The 1948 United States presidential election in Virginia took place on November 2, 1948, throughout the 48 contiguous states. Voters chose 11 representatives, or electors, to the Electoral College, who voted for president and vice president.
For the previous four decades Virginia had almost completely disenfranchised its black and poor white populations through the use of a cumulative poll tax and literacy tests. So restricted was suffrage in this period that it has been calculated that a third of Virginia's electorate during the first half of the twentieth century comprised state employees and officeholders.
This limited electorate allowed Virginian politics to be controlled for four decades by the Byrd Organization, as progressive “antiorganization” factions were rendered impotent by the inability of almost all their potential electorate to vote. Historical fusion with the “Readjuster” Democrats, defection of substantial proportions of the Northeast-aligned white electorate of the Shenandoah Valley and Southwest Virginia over free silver, and an early move towards a “lily white” Jim Crow party meant Republicans retained a small but permanent number of legislative seats and local offices in the western part of the state. In 1928 a combination of growing middle-class Republicanism in the cities and anti-Catholicism against Al Smith in the TidewaterPhillips. The Emerging Republican Majority, p. 195 allowed the GOP to carry Virginia and elect three Congressmen, including one representing the local district of emerging machine leader Byrd. However, from 1932 with the state severely affected by the Depression, Republican strength declined below its low pre-1928 level, although Byrd himself became highly critical of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal policies as early as 1940.
Virginia’s delegates at the 1948 Democratic National Convention were all opposed to incumbent President Harry S. Truman after his proposal for black civil rights titled To Secure These Rights. Nevertheless, the presence of viable Republican opposition in the southwest and Shenandoah Valley meant that Byrd refused to endorse either South Carolina Governor Strom Thurmond, who received the nomination of the States’ Rights Democratic Party, or Republican nominee New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey, largely because of fear of losing several seats in the House to resurgent Republicans.
Campaign Despite the failure of local federal officeholders to endorse him, Thurmond campaigned extensively in Virginia during October, arguing that Truman, Dewey and Progressive candidate Henry A. Wallace all had platforms that would destroy the existing “American way of life”. The Item argued that Byrd did support Thurmond and that his tour was helping the South Carolina Governor, although other polls did not imply this. Neither Dewey nor Truman campaigned in Virginia, and despite the fact that all federal representatives supported the incumbent president, local party officials of the Byrd Organization did little to work for Truman and running mate Alben W. Barkley.
Despite all polls expecting Dewey to carry the state, Truman would win quite comfortably, although the Democratic margin fell by more than seventeen points vis-à-vis the 1944 election.
Thurmond won 11% of white voters.
Polls SourceRankingAs ofChattanooga Daily TimesOctober 15, 1948The Montgomery AdvertiserOctober 24, 1948The Miami NewsOctober 25, 1948Mount Vernon ArgusNovember 1, 1948Oakland TribuneNovember 1, 1948
Results 1948 United States presidential election in VirginiaPartyCandidateVotesPercentageElectoral votes Democratic Harry S. Truman (inc.) 200,786 47.89% 11 Republican Thomas E. Dewey 172,070 41.04% 0 States’ Rights Strom Thurmond 43,393 10.35% 0 Progressive Henry A. Wallace 2,047 0.49% 0 Socialist Norman Thomas 726 0.17% 0 Socialist Labor Edward Teichert 234 0.06% 0 Totals 419,256 100.00% 11
Results by county or independent city