Political parallels between 1968 and 2024

The whole world is watching.

They’re eager to see what happens in Chicago this week, when Democrats convene their quadrennial political convention to nominate Vice President Harris as their 2024 presidential candidate.

But the mantra “the whole world is watching” has been around since 1968.

Press note: Win or lose, Harris must attend the presidential election certification ceremony on January 6th.

That was the battle cry of protesters who descended on the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, where they fought with delegates, reporters, and police. The Vietnam War was escalating, and anti-war demonstrators wanted the world to know how they felt. There was no better opportunity than the DNC to gather and air their discontent, often in the viewfinders of television cameras.

The 1968 Democratic National Convention was one of the most tumultuous in American history.

Democrats are hoping to avoid such a controversy this year, but it may be hard to avoid after raucous anti-Israel protests have continued throughout the spring on college campuses and across the country, highlighting divisions within the Democratic Party over the Middle East.

As they said in 1968, the world is watching.

Long before the protests, political commentators were already comparing 2024 to 1968. After all, the Democratic Party announced plans to hold its convention in Chicago, strengthening the parallels between 1968 and 2024.

1968 was a year that changed American society. The year was marked by a massive breakdown in political order, while social unrest was rampant in the streets. 1968 was a storm of time, where sets of months and days on the calendar were transformed into indelible, sometimes terrifying images for history.

2024 may still not rival 1968, but its mayhem stands out compared to other turmoil and chaos of recent times.

In 1968, the Vietnam War was besieging President Lyndon Baines Johnson. The Republicans had risen to prominence in the 1966 midterm elections, picking up three Senate seats and 47 House seats. Johnson may have lost political support, but he never lost political skill. He barely won the Democratic primary in New Hampshire in 1968 and knew what to do.

Like Biden in 2024, Johnson did not formally enter the New Hampshire primary, but instead ran on a write-in ballot. Biden’s only real rival in the primary was Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota. Many in his party blasted Phillips for challenging the president and saying he was unfit to serve another term.

In 1968, Senator Eugene McCarthy (D-MN) held Johnson to just under 50 percent of the New Hampshire vote.

Johnson, shaken but with keen political interests, resigned in late March 1968.

“I have come to the conclusion that the Presidency should not be allowed to become embroiled in the partisan divisions that have arisen in this political year,” President Johnson declared in his legendary Oval Office speech.

Indeed, President Biden’s words echoed those of Johnson, who decided to withdraw after his disastrous performance in a debate with former President Trump in late June.

“I decided the best way to move forward is to pass the baton to a new generation. That’s the best way to unite our country,” the president said.

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Political violence was a feature of 1968. The assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. sparked riots across the country.

Two months later, Robert F. Kennedy won the California and South Dakota primaries and celebrated his victory at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

“I thank you all. I’m heading to Chicago and we’re going to win there,” Kennedy said, an ominous statement for the future of the Democratic Party.

Sirhan Sirhan, a pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist gunman, jumped out from behind an ice machine in the hotel kitchen and fired several shots at President Kennedy at close range. Sirhan Sirhan had opposed Kennedy’s support for Israel in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

The current Middle East conflict has replaced the Vietnam conflict of the 1960s as it convulses the country today.

But there are other similarities.

In 1968, former Alabama Governor George Wallace (Democrat) ran as a third-party candidate.

In 2024, Kennedy’s son, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., will challenge Vice President Harris and former President Trump.

Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump was hastily escorted off the stage during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

Political violence will also be a possibility in 2024. Last month, a gunman nearly killed Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

Once President Biden gave up on reelection, Democrats quickly pivoted to Harris.

This is similar to what the Democrats did in 1968, when they pledged allegiance to another vice president, Vice President Hubert Humphrey, as their candidate.

Democrats will hold a formal rally in support of Harris this week in Chicago, home of their most ignoble convention in history.

“Unless they were expecting this comparison, Democrats will be heading back to Chicago for what is expected to be an unusually chaotic convention,” said Luke Nichter, a Chapman University professor who has written about 1968.

While protesters were scuffling with police outside the auditorium, reporters scuffled with security guards inside, who assaulted CBS reporter Dan Rather on the floor.

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Walter Cronkite, the calm, collected CBS news anchor, was none too pleased with the way authorities had roughed up his colleague.

“Dan, I think there’s a lot of bad guys here,” Cronkite said on air.

Tensions rose among the Democratic delegation over the Vietnam issue.

“If Senator George McGovern had been president of the United States, he would not have had to use Gestapo-like tactics on the streets of Chicago,” Sen. Abe Ribicoff (D-Conn.) said of the anti-war senator.

McGovern had to wait until 1972 to win the Democratic nomination.

The events of 1968 are making Democrats anxious ahead of this year’s convention.

“We need to get back to doing the right thing from a legal standpoint and from a political standpoint. We want everybody to be safe, and I’m waiting with bated breath,” said Senate Majority Whip Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill. “Law enforcement at the local, state and federal levels have assured me they are prepared for this, and I pray that they are.”

But it’s unclear whether unrest and civil unrest could supersede the convention’s claims.

Former President Bill Clinton raises his hand to the crowd before delivering his acceptance speech at the 1996 Democratic National Convention at the United Center on Thursday night. (Harry Hamburg/NY Daily News Archives via Getty Images)

“Just like in 1968, a lot will depend on how the media covers the protesters,” Nichter said. “Just like in 1968, a lot will depend on whether the cameras glamorize the violence and make the protesters stars during the games.”

However, 1968 was not the last year that Democrats held a convention in Chicago.

In 1996, the Democratic Party nominated former President Clinton for a second term in Chicago, but most people don’t even remember that.

In 1996, a pop culture phenomenon took the convention by storm.

Every night, the electronic sounds of Los Del Rio and the Bayside Boys fill the Chicago United Center, and within minutes, tens of thousands of Democrats are swaying to the unmistakable rhythm of the Macarena — on the floor, on the stage, in the aisles. The Democratic National Committee even released an animation on its official webpage showing people moving to the song.

The Macarena stayed at number one on the Billboard charts for an astounding three and a half months. It was the number one song in the US in 1996.

By the fall of that year, by the time the Macarena began to fade on the pop charts, former President Clinton had handily defeated the late Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kansas) and returned to the White House.

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In 1968, President Richard Nixon defeated Humphrey.

Democrats are hoping the end result of their 2024 convention will be closer to 1996 than 1968.

But win or lose, they probably won’t be performing the Macarena.