History Predicts Midterm Election Outcome
Predicting the winners in this November’s midterm congressional election is like predicting the Alabama-Notre Dame national championship football game in 2013. You know who is going to win; the only drama lies in the margin of victory.
Princeton professor Julian Zelizer recently made a compelling case that if historical trends continue, the Republicans will pad their House majority and have a decent chance of taking control of the Senate. Traditionally, the party of the president in the middle of his second term does not fare well in congressional elections. After six years of controversial decisions, a president’s opposition is often more motivated than his followers.
Let’s start with Woodrow Wilson, arguably one of the nation’s top five presidents. In his first term, the Democrat Wilson pushed major reforms through Congress, including the creation of the Federal Reserve and the progressive income tax. After his reelection in 1916, Wilson successfully led the country into World War I. In 1918, in the midterm election, Republicans won control of Congress and used it to effectively block ratification of the Treaty of Versailles and thwart U.S. entry into the League of Nations.
Franklin Roosevelt, the most influential president of the 20th century, met the same fate halfway through his second term in 1938. After transforming the government with his New Deal policies and winning reelection in a landslide, FDR became a victim of his own hubris. His plan to pack the Supreme Court with additional justices (favorable to the New Deal) backfired, and despite a solid Democratic South, the Democrats in 1938 lost 72 seats in the House and seven in the Senate.
In the 1950s, the Republican Dwight Eisenhower rode his popularity to two strong election victories, but his party struggled in his second midterm. The Democrats in 1958 increased their seats in the Senate from 49 to 65, and gained 51 seats in the House to reach a commanding majority of 283.
The next president to have an election in his sixth year in office was Ronald Reagan in 1986. Reagan ushered in a conservative revolution so strong that it still impacts politics today. He defeated sitting president Jimmy Carter in 1980 and crushed Walter Mondale in 1984. But in 1986, Democrats gained nine Senate seats to take control of both houses of Congress.
Bill Clinton is the only modern president to break the trend. The midterm election in his second term was dominated by House Republicans’ efforts to impeach Clinton for lying about an affair with an intern. With the economy performing well in 1998, the country judged that Republicans had overreached and Democrats, while not a majority, picked up five seats in the House.
The second midterm election of George W. Bush saw a return to the familiar pattern of presidential struggles. After coasting to reelection in 2004, Bush focused on privatizing Social Security, which was about as popular as FDR’s court-packing plan. In 2006, the Democrats retook control of the House for the first time since 1994.
What will happen in 2014? Since the president’s party usually loses seats in a midterm election, particularly in a second term, look for Republicans, who also have gerrymandered districts on their side, to make gains.
What will this mean for the presidential election of 2016? The party in power changed after Wilson, Eisenhower and Bush, but stayed the same after FDR and Reagan. So despite historical trends, we still have plenty of unpredictable drama left in our politics.
Brother Rogers is associate director of the Stennis Center for Public Service and a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News.
Princeton professor Julian Zelizer recently made a compelling case that if historical trends continue, the Republicans will pad their House majority and have a decent chance of taking control of the Senate. Traditionally, the party of the president in the middle of his second term does not fare well in congressional elections. After six years of controversial decisions, a president’s opposition is often more motivated than his followers.
Let’s start with Woodrow Wilson, arguably one of the nation’s top five presidents. In his first term, the Democrat Wilson pushed major reforms through Congress, including the creation of the Federal Reserve and the progressive income tax. After his reelection in 1916, Wilson successfully led the country into World War I. In 1918, in the midterm election, Republicans won control of Congress and used it to effectively block ratification of the Treaty of Versailles and thwart U.S. entry into the League of Nations.
Franklin Roosevelt, the most influential president of the 20th century, met the same fate halfway through his second term in 1938. After transforming the government with his New Deal policies and winning reelection in a landslide, FDR became a victim of his own hubris. His plan to pack the Supreme Court with additional justices (favorable to the New Deal) backfired, and despite a solid Democratic South, the Democrats in 1938 lost 72 seats in the House and seven in the Senate.
In the 1950s, the Republican Dwight Eisenhower rode his popularity to two strong election victories, but his party struggled in his second midterm. The Democrats in 1958 increased their seats in the Senate from 49 to 65, and gained 51 seats in the House to reach a commanding majority of 283.
The next president to have an election in his sixth year in office was Ronald Reagan in 1986. Reagan ushered in a conservative revolution so strong that it still impacts politics today. He defeated sitting president Jimmy Carter in 1980 and crushed Walter Mondale in 1984. But in 1986, Democrats gained nine Senate seats to take control of both houses of Congress.
Bill Clinton is the only modern president to break the trend. The midterm election in his second term was dominated by House Republicans’ efforts to impeach Clinton for lying about an affair with an intern. With the economy performing well in 1998, the country judged that Republicans had overreached and Democrats, while not a majority, picked up five seats in the House.
The second midterm election of George W. Bush saw a return to the familiar pattern of presidential struggles. After coasting to reelection in 2004, Bush focused on privatizing Social Security, which was about as popular as FDR’s court-packing plan. In 2006, the Democrats retook control of the House for the first time since 1994.
What will happen in 2014? Since the president’s party usually loses seats in a midterm election, particularly in a second term, look for Republicans, who also have gerrymandered districts on their side, to make gains.
What will this mean for the presidential election of 2016? The party in power changed after Wilson, Eisenhower and Bush, but stayed the same after FDR and Reagan. So despite historical trends, we still have plenty of unpredictable drama left in our politics.
Brother Rogers is associate director of the Stennis Center for Public Service and a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News.