Polling Fall campaign ). The Republicans campaigned against the
New Deal, seeking a smaller government and less-regulated economy as the end of the war seemed in sight. Nonetheless, Roosevelt's continuing popularity was the main theme of the campaign. To quiet rumors of his poor health, Roosevelt insisted on making a vigorous campaign swing in October and rode in an open car through city streets. Numerous campaign songs for F.D.R. were written, possibly in an effort to advertise on radio during
radio's Golden Age. These included 1940's "Franklin D. Roosevelt's Back Again" and "Mister Roosevelt, Won't You Please Run Again." In 1944, Broadway actress
Mary Crane Hone published piano march "Let's Re-Re-Re-Elect Roosevelt." Its lyrics were:Let's make each one of our blows felt For the causes of humanity and war. With
world peace just around the corner, His leadership is necessary still. So - Let's Re-Re-Re-Elect Roosevelt... He particularly derided a Republican claim that he had sent a US Navy warship to pick up his
Scottish Terrier Fala in Alaska, noting that "Fala was furious" at such rumors. The speech was met with loud laughter and applause from the labor leaders. In response, Governor Dewey gave a blistering partisan speech in
Oklahoma City a few days later on national radio, in which he accused Roosevelt of being "indispensable" to corrupt big-city Democratic organizations and
American Communists; he also referred to members of Roosevelt's cabinet as a "motley crew". However, American battlefield successes in Europe and the Pacific during the campaign, such as the
liberation of Paris in August 1944 and the successful
Battle of Leyte Gulf in the
Philippines in October 1944, made President Roosevelt unbeatable.
Results Throughout the campaign, Roosevelt led Dewey in all the
polls by varying margins. On election day, the Democratic incumbent scored a fairly comfortable victory over his Republican challenger. Roosevelt took 36 states for 432 electoral votes (266 were needed to win), while Dewey won twelve states and 99 electoral votes. In the popular vote, Roosevelt won 25,612,916 (53.4%) votes to Dewey's 22,017,929 (45.9%). Dewey conceded in a radio address the following morning, but declined to personally call or to send a telegram to President Roosevelt. Roosevelt sent Dewey a telegram reading, "I thank you for your statement, which I heard over the air a few minutes ago." Roosevelt's victory made him the only person ever to win the presidential popular vote four times, and neither party would again win the popular vote four consecutive times until the Democrats did so in all four elections from
2008 to
2020. The important question had been which leader, Roosevelt or Dewey, should be chosen for the critical days of peacemaking and reconstruction following the war's conclusion. Most American voters concluded that they should retain the governing party, and particularly the president who represented it. They also felt it unsafe to do so in "wartime", in view of ever-increasing domestic disagreements. Dewey did better against Roosevelt than any of Roosevelt's previous three Republican opponents: Roosevelt's percentage and margin of the total vote were both less than in 1940. Dewey flipped the states of Wyoming, Wisconsin, and Ohio from the previous election, while Roosevelt flipped Michigan. Dewey also gained the personal satisfaction of finishing ahead of Roosevelt in his hometown of
Hyde Park, New York, and ahead of Truman in his hometown of
Independence, Missouri. Dewey would again become the Republican presidential nominee in 1948, challenging President Truman (who had assumed that office on FDR's death), and would again lose, though by somewhat smaller popular- and electoral-vote margins. Roosevelt's net vote totals in the twelve largest cities increased from 2,112,000 votes in the 1940 election to 2,230,000 votes. Of the 3,095 counties/independent cities making returns, Roosevelt won the most popular votes in 1,751 (56.58%) while Dewey carried 1,343 (43.39%). The Texas Regular ticket carried
one county (0.03%). In New York, only the combined support of the American Labor and Liberal parties (pledged to Roosevelt but otherwise independent of the Democrats to maintain their identities) enabled Roosevelt to win the electoral votes of his home state. In 1944, the constantly growing Southern protest against Roosevelt's leadership became clearest in Texas, where 135,553 people voted against Roosevelt but not for the Republican ticket. The Texas Regular ticket resulted from a split in the Democratic Party in its two state conventions, May 23 and September 12, 1944. This ticket, which represented the Democratic element opposing the re-election of President Roosevelt, called for the "restoration of
states' rights which have been destroyed by the Communist New Deal" and "restoration of
the supremacy of the white race". Its electors were uninstructed. ==Results==