Walter DeVries
American political consultant (1929-2019)

Walter Dale de Vries (November 13, 1929 – November 27, 2019) was an American political consultant, author, and founder of the North Carolina Institute of Political Leadership.
Writing in 1972, Andrew M. Greeley remarked that "Walter DeVries and Lance Tarrance Jr. have apparently pinpointed a change which exists in the real world apart from the 'Op-Ed' page of the New York Times. If party identification has not changed much, 'ticket-splitting' has. In 1944 there were 41 Congressional districts that voted for one party for the Presidency and another for the House of Representatives. In 1956 there were 130 such districts; in 1964, 145... From 1914 to 1962 there was only one year when there were more than six states which elected a Senator from one party and a Governor from another... Since 1962 the average number of 'incongruences' has been eleven per year..."
Biography
Walt de Vries was born in Holland, Michigan, in 1929. He was the oldest of seven sons of Dutch immigrants. He enlisted in the 2nd Armored Division of the U.S. Army (1948–49) and was recalled to active duty as an Intelligence NCO with the Army Security Agency in Korea (1950–51).
“Walter DeVries” enters the record as american political consultant (1929-2019). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Walter, DeVries and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q17198103. VIAF identifies the subject as 75095925. The Library of Congress control number is n50036797. 3 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1929, 2019, 1972 and 1944.
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This entry incorporates text from “Walter DeVries” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.