The Small State Penalty

Friday, 22nd April 2011

Low name-recognition and his dangerously sensible opinions hamper Gary Johnson's bid for the Presidency but so, alas, does his background. New Mexico, delightful though it is, just isn't a good place from which to run for national office. Small states do not produce many presidential contenders and Bill Clinton is, once again, the exception to that general rule.

The last 13 Presidents have come from Illinois*, Texas, Arkansas, Texas, California, Georgia, Michigan, California, Texas, Massachusetts. Kansas, Missouri, New York. Clinton is exceptional and Eisenhower's base was the mighty US Army rather than sparsely-populated Kansas. All the others come from one of the 20 most-populous states.

So too do most defeated Presidential nominees. Since FDR beat Wendell Wilkie the losers have come from: Arizona, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Kansas, Texas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Georgia, Michigan, South Dakota, Minnesota, Arizona, California, Illinois, New York.

Note the paucity of small-state nominees. Arizona wasn't a major state when Goldwater ran while Bob Dole (Kansas), Mondale (Minnesota), McGovern (South Dakota) and Humphrey (Minnesota) were each Washington figures. If it's tough to win the Presidency from the Senate it's even harder to do so as a former governor of a small state.

Clinton, again, is the only ex-governor to reach the White House from one of the 30 least-populous states. Those states account for roughly 25% of the population and, obviously, 60% of governors and yet they produce very few successful candidates.

There are some good reasons for that: what works in a small state may not scale to national level and, just as importantly, the governor of a small state lacks names recognition in major media markets and, rather importantly, in major media newsrooms. Sure, you might have done a good job in your tiny, empty state thousands of miles from Washington but that means nothing on the national stage and it certainly doesn't earn you the right to be taken seriously by sagacious pundits and handicappers.

This is close to being a problem for Tim Pawlenty too. Minnesota is now the 21st most-populous state - right on the cusp of my arbitrarily-drawn division between large and small states - and who knows whether being Governor of Minnesota carries quite enough semi-mystical "gravitas" to ensure your candidacy is taken seriously. My guess is that it does, sort of, but only just. (Mike Huckabee suffers from the anti small-state bias too and so, frankly, will Sarah Palin if she decides to run.)

Small states, rightly, enjoy a good show in the United States Senate but, even allowing for the possible distortions of a small sample, they're probably not good places from which to run for the Presidency.

*Via Kenya, obviously.

Filed under: 2012 (167 more articles) , Americana (479 more articles) , Gary Johnson (6 more articles) , GOP (332 more articles) , Mike Huckabee (9 more articles) , Palin (59 more articles) , Pawlenty (11 more articles) , Romney (71 more articles) , White House (31 more articles)

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Jupiter

April 22nd, 2011 4:54pm Report this comment

I thought Barry was from Hawaii not Illinois.

Austin Barry

April 22nd, 2011 7:59pm Report this comment

The best presidents seem to come from Virginia: washington, Jefferson, Adams, Madison, Monroe, Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Woodrow Wilson.

Tom Round

April 22nd, 2011 9:30pm Report this comment

And yet the small States cling to the Electoral College as their guarantee of voting clout in presidential elections. Whereas the winner-take-all rule means that an extra 2% in California or NY is worth many more Electoral votes than an extra 2% across the rectangular States in flyover country.

Fergus Pickering

April 23rd, 2011 3:04am Report this comment

Woodrow Wilson? Wasn't he the worst President of the 20th century? Or was that some other Woodrow Wilson, not the bumbling self-righteous idiot I'm thinking of.

Baron

April 23rd, 2011 10:41am Report this comment

weird as it may be I have a soft spot for Nixon, the one of the Watergate fame, also the one who was, arguably, the most pragmatic man in charge of the Republic since WW2, pragmatism has always sliced it for me, it goes well with the limitations of the human condition.