1960 United States presidential election

President of the United States

**November 8, 1960**

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## Overview

**Nominee**
**John F. Kennedy**
Richard Nixon

**Political party**
Democratic
Republican

**State**
Massachusetts
California

**Running mate**
**Lyndon B. Johnson**
Henry Cabot Lodge Jr.

**Electoral vote**
**303**
219

**Popular vote**
**34,220,984**
34,108,157

**Percentage**
**49.7%**
49.6%

## Results

Blue denotes states won by Kennedy/Johnson and red denotes those won by Nixon/Lodge; orange denotes Alabama's and Mississippi's unpledged electors' votes cast for Harry F. Byrd/Strom Thurmond, and Oklahoma's unpledged elector's vote for Harry F. Byrd/Barry Goldwater

### Elected President

Dwight D. Eisenhower
Republican
John F. Kennedy
Democratic

The **1960 United States presidential election** was the 44th quadrennial presidential election. It was held on Tuesday, November 8, 1960. In a closely contested election, Democratic United States Senator John F. Kennedy defeated incumbent Vice President Richard Nixon, the Republican Party nominee. This was the first election in which fifty states participated and the last in which the District of Columbia did not. It was also the first election in which an incumbent president was ineligible to run for a third term because of the term limits established by the Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution.

## Results

As the early returns poured in from large Northeastern and Midwestern cities, Kennedy opened a large lead in the popular and electoral votes, and appeared headed for victory. However, as later returns came in from rural and suburban areas in the Midwest, the Rocky Mountain states, and the Pacific Coast states, Nixon began to steadily close the gap on Kennedy. Nixon made a speech at about 3 a.m., and hinted that Kennedy might have won the election. News reporters were puzzled, as it was not a formal concession speech. He talked of how Kennedy would be elected if "the present trend continues". It was not until the afternoon of the next day that Nixon finally conceded the election, and Kennedy claimed his victory.

Kennedy won in twenty-seven of the thirty-nine largest cities, but lost in Southern cities that had voted for Adlai Stevenson II although he maintained Atlanta, New Orleans, and San Antonio. New Orleans and San Antonio were the only cities in the Southern United States to have large Catholic populations and Atlanta was a traditional Democratic stronghold. A sample of how close the election was can be seen in California, Nixon's home state. Kennedy seemed to have carried the state by 37,000 votes when all of the voting precincts reported, but when the absentee ballots were counted a week later, Nixon came from behind to win the state by 36,000 votes.

In the national popular vote, Kennedy beat Nixon by less than two tenths of one percentage point (0.17%), the closest popular-vote margin of the 20th century. So close was the popular vote that a shift of 18,858 votes in Illinois and Missouri, both won by Kennedy by less than 1%, would have left both Kennedy and Nixon short of the 269 electoral votes required to win, thus forcing a contingent election in the United States House of Representatives; this was due to unpledged Democratic electors out of Alabama and Mississippi.