The election of 1948 is one of only two elections in the history of the United States where there were four "major" candidates running from different political parties, the other being 1860. Like 1860, 1948 was a time of much division in the political process, and particularly in the Democratic Party. Social movements from within the party had formally split, causing two new parties to be born out of the Democrats: one to the left and one to the right.

On the political left were the Progressive Citizens of America, lead this year by Henry A. Wallace, former Vice President, Secretary of Agriculture, and most recently Secretary of Commerce. Wallace was Vice President under Franklin Delano Roosevelt's first two terms, but did not receive the nomination at the 1944 Democratic National Convention. To keep Wallace from being too upset over this, Roosevelt gave him the position of Secretary of Commerce. When Harry S Truman assumed the presidency after Roosevelt's death, he rearranged the cabinet to his own liking. In doing so, he essentially fired many of the old members, including Wallace.

Wallace declared his candidacy on December 29, 1947, but it was not until February 15, 1948 that his running-mate, Senator Glen Taylor (Idaho), announced that he was running for vice-president at a rally in Brooklyn, New York. The only real Progressive candidates, the two were easily nominated as a ticket on July 24 at the Progressive Party convention.

This is not the first time the Progressive Party had been active. In 1912, when the progressives first appeared on the scene, former Republican president Teddy Roosevelt received 88 electoral votes as a Progressive. In 1924, Senator Robert M. LaFollette (Wisconsin) received 13 electoral votes as a Progressive. Although the Progressive Party differed under these three men, they shared similar general goals.

The Progressives truly were progressive. Much of what they fought for in their platform in 1948 would take many years to come true, and indeed some still has not. The Progressives were just a little too far ahead of their time to be popular enough to win an election, while the States Righters were just a little bit too far behind. Three key planks in the Progressive platform were:

• Peace with communists.
• Destruction of all nuclear weapons.
• Dismantlement of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).

Although there was no direct fighting between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., the Cold War was seen as tantamount to a full-fledged war, and therefore peace with communists would not come until the Soviet Union collapse in 1991. Peace with communists was something the majority of the U.S. electorate just could not handle in 1948. The U.S. was on the brink of the most anti-democratic period in the U.S., the height of the HUAC, and Sen. McCarthy's red-baiting tactics and people genuinely feared communism; they would rather keep fighting it as long as they possibly could than accept peace. As far as destruction of nuclear weapons, that has not happened yet, and is likely never to, considering the vast number of countries that have them. Wallace was possibly being too idealistic in this goal. Once the technology exists, it is all but impossible to get it all recalled. As far the dismantlement of the HUAC, it has been done, and I would say it took place around 1953, when McCarthy was censured by the Senate. In the end, the Progressives just appeared too dovish for the American people on a raft of issues, but especially on communism.

The States' Rights Democrats, informally known as the "Dixiecrats" were born out of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, July 12 to 15. When the convention voted on July 14 to adopt a relatively strong civil rights plank in their platform, the delegation from Mississippi, and half of that from Alabama "Marched out of the hall behind a confederate battle flag, vowing to meet in a 'real' Dixieland convention."¹ There had been grumbling among the southern Democrats previous to this about who would be the nominee, while they supported Governor Ben Laney of Arkansas, the majority of the convention voted for Truman. They were pushed over the edge by the civil rights plank, and decided to form their own right-wing splinter party.

The Dixiecrats held their own "rump" convention in Birmingham, Alabama, "the most segregated city in America"² shortly after the regular Democratic Convention was over. Over 6,000 people from 13 states participated in the convention. On July 17 they nominated Governor of South Carolina J. Strom Thurmond for president and Governor of Mississippi Fielding Wright for vice-president.

The States' Righters were basically against civil rights legislation of any kind — including that imposed by the federal government. They wanted to keep their way of life in the south intact. They only way for them to do this was to give more power to the states. States' Rights therefore became the vehicle by which they could continue their segregationist policies. The states' rights concept was a means, not an end in itself. Thurmond campaigned saying he was for the constitution, and for state autonomy, this was easier to take by the public than what Thurmond was really saying, that he was for continued southern segregation. "Every vote for the States' Rights Democrats will appear in the history books forever as another powerful voice, saying, 'I stand by the Constitution, and I will not be moved.'"³

The tactics used by the major candidates were altered considerably by the presence of these two third-parties. Truman, who thought that Wallace was more of a threat than Thurmond, actively campaigned against him, red-baiting him, while simultaneously assuming some of his positions. Truman simply ignored Thurmond, hoping he would bury himself with his own rhetoric. It proved to be a successful strategy for Truman, who won. Of course, the main objective of the Truman campaign was to beat the Republicans, which they did, in part by sucking up progressive votes. "We were concerned about the Wallace people and about the Thurmond people but I don't think we sweat much blood over them because obviously you had to fight the Republicans," said William L. Batt, Jr., who was in charge of the Democratic Party's research division, in 1966.⁴

Truman's tactics, in part, caused Wallace to do miserably, even in states where he had a good base of support. Many progressives eventually voted for Truman because they did not think Wallace had a chance, and they preferred Truman to Republican Thomas E. Dewey. This was exactly the effect Truman had desired by assuming some of Wallace's liberal policies.

Wallace, for his part, called Truman a hypocrite. Wallace said Truman had shifted his position on many issues including labor and segregation in the Armed Forces. "Henry A. Wallace said tonight that President Truman's campaign has set a new record for 'transparent hypocrisy' in the 'long and shoddy annals of politics,'" according to The Washington Post on October 31. Wallace said Truman both condemned and enforced the Republican sponsored Taft-Hartley Act, which called for abolished mandatory union participation (the closed shop), allowed union stores only where a majority of workers voted for them, and required unions notify management 60 days before a strike. The act was seen as a major enemy of labor. Truman had, of course, vetoed the Taft-Hartley Bill when it first came across his desk on June 20, 1947, and was forced to enforce it as chief executive.

Truman realized that Thurmond did not stand a chance in the general election — there was no way that Thurmond could have won states outside of the south. Even if Thurmond had won all the southern states, it was not enough to elect him. However, if in the extremely unlikely event that Thurmond had won all the southern states, it would have cost Truman many more votes than it would have cost Dewey, and Dewey might have won. Therefore, Truman could not ignore Thurmond totally. At a rally on October 19, Truman attacked the Dixiecrats by saying that they were wrong to have walked out of the convention. "[Andrew Jackson, a southerner in favor of segregation] knew that the way to correct injustice in a democracy is by reason and debate, never by walking out in a huff," he said.⁵ "You stand with the Democratic Party or for all practical purposes you stand against it," he went on to say.⁶ This strategy made people believe that they were throwing away a vote by voting for Thurmond, and because they would rather see Truman win than Dewey, voted for Truman. Truman ended up winning every southern state that did not vote for Thurmond and Wright.

Because Thurmond was only on the ballot in 13 states, his strategy for getting elected was to amass enough delegates to prevent either Dewey or Truman from receiving a majority of the electoral votes. This strategy is summed up best by Thurmond himself. "Our campaign is based on the belief we can prevent either Truman or Dewey from winning a majority of the electoral votes. In that event, the House of Representatives will choose a president who is dedicated to the preservation of local self-government," he said at a rally in Beaumont, Texas on October 30. Whether or not the House really would have voted for Thurmond is a subject for debate, but he obviously thought it would.

Having a presidential election decided in the House is something that is generally considered bad for a democratic government. It is largely seen that a president selected by the House would be considered illegitimate by many Americans. Some politicians probably do not care about this, as long as they can use the House method as means to the presidency, Thurmond included. The election by a president in the House, with representatives voting by state delegation was a necessary evil which came out of the Constitutional Convention. Many of the Founders did not like this plan, but could not come up with another one. "The representatives of a minority of the people [could] reverse the choice of a majority of the states and of the people,"⁷ lamented James Madison.

The results on election day were not as high as the supporters of the either of the third parties had hoped. The two parties received a combined total of 4.78 percent the popular vote. The States Rights Democrats received 1,169,032 votes. This gave them 39 electoral votes, tied for the fourth highest total of electoral votes for any third-party. The other third-party candidates who have received equal or higher electoral vote totals are listed in the following table:

Party	Election	Electoral Votes
Progressive Party	1912	88 (of 531)
Southern Democrat	1860	72 (of 303)
American Independent	1968	46 (of 535)
Constitutional Union	1860	39 (of 303)
States' Rights Democrat	1948	39 (out of 531)

Source: Wayne, Stephen J. The Road to the White House 1996. New York: St. Marten's Press. 1996.

The Progressives fared slightly worse off in the popular vote, but failed to received any electoral votes because their supporters were so geographically spread out. Wallace received votes in every state (including the southern Dixiecrat strongholds) except for Illinois, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, where he was not on the ballot. States in which more than three percent of the people voted for him were New York (8.25%), California (4.73%), North Dakota (3.80%), Washington (3.50%), and Montana (3.26%). Even Taylor's home state of Idaho, which elected him to the Senate, failed to cast more than a tiny show of support for the Progressives.

There is a litany of candidates which garner less than 1 percent of the total vote in any election, and 1948 is no exception. There were a total of seven minor third party candidates running, three of whom did not appear on the ballot in any state. Here is a table those who were on the ballot in at least some states, which helps to show the climate of the times, and also to show how relatively significant the States' Righters and Progressives were.

Source: Source Book of American Presidential Campaign and Election Statistics: 1948-1968

The election of 1948 also demonstrates the importance of third parties as an outlet for frustration against the two main parties. In this case, a significant group of people could not be accommodated by either the Republicans or Democrats, and they were able to form their own party to articulate their interests. In the U.S. electoral system, with two parties that endure from election cycle to election cycle, and with the possibility for other parties to arise as they are needed, we have a source for just the right amount of periodic change. No enduring parties would leave the public wondering who stood for what in any given election, but without the possibility of third parties arising, and keeping the other two in check, change would come about too slowly.

Third and fourth parties on occasion play a positive role as instruments for representing new forces, testing their support, and by virtue of these last two functions, pressuring the two major parties into maintaining responsiveness . . . The Third party, then, is one source of "renewal" for the two-party system.⁹

In the case of the Dixiecrats, they really only cared about one issue — racial segregation. If the Republicans had agreed with them, they could easily have shifted parties, beginning an eventual partisan realignment which was to occur anyway. But the GOP also was against segregation, so the Dixiecrats had nothing to do but start their own party. In the end, Thurmond, like many southern Democrats, would switch to the more conservative Republican party — geographically based partisan realignment. The long run effects of the two parties were the following. The Progressives would pull the Democrats slightly leftward, while the States' Righters would join the Republicans.

The election of 1948 provides us with one of the most interesting examples of the American electoral system. It is rare to have three "major" candidates running, even rarer to have four. Although the combined campaign efforts of the Progressives and the States' Righters would only poll about 5 percent of the popular vote, the effects of their campaigns were deep. If Truman had not fought Wallace as hard as he did, Wallace probably would have received more than 2 percent of the popular vote, and the fact that Wallace ran caused the eventual president to change his position on several issues such as a desegregated military. Also, the States' Rights Democrats called attention to the issue of race, which would divide the nation in years to come. The election of 1948, along with 1912, 1968, and other years, provides a good case study of how the system is affected by the influence of a third (and fourth) party.

¹The Washington Post, July 15, 1948, 1, 4.

²As it would later be called by civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. (Blumberg, Rhoda Lois. Civil Rights: The 1960s Freedom Struggle. [New York: Twayne Publishers, 1991] 115.)

³The Washington Post, October 22, 1948, 12.

⁴Yarnell, Allen. Democrats and Progressives. (Berkeley: U. of California P., 1974).

⁵The Washington Post, October 20, 1948, 1.

⁶Ibid.

⁷Caeser, James W. Presidential Selection: Theory and Development. (Princeton: Princeton U.P., 1979) 81.

⁸Wayne, Stephen J. The Road to the White House 1996. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996) 18.

⁹

Blumberg, Rhoda Lois. Civil Rights: The 1960s Freedom Struggle. New York: Twayne Publishers. 1991.

Ceaser, James W. Presidential Selection: Theory and Development. Princeton, NJ: Princeton U. P. 1979.

Chafe, William H. The Unfinished Journey: America Since World War II. New York: Oxford U. P. 1986.

Garson, Robert A. The Democratic Party and the Politics of Sectionalism, 1941-1948. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State U. P. 1974.

Runyon, John H., Sally S. Runyon and Jennifer Verdini. Source Book of American Presidential Campaign and Election Statistics: 1948-1968. New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing Co. 1971.

Schmidt, Karl M. Henry A. Wallace: Quixotic Crusade 1948. Binghamton, NY: Syracuse U. P. 1960.

Wayne, Stephen J. The Road to the White House 1996. New York: St. Marten's P. 1996.

Yarnell, Allen. Democrats and Progressives. Berkeley, CA: U. of California P. 1974.