October Surprises: Carter vs. Reagan (1980)
In 1976, voters wanted a Washington outsider after the Watergate scandal and the subsequent pardon of Richard Nixon, so they rejected Gerald Ford in favor of Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter. But after four years of Carter, things weren't going much better. In fact the economy has taken a turn for the worse, with interest rates reaching record levels, and a horrible combination of high inflation as well as high unemployment. Then when staff at the American Embassy were held hostage in Tehran, national pride and morale also took a hit.
At the time, Iran was experiencing a major uprising that severely damaged its oil infrastructure and greatly weakened its ability to produce and sell oil. In January 1979, shortly after Iran's leader Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi fled the country, lead Iranian opposition figure Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned from a 14-year exile and installed an Islamist régime that was hostile towards the United States. In the summer of 1979 parts of the country were experiencing energy shortages. Long lines at the gas pumps were blamed on Carter. His approval ratings were very low, at 28% according to a Gallup poll. Other polls gave him even lower numbers. In July Carter announced a reshuffling of his cabinet on national television, and gave a speech whose negative forecast resulted in it being named the "malaise speech." The speech caused a brief upswing in the president's approval rating, but this didn't last long. Some Democrats felt that they had the wrong candidate and decided to mount a challenge to Carter in the primaries. The last of the Kennedy brothers, Massachusetts Senator Edward M. Kennedy, finally made his long-expected run at the presidency.
Ted Kennedy had been asked to take his brother Robert’s place at the 1968 Democratic National Convention and had refused. Many believed that he was run for president in 1972. But the notorious Chappaquiddick incident of 1969 that killed Kennedy's car passenger Mary Jo Kopechne severely tarnished Kennedy's reputation and he subsequently refused to run for president in 1972 and 1976. Many of his supporters suspected that Chappaquiddick had destroyed any ability he had to win on a national level. Despite this, in the summer of 1979, Kennedy let it be known that because of Carter’s failings, he was considering a run for the presidency in 1980. Gallup polls showed him beating the president by over two to one.
Kennedy’s official announcement was scheduled for early November. But a television interview with Roger Mudd of CBS a few days before the announcement went badly, and hurt Kennedy's poll numbers. As animosity towards the Khomeini régime grew after 52 American hostages were taken by a group of Islamist students and militants at the U.S. embassy in Tehran, Carter’s approval ratings initially jumped in the 60-percent range in some polls, because of what was called a "rally ‘round the flag" effect from Carter's calm handling of the crisis. Kennedy fell far behind and Carter beat Kennedy decisively in Iowa and New Hampshire and in virtually every other primary except Massachusetts. However as impatience began to build with the President’s strategy on Iran, Kennedy won some late primaries in New York and Connecticut. Momentum built for Ted Kennedy after Carter's attempt to rescue the hostages on April 25 ended in disaster, reflecting badly on Carter's leadership ability. Kennedy won the key states of California and New Jersey in June. He refused to drop out, and the 1980 Democratic National Convention was a battle for the incumbent President. Nonetheless, Carter's lead over Kennedy was too great and on the second-last day of the convention, Kennedy conceded the nomination and called for a more liberal party platform. He delivered what many saw as the best speech of his career. The contempt Kennedy had for Carter was visible on stage on the final day, with House Speaker Tip O'Neill grabbing Kennedy's hand to force a handshake with Carter.
Meanwhile, Republicans knew that Carter appeared very vulnerable. A large field of Republican challengers soon emerged to try and seize the opportunity that presented itself. Former California Governor Ronald Reagan was the early odds-on favorite to win his party's nomination for president after nearly defeating incumbent President Gerald Ford just four years earlier. He was so far ahead in the polls that he chose not to attend many of the candidate forums in the summer and fall of 1979.
George H. W. Bush, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and chairman of the Republican National Committee, showed up at a number of events, especially those where Reagan was absent. In January 1980, the Iowa Republicans held a straw poll as a part of their caucuses for that year. Bush defeated Reagan by a small margin and declared that he had what he called "the Big Mo" (momentum). When Reagan skipped the Puerto Rico primary in deference to New Hampshire, Bush won easily, giving him an early lead going into New Hampshire.
In advance of the New Hampshire Primary, the Nashua Telegraph offered to host a debate between Reagan and Bush on November 9, 1979. Out of concern that a newspaper-sponsored debate might violate electoral regulations, Reagan arranged to fund the event with his own campaign money, inviting the other candidates to participate, though they were provided with short notice of this. The Bush camp did not learn of Reagan's decision to include the other candidates until just prior to the debate. Bush refused to participate. As Reagan attempted to explain his decision, the editor of the Nashua Telegraph ordered the sound man to mute Reagan's microphone. A visibly angry Reagan responded, "I am paying for this microphone!" Eventually the other candidates agreed to leave, and the debate proceeded between Reagan and Bush. Reagan's quote dominated news coverage of the event and he sailed to an easy win in the state primary.
The South Carolina primary was next and political operative Lee Atwater worked to engineer a victory for Reagan. Reagan swept the South, but lost five other primaries to Bush. Reagan was an adherent to a policy known as supply-side economics, which believed that economic growth is most effectively created by using incentives for people to produce (supply) goods and services. Reagan said that cutting tax rates would actually increase tax revenues because the lower rates would cause people to work harder as they would be able to keep more of their money. Reagan also called for a drastic cut in "big government" and pledged to deliver a balanced budget for the first time since 1969. Bush criticized Reagan's economic policy, calling it "voodoo economics" because it promised to lower taxes and increase revenues at the same time.
Reagan won a majority of the primaries, receiving 7,709,793 votes (59.79%) compared with 3,070,033 (23.81%) for Bush. The Republicans held their 1980 convention at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, Michigan, from July 14 to July 17, 1980. Ronald Reagan was nominated on the first ballot with 1,939 votes (97.44%). Bush had by then conceded victory to Reagan, but Illinois Congressman John Anderson received 37 votes or 1.86%. 13 delegates voted for Bush and 1 delegate voted for former Texas Governor John Connally and for Ambassador Anne Armstrong. Anderson would later run as a third party candidate in the election.
During the convention, the possibility of choosing former president Gerald Ford as the vice-presidential nominee was considered. Ford negotiated with the Reagan campaign team and asked for certain powers and prerogatives that would have essentially made Ford a co-president. This included the return of Henry Kissinger as Secretary of State and the appointment of Alan Greenspan as Secretary of the Treasury. The two sides could not come to an agreement. Instead Reagan chose Bush as his running mate.
Reagan took the unprecedented step of announcing his VP choice from the podium of the convention. Some delegates still resented Bush for his criticisms of Reagan during the campaign. This would be the last time during the 20th century that the bottom half of the ticket would be contested, as the rules would be changed in 1988 to prevent this from happening. In the ballot for the nominee for Vice-President, Bush received 1,832 votes (93.33%) while North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms received 54 and New York Congressman (and former Buffalo Bills quarterback) Jack Kemp received 42.
An early Gallup poll put Reagan was ahead of Carter, with 58% of voters. Carter enjoyed the support of a majority of evangelical Christians according to Gallup, but Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority lobbying group supported Reagan and they purchased $10 million in commercials on southern radio and TV to campaign against Carter.
Reagan promised to restore the nation's military strength. At the time, 60% of Americans polled felt defense spending was too low. Reagan also promised to restore economic health by implementing a supply-side economic policy. He promised a balanced budget within three years along with a 30% reduction in tax rates over those same years. Reagan famously quipped: "A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose yours. And recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his." Reagan also criticized the "windfall profit tax" that Carter and Congress enacted that year on domestic oil production and promised to work to repeal it as president. The tax was not a tax on the difference between the price control-mandated price and the market price.
Carter was the only candidate who supported the Equal Rights Amendment. Reagan announced his intention to appoint women to his cabinet and the first female justice to the Supreme Court. He also pledged to work with all 50 state governors to combat discrimination against women and to equalize federal laws as an alternative to the ERA.
Carter was criticized for not having a campaign strategy to put to voters for the recovery of the economy. He made no campaign promises in this regard, but he often criticized Reagan's economic recovery plan without proposing one of his own in response.
In August, after the Republican National Convention, Ronald Reagan gave a campaign speech at the annual Neshoba County Fair on the outskirts of Philadelphia, Mississippi. He announced, "Programs like education and others should be turned back to the states and local communities with the tax sources to fund them. I believe in states' rights. I believe in people doing as much as they can at the community level and the private level." Reagan added, "I believe we have distorted the balance of our government today by giving powers that were never intended to be given in the Constitution to that federal establishment." He proposed to "restore to states and local governments the power that properly belongs to them." Carter criticized Reagan for injecting "hate and racism" by the "rebirth of code words like 'states' rights'".
Two days later, Reagan appeared at the Urban League convention in New York, where he said, "I am committed to the protection and enforcement of the civil rights of black Americans." He promised to develop "enterprise zones" to help with urban renewal.
Reagan made some gaffes during the campaign. He was widely ridiculed by Democrats for saying that trees caused pollution. He later said that he meant only certain types of pollution and his remarks had been misquoted. But this was too little to help Carter, who was was burdened by a continuing weak economy and the Iran hostage crisis. Inflation, high interest rates, and unemployment continued through the course of the campaign, and the ongoing hostage crisis badly hamstrung Carter's efforts at re-election. John Anderson's independent candidacy, intended to draw support from liberal Republicans, hurt Carter more than Reagan, especially in such reliably Democratic states such as Massachusetts and New York.
Reagan and Carter held only one presidential debate, one week to the day before the election (October 28). Going into the debate, average poll data gave Reagan a two to three point lead over Carter. After the debate, Reagan was able to increase his lead dramatically against the president to win a comfortable Republican victory.
The League of Women Voters had announced a schedule of debates similar to 1976, three presidential and one vice presidential. Carter steadfastly refused to participate in any debate which included Anderson included, and Reagan refused to debate without him. It took months of negotiations for the League of Women Voters to finally put it together. It was held on September 21, 1980 in the Baltimore Convention Center. Reagan said of Carter's refusal to debate: "He knows that he couldn't win a debate even if it were held in the Rose Garden before an audience of Administration officials with the questions being asked by Jody Powell." The League of Women Voters promised the Reagan campaign that the debate stage would feature an empty chair to represent the missing president. Carter was very upset about the planned chair stunt, and at the last minute the League agreed to take it out. The debate was moderated by Bill Moyers.
With two weeks to go to the election, the Reagan campaign decided that the best thing to do at that moment was to accede to all of President Carter's demands, and it was agreed to exclude Congressman Anderson from the final debate, which was rescheduled for October 28 in Cleveland, Ohio.
Moderated by Howard K. Smith and presented by the League of Women Voters, the presidential debate between President Carter and Governor Reagan ranked among the highest ratings of any television show in the previous decade. Debate topics included the Iranian hostage crisis, and nuclear arms treaties and proliferation. Carter's campaign sought to portray Reagan as a reckless "war hawk," as well as a "dangerous right-wing radical". But Carter's reference to his consultation with 12-year-old daughter Amy concerning nuclear weapons policy became the focus of post-debate analysis and fodder for late-night television jokes. President Carter said he had asked Amy what the most important issue in that election was and she said, "the control of nuclear arms." A famous political cartoon, published the day after Reagan's landslide victory, showed Amy Carter sitting in Jimmy's lap with her shoulders shrugged asking "the economy? the hostage crisis?"
When Carter criticized Reagan's record, which included voting against Medicare and Social Security benefits, Governor Reagan audibly sighed and replied: "There you go again". In describing the national debt that was approaching $1 trillion, Reagan stated "a billion is a thousand millions, and a trillion is a thousand billions." In his closing remarks, Reagan asked viewers:
"Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Is it easier for you to go and buy things in the stores than it was four years ago? Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago? Is America as respected throughout the world as it was? Do you feel that our security is as safe, that we're as strong as we were four years ago? And if you answer all of those questions 'yes', why then, I think your choice is very obvious as to whom you will vote for. If you don't agree, if you don't think that this course that we've been on for the last four years is what you would like to see us follow for the next four, then I could suggest another choice that you have."
In September 1980, former Watergate scandal prosecutor Leon Jaworski accepted a position as honorary chairman of Democrats for Reagan. Five months earlier, Jaworski had harshly criticized Reagan as an "extremist". But he later said, after accepting the chairmanship, "I would rather have a competent extremist than an incompetent moderate." Former Democratic Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota also endorsed Reagan. Three days before the November 4 voting in the election, the National Rifle Association endorsed a presidential candidate for the first time in its history, backing Reagan.
The election was held on November 4, 1980. Reagan defeated Carter by almost 10 percentage points in the popular vote, receiving 43,903,230 votes (50.7%) compared to 35,480,115 (41.0%) for Carter. Republicans also gained control of the Senate for the first time in twenty-five years. The electoral college vote was a landslide, with 489 votes (representing 44 states) for Reagan and 49 votes for Carter (representing 6 states and the District of Columbia). NBC News projected Reagan as the winner at 8:15 pm EST (5:15 PST), before voting was finished in the West, based on exit polls. (It was the first time a broadcast network used exit polling to project a winner.) Carter conceded defeat at 9:50 pm EST. Carter's loss was the worst performing of an incumbent President since Herbert Hoover lost to Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932 by a margin of 18% and it was the most lopsided defeat for any incumbent president in an election where only two candidates won electoral votes.
On the morning that Reagan was inaugurated, the Iranians released the American hostages.