Dr. Robert Rupp Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Kennedy Visit During 1960 Primary Election In W.Va. Changed Politics

The 1960 Democratic Presidential Primary between John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey was a watershed event in American politics.

Kennedy was the first, and so far only, Catholic president of the United States. He credited West Virginia, which is largely Protestant, for making it happen.

Author and West Virginia Wesleyan College Professor Robert Rupp explored this issue in his new book “The Primary That Made a President: John F. Kennedy and West Virginia.”

He spoke with Eric Douglas via Zoom.

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

Douglas: Why did you feel now was the time to delve into this story?

Rupp: I think it’s a story that hasn’t been told. This is the first book by a historian who has looked at that primary. It has become very influential. Kennedy and his advisors admitted that he had to win West Virginia otherwise, he probably wouldn’t have gotten the nomination and there would have been no Kennedy administration.

Douglas: The other big issue, or the supposed big issue, was Kennedy’s Catholicism. And he took it head on in the campaign. He didn’t sit back and wait for people to question him about it. He addressed it up front and repeatedly.

Rupp: But the interesting thing is, before West Virginia, he didn’t use a confrontational strategy. He would wait until someone in the audience would ask him a question. In West Virginia, out of desperation, he addressed it straight on.

Douglas: What can we learn from that today? Obviously, one of the two candidates for president right now, 60 years later, if elected, will be only the second Catholic elected to the office. Is that even a discussion today?

Rupp: Well, let’s go back to 1960. In 1960, if you were talking about the United States presidency, and who was going to be in the White House. It had to be a white adult, male Protestant. And so Kennedy had to challenge that. Even as late as 1959, almost 20 percent of Americans said they would never vote for a Catholic for president, even if that person was qualified.

What Kennedy did is he challenged that. He told America to open that door. And over the last 60 years, we’ve seen that door open sometimes. But as you said, the irony is Kennedy was the first, and so far the only Catholic who has been elected president. But at least he tore down that barrier.

Douglas: Today, I don’t even know that we stopped to consider that Joe Biden is Catholic. It’s not something that I think most people anyway even stop to consider.

Rupp: If we’re looking for encouraging news, what was part of American presidential politics in 1960, as you said, is not part of it now in 2020. We’re not considering it was an obstacle.

Douglas: What did West Virginia gain from the Kennedy primary? I mean, other than some national attention, both good and ill?

Rupp: Kennedy recognized that he owed a debt to West Virginia. No. 1. No. 2 this a person (Kennedy) who barely ever saw poverty before. And according to the stories and interviews, his time in West Virginia educated him about poverty. And the result is, during his administration, he was the best thing that ever happened to West Virginia in terms of funneling projects and money to help the state. We’re talking about I-79, we’re talking about road-building, we’re talking about the food stamp program.

Douglas: There was a huge discrepancy between the amount of money that Kennedy spent versus the amount of money that Humphrey spent, and that seems to have affected campaigns moving forward as well.

Rupp: The Kennedy campaign in the West Virginia primary contest forecast many of the features that we associate with presidential campaigns today. And probably one of the most disturbing was the amount of money spent. It’s estimated that the Kennedy campaign spent more than a $1 million dollars on this primary and Humphrey barely had a 10th of that.

This allowed Kennedy to outspend Humphrey. Humphrey had no TV ads. Kennedy had TV ads all over the place. Humphrey had virtually no organization, Kennedy set up organization in 35 counties and was fully staffed. Kennedy sent out 100,000 mailers or letters.

So yeah, one of the downsides, when it comes to the future of American politics, was the huge amount of money spent in this small state primary. It really forecast what was going to happen in the rest of the century and now.

This story is part of a series of interviews with authors from, or writing about, Appalachia.

House Leaders Talk Future of Coal, West Virginia's Economy

Our premiere episode includes a discussion with House Speaker Tim Miley and Minority Leader Tim Armstead on a possible change in power in the House of Delegates this fall and their top priorities for the upcoming legislative session.

Dr. Robert Rupp of West Virginia Wesleyan College and Dr. Mary Beth Beller discuss the impact 2012’s redistricting could have on this year’s mid-term races.

We’ll also wrap up of the week’s top political stories during our reporter roundtable.

W.Va. Redistricting Resulted in Simple Swap

The complicated redistricting process prompted by population shifts resulted in one simple change in West Virginia’s congressional districts.

After two legislative committees adjusted political district boundaries to ensure equal representation, and an ensuing lawsuit challenging the plan was dismissed, Mason County was moved from the 2nd to the 3rd congressional district.

A more ambitious draft plan that switched 19 counties among the three congressional districts was rejected.

The 2010 Census showed population growth in the Eastern Panhandle and the Morgantown area and declines in the southern coalfields and the Northern Panhandle.

West Virginia Wesleyan College political science professor Robert Rupp says that while state lawmakers avoided making wholesale swaps in district lines, he expects more dramatic changes after the 2020 Census.

A new generation of West Virginia voters in search of a new party

On a national level, political watchers say West Virginia is on the verge of a big change, one that would pull the state from its traditionally Democratic roots and push it toward a future of Republican leaders and a new generation of young voters might be behind that change.

West Virginians are a proud people, proud most of all of their heritage. Almost any West Virginian can share his or her story of a parent or grandparent who came to the state to work in the factories, steel mills or coal mines to provide for their families.

But a part of that heritage is also political. And most West Virginians will tell you, their parents and grandparents voted blue.

“What we’re finding is when they say that they’re a Democrat, they argue well, my dad was a Democrat or my granddad was a Democrat,” said Dr. Robert Rupp, professor of history at West Virginia Wesleyan College. “There’s a reluctance, one, to break with that tradition and also a kind of continuance of what’s being handed down from generation to generation.”

Rupp said that has been the trend for at least three generations in West Virginia, my grandparents voted Democrat, my parents voted Democrat so I vote Democrat.

But in the state, the tendency to vote blue is beginning to change, at least at the federal level. The state hasn’t been won by a Democratic candidate for President since 1996 with Bill Clinton, two of the three seats in the U.S. House are held by Republicans and, next year, the state could possibly see its first Republican U.S. Senator since the late 1950s.

“So, there’s a real question over whether these people are ultimately going to change their identity and become Republicans or whether there is enough of the Democratic Party in West Virginia’s heritage that they will continue to be Democrats,” said National Political Correspondent for The Washington Post Karen Tumulty, “at least in name.”

Tumulty’s article, “A Blue State’s Road to Red,” focuses on the transition in party power in southern West Virginia.

“West Virginians are so conservative they vote Democrat out of tradition,” said state Republican Party Chairman Conrad Lucas.

Lucas said that tradition is what’s hindering his party’s success at the state and local levels. West Virginians are so proud of their heritage they don’t want to let it go, but Lucas said his party is slowly starting to see a change.

“I come from a long line of Lincoln County Democrats myself, so we see younger people in West Virginia being more willing to vote Republican than those who have been voting Democrat for so many generations, for election after election and wanting to stay with their party,” he said, “but it’s younger folks who realizing that the values of the national and state Democrat Party don’t align with their belief systems.”

Rupp said nearly 60 percent of a person’s party identification is based on family, but in West Virginia, the inclination to vote blue is starting to change, in part, Rupp said just as Lucas sees it, because of a new generation of voters. Millennials.

"What we seem to be finding is that most Americans, but particularly this generation, are socially liberal and conservative on fiscal issues. Mainly, they want a small government and lower taxes and they want that same small government to keep out of their private affairs." – Dr. Robert Rupp

“What we seem to be finding is that most Americans, but particularly this generation, are socially liberal and conservative on fiscal issues,” Rupp said. “Mainly, they want a small government and lower taxes and they want that same small government to keep out of their private affairs.”

“The difficulty is that neither the Republican nor Democratic Party appears to offer both of those conditions. So, we have a generation that’s kind of up for grabs. That’s skeptical.”

The transition, however, is happening at a slower rate than many other southern states that went through the same political shift decades ago. For example, Rupp said Georgia took less than a decade to transition from a solidly blue to solidly red state.

Part of the reason Rupp accounted to the age of the average West Virginian. If the party switch is being pushed by the young voter, with the oldest median age of any state in the country, it’s easy to see why the transition may take longer here than the rest of the south.

And then there’s participation. Tumulty said young, West Virginia voters’ participation rates are among the lowest in the nation.

“If you look at those voter turnout numbers, last year voter turnout among the young plummeted in West Virginia. Certainly, I talked to young people, I saw young people, but they more than any element of the population in West Virginia seem to be the ones who are just turning their backs on politics,” she said, “and I think those voter turnout numbers speak volumes to that.”

Low turnout may be because young voters feel outnumbered in an older state or maybe because they don’t seem to fit with either party. Rupp said either could be true, but if the parties can get Millenials involved in the election process again, he believes we will see a change in results.

“I think that is going to contribute, maybe not for a transition from Democrat to totally Republican, but it will mean more divided ballots. It will mean voting will be based on pragmatic issues rather than ideological issues or party issues,” Rupp said.

“I think that way, if we do see this transition happening, the key role will be what is this generation of young voters who’s basically parents and grandparents continued allegiance to the Democratic Party and now they’re questioning if that allegiance should go. I think the fact that we have a split level shows that we are living in very interesting times.”

Rupp said another contributing factor to the change in politics for young voters is the decreasing importance young people see in unions.

Once a major part of the state’s economic and political processes, Rupp said unions are becoming less important as we move away from an industry based economy, having less influence over a new generation in the workforce.

W.Va.’s political center shifting north from a once booming south

Southern West Virginia has traditionally been a Democratic stronghold, but an article in The Washington Post said that is starting to change.

With a decline in the coal industry’s production and a President enacting stronger regulations on it, the politics are shifting toward the right, at least, that’s what the article claims. But can it be said that a trend in southern West Virginia is actually happening across the entire state?

“Just about everybody you talk to can tell you of a grandfather or a great grandfather who actually came to West Virginia to make a life for themselves and their family and find economic opportunity in the coal mines,” said Karen Tumulty, national political correspondent for The Washington Post.

She spent time this summer traveling southern West Virginia, talking to people.

“The coal miner is just such a part of the shared heritage of West Virginia. The industry has a significance, I think, that goes much, much deeper than economic statistics will tell,” she said.

But as the industry struggles, West Virginians often look to place the blame, and State Democratic Party Chairman Larry Puccio said today, that blame is being shifted to Washington.

“The truth of the matter is I think that West Virginians believe not only the President is not doing enough to support the coal industry,” he said, “but they truly believe the President, with some of his beliefs and restrictions are harming the industry.”

Puccio said leaders from his party inside the beltway are making it clear they stand against the President and his position on coal, but with each election, the Democratic Party in West Virginia appears to be growing weaker as more and more Republicans are taking office. At least, that’s how Tumulty depicted the party in her article, “A Blue State’s Road to Red.”

“The southern part of the state has traditionally been the most deeply Democratic part of the state,” Tumulty said. “That is where the Democratic Party has always gotten the bulk of the votes with which it won statewide.”

But she added that trend is changing.

At the federal level, West Virginians are slowly turning away from their Democratic roots and voting Republican. She wrote, “What’s happening in West Virginia runs against the tide nationally, and even more, against the pull of its own history.”

“If I have difficulty with the story, it is it’s concentration on the narrative in southern West Virginia,” said Dr. Robert Rupp, professor of history at West Virginia Wesleyan College.

"Fifty years ago, southern West Virginia was the key economic driver, it was the key to the Democratic Party, it held political power, but now in the 21st century, we have seen a rapid decline in all those factors in terms of population, in terms of the economy and in terms of political clout." – Dr. Robert Rupp

He questioned Tumulty’s ability to assert the entire state is experiencing this change in party when she focused only on one region.

“Now, 50 years ago, southern West Virginia was the key economic driver, it was the key to the Democratic Party, it held political power,” he said, “but now in the 21st century, we have seen a rapid decline in all those factors in terms of population, in terms of the economy and in terms of political clout.”

“So, if you just visit this one section where there is decline in West Virginia, it’s an interesting narrative to ask how those citizens are reacting, but I think it’s a warped strategy because you’re ignoring what’s happening in the rest of the state.”

Rupp said the political center of the state is moving in a northeastern direction. Earl Ray Tomblin is the first governor since 1965 to truly come from southern West Virginia and today, both the state House and Senate are lead by northerners.

“If you’re really talking about looking at an entire state, then why visit those counties that have lost population rather than visit those counties that have gained in population and gained in the economy,” Rupp said. “There’s an entire picture of West Virginia that is lost to a national audience when the focus of outside journalists are simply on one area in the southern part.”

Tumulty counters by noting she interviewed members of the Governor’s staff who represent the entire state, both U.S. Senators who, again, together represent the entire state and writes of the booming shale industry in the northern counties and a panhandle thriving as suburb of D.C.

“What I was looking for was a way of explaining the transformation and again most of that transformation has been happening in the very deeply Democratic bastions of coal country,” she said.

Rupp, however, said he does agree with Tumulty’s thesis that the state is transitioning between the two political parties, after all the 3rd Congressional District is the only remaining seat in the U.S. House held by a Democrat in West Virginia.

Historically, he said, West Virginia is joining in with its southern cousins who followed the trend decades ago, but believes the other regions of West Virginia are still important to understanding the political change.

“I think if we really want to understand this transition, we have to be able to examine and explore what is happening politically in the other sections of the state, particularly in the panhandle,” Rupp said. “That’s the fastest growing region and any political party that is able to get the edge in that region will probably dominate the state just as the Democrats were able to get the edge in the southern part of the state and were able to dominate the state for such a long time.”

Tumulty said West Virginia will be a state to watch come the 2016 election. She contended there’s still a chance the right type of Democrat could win the states vote for President and make a difference, even though it only carries 5 votes.

“Well, if Al Gore had had those five votes he’d be building his presidential library about now.”