Editing Hardin County, Illinois (section)

==Politics==
{{PresHead|place=Hardin County, Illinois|source=<ref>{{Cite web |last=Leip |first=David |title=Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections |url=http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS |access-date=November 6, 2018 |website=uselectionatlas.org}}</ref>}}
<!-- PresRow should be {{PresRow|Year|Winning party|GOP vote #|Dem vote #|3rd party vote #|State}} -->
{{PresRow|2024|Republican|1,546|357|30|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2020|Republican|1,691|449|22|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2016|Republican|1,653|420|75|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2012|Republican|1,535|742|53|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2008|Republican|1,330|892|40|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2004|Republican|1,501|923|13|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|2000|Republican|1,366|1,184|87|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1996|Democratic|790|1,323|504|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1992|Democratic|985|1,665|523|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1988|Republican|1,504|1,308|12|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1984|Republican|1,689|1,205|5|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1980|Republican|1,721|1,314|79|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1976|Democratic|1,393|1,602|22|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1972|Republican|1,915|1,140|7|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1968|Republican|1,492|1,199|192|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1964|Democratic|1,324|1,639|0|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1960|Republican|1,944|1,465|4|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1956|Republican|1,919|1,444|8|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1952|Republican|1,984|1,563|6|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1948|Republican|1,713|1,358|16|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1944|Republican|2,037|1,370|31|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1940|Republican|2,333|1,974|26|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1936|Republican|2,008|1,984|19|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1932|Democratic|1,559|1,610|54|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1928|Republican|1,758|933|41|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1924|Republican|1,378|1,358|73|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1920|Republican|1,555|943|29|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1916|Republican|1,419|1,264|63|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1912|Republican|691|644|250|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1908|Republican|813|680|55|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1904|Republican|756|642|142|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1900|Democratic|753|839|34|Illinois}}
{{PresRow|1896|Democratic|780|900|10|Illinois}}
{{PresFoot|1892|Democratic|660|700|171|Illinois}}
In its early history, Hardin County was opposed to the “[[Yankee]]” Republican Party and its [[American Civil War|Civil War]] against [[Southern United States|the South]] – with whom it was closely allied both culturally and economically. It did not vote for a Republican presidential candidate until [[Theodore Roosevelt]]’s 1904 landslide.

Since 1904, however, Hardin County has turned powerfully Republican. Like the nearby counties of [[Johnson County, Illinois|Johnson]], [[Massac County, Illinois|Massac]] and [[Pope County, Illinois|Pope]], it managed to remain loyal to [[William Howard Taft]] during the 1912 election when the Republican Party was mortally divided. Hardin County would next be carried by a Democratic presidential candidate in [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]’s 1932 landslide victory, and not after that until [[Lyndon Johnson]] in 1964. The county did trend Democratic in the following three decades, actually voting more Democratic than the nation at-large between 1972 and 1996. Nonetheless, since 2000 Hardin County has followed the same political trajectory as [[United States presidential elections in Tennessee|Tennessee]], [[United States presidential elections in Missouri|Missouri]], [[United States presidential elections in Kentucky|Kentucky]], [[United States presidential elections in West Virginia|West Virginia]] and [[Appalachia]]n regions of adjacent states, whereby the Democratic Party's liberal views on social issues have produced dramatic swings to the Republican Party amongst its almost entirely Southern white population.<ref>Cohn, Nate; [https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/24/upshot/southern-whites-loyalty-to-gop-nearing-that-of-blacks-to-democrats.html ‘Demographic Shift: Southern Whites’ Loyalty to G.O.P. Nearing That of Blacks to Democrats’], ''[[New York Times]]'', April 24, 2014</ref> The past six Presidential elections have observed a swing totalling 79 percentage points to the GOP, with [[Hillary Clinton]] in 2016 receiving barely half the proportion of the worst-performing Democrat from before 2010.