In 1968 RFK would not have won, period.
If you look at the delegate numbers after California/etc Humphrey was still way ahead of RFK and McCarthy. Most of the remaining delegates to be chosen were in machine states (mostly in the South) controlled by LBJ.
Quite. I've stated before that RFK's entire strategy for the convention seems to have been to get a good old fashioned spontaneous convention demonstration going (in the hall, among the delegates, that is) and nobody has shot that notion down.
Yeah, nah, Bobby isn't getting the nomination along the lines of William Jennings Bryan.
Also, one fascinating thing I read recently, which absolutely has a baring on a living RFK's ability to win both the nom and the general, is the fact
he was so broke during his '64 senate race he went begging to Johnson for DNC funds. Like, in a personal meeting in the Oval Office. It's on tape, Michael Beschloss recounts it in his histories.
My contention: If the Kennedy national fundraising machine died with Jack, and it couldn't be revived because Evil Old Joe was an invalid, then this is obviously a thing for RFK if he wants to get the edge on both HHH and the Republicans.
I assume the convention machers know this; I assume Nixon knows it.
So, folks, what do the historians say about this? From my own reading this is something that just isn't teased out, because of the abrupt end of the '68 challenge.
But this actually has implications beyond the seemably-unwinnable-for-Kennedy cycle in 1968, it's a major thing for future winnable cycles.
A big question to me is this, the law order voters many went to Nixon and Wallace. Some yes were racists. But RFK believed he could get them to vote for him . He was the former AG.
Threading that needle in 1968 is one thing, but in future cycles this is something that becomes very hard. Perhaps impossible. The fight over whether or not to appease the Wallace Dems is a main reason for the terrible split of '72.
Eventually the only guy who can overcome this is Carter, by using the one political superpower he had--political outsiderdom in the aftermath of Watergate, Vietnam, the Church committee.
Somehow, in my mind an RFK who lives to fight another day is starting to merge with the contours of Teddy's ill-fated 1980 challenge, I just don't know if it's from the Right or from the Left...