Deadlocked 1912 Electoral College?

Let's say that Wilson does a little worse in the election, only getting about 36% of the popular vote, with most of his support going to Roosevelt, but a little to Taft. The vote loss is concentrated in non-southern states. However, his slightly weaker performance allows several close states to go to Roosevelt or Taft. Roosvelt and Taft also manage to win their home states of New York and Ohio.

These states are:
California (virtual tie OTL, the 2 electoral votes that went for Wilson go for Roosevelt)
Idaho (1% margin of victory, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
Illinois (2% margin OTL, 29 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Iowa (5% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Kansas (6% margin OTL, 10 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Maine (2% margin OTL, 6 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Massachusetts (3% margin OTL, 18 electoral votes to Taft)
Montana (7% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
New Hampshire (2% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
New Mexico (6% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)
New York (15% margin OTL, Roosevelt's homestate, 45 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
North Dakota (4% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Ohio (14% margin OTL, Taft's homestate, 24 electoral votes for Taft)
Oregon (7% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Rhode Island (3% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Taft)
Wisconsin (9% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Taft)
Wyoming (2% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)

The electoral college ends up 242 votes for Wilson, 207 for Roosevelt, and 82 for Taft. The popular vote is approximately 36% for Wilson, 31% for Roosevelt, and 25% for Taft.

Will Taft or Roosevelt's electors go to Wilson, perhaps with some deal between the candidates? Will the three sides refuse to cooperate, and the election go to the Democrat-controlled House that will probably vote in Wilson? Or will the Taft Republicans decide to join with Roosevelt instead, giving him the election? Or perhaps even unification of 2 of the sides around some new compromise candidate?
 
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Let's say that Wilson does a little worse in the election, only getting about 36% of the popular vote, with most of his support going to Roosevelt, but a little to Taft. The vote loss is concentrated in non-southern states. However, his slightly weaker performance allows several close states to go to Roosevelt or Taft. Roosvelt and Taft also manage to win their home states of New York and Ohio.

These states are:
California (virtual tie OTL, the 2 electoral votes that went for Wilson go for Roosevelt)
Idaho (1% margin of victory, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
Illinois (2% margin OTL, 29 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Iowa (5% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Kansas (6% margin OTL, 10 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Maine (2% margin OTL, 6 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Massachusetts (3% margin OTL, 18 electoral votes to Taft)
Montana (7% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
New Hampshire (2% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
New Mexico (6% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)
New York (15% margin OTL, Roosevelt's homestate, 45 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
North Dakota (4% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Ohio (14% margin OTL, Taft's homestate, 24 electoral votes for Taft)
Oregon (7% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Rhode Island (3% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Taft)
Wisconsin (9% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Taft)
Wyoming (2% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)

The electoral college ends up 242 votes for Wilson, 207 for Roosevelt, and 82 for Taft. The popular vote is approximately 36% for Wilson, 31% for Roosevelt, and 25% for Taft.

Will Taft or Roosevelt's electors go to Wilson, perhaps with some deal between the candidates? Will the three sides refuse to cooperate, and the election go to the Democrat-controlled House that will probably vote in Wilson? Or will the Taft Republicans decide to join with Roosevelt instead, giving him the election? Or perhaps even unification of 2 of the sides around some new compromise candidate?


No way will Taft Republicans support TR, nor vice versa. The two wings of the party are hopelessly estranged by now, to the point where in Feb 1913 half the Republican Senators supported a Constitutional Amendment which would bar former Presidents from running again - as insurance against any TR comeback. Even four years later the divided party still wasn't able to patch things up enough to win.

Iirc the Dems controlled 23 House delegations (just two short of a majority) the Republicans 21. Some western ones were Progressive, and might go to TR, but it would be basically a Wilson v Taft contest. At some point, my guess is that enough anti-Taft Republicans would cast blank ballots to enable Wilson to win.

The really interesting contest is for Vice President. If Taft is third, then the Senate has to choose between Thomas R Marshall and Hiram W Johnson. Since that Senate was 51R to 44D (1 seat vacant) it would require only four Taftite defections to elect Marshall as VP, which in the mood of the times would be certain to happen. Once that has happened, the Dems in the House no longer need to win, only to keep things deadlocked until March 4, which they are easily strong enough to do. So it's either Wilson or Marshall.

Nor, incidentally, do I really see what causes Wilson to do this badly - even worse than Parker in 1904. The only thing which could knock him out would be a 1919-type stroke, and even then, the party would either choose another candidate (Marshall? Champ Clark?) who would get about the same vote as Wilson did OTL, or, if it happned in the final week, just conceal Wilson's condition until the votes were in.
 
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Let's say that Wilson does a little worse in the election, only getting about 36% of the popular vote, with most of his support going to Roosevelt, but a little to Taft. The vote loss is concentrated in non-southern states. However, his slightly weaker performance allows several close states to go to Roosevelt or Taft. Roosvelt and Taft also manage to win their home states of New York and Ohio.

I'm afraid many of your suggested changes are grossly implausible.

California (virtual tie OTL, the 2 electoral votes that went for Wilson go for Roosevelt)

Keeping those electors faithful is not a big deal.

Idaho (1% margin of victory, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
Illinois (2% margin OTL, 29 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Maine (2% margin OTL, 6 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Massachusetts (3% margin OTL, 18 electoral votes to Taft)
New Hampshire (2% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Taft)
North Dakota (4% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Rhode Island (3% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Taft)
Wyoming (2% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)

These are OK. You missed Connecticut (7 EV), where Wilson beat Taft 39.2% to 35.9%.

Iowa (5% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Kansas (6% margin OTL, 10 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Montana (7% margin OTL, 4 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
New Mexico (6% margin OTL, 3 electoral votes to Taft)
Oregon (7% margin OTL, 5 electoral votes to Roosevelt)

These are unlikely.

New York (15% margin OTL, Roosevelt's homestate, 45 electoral votes to Roosevelt)
Ohio (14% margin OTL, Taft's homestate, 24 electoral votes for Taft)
Wisconsin (9% margin OTL, 13 electoral votes to Taft)

These are ASB territory. 7% to 5% swings don't happen without major swings nationally.

Roosevelt was third in New York.

The OTL EV totals were Wilson 435, Roosevelt 88, Taft 8.

With CA and the plausible shifts applied:
Wilson 352, Roosevelt 130, Taft 49.

With the unlikely but not impossible shifts applied:
Wilson 328, Roosevelt 151, Taft 52.

So Wilson still wins easily. To get Wilson's total below 266, New York or Ohio has to flip, and at least one or two additional states.

Sorry, you just can't get there from here.
 
I'm afraid many of your suggested changes are grossly implausible.



Keeping those electors faithful is not a big deal.

To be fair to the electors concerned, as I understand it they were not unfaithful.

In CA at that time, Electors ran as individuals rather than as a slate, so all 13 had to be voted for separately - a point which some voters may not have understood. The vote in CA was very close, with TR edging out Wilson by only 174 votes of about 600,000 cast, as a result of which the two highest placed Wilson Electors narrowly outpolled the two lowest placed TR ones, hence the split vote. Afaik, all 13 Electors voted for the candidate they were pledged to.



Sorry, you just can't get there from here.

Agreed. In Ohio, even had Wilson been held to the 34.32% that Parker got in 1904 (as against 40.96 that he actually received) and all of his lost votes had switched to Taft - both points of course highly unlikely - Wilson would still, other things being equal, have squeezed through by about a 1% margin.

And other things might well not have been equal. Eugene Debs received 8.69% in Ohio, more than twice his 1904 vote. As Debs was an ex-Democrat who had supported Bryan in 1896, it is likely that his gains were largely at Wilson's expense, and that many might have switched back had the outcome seemed in any serious doubt.
 
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