1968

46A-1067148

46B-1067149

President Johnson's surprise announcement that he would not run again in 1968 left the way to the Democratic nomination relatively open for Vice President Hubert Humphrey (46A-1067148). He was placed at the head of the ticket of a party fraught with splits and turmoil. He also had the liability of the obligation to support the record of the Johnson administration, increasingly under attack by anti-war critics. Jules Feiffer parodied the amorphous image of Hubert Humphrey (46B-1067149).

However, it was Nixon and Spiro Agnew, the Republican candidates, and George Wallace, running for the American Independent Party, who came under attack by cartoonists. Nixon was often caricatured as a used car salesman (46C-1067150). And Agnew's initial obscurity and subsequent notoriety for unfortunate phrase-making and malapropisms were parodied as well (46D-1067151, 46E-1067152, 46F-1067153). Wallace was attacked for his extremism and racism (46G-1067154). 

The key issue became the war in Viet Nam, however. Nixon could promise new strategies and programs, while Humphrey felt obligated to support the policies of President Johnson, in spite of the efforts of the pro-peace Democrats (46H-1067155). Johnson's call to halt bombings in Viet Nam late in the campaign raised Humphrey's popularity above that of Nixon, but Nixon's earlier lead reasserted itself to elect him to the presidency.