1934 United States House of Representatives elections

1934 United States House of Representatives elections

← 1932 November 6, 1934[a] 1936 →
All 435 seats in the United States House of Representatives 218 seats needed for a majority
Majority party Minority party   Leader Jo Byrns Bertrand Snell Party Democratic Republican Leader since January 3, 1935 March 4, 1931 Leader's seat Tennessee 5th New York 31st Last election 313 seats 117 seats Seats won 322 103 Seat change 9 14 Popular vote 17,542,400 13,434,477 Percentage 53.92% 41.29% Swing 0.56% 0.79%   Third party Fourth party   Party Progressive Farmer–Labor Last election 0 seats 5 seats Seats won 7 3 Seat change 7 2 Popular vote 425,839 395,040 Percentage 1.31% 1.21% Swing Pre-creation 0.20%
Speaker before election Henry Rainey Democratic Elected Speaker Jo Byrns Democratic

The 1934 United States House of Representatives elections were elections for the United States House of Representatives to elect members to serve in the 74th United States Congress. They were held for the most part on November 6, 1934, while Maine held theirs on September 10. They occurred in the middle of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's first term. The Democratic Party continued its progress, gaining another 9 net seats from the opposition Republican Party, who also lost seats to the Progressive Party. The Republicans were reduced below one-fourth of the chamber for the first time since the creation of the party. The Wisconsin Progressive Party, a liberal group which allied with the Democrats, also became a force in Wisconsin politics.

The 1934 elections can be seen as a referendum on New Deal policies. While conservatives and people among the middle class who did not bear the brunt of the depression saw New Deal programs as radical, lower-income voters overwhelmingly voted in this election cycle to continue the implementation of Roosevelt's agenda. This election cycle marked the first time the president's party did not have a net loss of seats in either chamber of Congress in a midterm election, which would be repeated in 1998 and 2002.^[1]

Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).