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1962 United States Senate election in Alabama

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1962 United States Senate election in Alabama

← 1956 November 6, 1962 1968 →
 
Nominee J. Lister Hill James D. Martin
Party Democratic Republican
Popular vote 201,937 195,134
Percentage 50.86% 49.14%

County results
Hill:      50–60%      60–70%      70–80%      80–90%
Martin:      50–60%      60–70%      70–80%

U.S. senator before election

J. Lister Hill
Democratic

Elected U.S. Senator

J. Lister Hill
Democratic

The 1962 United States Senate election in Alabama was held on November 6, 1962 to elect one of Alabama's members to the United States Senate. Incumbent Democratic U.S. Senator J. Lister Hill won re-election to his fifth, and last, full term.

Democratic primary

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Candidates

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Results

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Alabama Democratic senatorial primary, 1962[1]
Candidate Votes Percentage
J. Lister Hill 363,613 73.7%
Donald Gunter Hallmark 72,855 14.8%
John G. Crommelin 56,822 11.5%
Totals 493,290 100.00%

Republican primary

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Candidates

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Results

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James D. Martin ran unopposed in the Republican Primary.

General election

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Candidates

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  • J. Lister Hill, incumbent U.S. Senator since 1938 (Democratic)
  • James D. Martin, businessman (Republican)

Campaign

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In 1962, Hill, a pro-labor New Deal liberal, sought his last term in office but faced an unusually strong Republican opponent in James D. Martin, a petroleum products distributor from Gadsden. Like Hill, Martin supported the Tennessee Valley Authority, a New Deal project begun in 1933. Martin noted that the original sponsor of the inter-state development agency was a Republican U.S. senator, George W. Norris of Nebraska. Martin proposed in the campaign that the TVA headquarters be relocated from Knoxville, Tennessee, to its original point of development, Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Hill had worked to fund other public works projects too, including the deepening of the Mobile Ship Channel, the building of the Gainesville Lock and Dam in Sumter County, and the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, an ultimately successful strategy to link the Tennessee River with the Gulf of Mexico. In the campaign against Martin, Hill said, "If Alabama is to continue the progress and development she has achieved, she cannot do so by deserting the great Democratic Party of Franklin Roosevelt."[2]

Senator Hill pledged to seek renewed funding for the Redstone Arsenal and Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and accused Eisenhower of having neglected the space program while the Soviet Union was placing Sputnik into the atmosphere. Strongly endorsed by organized labor, Hill accused the GOP of exploiting the South to enrich the North and the East and attacked the legacy of former President Herbert C. Hoover and the earlier "evils" of Reconstruction. Hill predicted that Alabama voters would bury the Republicans "under an avalanche."[3]

The 1962 mid-term elections were overshadowed by the Cuban Missile Crisis. Martin joined Hill in endorsing the quarantine of Cuba but insisted that the problem was an outgrowth of the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion of 1961. Hill said that Soviet premier, Nikita S. Khrushchev, had "chickened out" because "the one thing the communists respect is strength."[4] The New York Times speculated that the blockade ordered by Kennedy may have spared Hill from defeat.[5]

Despite the postwar bipartisan consensus for foreign aid, Martin hammered away at Hill's backing for such programs. He decried subsidies to foreign manufacturers and workers at the expense of Alabama's then large force of textile workers: "These foreign giveaways have cost taxpayers billions of dollars and turned many areas of Alabama into distressed areas." Martin also condemned aid to communist countries and the impact of the United Nations on national policy. He questioned Hill's congressional seniority as of little use when troops were dispatched in the fall of 1962 to compel the desegregation of the University of Mississippi.[6]

The Hill-Martin race drew considerable national attention. The liberal columnist Drew Pearson wrote from Decatur, Alabama, that "for the first time since Reconstruction, the two-party system, which political scientists talk about for the South, but never expect to materialize, may come to Alabama."[7]The New York Times viewed the Alabama race as the most vigorous off-year effort in modern southern history but predicted a Hill victory on the basis that Martin had failed to gauge "bread-and-butter" issues and was perceived by many as an "ultraconservative."[8]

Results

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1962 United States Senate election in Alabama[9]
Party Candidate Votes %
Democratic J. Lister Hill (incumbent) 201,937 50.86
Republican James D. Martin 195,134 49.14
Independent Write-in candidates 8[a] 0.00
Invalid or blank votes
Total votes 397,079 100.00
Turnout  
Democratic hold

Results by county

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1962 United States Senate election in Alabama by county[10]
County Joseph Lister Hill
Democratic
James Douglas Martin
Republican
Margin Total votes cast
# % # % # %
Autauga 653 35.32% 1,196 64.68% -543 -29.37% 1,849
Baldwin 2,502 37.04% 4,253 62.96% -1,751 -25.92% 6,755
Barbour 1,088 44.39% 1,363 55.61% -275 -11.22% 2,451
Bibb 1,038 49.76% 1,048 50.24% -10 -0.48% 2,086
Blount 1,961 53.42% 1,710 46.58% 251 6.84% 3,671
Bullock 876 54.48% 732 45.52% 144 8.96% 1,608
Butler 1,291 43.67% 1,665 56.33% -374 -12.65% 2,956
Calhoun 5,270 60.60% 3,426 39.40% 1,844 21.21% 8,696
Chambers 2,285 68.83% 1,035 31.17% 1,250 37.65% 3,320
Cherokee 1,570 82.46% 334 17.54% 1,236 64.92% 1,904
Chilton 2,395 49.33% 2,460 50.67% -65 -1.34% 4,855
Choctaw 413 28.21% 1,051 71.79% -638 -43.58% 1,464
Clarke 902 34.56% 1,708 65.44% -806 -30.88% 2,610
Clay 1,071 59.20% 738 40.80% 333 18.41% 1,809
Cleburne 702 64.23% 391 35.77% 311 28.45% 1,093
Coffee 2,545 56.42% 1,966 43.58% 579 12.84% 4,511
Colbert 4,859 71.09% 1,976 28.91% 2,883 42.18% 6,835
Conecuh 1,226 42.31% 1,672 57.69% -446 -15.39% 2,898
Coosa 686 52.49% 621 47.51% 65 4.97% 1,307
Covington 2,175 43.35% 2,842 56.65% -667 -13.29% 5,017
Crenshaw 1,276 62.83% 755 37.17% 521 25.65% 2,031
Cullman 5,078 54.82% 4,185 45.18% 893 9.64% 9,263
Dale 1,622 47.04% 1,826 52.96% -204 -5.92% 3,448
Dallas 1,539 35.57% 2,788 64.43% -1,249 -28.87% 4,327
DeKalb 5,440 54.66% 4,512 45.34% 928 9.32% 9,952
Elmore 1,693 40.44% 2,493 59.56% -800 -19.11% 4,186
Escambia 1,822 40.46% 2,681 59.54% -859 -19.08% 4,503
Etowah 8,548 57.14% 6,413 42.86% 2,135 14.27% 14,961
Fayette 1,281 55.33% 1,034 44.67% 247 10.67% 2,315
Franklin 3,054 53.78% 2,625 46.22% 429 7.55% 5,679
Geneva 1,415 47.07% 1,591 52.93% -176 -5.85% 3,006
Greene 677 59.91% 453 40.09% 224 19.82% 1,130
Hale 899 53.77% 773 46.23% 126 7.54% 1,672
Henry 910 48.05% 984 51.95% -74 -3.91% 1,894
Houston 1,722 29.64% 4,087 70.36% -2,365 -40.71% 5,809
Jackson 2,996 79.18% 788 20.82% 2,208 58.35% 3,784
Jefferson 34,691 42.41% 47,102 57.59% -12,411 -15.17% 81,793
Lamar 1,104 66.15% 565 33.85% 539 32.29% 1,669
Lauderdale 5,856 70.23% 2,482 29.77% 3,374 40.47% 8,338
Lawrence 2,021 74.91% 677 25.09% 1,344 49.81% 2,698
Lee 1,843 56.43% 1,423 43.57% 420 12.86% 3,266
Limestone 2,522 78.37% 696 21.63% 1,826 56.74% 3,218
Lowndes 340 33.90% 663 66.10% -323 -32.20% 1,003
Macon 1,888 75.01% 629 24.99% 1,259 50.02% 2,517
Madison 7,880 67.63% 3,772 32.37% 4,108 35.26% 11,652
Marengo 633 28.18% 1,613 71.82% -980 -43.63% 2,246
Marion 1,863 53.12% 1,644 46.88% 219 6.24% 3,507
Marshall 3,573 62.94% 2,104 37.06% 1,469 25.88% 5,677
Mobile 17,067 47.95% 18,528 52.05% -1,461 -4.10% 35,595
Monroe 1,370 51.02% 1,315 48.98% 55 2.05% 2,685
Montgomery 7,873 42.03% 10,859 57.97% -2,986 -15.94% 18,732
Morgan 6,125 68.56% 2,809 31.44% 3,316 37.12% 8,934
Perry 600 40.03% 899 59.97% -299 -19.95% 1,499
Pickens 821 39.68% 1,248 60.32% -427 -20.64% 2,069
Pike 1,229 44.55% 1,530 55.45% -301 -10.91% 2,759
Randolph 1,556 62.72% 925 37.28% 631 25.43% 2,481
Russell 821 51.99% 758 48.01% 63 3.99% 1,579
Shelby 2,116 48.04% 2,289 51.96% -173 -3.93% 4,405
St. Clair 2,418 56.89% 1,832 43.11% 586 13.79% 4,250
Sumter 458 35.02% 850 64.98% -392 -29.97% 1,308
Talladega 3,649 53.90% 3,121 46.10% 528 7.80% 6,770
Tallapoosa 1,810 54.44% 1,515 45.56% 295 8.87% 3,325
Tuscaloosa 5,573 57.79% 4,071 42.21% 1,502 15.57% 9,644
Walker 5,597 57.10% 4,205 42.90% 1,392 14.20% 9,802
Washington 644 33.59% 1,273 66.41% -629 -32.81% 1,917
Wilcox 467 38.69% 740 61.31% -273 -22.62% 1,207
Winston 2,049 42.07% 2,822 57.93% -773 -15.87% 4,871
Total 201,937 50.86% 195,134 49.14% 6,803 1.71% 397,071

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^ These write-in votes were not listed by county

References

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  1. ^ http://digital.archives.alabama.gov/cdm/compoundobject/collection/register/id/593/rec/17 |title=Alabama Official and Statistical Register, 1963 |format=PDF
  2. ^ "James Douglas Martin and the Alabama Republican Resurgence," p. 55
  3. ^ The Mobile Register, October 2, 25, and 27, 1962; Walter Dean Burnham, "The Alabama Senatorial Election of 1962: Return of Inter-Party Competition," Journal of Politics, 26 (November 1964), p. 811
  4. ^ Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report, October 12, 1962, p. 1832; Mobile Register, October 24, 1962; The Huntsville Times October 26 and November 2, 1962
  5. ^ The New York Times, November 7, 1962, p. 44
  6. ^ Mobile Register, October 26, 30, and November 1, 1962; Alexander P. Lamis, The Two-Party South (New York, 1984), p. 77.
  7. ^ The Huntsville Times, October 24, 1962
  8. ^ The New York Times, October 31, 1962, p. 14
  9. ^ "1962 Senatorial General Election Results — Alabama". Dave Leip's U.S. Election Atlas.
  10. ^ "AL US Senate, November 06, 1962". Our Campaigns.