History is replete with instances where a local, state or national election in the U.S. was decided by just one vote.
One occurred just last month in Oklahoma.
In Pittsburg County, Quinton voters were asked to decide whether the town’s clerk-treasurer should be “appointed by the Mayor with the approval of the Board of Trustees.” Of the 319 ballots cast on the proposition, it passed by just one vote: 160 yes, 159 no.
Similarly, in the Chouteau- Mazie school district in northeastern Oklahoma, a school bond issue that failed last October was resubmitted and passed on April 2 by four votes out of the 568 ballots cast on that proposal. Last year in Catoosa, a Tulsa suburb, a $9 million school bond issue failed even though it received support from 58.95% of the voters.
In Oklahoma, passage of a school bond issue requires the endorsement of a 60% supermajority of the voters.
Federal elections this year also demonstrated the significance of every single vote.
Do not believe any claims by anyone that any political party won the 2024 general election by a landslide. Our nation hasn’t been this divided since Vietnam or the Civil War eras.
For example, former President Donald Trump bested Vice President Kamala Harris in the Electoral College by a margin of 312-226. But the popular vote margin this year was the second-closest in 56 years, since 1968.
As of noon last Friday, Trump/Vance led Harris/Walz by 2,297,175 votes: 77,234,099 (50%) to 74,936,924 (48%). The other 2% was divided among Independent, Libertarian, Green Party and Socialist slates, and at least one other third-party candidate. In other words, fully half of the voters voted for someone other than now President-elect Donald Trump.
The GOP regained control of the U.S. Senate, but the six-vote margin is thin: 53-47.
Depending on the issue, Vice President J.D. Vance might have to break a tie at some point during the next four years.
Republicans retained control of the U.S. House of Representatives, also by a narrow margin: 220-215.
However, one Republican congressman resigned and two House Republicans have been nominated for posts in the Trump administration.
The Ohio Secretary of State’s office reported that in November 2021, 18 local elections in Ohio – 12 candidate races and six local measures – ended in a tie.
Turning back the clock 177 years, in Indiana’s 6th Congressional District, Whig George G. Dunn defeated Democrat David M. Dobson by one vote, 7,455–7,454, in 1847.
On May 16, 1868, the U.S.
Senate voted on one article of impeachment against President Andrew Johnson. It fell just one vote short of the necessary two-thirds required for conviction and removal from office.
In 1910, in New York’s 36th Congressional District, Democrat Charles Bennett Smith defeated incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. DeAlva S.
Alexander by one vote, 20,685 to 20,684.
In 1962, the governors of Maine, Rhode Island and North Dakota were elected by an average of one vote per precinct. Of the 216,668 votes cast in a general election in Alaska in 1994, just 1.1 votes per precinct elected Tony Knowles as governor and Fran Ulmer as lieutenant governor.
Democrat Kristin Kassner defeated Republican incumbent Leonard Mirra by one vote in a 2022 Massachusetts House of Representatives race.
Also that year, Jay Hovey defeated incumbent Tom Whatley by one vote in an Alabama state Senate GOP primary.
Oklahoma is unquestionably a “red” state. Republicans have an overwhelming dominance in the 101-member state House of Representatives and the 48-member state Senate, occupy every statewide elected office, and all five members of Congress and both U.S. senators are Republicans.
Of the 2,442,211 registered voters the state Election Board counted Nov. 4 in Oklahoma, 52.33% of them are Republicans.
But 1,164,166 of them, 47.67% of all registered voters in this state, are not. Those Oklahomans – loyal, patriotic Americans one and all – include Democrats (26.98% of the total), Independents (19.72%), and Libertarians (0.95%).
Many people, on the “left” and on the “right,” don’t vote on some issues because they contend that their vote doesn’t “count.” A voter never knows whether his or her single ballot will affect the outcome of an election. But it definitely won’t if you don’t vote.
Mike W. Ray is a fifth-generation, award-winning journalist who has 55 years of experience covering municipal, county, state and federal government in Oklahoma and Texas. He can be reached at Mike.Ray@Hilliary.com.