I decided to check the popular wisdom that Senators don't get elected president. What's interesting is that it's partly the case that senators don't RUN for president.
Presidents, meanwhile almost always get re-elected (Bush I, Carter, Ford, Hoover and Taft make a short list of presidents who didn't get reelected in the 20th century)
More below the fold
Listing by most recent public office, winner first
- Pres v Senator
- Gov v VP
- Pres v Senator
- Gov v Pres
- VP v Gov
- Pres v VP
- Gov v Pres
- Gov v Pres
- Pres v Senator
- VP v VP
- Pres v Senator
- Senator v VP
- Pres v Gov
- General v Gov
- Pres v Gov
- Pres v Gov
- Pres v Businessman
- Pres v Gov
- Gov v Pres
- Sec Commerce v Gov
- Pres v Lawyer
- Sen v Gov
- Pres v SC Justice
- Gov v Pres
- SecWar v Lawyer
- Pres v Judge
- Pres v Lawyer
There may be some errors here. The further back you go, the harder it is to find info on the losing candidates (and sometimes to figure out the last job of the winning candidate!)
I had thought, when I started this list that every presidential election of the 20th century had either the pres or vp running for president, but I was suprised to see that this was in fact not the case.