1974 United States House of Representatives elections information
House elections for the 94th U.S. Congress
1974 United States House of Representatives elections
← 1972
November 5, 1974
1976 →
All 435 seats in the United States House of Representatives 218 seats needed for a majority
Majority party
Minority party
Leader
Carl Albert
John Rhodes
Party
Democratic
Republican
Leader since
January 21, 1971
December 7, 1973
Leader's seat
Oklahoma 3rd
Arizona 1st
Last election
242 seats
192 seats
Seats won
291
144
Seat change
49
48
Popular vote
30,054,097
21,271,332
Percentage
57.5%
40.7%
Swing
5.4%
5.8%
Results: Democratic hold Democratic gain Republican hold Republican gain
Speaker before election
Carl Albert
Democratic
Elected Speaker
Carl Albert
Democratic
The 1974 United States House of Representatives elections were elections for the United States House of Representatives on November 5, 1974, to elect members to serve in the 94th United States Congress. They occurred in the wake of the Watergate scandal, which had forced President Richard Nixon to resign in favor of Gerald Ford. This scandal, along with high inflation,[1] allowed the Democrats to make large gains in the midterm elections, taking 48 seats from the Republicans (an additional seat was gained, for a net gain of 49, when Representative Joe Moakley from Massachusetts switched his party affiliation back to Democrat after winning his 1972 election as an independent), and increasing their majority above the two-thirds mark. Altogether, there were 93 freshmen representatives in the 94th Congress when it convened on January 3, 1975 (76 of them Democrats). Those elected to office that year later came to be known collectively as "Watergate Babies."[2] The gain of 49 Democratic seats was the largest pickup by the party since 1958. Only four Democratic incumbents lost their seats.
As of 2022[update], this was the last time the Democrats gained 45 or more seats in a House election.
^James M. Naughton (November 6, 1974). "Senate and House Margins Are Substantially Enlarged". New York Times. Archived from the original on 2016-03-05. Retrieved October 31, 2014.
^Lawrence, John A. (May 26, 2018). "How the 'Watergate Babies' Broke American Politics". Politico Magazine. Retrieved October 12, 2019.
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