States in which the parties have won quadrant major margins/'rural wins'
Here is another possible way to think about the relative breadth of the two parties' support. In these maps, states in which the nominee carried no county by a quadrant-major margin are coloured in the darker shade of his or her party's colour. We can call these 'rural wins'. (Conversely, we can call those states in which the nominee did carry a county by a quadrant-major margin an 'urban win', for want of a better term.) At the time of this writing, I have done the 1896, 1916, 1948, 1960, 1968, and 1976 elections, and every election from 1988 on. The first election for which we have information for all the states is 1916; for 1896 (and any other elections before 1916 I may do later), yellow is for states we do not have enough information on.
1892
1896
1900
1916
1920
1948
1952
1956
1960
1964
1968
1972
1976
1980
1984
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004
2008
2012
2016
2020
3000
Rural wins
1896: Bryan 14-16, McKinley 1-3
1916: Wilson 14, Hughes 9
1948: Truman 11, Dewey 11
1960: Nixon 17, Kennedy 11
1968: Nixon 15, Humphrey 2
1976: Ford 12, Carter 8
1988: HW Bush 11, Dukakis 2
1992: Clinton 9, HW Bush 9
1996: Dole 8, Clinton 5
2000: Bush 13, Gore 4
2004: Bush 11, Kerry 4
2008: McCain 11, Obama 2
2012: Romney 10, Obama 2
2016: Trump 12, Hillary Clinton 1
2020: Trump 15, Biden 1
Now, out of the elections I have looked at, Democrats won more 'rural wins' than Republicans only in 1896 and 1916. However, in 1948 and 1976, the differential was not great (in 1948, there was no differential). It was greater in 1960, but it was still less than 2:1. Out of the elections I have looked at, prior to 2000, only in 1896, 1968, and 1988 did someone win over twice as many rural wins as his opponent (Bryan in 1896, Nixon in 1968, and HW Bush in 1988). This has been the case in every election from 2000 on, with the Republican being the one with the greater number of rural wins in every case.
(Of course, as with 'small county/big county wins', it is worth noting that, if a state is not a 'rural win', that does not mean the candidate who won the state did not enjoy support in the state's rural areas. It is more the case that, if a state is a 'rural win', that means the candidate did enjoy broad rural support in the state.)
Another index I thought might be interesting is the number of states a nominee won a county by a quadrant-major margin in (regardless of whether he carried them or not). Here are the states Republicans have carried a county by a quadrant-major margin in in select elections from 1896 on:
1892
1896
1900
1916
1920
1948
1952
1956
1960
1964
1968
1972
1976
1980
1984
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004
2008
2012
2016
2020
And the ones in which Democrats have done so:
1892
1896
1900
1916
1920
1948
1952
1956
1960
1964
1968
1972
1976
1980
1984
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004
2008
2012
2016
2020
Here are the numbers of states each party has carried a quadrant-major margin in in select elections:
1896: 21-25/7-10
1916: 21/12
1948: 26/9
1960: 17/15
1968: 21/19
1976: 21/20
1988: 30/22
1992: 27/18
1996: 30/17
2000: 24/21
2004: 26/26
2008: 34/16
2012: 34/21
2016: 36/20
2020: 37/16
This index tells a very different story to the number of 'rural wins' for 1916, 1948, and 1968, in particular. It seems that prior to 1960, Democrats held an advantage in number of states in which they carried a quadrant-major margin simply because of how shut out of the South the Republican Party was. (Furthermore, when they won, they generally did well in the Mountain West, and generally did heavily well in whatever population centres there were in that region as well.) In 1968, there was no great differential between the number of states in which Nixon carried a county by a quadrant-major margin, and the number of states in which Humphrey did so. In fact, out of these elections (again, as of the time of writing, 1896, 1916, 1948, 1960, 1968, 1976, and every election from 1988 on), before 2000, the party carrying a county by a quadrant-major margin in fewer states won only in 1976 (although the differential was not great).
2000 was the second time, out of these elections, that the party carrying a county by a quadrant-major margin in fewer states won. In 2004, Bush managed to tie the number of states in which Kerry carried a county by a quadrant-major margin, but in every subsequent election, Republicans have been carrying a county by a quadrant-major margin in fewer states than Democrats, to an increasingly marked degree.
This seems to be largely due to Democrats' expanding their margins in their largest county in some smaller states, and Republicans' margins in their largest county in some smaller states shrinking (à la Ada County, ID). In larger states, there are likely to be 1) more counties that can be won by a quadrant-major margin, and 2) more counties that do not need to be carried by a large proportional margin in order to be won by a quadrant-major margin; but in smaller states, there might be just a few counties that it's even possible to carry by a quadrant-major margin, and perhaps just one or two that do not require an unrealistic proportional margin to carry by a quadrant-major margin.
For example, let's look at the number of times some states have had a county giving someone a quadrant-major margin (the year in brackets is the first year for which we have information for that state, or 1892, whichever is later, to make a cleaner comparison):
Wyoming [1892]: never [0]
South Dakota [1892]: 1904 [1]
North Dakota [1892]: 1904, 1920 [2]
Montana [1892]: 1896, 1900, 1916, 1936 [4]
Arkansas [1892]: 1932, 1972, 1976, 1984, 1992, 1996 [6]
Idaho [1892]: 1952, 1968, 1972, 1984, 1988, 2000, 2004 [7]
New Mexico [1912]: 1956, 1972, 1984, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [7]
West Virginia [1916]: 1920, 1928, 1936, 1940, 1948, 1964, 1972 [7]
Mississippi [1912]: 1948, 1964, 1972, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [8]
Nevada [1892]: 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [9]
Vermont [1892]: 1892, 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1920, 1924, 2008, 2016, 2020 [10]
Delaware [1912]: 1912, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1972, 1984, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [13]
Iowa [1892]: 1892, 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, 1964, 1988, 2012 [13]
South Carolina [1892]: 1896, 1908, 1964, 1972, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [14]
Maine [1892]: 1896, 1904, 1908, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1996, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [15]
North Carolina [1892]: 1920, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1956, 1968, 1972, 1984, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [15]
New Hampshire [1892]: 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1956, 1964, 1972, 1984, 1988 [16]
The above are all the states--I believe--that have had no county giving anyone a quadrant-major margin in over half of the last 27 or 33 elections (from 1916 or 1892 on). Here are some other states:
Hawaii [1960]: 1964, 1968, 1972, 1984, 1996, 2000, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [10]
Nebraska [1892]: 1904, 1912, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1952, 1956, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 2000, 2004 [19]
Arizona [1912]: 1932, 1936, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976,
1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [20]
Kansas [1892]: 1904, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1936, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960,
1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2012, 2016 [21]
Kentucky [1892]: 1892, 1896, 1900, 1912, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932,
1936, 1940, 1944, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1972, 1984, 1992, 1996, 2008, 2012,
2016, 2020 [23]
Oklahoma [1908]: 1928, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960,
1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012,
2016, 2020 [23]
Oregon [1892]: 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932,
1936, 1940, 1944, 1952, 1964, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008,
2012, 2016, 2020 [24]
Rhode Island [1892]: 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932,
1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1976, 1980, 1988, 1992,
1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [27]
Colorado [1892]: 1896, 1900, 1904, 1912, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932,
1936, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992,
1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [28]
Utah [1896]: 1896, 1904, 1908, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944,
1948, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996,
2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [28]
Washington [1892]: 1904, 1908, 1912, 1916, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1932, 1936,
1940, 1944, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988,
1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [29]
Connecticut [1892]: 1892, 1896, 1900, 1904, 1908, 1916, 1920, 1924,
1928, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1976,
1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020 [31]
Maryland [1892]: 1892, 1896, 1900, 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 [31]
There are, incidentally, 14 states in which at least one county has given someone a quadrant-major margin in every election from 1912 on. There is nothing particularly special about 1912, except that it is the first election for which we have adequate information about every state whereof this was possible. Of those 14 states, we know that no county in Maryland gave anyone a quadrant-major margin in 1904 or 1908; no county in Missouri did so in 1900; and no county in Michigan did so in 1892.
Idaho and Nebraska are two states in which no county has given anyone a quadrant-major margin since 2004. In both states, only Bush did so in 2000 and 2004, and only in one county: Ada in Idaho, and Douglas in Nebraska. Ada has, as noted here, since turned too purple to give Republicans a quadrant-major margin. Douglas has voted Democratic outright in three of the last four elections.
On the other hand, New Mexico, Nevada, Maine, and Kentucky are states in which a county has given someone a quadrant-major margin in each of the last four elections, but in which it had been rare before 2008 for a county to do so. We can add Vermont (where a county has given someone a quadrant-major margin in three of the last four elections) and Mississippi (where a county has given someone a quadrant-major margin in the last five elections).
In the cases of New Mexico, Nevada, Maine, and Kentucky, it is a matter of Democrats winning a county (two counties, in New Mexico) by a quadrant-major margin: Bernalillo and Santa Fe, NM; Clark, NV; Cumberland, ME, and Jefferson, KY. In Vermont, Democrats have carried Chittenden by a quadrant-major margin in three of the last four elections. In Mississippi, Bush was actually the only one to carry a county (Rankin) by a quadrant-major margin in 2004; but in every election from 2008 on, Democrats have won Hinds by a quadrant-major margin, and Trump won no county by a quadrant-major margin in either 2016 or 2020.
These counties have been undergoing something of a reverse of what has been going on in Ada: their largest, or one of their largest, counties, has been voting Democratic by larger and larger margins:
Bernalillo, NM
2000: 48.7%-46.6%
2004: 51.5%-47.3%
2012: 55.6%-39.3%
Santa Fe, NM
2000: 64.7%-28.3%
2004: 71.1%-27.9%
2012: 73.5%-22.4%
Clark, NV
2000: 51.31%-44.72%
2004: 51.66%-46.82%
2012: 56.42%-41.82%
Chittenden, VT
2000: 54.4%-36.3%
2004: 63.5%-34.0%
2012: 69.6%-28.0%
Cumberland, ME
2000: 52.0%-41.1%
2004: 58.2%-40.1%
2012: 62.3%-35.3%
Jefferson, KY
2000: 49.6%-48.0%
2004: 50.4%-48.8%
2012: 54.7%-43.6%
Hinds, MS
2000: 53.3%-43.0%
2004: 59.3%-40.0%
2012: 71.5%-27.9%
A similar process is visible in Richland County, SC, which Democrats have carried by quadrant-major margins in the last four elections (after having last won a county by a quadrant-major margin in the state in 1908); Fairfax and Arlington, VA, which Democrats have carried by quadrant-major margins in the last five elections (after having last won a county by a quadrant-major margin in the state in 1964); Durham, NC, which Democrats have carried by a quadrant-major margin in the last five elections (after having last won a county by a quadrant-major margin in the state in 1948). In South Carolina, Republicans have continued to win counties by quadrant-major margins; but in Virginia, Democrats have been the only ones to carry any county by a quadrant-major margin in the last four elections; and in North Carolina, they were the only ones to do so in 2004, 2008, and 2012.
Richland, SC
2000: 54.2%-43.1%
2004: 57.0%-42.0%
2012: 65.3%-33.4%
Fairfax, VA
2000: 47.49%-48.86%
2004: 53.25%-45.94%
2012: 59.57%-39.07%
Arlington, VA
2000: 60.2%-34.2%
2004: 67.6%-31.3%
2012: 69.1%-29.3%
Durham, NC
2000: 63.7%-35.6%
2004: 68.0%-31.6%
2012: 75.8%-23.0%
Meanwhile, a similar process as in Ada County can be seen in some counties in states where Republicans used to win a county by a quadrant-major margin on a relatively consistent basis, but no longer do. For example, in Virginia, there was one county that Bush won by a quadrant-major margin in both 2000 and 2004 (he additionally carried Virginia Beach by a quadrant-major margin in 2004); and no Republican has won any county in the state by a quadrant-major margin since 2004:
Chesterfield, VA
2000: 63.0%-34.8%
2004: 62.6%-36.9%
2012: 53.2%-45.4%
In Mississippi, as mentioned above, Republicans carried a county by a quadrant-major margin in 2004, 2008, and 2012, but haven't since 2012:
Rankin, MS
2000: 79.6%-19.4%
2004: 78.7%-20.1%
2012: 75.5%-23.4%
2016: 74.8%-22.4%
In Tennessee, Republicans carried at least one county by a quadrant-major margin in 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016, but Trump carried none in 2020. In 2004, 2008, 2012, and 2016, both Knox and Williamson were carried by Republicans by quadrant-major margins (Sullivan, TN was as well in 2016):
Knox, TN
2004: 62.1%-37.0%
2012: 63.6%-34.4%
2016: 58.5%-34.8%
2020: 56.5%-41.5%
Williamson, TN
2004: 72.1%-27.3%
2012: 72.6%-26.1%
2016: 64.2%-29.2%
2020: 62.2%-36.1%
In Indiana, Republicans carried a county by a quadrant-major margin 2000, 2004, and 2012, but not in 2016 or 2020; and the one county Republicans carried by a quadrant-major margin in all of those elections was Hamilton:
Hamilton, IN
2000: 74.3%-23.7%
2004: 74.2%-25.2%
2012: 66.2%-32.0%
2016: 56.0%-36.7%
2020: 52.4%-45.6%
In Illinois, Republicans haven't carried a county by a quadrant-major margin since 2004; the one in which Bush did so was DuPage:
DuPage, IL
2000: 55.18%-41.87%
2004: 54.39%-44.75%
2012: 48.63%-49.73%
In some states, one or both of these processes had played out earlier. Democrats, for example, have won a county by a quadrant-major margin in Colorado in every election from 1988 on; from 1968 through 1984, they never did, and Republicans were the only ones to do so:
Denver, CO
1968: 50.2%-43.5%
1976: 49.5%-46.7%
1988: 60.7%-37.1%
In Delaware, where any county had given someone a quadrant-major margin only in 1964, 1972, and 1984 since the Second World War, Clinton carried New Castle by a quadrant-major margin in 1996, and every Democrat since has as well (which made 2000 the first election since 1900 in which the national loser carried a county in a 3-EV state by a quadrant-major margin):
New Castle, DE
1968: 43.77%-44.76%
1976: 51.38%-47.01%
1992: 46.50%-33.69%
1996: 55.05%-33.94%
And in Connecticut, Republicans had carried a county by a quadrant-major margin in every election from 1968 through 1988, but haven't done so since:
Fairfield, CT
1968: 51.78%-41.69%
1976: 58.15%-41.18%
1988: 59.04%-39.91%
2004: 47.29%-51.35%
In fact, although I said above that in (very) large states, it is likely that both parties (if nationally competitive) will find a way to win at least one county by a quadrant-major margin, Republicans have failed to do so in any county in New York since 1988 save in 2016, and in any county in California since 2012.
Since the Second World War, there were, as of 1999, seven states in which every nominee who had either won the national election, or come within less than 5% of winning the national popular vote, had won at least one county by a quadrant-major margin in. (There are no Southern states, but this is not because of Dewey; Ford carried no county in Florida by a quadrant-major margin, and Kennedy, none in Texas.) Now, to be sure, states change over time, but as of Halloween 2000, these were still--together with Florida and Texas--the nine largest states in the country.
In 2000, Bush carried no county in either New York or New Jersey by a quadrant-major margin, making him the first winner not to do so in New Jersey since 1916 and the first near-winner not to do so in New York since 1896. The failure to win a county by a quadrant-major margin in New Jersey turned out to be transitory, but Bush reprised his failure to carry any county in New York by a quadrant-major margin in 2004, and the only time a Republican has done so since 1988 is 2016, when Trump did so in Suffolk County.
In 2016, Trump failed to carry any county in California by a quadrant-major margin (which Bush, McCain, and Romney had managed to do in the previous four elections), and failed to do so once again in 2020. In 2016, this made him the first near-winner to fail to carry a county in California by a quadrant-major margin since 1896 (when the state had nine electoral votes). In 2020, he became the first major-party nominee to fail to win a county in either California or New York by a quadrant-major margin (regardless of how he was doing nationally) since John Davis in 1924.
(Trump also became the first winner since 1916 to fail to carry any county in Illinois, still one of the country's six largest states, by a quadrant-major margin [Romney had already come close in 2012 without carrying a county in the state by a quadrant-major margin].)
Now, to be sure, in 2000, Gore failed to carry any county in Texas by a quadrant-major margin. Gore's margins out of Hidalgo and El Paso Counties, TX, however, each (separately) approached a quadrant-major margin much more than Bush's margin out of Steuben County, NY (and more, even, than Bush's margin out of Staten Island in 2004 would); and, aside from that, the largest state in which Democrats have failed to win any county by a quadrant-major margin in the past six elections has been 14-EV North Carolina in 2000 (in which Bush also failed to win any county by a quadrant-major margin). The largest state in which a Democrat has failed to win a quadrant-major margin even though his or her Republican opponent was doing so in that state, in the last six elections (again, leaving aside Texas in 2000), was 13-EV Virginia in 2000. Meanwhile, these were the largest three such states for Republicans in the last six elections:
2000
New York [33]
New Jersey [15]
Massachusetts [12]
2004
New York [31]
North Carolina [15]
Massachusetts [12]
2008
New York [31]
Illinois [21]
Pennsylvania [21]
2012
New York [29]
Illinois [20]
North Carolina [15]
2016
California [55]
Illinois [20]
Virginia [13]
2020
California [55]
New York [29]
Illinois [20]
And the biggest single such state for the Democrats in the last six elections (three in 2000):
2000
Texas [32]
Virginia [13]
Alabama [9]
2004
Arizona [10]
2008
Arizona [10]
2012
Arizona [11]
2016
Alabama [9]
2020
Oklahoma [7]
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