1892 United States presidential election in North Dakota explained

See main article: 1892 United States presidential election.

The 1892 United States presidential election in North Dakota took place on November 8, 1892. As North Dakota had been admitted to the Union as the 39th state on November 2, 1889, this was the first presidential election in which North Dakota cast electoral votes. All contemporary 44 states were part of the 1892 United States presidential election. Voters chose three electors to the Electoral College, which selected the president and vice president.

In 1892, the Populist nominees, James B. Weaver of Iowa and his running mate James G. Field of Virginia, won a plurality of the votes of North Dakota. However, the state Democratic Party also endorsed the Weaver/Field ticket in exchange for the Populists supporting Democratic candidates for local offices, creating a fusion ticket.^[1] In North Dakota, Weaver and Field's opponents were the Republican nominees, incumbent President Benjamin Harrison of Indiana and his running mate Whitelaw Reid of New York.

As was often the case in this era, voters in North Dakota had to choose electors individually rather than as a slate.^[2] While it was a Democratic-Populist elector who earned the most votes with 17,700, the 17,519 recorded by the top Republican elector was enough to edge out the bottom-finishing Fusion elector for third place overall. This created a split delegation of electors. With the overall national result not in doubt, the two Fusion electors ultimately split their votes (one for Weaver and one for Democratic president-elect Grover Cleveland, who was not separately on the ballot) while the Republican elector duly voted for the defeated incumbent Harrison. This is the only time in a US presidential election that a state has equally distributed its electoral votes between three candidates. A state had only cast electoral votes for 3 different candidates twice before, in 1824 (New York cast votes for four) and 1872, the latter due to the death of Horace Greeley. Since 1892, the only time a state has cast electoral votes for more than two candidates was in 2016, when both Washington and Texas did so. However, both of those situations involved faithless electors, meaning this remains (as of) the last time a state's voters duly elected presidential electors who vote more or less as pledged for three different candidates.

Results

1892 United States presidential election in North Dakota[3]
Party		Candidate	Votes	Percentage	Electoral votes
	People's	James Weaver	17,700	49.01%	1
	Republican	Benjamin Harrison (incumbent)	17,519	48.50%	1
	Democratic	Grover Cleveland	Not on the ballot	N/A	1
	Prohibition	John Bidwell	899	2.49%	0
Totals			36,118	100.00%	3
Voter turnout					—

Results by county

County[4]	Benjamin Harrison Republican		James Baird Weaver[5] Populist/Democratic Fusion		John Bidwell[6] Prohibition		Margin		Total votes cast
	data-sort-type="number" width="9%"		data-sort-type="number" width="9%"	%	data-sort-type="number" width="11%"		data-sort-type="number" width="11%"	%		data-sort-type="number" width="9%"		data-sort-type="number" width="9%"	%	data-sort-type="number" width="9%"		data-sort-type="number" width="9%"	%
	Barnes		665		41.02%		918		56.63%		38		2.34%		-253		-15.61%		1,621
	Benson		419		68.80%		175		28.74%		15		2.46%		244		40.07%		609
	Billings		47		73.44%		17		26.56%		0		0.00%		30		46.88%		64
	Bottineau		175		37.15%		290		61.57%		6		1.27%		-115		-24.42%		471
	Burleigh		640		68.60%		283		30.33%		10		1.07%		357		38.26%		933
	Cass		2,022		53.98%		1,647		43.97%		77		2.06%		375		10.01%		3,746
	Cavalier		297		25.34%		855		72.95%		20		1.71%		-558		-47.61%		1,172
	Dickey		509		43.39%		647		55.16%		17		1.45%		-138		-11.76%		1,173
	Eddy		202		51.40%		184		46.82%		7		1.78%		18		4.58%		393
	Emmons		278		67.48%		132		32.04%		2		0.49%		146		35.44%		412
	Foster		192		54.08%		157		44.23%		6		1.69%		35		9.86%		355
	Grand Forks		1,639		51.27%		1,483		46.39%		75		2.35%		156		4.88%		3,197
	Griggs		245		41.88%		332		56.75%		8		1.37%		-87		-14.87%		585
	Kidder		224		60.87%		136		36.96%		8		2.17%		88		23.91%		368
	LaMoure		338		42.62%		436		54.98%		19		2.40%		-98		-12.36%		793
	Logan		87		70.73%		35		28.46%		1		0.81%		52		42.28%		123
	McHenry		201		64.22%		110		35.14%		2		0.64%		91		29.07%		313
	McIntosh		280		70.00%		120		30.00%		0		0.00%		160		40.00%		400
	McLean		115		62.84%		65		35.52%		3		1.64%		50		27.32%		183
	Mercer		28		32.94%		48		56.47%		9		10.59%		-20		-23.53%		85
	Morton		596		60.75%		380		38.74%		5		0.51%		216		22.02%		981
	Nelson		460		46.09%		527		52.81%		11		1.10%		-67		-6.71%		998
	Oliver		35		42.17%		48		57.83%		0		0.00%		-13		-15.66%		83
	Pembina		954		36.72%		1,511		58.16%		133		5.12%		-557		-21.44%		2,598
	Pierce		121		69.14%		53		30.29%		1		0.57%		68		38.86%		175
	Ramsey		619		57.58%		421		39.16%		35		3.26%		198		18.42%		1,075
	Ransom		566		49.43%		526		45.94%		53		4.63%		40		3.49%		1,145
	Richland		866		42.77%		1,134		56.00%		25		1.23%		-268		-13.23%		2,025
	Rolette		273		57.84%		194		41.10%		5		1.06%		79		16.74%		472
	Sargent		491		47.39%		525		50.68%		20		1.93%		-34		-3.28%		1,036
	Stark		339		60.64%		212		37.92%		8		1.43%		127		22.72%		559
	Steele		398		52.65%		338		44.71%		20		2.65%		60		7.94%		756
	Stutsman		648		53.91%		522		43.43%		32		2.66%		126		10.48%		1,202
	Towner		166		43.68%		214		56.32%		0		0.00%		-48		-12.63%		380
	Traill		1,026		56.31%		668		36.66%		128		7.03%		358		19.65%		1,822
	Walsh		974		31.48%		2,040		65.93%		80		2.59%		-1,066		-34.45%		3,094
	Ward		182		58.52%		114		36.66%		15		4.82%		68		21.86%		311
	Wells		157		50.81%		147		47.57%		5		1.62%		10		3.24%		309
	Williams		45		44.55%		56		55.45%		0		0.00%		-11		-10.89%		101
Totals	17,519	48.50%	17,700	49.01%	899	2.49%	-181	-0.50%	36,118

See also

• United States presidential elections in North Dakota

Notes and References

1. Knoles, George Harmon; The Presidential Campaign and Election of 1892 (1942), p. 185
2. Knoles; The Presidential Campaign and Election of 1892
3. Dave Leip's U.S. Election Atlas; Presidential General Election Results – North Dakota
4. Géoelections; Popular Vote at the Presidential Election for 1892 (.xlsx file for €15)
5. Géoelections; Popular Vote for James B. Weaver at the Presidential Election for 1892 (.xlsx file for €15)
6. Géoelections; Popular Vote for John Bidwell at the Presidential Election for 1892 (.xlsx file for €15)