderson. "He's never heard of you either," indeed.

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

John Anderson is the only major* presidential candidate I've ever actually met, so I find it easy to remember him.

*by the standards outlined in the quiz question.

[cantkeepsilent.livejournal.com]

It also helps if you remember the trivia nugget that this is the first election since Watergate that didn't have Bob Dole or (a) George Bush on the Republican ticket.

I guess I got 10/15 of the losers during my lifetime, missing out on Muskie (hey, I was one at the time) and all of the independents except Stockdale.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

And it's been 80 years since the Republicans won an election without a Nixon or Bush on the ticket.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

My definition of "major ticket" is stricter than yours, and of those in this time period, only Anderson-Lucey and Perot-Stockdale qualify. But given that, I know them all offhand back to about 1920, and with only occasional gaps a lot further back than that. But that's because this interests me.

[washa-way.livejournal.com]

Okay, let's see...

04: Edwards
00: Lieberman
96: Kemp
92: Quayle, Stockdale
88: Bentsen
84: Ferraro (first election I could vote in)
80: Mondale (don't recall Anderson's VP)
76: Dole
72: Shriver after Eagleton
68: Can't recall Humphrey's running mate
64: Can't recall Goldwater's running mate

So I got all the GOP/Democratic VPs from age nine on--not stellar, but not embarrassing.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

I go back an election more than you, but I don't remember Stevenson's running mate. Otherwise, I recognize (but maybe not name out of the blue) all but Lucey, which I should have (it was a big deal) and Chaote (which wasn't).

[nppyinzer.livejournal.com]

I had completely blocked Lieberman out of my mind. And was a better man for it.

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

Womzilla Enterprises: Forcing the Return of the Repressed online since 1982.

[davidgoldfarb.livejournal.com]

Born in 1968, I remembered all except Muskie, LeMay, Lucey, Stockdale, Kemp, Choate, and LaDuke.

Incidentally, it should be "Bentsen" rather than "Bentson".

One More!

[(Anonymous)]

In 1948, there was also the Progressive Party, which received as much of the popular vote as the Dixiecrats, but carried no states.

The Vice-Presidential nominee was Glen H. Taylor of Idaho.

I thought Harry Byrd of Virginia received the 15 Electoral votes in 1960, not Strom Thurmond.

Fun fact: both of Thomas E. Dewey's running mates were Governors (Bricker in 1944, Warren in 1948), while both of Adlaim E. Stevenson's running mates were Senators.

Re: One More!

[womzilla.livejournal.com]

In 1960, Harry Byrd as the *presidential* choice of 14 unpledged electors from South Carolina electors. They voted for Strom for VP. (One Georgia elector also voted for Harry Byrd, and voted for Goldwater for VP.)

You're right that I missed the Progressive/American Labor party in 1948. I've added it to the list. Thanks!