The Cold Table Problem: Why History Suggests That More Campaign Time Wouldn't Have Helped Harris
In the coming year, I plan to compose a series of essays analyzing from a historian’s standpoint what I believe most postmortems of the Biden dropout and Trump’s 2024 victory over Kamala Harris are fundamentally missing. As a prelude, I want to use the lens of the 140 years of presidential elections to address a common claim. This claim is that while Biden was purportedly on track to lose (an unprovable assumption I find very questionable), Harris or another Democrat would have likely won had Biden never tried running again and instead let a traditional primary take place. I will leave for my upcoming essay series the issue of why I am much more skeptical than most people that Biden would definitely have lost had he stayed in the race, as well as the “built in” difficulties that incumbent vice presidents face in winning presidential elections. I will focus here on what I call the “cold table” problem, in other words the fact that historical analysis suggests that when an incumbent president is not running for reelection, it is essential that they be in a position where they would win another term in order for another member of their party to have any significant chance (not necessarily a strong one!) of winning. In casino speak, an incumbent president not being renominated creates a “cold table” for their party and a “hot table” for the opposition party. To put it another way, my snapshot of every post-1880, pre-2024 election where the incumbent was not nominated for reelection indicates that in every case where the incumbent would have likely lost the race (and many cases where they would have likely won), their party’s nominee lost:
1880: Republican incumbent Rutherford B. Hayes had won a very tight race under highly contested circumstances, forcing Congress to create a commission to determine the winner. Probably due to well-founded pessimism about his reelection chances under these circumstances, Hayes declines to run again. Republican nominee James Garfield defeats Democrat Winfield Hancock. This is the last election to date where, in my “best guess” counterfactual opinion, the incumbent was in a position to lose reelection but did not drag their party’s nominee down with him.
1884: Chester Arthur, the incumbent Republican president, has attained office as a result of the incumbent president, Garfield, being assassinated while Arthur was vice president, meaning Arthur had not won a previous election and making him 1 of just 5 presidents to both never be nominated by their party and never win a presidential election, further complicating efforts to assess his odds of victory. (National presidential polls as we understand the concept did not exist in 1884.) Arthur fails to be nominated. Democrat Grover Cleveland defeats Republican James G. Blaine.
1896: Democratic incumbent Grover Cleveland declines to run again. Republican William McKinley wins in a landslide against Democrat William Jennings Bryan.
1908: Republican incumbent Teddy Rosevelt is four years removed from a 1904 landslide victory during a 72 year era of GOP political dominance. Analysis suggests he was popular enough to have easily won reelection but anoints William Howard Taft as his successor, much to his later regret. Taft wins handily but has a falling out with T.R. as president.
1920: Democratic incumbent Woodrow Wilson declines to run again. Republican Warren G. Harding wins in a landslide.
1928: Republican incumbent Calvin Coolidge is 4 years removed from a landslide victory and 2 years removed from one of the best midterm elections for Republicans in the 20th century. He declines to run again despite probably being popular enough to win again. Republican Herbert Hoover wins.
1952: Democratic incumbent Harry Truman, his poll numbers abysmal and failing to win the New Hampshire primary, drops out. Republican Dwight Eisenhower defeats Democratic nominee Adlai Stevenson in a landslide.
1960: Apart from a 49% approval rating in July, Eisenhower’s favorability among Americans never goes below the high 50s throughout the year, indicating it would have been highly unlikely for any Democrat to unseat him. Despite his popularity and not being bound by the 22nd Amendment, Eisenhower declines to run again. Democratic nominee JFK defeats incumbent GOP Vice President Richard Nixon.
1968: Democratic incumbent LBJ drops out of the race. With his approval in the prior 6 months having ranged from the mid 30s (similar to what Truman had 5 months before defeating Thomas Dewey) to the high 40s (similar to what George W. Bush and Barack Obama had when they won reelection), I would submit that LBJ had a solid chance of winning reelection. This is bolstered by pre-dropout polls that showed him close to or ahead of eventual Republican nominee, Richard Nixon. At the same time, with his party fractured and his administration experiencing backlash from across the political spectrum, he would have been in a much weaker position politically than he had been against Barry Goldwater in 1964. Republican nominee Richard Nixon defeats incumbent Democratic Vice President Hubert Humphrey.
1988: Term-limited GOP incumbent Ronald Reagan is 4 years removed from a 49-state landslide and has approval ratings above 50% throughout the election season, indicating it would have been unlikely for him to lose. George H.W. Bush becomes the only incumbent Vice President in the last 100 years to win an election.
2000: Term-limited Democratic incumbent Bill Clinton is 4 years removed from a landslide reelection and has a Gallup approval rating of above 50% at every point during the year, suggesting he would have probably won a third term. Republican nominee George W. Bush defeats incumbent Democratic Vice President Al Gore.
2008: Term-limited Republican incumbent George W. Bush is highly unpopular, is considering politically toxic by both parties, and would have probably had a hard time winning against the average Democrat, let alone a political juggernaut like Barack Obama. Obama wins the last 350+ Electoral College victory by a nominee to date against Republican John McCain.
2016: Term-limited Democratic incumbent Barack Obama’s Gallup approval rating stays consistently above 50% beginning in early July, suggesting he likely would have won a third term. Republican nominee Donald Trump defeats Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.
The takeaway: while incumbent presidents seeking reelection normally win, non-incumbents from the sitting president’s party struggle to replicate their success. History suggests Harris’s chances of winning in an alternate scenario rise or fall with the likelihood that Biden would have won had he stayed in. If you believe Biden was doomed, Harris’s path to victory in any scenario would have required defying 140 years of political history.