Richard Neuberger

Some good news for Gordon Smith: Oregonians traditionally doesn’t vote out incumbent U.S. Senators. It’s been nearly forty years since a sitting Senator lost, and its only happened three times in state history.

That was in 1968, when Republican turned Independent turned Democrat Wayne Morse lost to Bob Packwood by 3,445 votes. Since voters began directly electing U.S. Senators in 1912, only two other incumbent Senators lost re-election bids: Republican Guy Gondon, 3,462 votes in 1954 (against Democrat Richard Neuberger), and Democrat George Chamberlain, who lost to Republican Robert Stanfield by 16,572 in 1920.

Some good news for Gordon Smith: Oregonians traditionally doesn’t vote out incumbent U.S. Senators. It’s been nearly forty years since a sitting Senator lost, and its only happened three times in state history.

That was in 1968, when Republican turned Independent turned Democrat Wayne Morse lost to Bob Packwood by 3,445 votes. Since voters began directly electing U.S. Senators in 1912, only two other incumbent Senators lost re-election bids: Republican Guy Gondon, 3,462 votes in 1954 (against Democrat Richard Neuberger), and Democrat George Chamberlain, who lost to Republican Robert Stanfield by 16,572 in 1920.

If Candy Neville were to score an uphill victory against Gordon Smith next November, she would become the first woman to represent Oregon in the United States Senate since Maurine Neuberger left office in January 1967. Neuberger served just slightly more than one term in the Senate, winning a 1960 Special Election to replace her late husband, who died at age 47, and at the same time won a full six-year term. From 1953 to 1955, the Neuberger's were a husband and wife team in the Legislature: Richard Neuberger served in the State Senate and Maurine was a State Representative.

Bob Packwood was the last challenger to oust an incumbent U.S. Senator -- in 1968Some good news for Gordon Smith: Oregonians traditionally doesn’t vote out incumbent U.S. Senators. It’s been nearly forty years since a sitting Senator lost, and its only happened four times in state history.