1968 United States presidential election in Alabama
Election in Alabama / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The 1968 United States presidential election in Alabama was held on November 5, 1968.
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All 10 Alabama electoral votes to the Electoral College | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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County Results
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In Alabama, voters voted for electors individually instead of as a slate, as in the other 49 states.
The 1960s had seen Alabama as the epicenter of the Civil Rights Movement, highlighted by numerous bombings by the Ku Klux Klan in "Bombingham",[1] Birmingham police commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor's use of attack dogs against civil rights protesters, attacks on the Freedom Riders and Selma to Montgomery marchers, and first-term Governor George Wallace's "stand in the door" against the desegregation of the University of Alabama.[2] The state Democratic Party, which had remained closed to African-Americans two decades after Smith v. Allwright outlawed the white primary,[3] had by a five-to-one margin refused to pledge its 1964 electors to incumbent President Lyndon B. Johnson,[4] and no attempt was made to challenge this Wallace-sponsored Democratic slate with one loyal to the national party.[5] Despite sponsoring the state Democratic slate, in the 1964 general election Wallace would back Republican nominee Barry Goldwater,[6] who won almost seventy percent of Alabama's ballots against the state Democratic electors, for his opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
George Wallace would build a third party candidacy with his right-wing populist American Independent Party during the following two years, campaigning on opposition to desegregation, race riots, and the counterculture. However, with the state Democratic Party still refusing to integrate,[3] the national party made efforts to place its own electors on the Alabama ballot during 1967.[7] As expected, Wallace won the state Democratic primary in May, and was listed as the “Democratic” candidate on the Alabama ballot.[8] National Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey was able,[9] unlike Harry S. Truman and outgoing President Johnson, to gain ballot access on a fusion of the "Alabama Independent Democrat" and National Democratic lines.[10]
78% of white voters supported Wallace, 16% supported Nixon, and 4% supported Humphrey.[11][12][13]