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United States presidential elections determine who serves as President and Vice President of the United States for four-year terms, starting on Inauguration Day , which is January 20th of the year after the election. The Most Recent Election occurred on November 2 , 2004 . The Next Election is scheduled for November 4 , 2008 . HOW ELECTIONS ARE ADMINISTERED The election of the United States President is governed by Section 1 of Article Two of the United States Constitution , as amended by Amendments XII , XXII , and XXIII . The President and Vice President are elected on the same ticket by the U.S. Electoral College , whose members are elected directly from each state; the President and Vice President serve four-year terms. Elections take place every four years on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November (although in many states early and absentee voting begins several weeks before Election Day ). The elections are run by local election boards who ensure the fair and impartial nature of the election and prevent tampering of the results. See Also: U.S. presidential election maps Ballot candidates Voters are required to vote on a ballot where they select the candidate of their choice. The Presidential ballot is actually voting "for the electors of a candidate" meaning that the voter is not actually voting for the candidate, but endorsing members of the Electoral College who will, in turn, directly elect the President. Many voting ballots allow a voter to "blanket vote" for all candidates in a particular Political Party or to select individual candidates on a line by line voting system. Which candidates appear on the voting ticket is determined through a legal process known as Ballot Access . Usually, the size of the candidate's political party and the results of the major nomination conventions determine who is pre-listed on the Presidential ballot. Thus, the Presidential election ticket will not list every single candidate running for President, but only those who have secured a major party nomination or whose size of their political party warrants having been formally listed. Laws are in effect to have other candidates pre-listed on a ticket, provided that a sufficient number of voters have endorsed the candidate, usually through a signature list. Never, however, in U.S. history has a 3rd party candidate for President secured a place on the election ticket in this fashion. The final way to be elected for President is to have one's name written in at the time of election as a Write-in Candidate . This is used for candidates who did not fulfill the legal requirements to be pre-listed on the voting ticket. It is also used by voters to express a distaste for the listed candidates, by writing in a ridiculous candidate for President such as Mickey Mouse or Darth Vader . In any event, a write-in candidate has never won an election for President of the United States. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION TRENDS In recent decades, one of the presidential nominees of the Democratic and Republican parties has almost always been an incumbent President or a sitting or former Vice President . In fact, in the likely case that the 2008 Election is an open race, it would be the first time since the 1952 Election and only the second time since the 1928 Election in which neither a Vice President nor a sitting President will be either party's nominee. When the candidate has not been a President or Vice President, presidential nominees of the two main parties have been state Governor s or U.S. Senator s. The last nominee from either party who had not previously served in such an office was General Dwight D. Eisenhower who won the Republican nomination and ultimately the presidency in the 1952 Election . Contemporary electoral success has favored state governors. Of the last five Presidents ( Carter , Reagan , George H.W. Bush , Bill Clinton , George W. Bush ), only George H.W. Bush had never been Governor of a state. Geographically, these Presidents were all from either very large states ( California , Texas ) or from a state south of the Mason-Dixon Line and east of Texas ( Georgia , Arkansas ). The last elected President from a northern state and sitting U.S. Senator elected President was John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts in 1960. RESULTS † Winner received less than 50% of all popular votes. ‡ Losing candidate received a Plurality of the popular votes.
; Notes : Presidents John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Chester Arthur and Gerald Ford served as president but never won an election for president. : Ford was never elected vice-president. : Tyler and Johnson were never major candidates, not even as incumbent presidents. : Fillmore was a major candidate, but not as an incumbent. VOTER TURNOUT Voter Turnout in presidential elections has been on the decline in recent years, although it bounced back sharply during the 2004 election from the 1996 and 2000 lows. While turnout has been decreasing, registration has been increasing. Registration rates varied from 65% to 70% of the voting age population from the 1960s to the 1980s , and due in part to greater government outreach programs, registration swelled to 75% in 1996 and 2000. Despite greater registration, however, turnout in general has not greatly improved, save the sharp bounce back in 2004. ''Sources'': Federal Election Commission , Office of the Clerk , U.S. Census Bureau ¹ It should be noted that the voting age population includes all persons age 18 and over as reported by the U.S. Census Bureau , which necessarily includes a significant number of persons ineligible to vote, such as non-citizens or felons. The actual number of ''eligible voters'' is somewhat lower, and the number of ''registered voters'' is lower still. The number of non-citizens in 1994 was approximately 13 million, and in 1996, felons numbered around 1.3 million, so it can be estimated that around 7-10% of the voting age population is ineligible to vote. Note that the large drop in turnout between 1968 and 1972 can be attributed (at least in part) to the expansion of the franchise to 18 year olds (previously restricted to those 21 and older). The total number of voters grew, but so did the pool of eligible voters- so total percentage fell. SEE ALSO
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