Talk:1960 United States presidential election

Eisenhower campaign

There's a paragraph claiming that Nixon asked Eisenhower to stop campaigning for him because Mrs. Eisenhower thought that it would be fatal to her husband. Is there any source for this because this seems insane? 153.33.157.28 (talk) 04:23, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Changing infobox images to higher quality color ones

I think we should switch the infobox images for Kennedy and Nixon to these two higher quality color images.

1960 United States presidential election

November 8, 1960
537 members of the Electoral College 269 electoral votes needed to win
Turnout	63.8% 3.6 pp
Nominee John F. Kennedy Richard Nixon Party Democratic Republican Home state Massachusetts California Running mate Lyndon B. Johnson Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. Electoral vote 303 219 States carried 22 26 Popular vote 34,220,984 34,108,157 Percentage 49.72% 49.55%
Presidential election results map. Blue denotes states won by Kennedy/Johnson, red denotes those won by Nixon/Lodge, light blue denotes the electoral votes for Byrd/Thurmond by Alabama and Mississippi unpledged electors, and a vote for Byrd/Goldwater by an Oklahoma faithless elector. Numbers indicate the number of electoral votes allotted to each state.
President before election Dwight D. Eisenhower Republican Elected President John F. Kennedy Democratic

The Image Editor (talk) 20:02, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

While the Kennedy image looks okay, I think we should still hold off on updating to colored images until a better image of Nixon is available that doesn’t look like it was colored with AI HistorianL (talk) 17:11, 26 March 2024 (UTC)

yeah we need to change

there is this image btw I think could work

Richard Nixon In 1960

Randompandaeatcake (talk) 03:39, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

The only issue with this is that Kennedy’s photo is anachronistic to the year 1960. Albeit the 1968 election uses a photo of Nixon after he became president. However, I still think the info boxes should avoid using anachronistic portraits. USEditor.2007 (talk) 04:07, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Byrd Wikibox

I actually think he should be in the wikibox but with notes saying it was via unpledged electors, as he was in reality a canidate in the same vein as thurmond and wallace but just not formally Randompandaeatcake (talk) 03:31, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I agree too. There's no reason why Byrd shouldn't be in wikibox. Nppfarcenter (talk) 03:00, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

Byrd was not a candidate himself or nominee of any major party, putting him on the wikibox would disregard precedent for election articles. I understand that 1960 is a special case with unpledged electors being sent to the Electoral College, but I feel that the current map represents this the best it can. Keeping this in mind along with his negligible popular vote score, I support sticking with the status quo for this article. JohnArizona1985 (talk) 04:30, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Mississippi was not won by either party! If we don't put Byrd into wikibox, we should at least do it for unpledged electors. Nppfarcenter (talk) 05:03, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

I would personally support unpledged electors being added to the wikibox as a compromise, precedent exists for this already in previous articles, i.e 1956 in Mississippi and 1944 in Texas. However, there would need to be a way to display that those unpledged electors voted for Byrd without making it look as if Byrd was a candidate in the race, which previous revisions of this article inaccurately gave the impression of. JohnArizona1985 (talk) 05:31, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

I thought a note about them voting for Byrd would be useful Nppfarcenter (talk) 05:58, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

Absolutley I fully agree with you Randompandaeatcake (talk) 21:13, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

I dont think there should be Byrd on the wikibox. The status quo works just fine. Byrd had no campaign and the unpledged electors were just votes for Democratic delegates who could vote however they wanted, they just so happened to vote for Byrd.

Besides, if people are curious as to the nature of the unpledged elector victories, they can just click on Mississippi on the map or read the article. Gelid Lagopus (talk) 11:40, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

@Gelid Lagopus: @Orbitm8693:

Both of you should stop reverting before someone notices and you both get blocked. Orbit, while I think your boldness is commemorable, there does exist a debate on whether Byrd should be included in the infobox. Personally I believe he shouldn't be and as evidence I present " A total of 15 electors – eight from Mississippi, six from Alabama, and one from Oklahoma – all refused to vote for either Kennedy or Nixon, and instead cast their votes for Senator Harry F. Byrd of Virginia, a conservative Democrat, even though he had not been a candidate for president." All other candidates mentioned in any infobox, whether they won a state or not, were all candidates for president. Just because Byrd happened to receive electoral votes from unpleged electors does not make it infobox worthy. This is especially considering Byrd did not win any state (and no, Mississippi does not count.). Let's discuss. TheCartoonEditor_{(he/him/they)} (talk) (contribs) 01:46, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

The situation in Mississippi is completely different: Unpledged elector is not equal to Faithless elector. Byrd won there. Nppfarcenter (talk) 01:49, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

When the voters selected to have the unpledged electors instead of Kennedy, they were basically instructing the electors to vote however they wanted. It wasn't specifically for Byrd, that's just how it ended out. TheCartoonEditor_{(he/him/they)} (talk) (contribs) 01:56, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

In any case, neither Kennedy nor Nixon won Mississippi. I think this means they shouldn't be the only ones on Wikibox. Nppfarcenter (talk) 03:56, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

We should not have Byrd in the wiki box and instead have a thing saying “unpledged electors” on the wiki box, similar to how “uncommitted” apears on wikiboxs for primaries 159.196.168.88 (talk) 03:01, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

You guys need to stop being weird. Harry Byrd wasn't a candidate for president. He never waged a campaign. He won exactly zero states and zero popular votes. The only reason we're even having this discussion is because Harry Byrd happened to be the person the unpledged electors voted for. If you put him on the infobox, your average person is going to see it and think that Byrd was an actual candidate of some sort, like George Wallace or Strom Thurmond, and assume 1960 was a three-way race. We do not want to propagate false notions about this historical event because of lazy infobox design.

The way we do it now is fine. He is on the map, acknowledged as having won electoral votes, but is not listed as an actual candidate, because he wasn't. If you want to put anybody who won electoral votes on the infobox, then go ahead and put Faith Spotted Eagle on the 2016 infobox.

If you really wanted these southern segregationists to be represented on the wiki box, you could have "unpledged electors" listed alongside Kennedy and Nixon. But putting Byrd on the infobox is weird and potentially misleading. Born Isopod (talk) 01:03, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

I think at this point the "unpledged electors" idea seems to be the most agreed upon one by everyone. Should be stylized in the way others were on state wikiboxes. TheCartoonEditor_{(he/him/they)} (talk) (contribs) 16:29, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

The main reason that I feel that adding "unpledged electors" is the best course of action stems from this, it makes it very clear that Byrd was not a candidate in the race and that MI and AL voted for unpledged electors. The current status quo works fine, but allowing the wikibox to clear up this possible misconception is enough to make me support adding unpledged electors to it. JohnArizona1985 (talk) 23:58, 19 April 2024 (UTC)