An alternate 1968 US presidential race

In OTL Hubert Humphrey in 1968 intentionally delayed announcing his presidential candidacy until it was too late to file for the primaries. His advisors convinced him that entering primaries was not only unnecessary but too risky. But suppose Humphrey replied "Maybe I can win the nominaton without entering any primaries, but there will be a lot of resentment, I will be portrayed as the candidate of the 'bosses' and 'smoke-filled rooms,' and the McCarthy and Kennedy backers might not vote for me in November. Besides, I am convinced I can win in the primaries--all I need is a plurality, I get old-fashioned labor Democrats while RFK and McCarthy are splitting the 'new politics' vote." Is it really that implausible to think that Humphrey is confident enough of his abilities as a campaigner to believe that he can win *pluralities* in a few primaries? Including perhaps even California, where he did have the support of Pat Brown and San Francisco Mayor Joseph Alioto?

So Humphrey announces his candidacy early enough to enter the California primary. There is a three-way televised debate between McCarthy, Kennedy, and Humphrey, in which the three candidates are asked their views on (among other issues) Israel and the Middle East. All three give strongly pro-Israel statements. Sirhan Sirhan, watching the debate on TV, is outraged and vows to kill *whichever* candidate wins. When on primary night he learns that Humphrey is projected the winner (with 35 percent of the vote to 32.5 each for Kennedy and McCarthy) and is about to give a victory speech, Sirhan heads for Humphrey campaign headquarters and fatally shoots the vice-president...

Do Humphrey delegates try to find a new standard-bearer, and if so, whom? (Is it a little early for Ed Muskie?) Or do they decide to go with RFK who after all had plenty of contacts with Democratic machine politicians (most notably Richard J. Daley) and wasn't even all *that* dovish on Vietnam, at least publicly (he called for a bombing halt and negotiations, but not unilateral withdrawal)?
 
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If it plays out as you have put forward, then yes, Kennedy wins. However, I'm not sure all three candidates would give strong enough pro-Israel statements that Sirhan would just decide to kill the winner. After all, if all three are just as bad, what does killing the winner accomplish? Secondly, there would be more security for the sitting vice president of the United States, than there was for Kennedy at the time. Not sure Sirhan would get close enough. I like the idea, and would love to see RFK go on, but I wonder how plausable this is.
 
Given how much he despised Robert Kennedy might the death of Vice President Humphrey push LBJ to reenter the race at the last possible moment if only to ensure that Kennedy isn't the nominee? I think that LBJ is in the best position to inherit the majority of the Humphrey delegates.

Otherwise Kennedy isn't offensive enough to the leadership class of the party for an anybody but Kennedy movement to coalesce around a single candidate.

I'd expect the Humphrey delegates to splinter-some supporting Kennedy, some supporting favorite sons, some supporting people who might make plausible nominees in the future-and perhaps some voting for Eugene McCarthy.

In that context Kennedy eventually wins the nomination.

So either Kennedy is the nominee or there's the most brutal floor fight ever and LBJ is renominated despite his famous declaration that he wasn't going to run.

If it's Johnson Nixon then crushes him in the fall.

Nixon would probably win even if Johnson's justice department indicts Chennault and Kissinger for interfering with the Paris Peace Talks. That's how unpopular Lyndon Johnson was by 1968.
 
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