THE ORIGIN OF RED STATES VS. BLUE STATES

By Gage (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The concept of "red states" for Republicans and "blue states" for Democrats in United States politics originated in 2000, when the three major networks and the New York Times and USA Today decided, for the sake of uniformity, to institute the same system when displaying political maps showing which party won a state in the Presidential election.  

Prior to that time, there was no absolute consistency in applying the colors, although, as a general rule, most news agencies did follow the custom in Great Britain of representing the more conservative party by blue and the more liberal or revolutionary party by red. The method initiated in 2000 obviously falls contrary to this pattern.

According to the New York Times, it linked "red" to "Republican" for the simple reason that both words begin with "re." The decision purportedly had nothing to do with a fear that if the news media perpetuated the historical use of red, people would associate the Democratic Party with the crimson taint of Communism (even though that train had already long ago left the station).