In 1928, Al Smith lost to Herbert Hoover in a landslide - partly because of the strong economy, but partly because many assumed that the Catholic Smith would be beholden to the Pope. In 1960, JFK narrowly defeated Richard Nixon despite rumors he would be subservient to Rome. Why didn't JFK's religion devastate his chances, like what happened to Smith in 1928? Was it simply due to demographic and cultural changes in the following 32 years? Was it because Kennedy presented a more articulate counter to attacks on his religion?
First of all, it's not clear to what extent Catholicism did hurt Smth
overall in 1928. Yes, the Democrats lost big that year--but they had lost big in 1920 and 1924 with Protestant nominees. As I wrote here a couple of years ago:
"Would the Democrats have done much better had they nominated a Protestant? I doubt it. According to Lichtman, "Compared to the combined votes of Davis and Lafollette, the vote for Smith declined by approximately 11 percentage points among Protestants and increased by approximately 28 percentage points among Catholics. Catholics as well as Protestants voted their religion in 1928."
http://books.google.com/books?id=KbGiJpDk6pwC&pg=PA42 Since there were many more Protestants than Catholics, these numbers are not really favorable for Smith, but they do show that nominating a Protestant would have costs as well as benefits--especially if Catholics were convinced the Democrats had rejected Smith because of his religion. (In particular, Hoover might have done well among Polish-Americans against a Protestant Democrat; his record as administrator of war relief was highly respected by them, and was cited by the Polish National Alliance in its endorsement of Hoover.)"
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...mocrat-have-won-in-1928.467560/#post-18915059
Second, one can argue that JFK's religion was a bigger net disadvantage for him--
relative to the "natural" Democratic vote--than Smith's was. In 1960, unlike 1928, the Democrats were definitely the majority party in the US in non-presidential elections. Eisenhower's victories had been personal, not party, victories--the Democrats won both houses of Congress in 1954, 1956, 1958 and 1960. Furthermore, 1960 was a recession year--a mild recession, to be sure, but the second one in two years As I wrote here a few years ago:
"If this is the case, why was the race so close? I know some disagree, but I think JFK's religion hurt him more than it helped him. Yes, he did win most Catholic votes, but so did the Baptist Harry Truman in 1948; the Catholic vote for Eisenhower had been basically personal rather than partisan, and I think that any Democrat other than the divorced and dovish Stevenson would have been able to win back the Catholic Democrats who had voted for Ike. (In 1960, most of the issues that would lead Catholics to vote Republican in subsequent elections--abortion, school busing, etc.--did not yet exist.) OTOH, JFK actually did worse against Nixon in 1960 than Stevenson had done against the very popular Ike in the prosperous year 1956 in a number of southern and border states, and it is hard for me to believe that religion was not largely to blame."