Talk:1792 United States presidential election

Jefferson as VP?
Jefferson received 4 electoral votes, from the new state Kentucky. Was there some sort of miscommunication or something with regards to the wanted DR VP (apparently Clinton)?

Also, didn't the fact that Jefferson was from Virginia make him ineligible to serve as VP to Washington (another Virginian)? This should probably be noted somehow.--Tim Thomason 23:34, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Really? Can you enlighten me a little? I don't recall any requirements banning candidates from the same state as the presidential candidate's running for the VP office. Please talk to me on my talkpage. Pieuvre (talk) 09:13, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Washington's Political Party (if any)?
I remember reading years ago in The Complete Book of US Presidents (1982) that Washington was a Federalist. But in this article's infobox he is said to have had no party affiliation. If the party fields are left blank, the one for the Incumbent Pres stays blank, but the one for Pres-elect automatically says "To Be Determined"; why? And if the parameter for the party fields is "None," both will show up as "No Party," but both will also link to the article titled "Nothing" (a redirect from "None"). Roxtar 06:08, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

The reference to Washington as a Federalist probably refers to his stance on the US Constitution, not his political party. In the 1787-88 ratification fight, a federalist was someone who supported the ratification of the Constitution (those who opposed it were antifederalists). The Federalist Party founded by Alexander Hamilton to support his agenda in the new Congress did include some of the old federalists, but they were not the same group and not all federalists joined the Federalist Party (for example, James Madison, who had been instrumental in getting the Constitution ratified, opposed the Federalists in Congress). Washington, who opposed political "factions", did not join the Federalist Party, but had presided over the Constitutional Convention and supported its ratification, and is thus often considered a federalist. Also, he generally sided with Federalist Alexander Hamilton on policy issues, making him in a sense a de facto Federalist.Nathaniel Greene (talk) 18:52, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Dates?
Why are there no dates listed for this election. Washington was re-elected on Dec. 3rd. Were there any other key dates that need mentioning?

Record low turnout

 * Only 13,332 popular votes were cast for presidential electors, creating a record low for United States presidential election turnout that has not yet been broken.

I'm sure newspapers of the day led with this headline and the voters hung their heads in shame. Tempshill (talk) 23:15, 7 November 2008 (UTC)


 * An interesting idea. As it turns out, though, the popular vote of 1792 was not compiled until about 1995 when Phil Lampi of the American Antiquarian Society did the research. Chronicler3 (talk) 02:28, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Considering that the president was still picked by the legislature in every state at this point, it's not shocking. Total turnout has improved, to my knowledge, every consequtive presidential election. –Cg-realms (talk • contribs) 01:51, 8 September 2009 (EST)


 * Six states held popular election of Presidential Electors in 1792. Nine states chose Electors by legislative appointment. The numbers here are the sum of the popular votes for slates of Presidential Electors. Here is an overview of the popular vote of 1792. Chronicler3 (talk) 15:08, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Electoral Map
Should there really be electoral maps for presidential elections prior to 1804? The current map only shows electoral votes cast for Washington, 69 of the 138 cast. Before ratification of the Twelfth Amendment, the electoral votes of every state would necessarily be split. –Cg-realms (talk • contribs) 01:49, 8 September 2009 (EST)

page is confusing
reading through the article, it is extremely unclear how the voting went and was tallied in this election. Several statements and charts in the article seem to contradict each other, particularly concerning the selection of the vice president. Someone who understands in depth how this election was conducted should review the whole article for consistency, coherence. Jvol (talk) 00:47, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Connecticut Western Reserve
The map should show that the Connecticut Western Reserve still belonged to Connecticut at the time. Whoop whoop pull up Bitching Betty 21:21, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Navigation section?
Is there a reason that we have a subsection called "Navigation" for the template with all the inauguration articles? Most wiki articles have no such section, and just have templates sit right above the categories. Thanks KConWiki (talk) 04:06, 28 June 2013 (UTC)

Proposed Change to 'Candidates' Section
In the 'candidates' section, this article makes a distinction between presidential and vice-presidential candidates. Election rules at the time, however, did not make this distinction: presidential electors were forbidden to specify which of their votes was cast for president and which for vice-president. Regardless as to whether Washington was the intended Presidential candidate, election laws of the time did not specify that, and the distinction in this article is misleading. To another end, it is impossible for us to judge the will of all 69 electors: some might very well have intended Adams or Clinton to be President, with Washington as vice-president.

I propose a general candidates section with the candidates divided by party, not by presumed office sought, with a note at the top explaining why Washington is considered to have run unopposed (one vote from every elector). This would maintain the general thesis of the article and most scholars while staying out of the messy business of interpreting the intent of men who have been dead for 200 years.

I will wait a few weeks or so to see if anyone has any objections and then make the change. Nathaniel Greene (talk) 19:25, 25 July 2013 (UTC)

Running Mates
Should a running mate for Washington really be listed in the infobox? This seems inconsistent with the electoral system of the time, which made no such distinction. Nathaniel Greene (talk) 22:22, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

French Revolution as backdrop
The article makes the error common to political science of blaming the partisanship of the time on domestic issues such as the national bank. The French Revolution inspired the bulk of the pamphleteering and bickering among the people (ie voters); Washington's policy of neutrality was unpopular at the time (but hardly made him vulnerable, of course). The Hamiltonian/Jeffersonian argument was more of a chattering classes favorite, the result of which could be undone by a future election... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.222.85.87 (talk) 20:33, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 09:38, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Washington's affiliation
United States presidential election, 1788–89 lists Washington's affiliation as |Independent, while this article lists Nonpartisan. While both are accurate, I think we should pick one for consistency's sake. Which do you prefer? Zeldafanjtl (talk) 21:21, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

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1792 Election Washington Being A Federalist
[copied from my discussion page] In 1792 Washington Ran For Re-Election As A Federalist And Won But In 1788 He Ran As Independent And Won Jed Mek 25 (talk) 22:14, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Source? Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 22:22, 29 October 2018 (UTC)
 * [copied from my discussion page] If You Litteraly Search In Wikepidia Federalist Party And Look In Elections It Shows You That In 1792 George Washington Was A Federalist Jed Mek 25 (talk) 22:36, 29 October 2018 (UTC)


 * From that article:
 * The only Federalist President was John Adams. George Washington was broadly sympathetic to the Federalist program, but he remained officially non-partisan during his entire presidency.  Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 22:48, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

I Mean Electoral History In The Federalist Party Wikepidia Jed Mek 25 (talk) 22:51, 29 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Read this WP:RSPRIMARY (i.e. "Thus, Wikipedia articles (and Wikipedia mirrors) in themselves are not reliable sources for any purpose") as well as the entire article. When I asked for a source I meant a source outside of wikipedia. I brought this issue up on the discussion page at Talk:George Washington and another editor brought up two reliable sources supporting my view.  You can demonstrate a willingness to be a serious editor by reverting yourself although I've seen way too many new editors get stubborn without taking the time to learn the rules of wikipedia. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 01:12, 30 October 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:07, 29 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Gilbert Stuart Williamstown Portrait of George Washington.jpg

Reliable popular vote figures from before 1824 are not available
I find it quite bizarre that Wikipedia has actually claimed popular vote figures in presidential elections from before 1824, likely fudged from another website. I have deleted dubious popular vote references from the 1820 and 1816 elections. A request for comment would be very helpful. Classicalfan626 (talk) 23:41, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Electoral votes needed to win
The article states that 68 electoral votes were needed to win. 132 electors cast votes. But the smallest possible majority out of 132 is 67, not 68. Am I missing something? Chuck (talk) 00:28, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Depiction of Maine in the Electoral Map
The depiction of the border of the part of Massachusetts that is now Maine is incorrectly depicted as the modern border. It is depicted correctly from 1804 onward, gaining its modern shape in 1844 after the Webster-Ashburton Treaty that ended the Aroostook War. I encourage someone who is more skilled and familiar with these maps attempt to fix this. I know it's difficult given the weird borders of the states and territories in these early elections. Discuss the issue here. Mdewman6 (talk) 01:44, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Inclusion of John Adams in infobox
I understand the premise of adding Adams to the infobox, as he indeed earned electoral votes, and wasn't necessarily Washington's running mate in the modern sense, at least not in 1788-89. Yet, this creates problems. First, the leads of the pages for both that election and this election indicate that Washington won unanimously (in that, he had unanimous support from every elector, but of course did not receive every electoral vote). Second, here the infobox states "67 electoral votes needed to win" and that Adams received 77 votes. Of course, the problem here is that in the pre-12th amendment elections, a majority was necessary for being elected president but was not sufficient, because you also had to have the most votes (see Necessity and sufficiency). This distinction disappeared under the 12th amendment because anyone with a majority of votes for each office would necessarily also have the most. So, perhaps we need to change how the electoral vote is summarized in the infobox for these pre-12th amendment elections. I did not revert your edits, but it might be best to leave the VP out of the infobox to avoid confusion, as is the case with post-12th amendment elections. For example, though lots of people received electoral votes in 1796, the infobox for that page is limited to the two major presidential contenders from the two parties, with their running mates simply listed without their electoral vote tallies or portraits. Mdewman6 (talk) 21:48, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

George Washington
Washington did not run unopposed for his first or second term. In the first election, there were thirteen people vying for the election. In the second election there were five people running for the election. 69.92.26.42 (talk) 23:24, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

Popular vote figures
Linking to a discussion on the talk page for 1788-89 cause this article has the same problem there is no way Massachusetts has 20,000+ votes Wowzers122 (talk) 23:56, 10 July 2024 (UTC)