Aug. 11, 1957
Princeton, N.J.

I’ve intentionally avoided politics so far, but hindsight is a
wonderful way to judge 50-year-old attempts to forecast the future, in
this case, the 1960 presidential election.

Let’s see how George Gallup did with the Democrats.

The front-runner for most of 1957 was Sen. Estes Kefauver of Tennessee,
followed by Sen. John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts, the eventual winner.
Although Kennedy had a slight lead in June, Kefauver began and
ended the year as the top Democratic candidate, according to Gallup.

In February, Kefauver led Kennedy among all Democratic voters 49% to 38%,
Gallup said. (Among Republicans, Vice President Richard Nixon outpolled Sen. William F.
Knowland of California 63% to 23%). The problem with Kennedy, Gallup
found, was that he did not have national prominence–26% of Democrats
said they didn’t know who he was.

In June, the two men traded places, with Kennedy over Kefauver 50% to
39%. Gallup again found that Kennedy lacked national recognition–among
Democrats, 28% didn’t know who Kennedy was.

By August, however, Kefauver was back on top, although by a closer
margin (Kefauver 29% to Kennedy’s 23%). The remaining six candidates
were:

• Sen. Lyndon Johnson of Texas, 8%
• Gov. Frank Clement of Tennessee,  6%
• Sen. Stuart Symington of  Missouri, 5%
• Sen. Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota, 5%
• Gov. G. Mennen Williams of Michigan, 4%
• Gov. Edmund S. Muskie of Maine, 2%

More important, Kennedy and Kefauver were almost evenly matched among independent voters (25% vs. 24%), Gallup found.

Although Kefauver led Kennedy 26% to 19% in November, the ultimate tests, at least for our purposes, came in August 1957.

Kennedy easily defeated Knowland in a hypothetical presidential race, 51% to 37%, Gallup found.

As for a hypothetical race against Nixon, Kennedy was the winner 48% to
43%, Gallup found. And as Gallup noted, Nixon prevailed slightly in
every part of the country except the South, which handed Kennedy a huge
margin of 64% to 25%.

The popular vote, as reported by The Times on Nov. 11, 1960:
50.2% for Kennedy, 49.8% for Nixon. It was the closest election since
1888, The Times said.

To be continued…

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