Political Viewpoints
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In late September 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson phoned U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie to check on the Maine political climate.
In a typical year, the news would have been gloomy for the party. Democratic presidential nominees had carried the state only once in more than 100 years. Before Muskie, Maine had not re-elected a member of their party to the Senate since before the Civil War.
Things were different that fall, and Muskie and Johnson could hardly believe it. State polls showed Johnson leading Sen. Barry Goldwater, his Republican opponent, by almost 50 points.
“I haven’t been able to find anybody who’s unhappy with me at this point except my opponent,” Muskie said, referring to U.S. Rep. Clifford McIntire, a Republican from Aroostook County.
“It’s unbelievable, isn’t it?” Johnson mused.
Maine is a famously countercyclical political state. In 1936, it joined only Vermont in spurning Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s re-election bid. In the 1974 midterms marked by Watergate-related backlash to Richard Nixon, young Republican David Emery unseated a Democratic congressman.
Two decades later, the “Republican Revolution” gave that party control of Congress, yet Democrat John Baldacci flipped Maine’s 2nd District. After splitting the state with Joe Biden four years ago, Susan Collins is the only U.S. senator since 2012 to prevail when the opposition party’s presidential candidate won the state.
Yet there are times when the national environment can overwhelm local politics, as 1964 demonstrated. Sixty years later, we are seeing a similar phenomenon with the chaotic race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Muskie attributed the Democratic margins to Maine voters lacking confidence in an “irresponsible” Goldwater. That was understandable. Goldwater voted against the Civil Rights Act. His convention speech was widely attacked for celebrating extremism. He was cavalier about using nuclear weapons. The result was an electorate that Johnson believed would “know who they ought to be scared of without our ever saying so.”
Johnson tallied a 37-point victory in Maine. Muskie won by almost as much. Future Democratic Sen. William Hathaway easily captured McIntire’s House seat, and future Democratic Gov. Ken Curtis missed unseating a Republican congressman by just 203 votes.
Trump is far more popular than Goldwater. But much like his 1964 counterpart, his polarizing nature has made all contests at least in part a referendum on his fitness for office.
Sen. Angus King remains Maine’s most popular federal officeholder, but an August poll showed his favorability cratering among Republicans. CNalysis, which tracks state legislative contests, has forecast a result mirroring attitudes toward Trump, as if Maine were two states. Caught in the middle of this in Maine’s highest-profile contest, U.S. Rep. Jared Golden — one of the few Democrats to represent an area carried by Trump — risks defeat in the 2nd District.
A generation ago, there were dozens of figures in Congress like Golden: talented politicians whose centrist voting records insulated them from local distrust of their national party. Now there are no more than a handful. Politics is dominated by reflexive partisans.
Regardless of the presidential outcome, Trump won’t be on the ballot again. Will the national environment he fostered continue to affect state politics? We can look to 1964.
No Democratic presidential nominee has ever approached Johnson’s margin in Maine. The Republicans carried the state in five straight elections between 1972 and 1988. Yet Maine never reverted to the solid Republican state it previously had been. Democrats have won every presidential election here since 1992.
Some Trump-era changes seem permanent. It’s hard to imagine a Democrat other than Golden carrying the 2nd District anytime soon. A state that leans Democratic seems unlikely for much longer to support a Republican senator, even one with Collins’ reputation for independence.
As politics becomes more nationalized, perhaps elections like 1964 and 2024 will become the norm. If so, states like Maine will lose their political distinctiveness.
