301-191 is a landslide.
By that standard, most elections are landslides. 1968 was actually one of the closer elections in the Electoral College.
But what most people are talking about is the popular vote. Nixon’s advantage over Humphrey was under a percentage point. Very close indeed.
Of course the riots did have an affect. Some Johnson voters defected to Wallace, as well as to Nixon, and that helped put Nixon in the White House.
I had forgotten that the electoral college numbers were so lopsided.
As a schoolboy I remember it was close until the following morning when Nixon was determined to be the winner.
A Wikipedia entry remembers it this way:
“The election on November 5, 1968, proved to be extremely close, and it was not until the following morning that the television news networks were able to declare Nixon the winner. The key states proved to be California, Ohio, and Illinois, all of which Nixon won by three percentage points or less. Had Humphrey carried all three of these states, he would have won the election.”