The Election Night +1 Waiting Game

We are all waiting for the final results of the election to come in, and the waiting is excruciating. It has been more than 24 hours since most polls closed, and to us, it feels like an eternity. But while we wait, I thought I might offer a bit of context for delays in election results when mail-in ballots have made up a significant portion of the vote.

Soldiers have been voting by mail dating back to the War of 1812, though it was not widely practiced until the American Civil War. But the 1944 US Presidential election took voting by mail to the next level. Sending ballots to soldiers abroad (including to POW camps, which you can read about in this great blog post from the National WWII Museum) was not without issue. Logistical issues meant only 85,000 ballots were sent to soldiers serving abroad in time for the election. In the end, it appears not to have mattered, as FDR prevailed with a commanding Electoral College victory over Dewey.

However, a year later, when Britain went to the polls in the July 1945 general election, it was a different story, and if you think our waiting game is excruciating, try this. Britons went to the polls on July 5, but votes were not counted until July 26 to allow for the thousands of ballots of British servicemen and women to be received from abroad. After twenty-one days, in the middle of the Potsdam Conference, Winston Churchill returned home to Britain only to learn that his Conservative Party had lost.

So if you think you have it bad 24 hours in, maybe a two day wait for election results is not so bad. :)

CGK