Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 2, 1920. The Republican ticket of senator Warren G. Harding of Ohio and governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts defeated the Democratic ticket of governor James M. Cox of Ohio and assistant secretary Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York. It was the first election held after the end of the First World War, and the first election after the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment gave nationwide suffrage to women.
Incumbent President Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat who had served since 1913, privately hoped for a third term despite severe physical and mental disabilities from a stroke, but he had very little support. Former president Theodore Roosevelt had been the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, but he died in 1919 without leaving an obvious heir to his progressive legacy. The major parties turned to little-known dark horse candidates from the state of Ohio, a populous swing state with many electoral votes. Cox won on the 44th ballot at the 1920 Democratic National Convention, defeating William Gibbs McAdoo (Wilson's son-in-law), A. Mitchell Palmer, and several other candidates. Harding emerged as a compromise candidate between the conservative and progressive wings of the Republican party, and he clinched his nomination on the tenth ballot at the 1920 Republican National Convention.
The election was dominated by the American social and political environment in the aftermath of World War I, which was marked by a hostile response to certain aspects of Wilson's foreign policy and a massive reaction against the reformist zeal of the Progressive Era. The wartime economic boom had collapsed and the country was deep in a recession. Wilson's advocacy for America's entry into the League of Nations, in the face of a return to non-interventionist opinion, challenged his effectiveness as president, and there were wars and revolutions overseas. At home, the year 1919 was marked by major strikes in the meatpacking and steel industries and large-scale race riots in Chicago and other cities. Additionally, the September 16, 1920, Wall Street bombing aroused fears of radicals and terrorists. The Irish Catholic and German communities were outraged at Wilson's perceived support of their traditional enemy, Great Britain.
Harding all but ignored Cox in the race, and essentially campaigned against Wilson by calling for a "return to normalcy". Harding won a landslide victory, sweeping every state outside of the South and becoming the first Republican since the end of Reconstruction to win a former state of the Confederacy: Tennessee. Harding's victory margin of 26.2 percent in the popular vote remains the largest popular-vote percentage margin ever since widespread popular elections began in the 1820s. Cox won just 34.1 percent of the popular vote, and Socialist Eugene V. Debs won 3.4 percent, despite being in prison at the time. It was the first election in which women had the right to vote in all 48 states, which caused the total popular vote to increase dramatically, from 18.5 million in 1916 to 26.8 million in 1920.
It was the third presidential election in which both major party candidates were registered in the same home state (the others have been in 1860, 1904, 1940, 1944, and 2016). Coincidentally, the election was held on Harding's 55th birthday.
Both major-party vice-presidential nominees would later succeed to the presidency: Calvin Coolidge (Republican) upon Harding's death in 1923 and Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democratic) after defeating Republican president Herbert Hoover in 1932. In contrast, the incumbent vice president, Thomas R. Marshall, entered his name for the Democratic nomination in this election but ultimately did not receive it, making this election the last time where the incumbent vice president ran for his party's nomination for president and lost.
Nominations Republican Party nomination
1920 Republican Party ticket for Presidentfor Vice President United States Senator from Ohio(1915–1921) 48thGovernor of Massachusetts(1919–1921): 39 votes: 692.2 votes144,762 votes
Other candidates
Candidates in this section are sorted by their highest vote count on the nominating ballotsLeonard WoodFrank Orren LowdenHiram JohnsonWilliam Cameron SproulNicholas Murray ButlerCalvin CoolidgeChief of Staff of the Armyfrom New Hampshire(1910–1914)Governorof Illinois(1917–1921)U.S. Senatorfrom California(1917–1945)Governorof Pennsylvania(1919–1923)Columbia University Presidentfrom New York(1902–1945)Governorof Massachusetts(1919–1921): 145 votes: 314.5 votes710,863 votes: 78 votes: 311.5 votes389,127 votes: 110 votes: 148 votes965,651 votes: 0 votes: 84 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 69.5 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 34 votes0 votesRobert M. La FolletteJeter PritchardMiles PoindexterHoward SutherlandHerbert HooverU.S. Senatorfrom Wisconsin(1906–1925)Court of Appeals Judgefrom North Carolina(1904–1921)U.S. Senatorfrom Washington(1911–1923)U.S. Senatorfrom West Virginia(1917–1923)Director of the U.S. Food Administrationfrom California(1917–1918): 0 votes: 24 votes0 votes: 17 votes: 21 votes0 votes: 14 votes: 20 votes3,806 votes: 0 votes: 17 votes33,849 votes: 0 votes: 10.5 votes303,815 votes
Following the return of former president Theodore Roosevelt to the Republican Party after the previous election, speculation quickly grew as to whether he would make another run for the presidency. Roosevelt's health declined seriously in 1918, however, and he died on January 6, 1919. Attention then turned to the party's unsuccessful 1916 candidate, Charles Evans Hughes, who had run Wilson close that year, but Hughes remained aloof as to the prospect of another run, and ultimately ruled himself out following the death of his daughter early in 1920.
On June 8, the Republican National Convention met in Chicago. The race was wide open, and soon the convention deadlocked between Major General Leonard Wood and Governor Frank Orren Lowden of Illinois.
Other names placed in nomination included Senators Warren G. Harding from Ohio, Hiram Johnson from California, and Miles Poindexter from Washington, Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts, philanthropist Herbert Hoover from California, and Columbia University President Nicholas M. Butler. Senator Robert M. La Follette from Wisconsin was not formally placed in nomination, but received the votes of his state delegation nonetheless. Harding was nominated for president on the tenth ballot, after some delegates shifted their allegiances. The results of the ten ballots were as follows:
Presidential Balloting, Republican National Convention 1920 Ballot1 2 3 4 5 67 8 9 10 Before shifts 10 After shifts Warren G. Harding 65.5 59.0 58.5 61.5 78.0 89.0 105.0 133.0 374.5 644.7 692.2 Leonard Wood 287.5 289.5 303.0 314.5 299.0 311.5 312.0 299.0 249.0 181.5 156.0 Frank Orren Lowden 211.5 259.5 282.5 289.0 303.0 311.5 311.5 307.0 121.5 28.0 11.0 Hiram Johnson 133.5 146.0 148.0 140.5 133.5 110.0 99.5 87.0 82.0 80.8 80.8 William Cameron Sproul 84.0 78.5 79.5 79.5 82.5 77.0 76.0 76.0 78.0 0 0 Nicholas Murray Butler69.5 41.0 25.0 20.04.0 4.02.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 Calvin Coolidge34.0 32.0 27.0 25.0 29.0 28.028.0 30.0 28.0 5.0 5.0 Robert M. La Follette24.0 24.0 24.0 22.024.0 24.024.024.024.0 24.0 24.0 Jeter Connelly Pritchard 21.010.0 0 0 0 000 0 0 0 Miles Poindexter 20.0 15.015.0 15.0 15.015.015.0 15.0 14.0 2.0 0 Howard Sutherland 17.0 15.0 9.03.0 1.00 0 0 0 0 0 Herbert Hoover 5.5 5.55.5 5.0 6.05.04.0 5.0 6.0 10.5 9.5 Scattering 11.0 9.07.0 9.0 9.09.06.0 6.0 5.0 5.5 3.5
Harding's nomination, said to have been secured in negotiations among party bosses in a "smoke-filled room," was engineered by Harry M. Daugherty, Harding's political manager, who became United States Attorney General after his election. Before the convention, Daugherty was quoted as saying, "I don't expect Senator Harding to be nominated on the first, second, or third ballots, but I think we can afford to take chances that about 11 minutes after two, Friday morning of the convention, when 15 or 12 weary men are sitting around a table, someone will say: 'Who will we nominate?' At that decisive time, the friends of Harding will suggest him and we can well afford to abide by the result." Daugherty's prediction described essentially what occurred, but historians Richard C. Bain and Judith H. Parris argue that Daugherty's prediction has been given too much weight in narratives of the convention.
Once the presidential nomination was finally settled, the party bosses and Sen. Harding recommended Wisconsin Sen. Irvine Lenroot to the delegates for the second spot, but the delegates revolted and nominated Coolidge, who was very popular over his handling of the Boston police strike from the year before. The tally:
Vice Presidential Balloting,Republican Nat'l Convention 1920Calvin Coolidge 674.5Irvine Lenroot 146.5Henry Justin Allen 68.5Henry W. Anderson 28Asle Gronna 24Hiram Johnson 22.5Jeter Connelly Pritchard 11 Abstaining 9
Source for convention coverage: Richard C. Bain and Judith H. Parris, Convention Decisions and Voting Records (Washington DC: Brookings Institution, 1973), pp. 200–208.
Democratic Party nomination
1920 Democratic Party ticket for Presidentfor Vice President 46th & 48thGovernor of Ohio(1913–1915 & 1917–1921) Assistant Secretary of the Navy(1913–1920): 74 votes: 699.5 votes86,194 votes
Other candidates
Candidates in this section are sorted by their highest vote count on the nominating ballotsWilliam Gibbs McAdooMitchell PalmerAl SmithJohn W. DavisEdward EdwardsRobert Latham OwenU.S. Secretary of the Treasuryfrom California(1913–1918)U.S. Attorney Generalfrom Pennsylvania(1919–1921)Governorof New York(1919–1920)Ambassador to Britainfrom West Virginia(1918–1921)Governorof New Jersey(1920–1923)U.S. Senatorfrom Oklahoma(1907–1925): 0 votes: 467 votes74,987 votes: 104 votes: 267 votes140,010 votes: 0 votes: 109 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 71.5 votes0 votes: 28 votes: 42 votes28,470 votes: 20 votes: 41 votes0 votesThomas MarshallEdwin T. MeredithCarter GlassHomer CummingsFurnifold SimmonsJames GerardU.S. Vice Presidentfrom Indiana(1913–1921)U.S. Secretary of Agriculturefrom Iowa(1920–1921)U.S. Senatorfrom Virginia(1920–1946)Chair of the DNCfrom Connecticut(1919–1920)U.S. Senatorfrom North Carolina(1901–1931)Ambassador to Germanyfrom New York(1913–1917): 0 votes: 37 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 28 votes0 votes: 24 votes: 27 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 27 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 25 votes0 votes: 10 votes: 21 votes4,706 votesJohn Sharp WilliamsGilbert HitchcockFrancis HarrisonU.S. Senatorfrom Mississippi(1911–1923)U.S. Senatorfrom Nebraska(1911–1923)Philippine Governor-Generalfrom New York(1913–1921): 0 votes: 20 votes0 votes: 0 votes: 18 votes37,452 votes: 0 votes: 6 votes0 votes
It was widely accepted prior to the election that President Woodrow Wilson would not run for a third term, and certainly would not be nominated if he did so. While Vice President Thomas R. Marshall long had desired to succeed Wilson, his indecisive handling of the situation around Wilson's illness and incapacity destroyed any credibility he had as a candidate, and in the end he did not formally put himself forward for the nomination.
Although William Gibbs McAdoo (Wilson's son-in-law and former Treasury Secretary) was the strongest candidate, Wilson blocked his nomination in hopes a deadlocked convention would demand that he run for a third term, even though he was seriously ill, physically immobile, and in seclusion at the time. The Democrats, meeting in San Francisco between June 28 and July 6 (the first time a major party held its nominating convention in an urban center on the Pacific coast), nominated another newspaper editor from Ohio, Governor James M. Cox, as their presidential candidate, and 38-year-old Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt, a fifth cousin and nephew by marriage of the late president Theodore Roosevelt, for vice-president.