HHH, McCarthy vied for nomination

By Tom Hintgen (Contact) | The Daily Journal

Published Monday, January 28, 2008

It appears that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are the two front runners for this year’s Democratic Party nomination. Forty years ago two Minnesotans — Hubert H. Humphrey and Eugene McCarthy — were the two Democratic finalists.

The year of 1968 was one of the most tumultuous times in United States history.

In late 1967 McCarthy, a United States senator opposed to the Vietnam War and known to few people outside Minnesota, announced that he would run against President Lyndon B. Johnson for the nomination of the Democratic Party. Although the press and polls were skeptical that McCarthy's candidacy could effectively contest Johnson's war policy, young people joined the McCarthy bandwagon.

On March 12, 1968, McCarthy won 42 percent in the New Hampshire primary vote. Later that month President Johnson — seeing a gain in McCarthy’s popularity — announced that he would not run for reelection.

After McCarthy successfully challenged LBJ, New York Sen. Robert F. (Bobby) Kennedy announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination. Also joining the race was Minnesotan and LBJ’s Vice President, Hubert H. Humphrey.

Many people who joined McCarthy's effort early on were Kennedy loyalists. After RFK joined the race, many Kennedy supporters urged McCarthy to drop out and support RFK for the nomination.

McCarthy, however, resented the fact that Bobby Kennedy had let him (McCarthy) do the dirty work of challenging LBJ and that RFK only entered the race once it was apparent that President Johnson was vulnerable. McCarthy devoted himself to beating both Kennedy and Humphrey.

McCarthy defeated Kennedy in the Oregon primary on May 28, 1968, while Humphrey campaigned for delegates in non-primary states. The field narrowed to two major candidates after Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles on June 5, 1968, after winning the California primary.

Winning the primaries 40 years ago did not necessarily win delegate votes at the national convention. The delegate selection process was oftentimes separate from the popular vote, and usually controlled by the state party. Consequently — at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago — McCarthy only received 23 percent of the 2,622 votes at which time delegates nominated Humphrey. Chicago — outside the convention building — was marred by war protests and police brutality.

McCarthy did support Humphrey, but not until late in the fall of 1968. By that time Richard Nixon — who said he had a secret plan to end the Vietnam War — was on his way to winning the Presidency in November by a razor thin margin. Alabama’s George Wallace was a third-party candidate that year.

The 1968 election prompted the Democrats to reform the nomination process. Two commissions made several recommendations that were adopted for the 1972 convention.

The number of states which selected convention delegates through primary elections — that reflected the actual vote — increased significantly. The nature of the nominating process was never the same again.

McCarthy left the U.S. Senate in 1972 and moved to rural Virginia where he became an author. Ironically, Humphrey took his place while representing Minnesota in the U.S. Senate. Major U.S. involvement in Vietnam continued for about five more years. Nixon’s secret plan to end the war, according to many critics, turned out to be no viable plan at all.

Humphrey was 66 when he died in 1977 and McCarthy died in 2005 at the age of 89. Both leave noteworthy legacies.

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Tom Hintgen is a reporter with The Daily Journal. His column appears Mondays.