Was anyone leading in 3 of the first 4 states?
Do you mean was the eventual 2008 primary winner ahead in the first four states in December of 2007?
McCain won NH, but didn’t overtake Romney until January.
Huckabee was ahead of Romney in Iowa by 14 points in Iowa in December, then won by 3.
McCain didn’t poll over Romney in SC until Jan 7 and didn’t overtake Huck until January 15th.
I’ve been of voting age for 3 presidential elections, and for two of those I was in Florida, and I can tell you that Florida’s presidential primaries are very, very volatile and don’t really start to shake into place until after the results are in for Iowa, NH, and SC.