The most important “most important election”?

Summary

Today, Explained: The Most Important “Most Important Election”?

Podcast Information:

• Title: Today, Explained
• Host/Author: Vox
• Description: Today, Explained is Vox's daily news explainer podcast. Hosts Sean Rameswaram and Noel King guide listeners through the most important stories of the day.
• Episode: The Most Important “Most Important Election”?
• Release Date: November 5, 2024

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Introduction: The Persistent Claim

The episode opens with Hosts Sean Rameswaram and Noel King addressing a ubiquitous claim circulating during election seasons: "This is the most important election of our lifetime." Rameswaram remarks at [00:01], “Remember, remember the 5th of November, because this is the most important election of our lifetime,” setting the stage for a critical examination of this assertion.

Historical Perspective with Jeffrey Engel

To assess the validity of labeling any election as the "most important," the hosts consult Jeffrey Engel, Director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University. Engel challenges the notion at [02:12], stating, “I think the better question is has anyone not said it?” He emphasizes that declaring each election as the most important has been a recurring theme, regardless of the era.

Comparing to the 1932 Election

Engel draws parallels between the 2024 election and the pivotal 1932 presidential election during the Great Depression. At [04:50], he explains:

“Franklin Roosevelt, the challenger, the Democrat, he basically made the following campaign slogan, which is, vote for me, I'm not him. And the him was Herbert Hoover.”

He highlights the stark ideological differences of that time, where Roosevelt's promise to "do more" contrasted sharply with Hoover's reluctance for government intervention. The desperation of the Great Depression made the 1932 election exceptionally consequential, ultimately leading to Roosevelt’s historic New Deal policies.

The 1860 Election and the Civil War

Engel also references the 1860 election, a moment when the stakes were existential for the Union. He notes:

“Abraham Lincoln or any Republican... they [Southern Democrats] were to secede because they didn’t like the outcome.”

This election directly led to the Civil War, underscoring how certain elections can indeed determine the very survival of the republic.

The 1800 Election: A Peaceful Transfer of Power

Further back, Engel discusses the 1800 election between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. This election is celebrated for establishing the precedent of a peaceful transfer of power between rival political parties, a cornerstone of American democracy.

Current Election Stakes: Democracy vs. Division

Transitioning to the present, the episode features insights from Julia Azari, a Professor of Political Science at Marquette University, alongside Kamala Harris. They analyze the current election’s rhetoric and its emphasis on democracy.

At [18:43], Kamala Harris states:

“For the Harris campaign, it's very much about democracy.”

She contrasts this with Donald Trump’s messaging, which focuses on national identity, referencing his January 6, 2021, remarks:

“If you don't fight like hell, you're not gonna have a country anymore.”

Azari adds at [19:56]:

“We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics...”

This polarized discourse underscores the high emotional stakes and deep societal divisions present in the 2024 election.

Voter Turnout: A Sign of Engagement

The hosts and guests discuss the correlation between the perceived importance of an election and voter turnout. Kamala Harris explains at [20:02]:

“Voter turnout does go up when people care about the difference between the two candidates and perceive that difference to be meaningful.”

This suggests that framing the election as crucial can mobilize higher participation, contrasting with past decades where voter apathy was more prevalent.

Is the Election Truly the Most Important?

Engel urges caution in accepting the "most important election" narrative without context. He points out that while some elections have had transformative impacts, others may be overstated by media and political actors for mobilization purposes.

At [25:10], Kamala Harris reflects on the fatigue of repeatedly hearing this claim:

“I think maybe this is just because elections are real important. I want to sort of give credence to the idea that every election maybe is the most important.”

This perspective suggests a cyclical and perhaps cynical view of the repeated labeling of elections as unprecedentedly significant.

Conclusion: A Balanced View

The episode wraps up by acknowledging the complexity of evaluating an election’s historical significance in real-time. While certain elections undeniably shape the nation's trajectory profoundly, the frequent declaration of "most important election" can be both a motivator for higher engagement and a potential source of fatigue or skepticism among voters.

Notable Quotes:

• Sean Rameswaram [00:01]: “Remember, remember the 5th of November, because this is the most important election of our lifetime.”
• Jeffrey Engel [02:12]: “I think the better question is has anyone not said it?”
• Kamala Harris [18:43]: “For the Harris campaign, it's very much about democracy.”
• Julia Azari [19:56]: “We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics...”
• Kamala Harris [25:10]: “I want to sort of give credence to the idea that every election maybe is the most important.”

Final Thoughts

"Today, Explained" offers a nuanced exploration of whether the 2024 election merits the grandiose title of "most important election." By juxtaposing historical pivotal elections with the current political climate, the podcast encourages listeners to critically assess such claims and understand the broader context of electoral significance.

Transcript

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Remember, remember the 5th of November, because this is the most important election of our lifetime.

[Kamala Harris]

Fellow Americans, this election is not only the most important of our lives, it is one of the most important in the life of our nation.

[Julia Azari]

And this is the most important election. I think it's going to be the most important election of them all. I mean, they had some pretty good ones, right? Long time ago, they had some pretty.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Good Stop me if you've heard this one before.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Every single election, you're gonna find somebody.

[Kamala Harris]

Saying that you can't go anywhere without it being the most important election of our lifetimes. And that was also true four years ago and eight years ago and 24 years ago.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

We're gonna try and figure out if this really is the most important, most important election of our lifetime on election day here at Today Explained Amgen, a.

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[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Explained 2024 explained Jeffrey Engel is the director of the center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University. We reached out to him because we couldn't help but notice everyone saying this is the most important election of our lifetime. This year we asked him if anyone has ever said that before.

[Jeffrey Engel]

I think the better question is has anyone not said it?

[Julia Azari]

This is the most important election of our lifetimes.

[Jeffrey Engel]

There are just eight days left in what is the most important election of our lifetimes?

[Julia Azari]

This will be maybe the most important election that our country's ever had. Former First Lady Barbara Bush said, this.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Is the most important election of my lifetime. That's why this election could not be more important. This is the most important election I.

[Julia Azari]

Believe in 100 years.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Perhaps, as Senator Kennedy has already indicated.

[Julia Azari]

The Most important election in our district.

[Jeffrey Engel]

People basically say every single election cycle, obviously the candidates want you to get motivated and get to the polls. Their people anyway. And more importantly, I think, to be honest, the advertisers want us to think that it's the most important. And of course, we all know by definition it cannot. Every single election cannot be the most important of our lifetime. I think some are, in fact, more important than others. I think. I think the best way to think about this is to think about the distance, the divergence between what the two candidates are offering.

[Kamala Harris]

It is a choice about whether we have a country rooted in freedom for every American or ruled by chaos and division.

[Julia Azari]

They treat you like garbage. They treat our whole country like garbage, with open borders, with all of the horrible things they've done to hurt our country. Inflation that should have never happened.

[Jeffrey Engel]

This is in 2024, basically as wide as I can think of between the two candidates. Positions in business of America since perhaps 1932. And so this is probably why this one feels a little bit more important. I would say it's more important. I'm just not legally allowed as a historian by my training to say most important.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

You mentioned 1932. Can you take us through perhaps some historic occasions where it did actually feel like the stakes were really high? You mentioned that the ideological distance between the candidates can help dictate the import that at least is being sold to the American public.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Yeah, I actually think 1932 is a really helpful one for us today, not least of which because the term fascist was thrown around quite a bit during that time as well. So let me just set the background for everybody. The Great Depression has already been going on for three and a half years.

[Julia Azari]

Farmers find no market for their produce, and the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone.

[Jeffrey Engel]

This is the worst economic crisis in American history that we've ever had. Much worse than anything anybody in our lifetime basically has seen. And consequently, it was a very impactful election. Franklin Roosevelt, the challenger, the Democrat, he basically made the following campaign slogan, which is, vote for me, I'm not him. And the him was Herbert Hoover.

[Julia Azari]

The past three years have been a time of unparalleled economic calamity. There have been years of greater suffering and hardship than any which have come to the American people since the aftermath of the Civil War.

[Jeffrey Engel]

And Herbert Hoover, who, of course, was given blame, if you will, by the American people. Because the American people, as we see today, always blamed the President for good or bad economic times, especially bad economic times.

[Julia Azari]

Come on, man.

[Jeffrey Engel]

And Also Herbert Hoover, who, frankly, didn't think that there needed to be that much government intervention in helping people suffering through the Depression. So Franklin Roosevelt, who actually campaigned on a remarkably ambiguous platform, basically said two things, I will do more, and I'm not him. Ultimately, what's really interesting about this election is that Franklin Roosevelt, when he gets inaugurated in 1933, we all remember his inauguration address where he said that the.

[Julia Azari]

Only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

[Jeffrey Engel]

That's the most memorable line, but it's not the most important line. The most important line is when Roosevelt said, I intend to work with Congress. Keep in mind, by the way, it's a Democratic Congress. I intend to work with Congress to solve the present cris.

[Julia Azari]

But in the event that the Congress shall fail to take one of these.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Two clauses, if Congress doesn't do what I want, I'm going to assume fraud, executive power given to me by the Constitution, as though we were in fact.

[Julia Azari]

Invaded by a foreign fall to wage.

[Jeffrey Engel]

War against the current crisis. You can imagine his detractor said, that sounds pretty fascist to me, especially this is the era of Mussolini and literally the era of Mussolini and Hitler. I mean, you know the story. And this is one of those stories that's mostly probably true. At least it's true. Ish in the sense that it gives a flavor of what happened, is that Franklin Roosevelt was sitting in his office that night, the Oval Office, first time, behind the Resolute desk, and his chief aide, Harry Hopkins, comes in and says, you know, Mr. President, if you solve this, you're going to go down as the greatest president in American history. To which Roosevelt replied, if we don't solve it, I'll go down as the last. And that wasn't hyperbole. That was the depth of which people were really questioning whether, and this will sound familiar to us today, whether the world had gotten too fast for democracy, whether the new communications of radio and aircraft had sped things up so much that democracy, with its slow, deliberate conversation, was just not up to the task of the 20th century. You can hear that argument today, obviously, given the new changes in technology that we have. So it's a very resonant election, I think.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Let's take it back to a time that was a bit slower. Let's go back to the 19th century for a minute here, because talking about the Great Depression, an inflection point for this republic, it reminds me that we once went to war with ourselves. Was there an election around the Civil War or even Reconstruction that felt pivotal, existential, that felt like the most important we had ever seen, no doubt.

[Jeffrey Engel]

And in fact, I'm glad you used the word existential because I think that's exactly the right word, that there are certain moments in American history that involve elections, but I think broader crises where we say, boy, if we don't get this right, then we're not going to have a republic anymore. In fact, I think actually there were three in our past, specifically the Great Depression, the Civil War, which I'll talk about in a moment, and the beginning. If you don't get the country started off right, it's not going to work out well. And the 1860 election also has some resonance for us today, though I'm always hesitant to say there's resonance for the Civil War, but this is something I think people should pay attention to before the election. Democrats primarily in the South, Confederate supporters, people who from Southern states, shall we say, pro slavery supporters, made it very clear, very plain that if they lost the election, they were going to secede. And I think the way most Americans think about the logic and the sequence of this is that the election occurred, Lincoln won, and then the states said, we're going to succeed because we don't like the outcome. Oh, no, that's exactly opposite. They had said very plainly, we only like democracy if our side wins. If the other side wins, we're out of here. So basically, you had a referendum on whether the country was going to stay together or not. And you know, to be fair, the reason that the Southern Democrats primarily, but Southerners felt that they needed to leave the Union was because they could read an actuarial table as well as anyone else and realize that if Abraham Lincoln or any Republican or any Northerner is able to capture the White House without getting a single electoral college vote from the south, they're never going to get any again, any presidents again. So it was all laid out before the election.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

And you said, going back even further to George Washington, we have an election that fairly qualifies as the most important of a lifetime. Not our lifetime, but a lifetime.

[Jeffrey Engel]

Yeah, I mean, people certainly in the election of 1800, that was the sentiment. That's of course, the election when Thomas Jefferson, who had been vice president, defeated the incumbent president, John Adams. That was a real election that was, I think, really critical at the time, but more importantly critical in hindsight, because this is actually the election that gives us the precedent and the practice for a peaceful transfer of power. Because when George Washington handed things off to John Adams, they were of the same party. So it wasn't that Radical, a move for the president and the vice president to just sort of hand things off when. When Thomas Jefferson took over. This was a hostile takeover. This was new people coming into town and taking the jobs of old people who were kicked out. And one of the things that's been noticed in the last four years as president, Trump broke with the tradition of attending the inauguration of his successor. People pointed out that John Adams did not attend the inauguration of his successor. And in our modern sense, I think some people have chosen to criticize Adams for that. I actually think that that's a moment where we should praise Adam because he's setting a precedent. He is making the point by leaving town before the inauguration that the town is yours, like the government is yours. My job is done, literally not even ceremonial, for me to be here anymore.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

I missed the video where Trump said that about Biden, though.

[Jeffrey Engel]

I'm looking still. I'm looking still.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

A lot of people feel anxious today. A lot of people have felt anxious for weeks, for months around this election. Does your historical vantage. Does remembering every day that this country went to war with itself, that this country's leaders used to solve their problems by literally shooting each other, does that bring some cold comfort on a day like today?

[Jeffrey Engel]

You know, it gives me confidence, but it doesn't give me a guarantee. And I'll tell you why. We in the United States, especially in the 20th century, the way that we've decided to design our educational system, which parenthetically doesn't pay nearly enough attention to history, what people usually do learn about history is that things get better and that we have a crisis, we have a civil war. That was terrible, obviously. But look, we got better and we resolved some of the issues. We got rid of slavery, and then we had a civil rights movement. It was difficult, it was terrifying for people, but look, it got better. We had the Great Depression. It was bad, but we solved it. Look, it got better. The truth of the matter is that progressive idea that things always get better is true up until the moment that it's not. Which is to say I take great comfort in the fact, as an American, that we have bounded together and the better angels of our nature, as Abraham Lincoln would say, spoke to enough people that they were able to pull the country through the crisis. However, that only happens because people at the time put their nose to the grindstone and worked really hard through a terrify. So I take comfort in the fact that we have a tradition of doing things that make the country better and getting through our crises. I sleep a little bit better at night, right up until the moment where I wake up in the middle of the night screaming, remembering that wait. That means I have a responsibility to work as hard as people in previous generations.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

History Professor Jeffrey Engel, Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas, when we return on Today Explained how this year's most important election of our lifetime stacks up against all the rest.

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[Jeffrey Engel]

Hi. I was Hillary Clinton's vice presidential running mate at the time. You said it was the most important election in American history and that democracy was on the line. It's been less than eight years. What's my name.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Today? Explained Shawn Ramasvaram, joined by Julia Azari, a professor of political science at Marquette University. We asked her to help us assess this argument that today's election really is the most important election ever.

[Kamala Harris]

I think that this is a lot clearer on the Harris side, the kind of argument about democracy being on the ballot and the ways that Harris has tried to frame the election around democracy considerations around Project 2025, around January 6th, and the speech that she gave last week in Washington, D.C. to try to allude to that. We know who Donald Trump is. He is the person who stood at this very spot nearly four years ago and sent an armed mob to the United States. For the Harris campaign, it's very much about democracy. For the Trump campaign, I think it's maybe a little bit blurrier. But his message is always about national identity being at stake. You know, he had this phrase he said on January 6, 2021, about how.

[Julia Azari]

If you don't fight like hell, you're not gonna have a country anymore.

[Kamala Harris]

It's very similar to some language that Andrew Johnson used in the years after the Civil War. So it's a sort of recurring thing in American politics to talk about the stakes of what's going on and to kind of have a racial element to that.

[Julia Azari]

You gotta get these people back where they came from. You have no choice. You're gonna lose your culture, you're gonna lose your country.

[Kamala Harris]

And I do think that that's some of what gets lost in the way that the Democrats frame the stakes of this election is to talk about Trump as being unprecedented. And there are some elements of that that are unprecedented, but there are also some elements. Lot of deep continuity in history.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Do we know if it's working for either Harris or Trump? The message that it's do or die. This one is the big one in.

[Kamala Harris]

A very general sense. Voter turnout does go up when people care about the difference between the two candidates and perceive that difference to be meaningful. There's this sort of misconception that elections that are kind of hard fought turn off voters. And actually what we've seen is compared with like the late 90s and early 2000s. I remember when I was kind of aging into the electorate, voter turnout was quite low. And I always tell my students, I was in College in 2000. I couldn't get my roommates to vote. They were just uninterested in the difference between Bush vigor. You know, they did not see these two candidates as having compelling differences.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Neither did rage against the machine. They made a whole music video about it.

[Kamala Harris]

Exactly.

[Jeffrey Engel]

I support the death penalty. I support the death penalty.

[Julia Azari]

We will be prosperous if we embrace.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Free trade, prosperity from free and fair trade.

[Kamala Harris]

We think of that as being now like a simpler time and a time when people were using this most important election of our lives, much less as we got more into these more existential elections. So, like really the Bush era, 2004, 2008, 2012 even, and then of course, this whole Trump era, voter turnout has gone up. I mean, it hasn't climbed steadily or in a super clear pattern, but for sure, like, people are way more engaged. And that's what happens when people care about the difference between the two candidates.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Harris is selling this argument that this is the most important election in our lifetime based on the idea that Donald Trump wants to fundamentally alter our democracy. He was president once, and yes, that whole era ended in an insurrection. But did he fundamentally alter our democracy that go round?

[Kamala Harris]

I actually think so. The most obvious one is that the peaceful transfer of power is sort of really critical element of democracy. That simply did not happen. There's just no way to spin it in 2021, not just January 6, but all of the legal stuff that went into it, all the legal jockeying that went into it.

[Julia Azari]

The election was totally rigged. It's a disgrace to our country. It's like a third world country. And I think the case is looking.

[Kamala Harris]

For loopholes in the law that allow you to do what you want, even if it doesn't necessarily serve public purposes. I think that Trump decisively lost the popular vote and governed very much as if he had decisively won the popular vote. I think there was a lot of evidence of using the office for private purposes.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Records shared by the House Oversight Committee show Trump hotels and properties charge Secret Service agents five times the normal government rate for accommodations while protecting it expenses covered by the taxpayer.

[Kamala Harris]

So I think that there was some real change to American democracy and I think really key and important ways.

[Julia Azari]

We have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics, and I think they're the. And it should be very easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard or if really necessary, by the military, because they can't let that happen.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

The argument from the right as to why this is the most important election in the history of the Republic is that if you don't vote for Donald Trump, Kamala Harris is going to fundamentally change this country. Is there any credence to that argument?

[Kamala Harris]

It's very unlikely that Kamala Harris as president would fundamentally change this country. I would mostly look to Obama and Biden for guidance as to what kind of politician Harris will be. And I think that if Harris wins, we will think of this as a historic election. We'll think of this as the first woman president and then very similar to Obama as the first African American president, will then see governance that doesn't really match the level of revolutionariness of the election result. We'll see governance that very much reflects a complicated Democratic coalition. We'll see governance that I think will reflect a changed Democratic party that has shifted to the left and consolidated on abortion, has shifted to the left on economics in some ways, but also a party where there are a lot of Democrats in swing districts who are very, very cautious in their rhetoric about the police. I think we'll see somebody like Liz Cheney or another Republican in her cabinet playing a role, probably not setting key policy, but playing a role. And I think it would be to the benefit of the American public to have a member of my Cabinet who was a Republican. I cannot imagine that it will fundamentally change American democracy as far as the policies that she would pursue and the coalition that she would lead.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

You're kind of saying that Harris pretty much promises more of the same, which might be the fundamental reason that people vote against her.

[Kamala Harris]

It might. It might.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

You know, we spoke to the history professor early in the show. We're speaking to the political scientist now. Both of you seem exhausted by this pitch from candidates that the most important election ever? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Give me a break. When it actually comes, will we know it? Will there be a most important election ever? And, and how will we know it's for real?

[Kamala Harris]

I have to be honest, I think I might just be exhausted in general.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Join the club.

[Kamala Harris]

It might just feel like it's been one long campaign since June 2015. You know, I was sort of looking through some of the news articles about how common it is to say it's the most important election. And I came away with the conclusion maybe this is just because elections are real important. You know, I don't want to be cynical about that claim. I actually want to. I want to sort of like give credence to the idea that every election maybe is the most important.

[Shawn Ramaswaram]

Julia Azari leads the Civic Dialogues program at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She's also written for Vox.com we here at Vox will try to answer all your questions about the results on tomorrow's edition of Today Explained. But if we don't get to any, there's always the new Explain It To Me podcast. Give them a call with any election related questions you may have at 1-800-618-8545 again 1-800-618-8540 or you can email a voice memo to ask vox.com Vox's Abhishek Artsy produced our show today. He was edited by Aminah Al Saadi, Fact Checked by Laura Bullard and mixed by Patrick Boyd and Andrea Christensdottir have a great support for this podcast comes from Stripe. Stripe is a payments and billing platform supporting millions of businesses around the world, including companies like uber, BMW and DoorDash. Stripe has helped countless startups and established companies alike reach their growth targets, make progress on their missions, and reach more customers globally. The platform offers a suite of specialized features and tools to fast track growth like Stripe Billing, which makes it easy to handle subscription based charges, invoicing and all recurring revenue management needs. You can learn how Stripe helps companies of all sizes make [e-mail] that's stripe.com to learn more. Stripe Make Progress.