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Caprice's Maps and What-Not

In 1861, the United States had a minor issue called the American Civil War, in which the bottom right third-or-so split off from the country because they were worried that president-elect Abraham Lincoln would stop them from having slaves. They set up the Confederate States of America, and here are the districts used for their House of Representatives.

House.png

Missouri was meant to have 13 districts, but the pro-Confederate government was in no way able to draw up 13 districts and so they just used the old seven districts used in the US House of Representatives in the 1850s. South Carolina also used their old districts, as they kept having six representatives.

Confederate elections were non-partisan, and so I have not properly mapped any of them.
 
I am slowly making my way through Delaware's State Senate elections. The State Senate has been elected to staggered terms ever since it was first established in 1776, and they have been screwing it up since 1832.

Up until 1898, three senators were elected from each county. Originally, they were elected to three-year terms, one elected from each county every year. This is the only valid way to have staggered terms for your legislature. However, Delaware changed to having elections on even years only in 1832, and as such changed senatorial terms to four years, one-third elected on presidential election years and two-thirds elected on off years. Michael J. Dubin says in his book that half were elected every two years. This is objectively wrong.

In 1898, senatorial districts were implemented and the size of the legislature was increased to 17. Seven of these seats were elected on presidential election years, and ten on off-years. Delaware went on to not redistrict until the Supreme Court gave all the states an intervention in the lead-up to the 1964 election. This is why, in 1954, the first district of New Castle had nearly 25,000 votes, while the seventh district had less than two thousand. Which brings us to the subject of this map.

The Republicans had controlled the Senate since the 1928 election. During the 30s and 40s, the political system shifted so that the 10 midterm districts mostly tended to vote Republican, while the 7 main year districts tended to vote Democratic. Eventually, however, in 1950, the Democrats managed to get a 9-8 majority, but this was lost in 1952, when the Republicans won 3 out of the 7 districts up for election that year, bringing them to a 10-7 majority.

Then, in 1954, the Democrats managed to win eight of the ten seats up for election that year (with 51% of the vote), giving them a 12-5 majority. In 1956, due to the Republicans not fielding a candidate in New Castle's 2nd district (the first time since 1878 that there had not been a Republican candidate in any district), it was mathematically impossible for them to regain control over the Senate. Instead, they lost a seat, bringing the Democratic majority up to 13-4. The Democrats won about 59.5% of the vote in 1956. There were no known third-party candidates in either election.

1954.png
1956.png
 
I've moved on to Pennsylvania. Here's 2018's State House election.
2018.png

Republicans: 110 seats, 45.71% among 149 candidates
Democrats: 93 seats, 53.79% among 180 candidates

Libertarians: .18% among 10 candidates
Greens: .15% among 2 candidates
Independent: .11% among 1 candidate
No Affiliation: .07% among 1 candidate.

Pennsylvania has this thing where there's no real dedicated independent party label, and so the independent candidates tend to split between "Independent" and "No Affiliation". At least it's not New Jersey.
 
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2004.png
The 2004 State House elections.

Republicans: 110 seats, 51.83% among 157 candidates
Democrats: 93 seats, 47.46% among 145 candidates

Libertarians: .36% among 12 candidates
Greens: .30% among 10 candidates
Action and Accountability: .12% among 1 candidate
51st Independent Delegation: .08% among 1 candidate
Independents: .03% among 2 candidates
Constitution: .02% among 1 candidate
Whatever on earth Theresa Merli's party label was (GRO): .02% among 1 candidate
Reform: .00% among 1 candidate
Socialist Workers: .00% among 1 candidate

Of note is the 51st district in Fayette County, which saw four major candidates due to Democratic primary loser Tim Mahoney running a sore loser campaign and Gary Gearing doing whatever on earth he did. The results there are as follows:

Larry Roberts (Democratic): 7742 votes (35.46%)
Tim Mahoney (Action and Accountability): 5918 votes (27.11%)
Gary Gearing (51st Independent Delegation): 3826 votes (17.53%)
Harry Albert (Republican): 3732 votes (17.09%)

Terry Janosek (Independent): 613 votes (2.81%)

Mahoney went to win the primary in 2006, and would be elected in every election until 2016.
 
Very nice work @Caprice !

Tagging @Ciclavex to make him aware of the PA maps. (As someone who did a 2018 one myself, I feel your pain in tracing those districts...)

Thanks! Tracing the districts was a pain, but so was shoving labels into as many of the small districts as I could to avoid having to make insets. Granted, I failed with Philadelphia, but at least I succeeded with Pittsburgh.
 
I made a map of the electoral vote in the first United States presidential election. There was no particularly thorough political party system at the time, though Pennsylvania and Maryland had opposing federalist and antifederalist slates. New York probably also would've had them had the legislature not torn itself up over how to choose electors, so they had to sit out the election. The main contest was in the choice of electors, as the biggest obstacle to Washington's acclamation was Washington himself.

1789.png
 
In the 1788-89 presidential election, Massachusetts had an... interesting system. Essentially, the legislature chose electors, but the candidates for elector were determined by a popular vote held three weeks before the legislative vote. Each voter would choose two candidates from his congressional district, and the legislature would choose one of the top two candidates from each district, as well as two at-large electors. The original plan was for the legislature to choose two at-large electors who had gotten no popular vote. Then, two days before the vote was to happen, they received, essentially, the following returns.

1586117147000.png

Everyone anyone could think of nominating as an at-large elector had already gotten votes, so the day before the election the election law was changed to allow people who got votes to be chosen as at-large electors, and so the election went normally. Somehow, this was not the worst federal election scheme that Massachusetts used in the late 18th century.
 
Popular Vote (county).png

I have finished the 1788-9 presidential election in my elections database. This election featured such things as:

- Massachusetts's amendment of the electoral law the day before the election (see the last post)
- Fayette County, Pennsylvania, just cancelling the election because not enough people showed up
- The New Hampshire state legislature holding a vote on whether to determine the electors by lot (after the popular vote had returned no majorities)
- The New York state legislature completely missing the deadline for choosing electors because the two houses, controlled by different parties, couldn't agree on whether each house should have to agree on the same electors separately or vote on electors in a combined session

About fifty thousand votes were cast, but the exact number cannot be determined. This is because every state either gave each voter multiple votes (NH, MA, PA, MD) or misplaced a significant portion of its electoral returns (DE, VA). Only two states (PA, MD) had any sort of partisan contest, and the slates were often somewhat loose in structure, which some counties being won by members of both slates (Worcester County, Maryland, being a particularly egregious example). However, the entire federalist slate was elected in both states.

The Wikipedia map for this election shows the federalists winning every county. This is because Michael J. Dubin, the only person as of right now to publish a book on pre-1824 presidential election results by county, counted the highest-voted elector in each state. However, in both states here, the highest-voted elector had been nominated by both the federalists and the anti-federalists, which generally meant they got about as many votes as both of them combined. This, therefore, does not properly outline their respective strengths.
 
In 1861, the United States had a minor issue called the American Civil War, in which the bottom right third-or-so split off from the country because they were worried that president-elect Abraham Lincoln would stop them from having slaves. They set up the Confederate States of America, and here are the districts used for their House of Representatives.

View attachment 18004

Missouri was meant to have 13 districts, but the pro-Confederate government was in no way able to draw up 13 districts and so they just used the old seven districts used in the US House of Representatives in the 1850s. South Carolina also used their old districts, as they kept having six representatives.

Confederate elections were non-partisan, and so I have not properly mapped any of them.
Does northwestern Texas have no districts on account of it being unpopulated back then, or what?
 
Thanks! Tracing the districts was a pain, but so was shoving labels into as many of the small districts as I could to avoid having to make insets. Granted, I failed with Philadelphia, but at least I succeeded with Pittsburgh.
I had the exact same thought process and reluctant concession on Philadelphia when I did mine...also excellent work on those early presidential election maps, there'll never be a completely unambiguous way of representing those votes...
 
I revised my map style somewhat; here's the 2018 Maine State House election for an example.

State House.png

Democrats: 89 seats, 52.76% w/ 139 candidates
Republicans: 57 seats, 42.89% w/ 137 candidates
Independents*: 3 seats, 2.94% w/ 15 candidates
Common Sense**: 2 seats, 1.00% w/ 3 candidates

Green Independents: .38% w/ 6 candidates
Libertarians: .03% w/ 1 candidate

* Fusion of Independent (2 seats, 11 candidates), Independent for Maine (1 seat, 1 candidate), Unenrolled (2 candidates), and People's Unenrolled Independent (1 candidate).
** Fusion of Common Sense Independent (1 seat, 2 candidates) and Candid Common Sense (1 seat, 1 candidate).
 
I revised my map style somewhat; here's the 2018 Maine State House election for an example.

View attachment 19872

Democrats: 89 seats, 52.76% w/ 139 candidates
Republicans: 57 seats, 42.89% w/ 137 candidates
Independents*: 3 seats, 2.94% w/ 15 candidates
Common Sense**: 2 seats, 1.00% w/ 3 candidates

Green Independents: .38% w/ 6 candidates
Libertarians: .03% w/ 1 candidate

* Fusion of Independent (2 seats, 11 candidates), Independent for Maine (1 seat, 1 candidate), Unenrolled (2 candidates), and People's Unenrolled Independent (1 candidate).
** Fusion of Common Sense Independent (1 seat, 2 candidates) and Candid Common Sense (1 seat, 1 candidate).
Excellent work - I started a Maine house map once but gave up halfway through tracing the basemap.
 
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