On Wednesday afternoon, the Home elected a brand new speaker, filling the emptiness that grew to become vacant three weeks in the past with McCarthy’s ouster. Inside a couple of hours of the Speaker’s election, we observed one thing exceptional: he truly made a tremendous sound 52.9 million Google search outcomes – almost double McCarthy’s search outcomes.
This isn’t as a result of the brand new speaker, Mike Johnson (R-LA), is twice as well-liked or twice as influential as McCarthy. That is as a result of his title – like many different People – is Mike Johnson.
The political knowledge agency L2’s index of registered voters in america signifies that about 18,600 of them are named “Mike Johnson” or “Michael Johnson.” It is an unusually massive quantity, to make certain — largely as a result of “Michael” and “Johnson” are among the many commonest first and final names within the nation.
To be truthful, “Michael” was extra well-liked. Final yr, knowledge from the Social Safety Administration positioned “Michael” sixteenth on the listing of hottest names for boys, simply behind “Jack” and simply forward of “Alexander.” No 1 was Liam.
However, you realize, Johnson wasn’t born in 2022. He was born half a century in the past, in 1972. And in that yr, the most typical first title for boys born in America was… “Michael.”
(In contrast to in 2022, “Kevin” additionally made it onto the Scorching 100 listing.)
You may discover that “Michael” was not solely the most well-liked title, however it additionally made up a a lot bigger share of boys’ names that yr than “Liam” does in 2022. Final yr, The Atlantic’s Joe Pinsker explored the historical past of this period. Embrace unique baby namesthis implies a larger variety of names total, and subsequently a smaller share of the whole going to at least one title.
However there’s one particular purpose why there was much less variety in child names in 1972 than there’s now: there was much less variety within the inhabitants. Immigration legal guidelines have been relaxed lower than a decade earlier than Johnson’s start, permitting a larger variety of new residents to america from different international locations and rising the variety of child names with roots in different cultures and languages. The eleventh hottest title in america final yr was “Matthew,” which didn’t seem within the prime 1000 in 1972.
So that is the primary title. However then it is paired with “Johnson,” which, the Census Bureau tells us, was the second commonest final title in america in 2010, the newest yr for which knowledge is on the market.
However what this does not inform us is how frequent this phenomenon is Combine That’s, what number of “Mike Johnson” names are there in comparison with others. It is a extra difficult query than it could appear.
Writing for 538 in 2014, Mona Shalabi and Andrew Flowers exploration This similar query in regards to the commonality of names (although not Mike Johnson particularly). One complicating issue is that first and final names usually are not evenly distributed; For instance, the primary title “Mateo” can be paired extra with the final title “Garcia” than “Nguyen.”
Census Bureau knowledge inform us, actually, that the title “Johnson” is disproportionately well-liked amongst black People in comparison with different final names. It’s second total, after Williams.
There may be a couple of 1 in 3 probability that an individual dwelling in america in 2010 with the final title “Johnson” could be black, which isn’t the case with Mike Johnson. There was a couple of 1 in 5 probability that an individual with the final title “Smith” was black; 7 out of 10 “blacksmiths” are white.
Anyway, with the proviso that we will not simply know precisely what number of “Mike Johnsons” there are within the nation proper now, we are able to create a grid that compares the primary and final title mixtures of latest audio system to evaluate how distinctive “Mike Johnson” is likely to be in frequent, relative to the audio system. others. So, given final names in 2010 (for which we’ve got the newest knowledge) and first names from 1972 (which is when individuals with a median age of 37 in 2010 would have been born), we are able to draw a phylogenetic map of the present Home leaders to the most typical first and final names of these years, “Michael” and “Smith.”
Mike and Johnson are an unusually well-liked mixture. (Word that Newton “Newt” Gingrich doesn’t seem, and his first title doesn’t seem among the many most well-known thousand.) The following hottest mixture is “James/Wright,” the title of the person who served 9 audio system earlier than 9. Pelosi’s first title is in comparison with extra frequent names given to women, however her unusual final title condemns her to the underside left nook.
There could also be different audio system in American historical past with names extra well-known right now. That is tough to guage, given the constraints of our knowledge on how many individuals have a primary or final title in historical past. Was the title “Langdon Cooks” notably well-liked in 1814? Most likely not, however we will not say for certain.
What we are able to say is that Mike Johnson is certainly among the many leaders, and maybe the speaker with the most typical title in historical past. No less than till he’s ousted in per week and Republicans elect Home Speaker Liam Smith.
Lenny Brunner contributed to this report.