Did Johnson Cause Humphrey to Lose the 1968 Election?
Who created the artifact?
– Zubeida Mustafa
When was the artifact created?
– First Quarter, 1969
Where was it created?
– In the Pakistan Institute of International Affairs / Pakistan Horizon
Why was the document created?
– To express the author’s take on the Presidential Election of 1968 and the cause for its outcome.
Why is the document a primary source?
– It is the firsthand account of the 1968 Presidential Election.
How trustworthy is the source?
– Very. It is a “non-official, non-party, and non-profit making body”.
What other questions might you ask the source in order to better understand what it reveals about the events of 1968?
Did Nixon win the 1968 election solely because of the public’s views of the Democrats and their policies on the Vietnam War?
I would look for other artifacts that would possibly contain surveys done on the American public to see if they actually felt strongly against the Democratic party during the 1968 election. Also I would wonder if this is the only reason why the Republicans won the election, or did the people who voted for the Republicans strongly believe that they had a better campaign for that voting year. In order to find out more, I would conduct more research and see if there were voting polls taken during that time period, and if so, what the general public thought.
I would also try to find out if the Republicans won because of the Democratic candidate, Hubert Humphrey, or they would have won regardless of who the Democratic candidate was because either (a) Nixon had a stronger campaign, (b) the general public was upset at President Johnson’s actions in the Vietnam War, or (c) Hubert Humphrey was not a very likable candidate and/or his platform was weak.
Thanks, William, for this post. It is intriguing to see a source published in Pakistan, far from the epicenter of the U.S. presidential election. However, this does not qualify as a primary source in the context of answering the question in the assignment (what role did cultural conflict play in the presidential election of 1968). The text does not represent a firsthand account of the election, but instead a published survey of a broad range of events and data. The author does not appear to have been an eyewitness to any of the events, but instead an interpreter of other (primary and secondary) sources.
Also, in what way does this document shed like specifically on the role of cultural conflict in the election?