President Lyndon B. Johnson scored a 454-389 victory Wednesday in a Student Association- Flat Hat sponsored mock presidential election.
President Johnson carried the faculty with 45 votes to Goldwater’s 26 with one write-in vote for Robert Taft, Jr. Percentages saw Johnson with 62.5 percent and Goldwater 36.1 percent.
The student vote was closer with Johnson winning by 52.98 percent to Goldwater’s 47.02. The vote was 409 for LBJ and 363 for Goldwater.
Total voting percentages — students and faculty — were 53.72 for Johnson, 46.27 for Golwater with .01 percent for Taft.
Only 27.17 percent of the faculty (72 of 265) voted, while approximately 21.01 percent of the students (854 of about 2800) went to the polls.
The low voting percentage could well be indicative of a possible state-wide or national voting trend on election day.
The mock election failed to give Johnson the wide campus majority that most political scientists expected. A poll of some political scientists a month ago gave Johnson a comfortable 51-31 percentage margin (18 percent undecided) with approximately 328 students for participating.
A poll tax of a nickel ($43) was collected from the William and Mary students and will be added to the Student Association’s general fund.
