DOVER — Some notes and old quotes between headlines and deadlines …
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Remember when Delaware proudly wore the bellwether title?
The run started after Delaware had sided with Republican Thomas E. Dewey over Democrat Harry S. Truman in the 1948 election. (Remember the famous erroneous headline, “Dewey defeats Truman” in the Chicago Daily Tribune? Well, it was true for Delaware.)
In presidential elections from 1952 through 1996, the First State was the only state in the nation to back the winning presidential candidates.
That’s all the way from Republican Dwight David Eisenhower to Democrat Bill Clinton.
In 1988, then-Delaware Elections Commissioner John G. Davis Jr. noted that the state had chosen the losing presidential candidate just three times in the 20th century. That year, Delaware was in step with the nation with George H. W. Bush.
It was the last year that Delaware backed a Republican.
“Delaware voters ignored party labels and selected candidates of every political stripe,” he wrote in a post-election report. “It is heartening to see the keen competition between the political parties. Ultimately Delaware citizens are the winners in a truly two-party state.”