THE YEAR THAT BROKE POLITICS

A revisionist view of a momentous election.

Historian Nichter, who received a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship in support of this book, draws on abundant archival sources and interviews with 85 key individuals to create a penetrating examination of the 1968 presidential election, a contest among Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, and former Alabama Gov. George Wallace. Setting the election in the context of the political, social, and economic upheaval that roiled the nation, the author examines the appeal of third-party candidate Wallace; explains Lyndon Johnson’s tepid support for his vice president, Humphrey; and raises questions about the scandal surrounding the ties between Chinese-born socialite Anna Chennault and Nixon. Anti-war and Black Power protests, along with the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Kennedy, “brought a period of national soul-searching.” Wallace, as “the living embodiment of resistance to social change,” appealed to voters fearful of unrest and rising crime. His critics, Nichter argues, “by remaining focused on his racist origins, missed the deeper bonds he was forming with anti-establishment supporters.” The polls consistently showed that Wallace “received high marks for ‘saying it the way it really is,’ and for having ‘the courage of his convictions.’ ” He has proven to be a model, Nichter asserts, for “every conservative who has run for the presidency since 1968.” Whereas Eisenhower endorsed his former vice president, Johnson, with history in mind, “saw the rightward shift of the nation and came to believe that a President Nixon,” rather than Humphrey, “would be better for Lyndon Johnson’s legacy.” While Humphrey struggled to distance himself from Johnson’s policies, Nixon promised Johnson—through go-between Billy Graham—to promote his position in Vietnam peace negotiations. Accusations that Chennault acted for him in preventing peace talks, Nichter has found, are unsubstantiated; Nixon, he asserts, was trying “to rally people toward Johnson’s Vietnam position, not commit treason against it.”

A fresh, authoritative analysis of a pivotal election year.