American Government Research Paper

8/10/2019 American Government Research Paper

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Tirol Palmer

Rosalind Blanco Cook

American Government

Tulane University, 2014

United States presidential election of 1996, American presidential election of 1996,

American presidential election held on Nov. 5, 1996, in which Democratic Bill

Clinton was elected to a second term, defeating republican Bob Dole, a former U.S.

senator from Kansas.

The 1996 presidential primaries were the selection process by which voters of the

Republican and Democratic Party chose its nominee for President of the United

States. The former senator of Kansas and Senate Majority Leader, Bob Dole, was

designated as the nominee for the Republicans while the incumbent President Bill

Clinton was again selected as the nominee through a series of primary elections and

caucuses concluding in the 1996 Republican National Convention held in August

12th to August 15th, and the Democratic National Convention held from August 26th

to August 29th, 1996 (1).

Following the 1994-midterm elections, many obvious candidates entered what

would be a busy field. This was expected, as Democratic President Bill Clinton was

very unpopular in his first two years in office, which eventually lead to the

Republican Revolution. However, as Clinton became progressively more popular in



his third year, several withdrew from the race or decided not to run. It would be the

first time a Democratic president was reelected for a second term since Franklin

Roosevelt. It would also be the first time a Senate Majority leader was elected to the

presidency (Lyndon Johnson was a Democratic Majority Leader when he was

selected to run with John Kennedy in 1960).

Going into the election, the Senate Majority Leader and former vice-presidential

nominee Bob Dole was generally seen as the front-runner. Dole had significant name

recognition (being a two time presidential candidate in 1980 and 1988) and was

expected to win the nomination against less admired candidates such as the more

conservative U.S. senator Phil Gramm of Texas and more centrists U.S. Senator Arien

Spector of Pennsylvania. The uneven field of candidate’s (including journalist and

1992 presidential candidate Pat Buchanan and magazine publisher Steve Forbes)

debated issues such as a flat tax and other tax cut proposals, and a return to supply-

side economic policies promoted by Ronald Reagan. More attention was drawn to

the race by the budget draw in 1995 between the Congress and the President, which

caused brief shutdowns and slowdowns in many areas of federal government

service (2).

Buchanan won a non-binding straw poll in Alaska. Most experts dismissed

Buchanan’s showing as unimportant. Buchanan later said that future Vice

Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin worked on his 1996 Alaska campaign. He later

went on to win the Louisiana caucus. Buchanan and Gramm had made several trips



to the state to campaign. Gramm was expected to win, due to being from

neighboring and local Texas and having the support and upkeep of many of the

Louisiana part regulars.

Dole won the Iowa Caucus with 26% of the vote, a substantially smaller margin of

victory than was projected.

Gramm’s unfortunate showing in Louisiana plus placing 5 th in Iowa’s causcuses

resulted in his withdrawal from the race on the Sunday before the New Hampshire

primary.

In the New Hampshire Primary, Bunchanan recorded an unexpected victory over

Dole, who finished in second place.

Bunchanan’s early victories and Forbe’s victories in Delaware and Arizona put

Dole’s anticipated front-runner status in reservation during the formative months of

the primary season. Dole won every primary after including North and South

Dakota; which eventually gave him enough representative commitments to claim

status as the GOP presidential presumptive nominee. Dole resigned his senate seat

on June 11th in order to focus more intently on his presidential campaign.

However, the Democratic Primary race had Bill Clintons path to re-nomination very

uneventful (with the advantage of incumbency). At the Democratic National

Convention in 1996, Clinton – along with serving vice President Al Gore – was re-

nominated after a primary race in which he faced only empty opposition. Perennial

candidate Lyndon Larouche qualified for one delegate from Virginia and one

delegate from Louisiana, but the state parties rejected to award him delegates and



the First District Court of Appeals upheld their decision. Former Pennsylvania

Governor Bob Caset considered a challenge to Clinton, but health problems forced

Casey to vacate the bid. That left Jimmy Griffin, the former mayor of Buffalo, New

York, as the highest-ranking challenger still in the race. After finishing in eighth

place, behind even the continuing candidates, in the New Hampshire primaries,

Giffin dropped out of the race. Clinton easily won primaries nationwide, with

margins consistently higher than 80%.

The race was interesting because there were established issues even before Dole

was officially nominated. Because Clinton had no prearranged opposition within the

Democratic Party, he and his key campaign strategist Dick Morris created a plan to

air political commercials even before Clinton officially acknowledged his intention

to run again and prior to the outcome of the Republican primaries (3). This decision,

coupled with Clintons positioning himself away form the Republican Party’s

unpopular stands related to the shutdown of the federal government in 1995 and

1996 and his own party’s traditional liberal policies (a policy called triangulation),

gave him a lead, which was never resigned throughout the complete campaign.

Once Dole became the official nominee for the Republicans, the issues formed.

Clinton developed a theme of “building a bridge to the 21 st century” protecting

“Medicare, Medicaid, the environment and education.” In a constant repetition,

Clinton repeated this message in political ads, at rallies, and during the debates. He

was fixated and stayed on the message.(3) Dole, however, never developed a

message that stayed on target. The entirety and heart of his campaign was a 15



percent across the board tax cut. However, when the proposal fell flat with the

electorate, Dole then switched to criticizing Clinton as being soft on drugs and

lacking in character and ethics, raising the Whitewater scandal and disclosures

about campaign finance abuses. The public responded to these issues, but still fell

short of giving Senator Dole the momentum to win (1).

More than any recent or current presidential election, media and the polls have had

a extensive impact and influence on the result. Both parties’ hired key political

consultants to establish and manage focus polls to help govern and direct what

positions on issues would strike a encouraging chord with the electorate. Daily

tracking polls kept both the candidates and the public conscious of the fact that

Clinton was maintaining a steady double-digit lead throughout the campaign. The

media played its role of looking for the sound bit or photo op rather than closely

examining the issues. One example of this was when Senator Dole made the account

on the Today show that he didn’t believe tobacco was addictive (4). The media

replayed and repeated the interview countless times, and it then became an issue

for Clinton. The debates, another media event, solidified Clinton’s position, and the

outcome of the election reflected Clinton’s traditional strength within his

Democratic base and an increased advantage among women, Catholics, Hispanics,

and young voters.

Four “wedge” issues that emerged—immigration reform, affirmative action, English

as an official language – and by the opposed positions taken by Republicans toward



Hispanics on those issues separated Hispanics from the GOP revitalized Hispanic

voters. Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole surrendered the already weak

appeal of the GOP toward Hispanics by embracing the anti-Hispanic position in an

effort to appeal to WASP voters. In the end, the Dole strategy failed due to his

incapability to gain the support of white women. In the meantime, 72% of Hispanics

voted for Democrat Bill Clinton, the highest percentage ever. Hispanics were a key

factor of the Clinton victory margin. In Florida and Arizona, Hispanics helped to pilot

those states from the Republican to the Democratic column. In Texas and Colorado,

Hispanic support for Clinton added to the close election, even though Clinton lost. In

New Mexico, the Hispanic vote was essential to the Clinton victory (5).

Works Cited

1. , R. Michael, and Jonathan Nagler. "Economics, Issues and the Perot Candidacy: Voter Choice

in the 1992 Presidential Election." American Journal of Political Science 39.3 (1995):

714. Web.

2. "Financing the 1996 Presidential Campaign." Financing the 1996 Presidential Campaign.

N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.

3. Lader, Curt, and Curt Lader. Barron's AP United States Government & Politics 2008 .

Hauppauge, NY: Barron's, 2008. Print.

4. "STATISTICS." 96 PRESIDENTIAL and CONGRESSIONAL ELECTION . N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Dec.

2014.

5. Vigil, Maurilio E. Hispanics and the 1996 Presidential Election. N.p.: n.p., 1997. Print.

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