ABOUT THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE

I am still working  on a blog about Cruz and perhaps Rubio which I will post later today. Meantime as a matter of interest this is  from an  internet letter by Sabato, UVA professor of politics:

"Finally, in 1912, the continental map was completed and 48 states were represented in the Electoral College for the first time. With just 41.8% of the vote, Democrat Woodrow Wilson won 40 states. Republican President William Howard Taft captured only Utah and Vermont, while Bull Moose nominee Teddy Roosevelt lassoed six states, most prominently California, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

No two-term president has ever fallen so far in the Electoral College as Wilson did in his second election, from a massive 435 votes in 1912 to just 277 in 1916, when the GOP reunited behind Charles Evans Hughes. Wilson barely scraped by, and even the state he had governed, New Jersey, turned its back on him.

Of course, one-term presidents defeated for a second term have fallen further than Wilson. Herbert Hoover holds the record, collapsing from 444 electors in 1928 to a mere 59 in 1932. At least Hoover held onto 5 states (all in the Northeast). His successor as GOP nominee, Gov. Alf Landon of Kansas, received just 8 votes in 1936 from two states: As Maine went, so went Vermont.

Franklin Roosevelt’s four victories were all Electoral College landslides, with his electors totaling 472, 523, 449, and 432. His successor, Harry Truman, didn’t have FDR’s pull, but Truman’s 303 electors in 1948 comprised a magnificent upset triumph in difficult circumstances.

Never has personal popularity mattered as much as in 1952 and 1956. The nation was still fundamentally Democratic, but Dwight Eisenhower had two near-sweeps (442 and 457 electors, respectively)."