High Voter Turnout Reverses 32-Year Slide : Electorate: 55% of eligible adults cast ballots, first major increase since Kennedy-Nixon election. Worries over economy, nation’s future are cited.

Upset about the economy and worried about the nation’s future, voters streamed to the polls Tuesday in numbers that reversed a 32-year-long slide in voter turnout.

According to preliminary tallies, about 104 million Americans cast their ballots--the first time the 100-million mark has been reached in a U.S. election. The number of voters represented about 55% of the eligible adults, the largest proportion since 55.2% voted in 1972.

By contrast, only 50.2% of the voting population cast ballots in the 1988 presidential race between George Bush and Michael S. Dukakis. A total of 91.6 million voters went to the polls four years ago, a drop of 1 million voters from the 92.6 million who cast ballots in 1984.

This year’s rise of 5 percentage points in the turnout “is the first significant increase we’ve had since 1960,” said Curtis Gans, an expert on voting patterns. That year, the close race between John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon drew a record high of 63.1% of eligible adults to the polls.

Since then, the percentage of those voting has fallen steadily, driven down by apathy and general disaffection with politics and politicians. But from coast to coast on Tuesday, neither snow, cold nor freezing rain kept voters from the polls.

Based on the preliminary data, the highest rate of turnout in a state occurred in Maine, where 71.4% of the eligible residents voted.

In Chicago, meanwhile, officials said that as many as 80% of the city’s voters went to the polls, inspired in part by the chance to elect the first black woman--Democrat Carol Moseley Braun--to the U.S. Senate. In Detroit, Democratic poll workers served coffee and doughnuts to those who waited in long lines. Denver was hit with its first snowfall of the season, but several longtime poll workers said they had not seen such lines of voters since 1960.

In California, when all the absentee ballots are counted, state officials predict that about 11.3 million--about 54% of eligible residents--will have voted, according to a spokeswoman for Secretary of State March Fong Eu. That is a slight upturn from the 1988 figure of 53.5%.

Nationwide, the voting surge was fueled by the sinking economy, as well as the chance to vote for a genuine political outsider in Texas businessman billionaire Ross Perot, according to Gans, head of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate.

Interviewed as they left the polls, many first-time voters acknowledged that they were spurred on by fears over the economy and a desire to defeat President Bush.

Helen VanBuskirk, a 30-year Chicago woman, was late for work Tuesday, but she nonetheless waited at a firehouse on Chicago’s Northside to cast her first vote.

“I don’t like Bush,” she said. “We are really screwed up. It’s a cliche, but it’s true: We need a change.”

Other first-time voters said they were attracted to the polls by the urge to support Democrat Bill Clinton.

“There’s something charismatic about this guy,” said 41-year-old John Munoz, who buys pharmaceuticals for a Houston hospital. “In our family, no one has gotten this worked up about a candidate since Kennedy.”

During the summer, Munoz said he favored Perot “big time.” But he changed his mind after Perot quit the race in July.

Many young women said they were driven to cast their first votes by the abortion issue.

“I’m not a single-issue voter, but (maintaining abortion rights) is something that’s important,” said Karen Riley, a 21-year-old student from Miami.

“Choice is more than about abortion. It’s about human rights,” said Tasha Avery, a 22-year-old retail clerk from Seattle, who recently registered to vote at a rock concert. She arrived at the polling places with friends chanting, “Change! No More Republicans.”

A number of voters who described themselves as Republicans or “conservative” nonetheless said they went to the polls to vote against Bush.

“I’ve been registered as a Republican since I was 18,” said James Rogers, a 34-year-old flight attendant from Denver, “but I changed eight months ago. Bush doesn’t have a vision. He just says we’re all fine.”

Outside a Florida polling place, 22-year-old Tracy Carracedo, a criminal justice major at the University of Miami, described himself as a registered Republican who listens every day to the radio broadcast of Rush Limbaugh, the conservative commentator.

So, how did he vote? For Clinton.

“I voted for Clinton because what he did successfully was address my age group by making appearances on Arsenio Hall and MTV. Half was what he said, and half was that he made an effort,” he said.

Contributing to this story were Times staff writer Hector Tobar in Los Angeles, researchers Ann Rovin in Denver, Edith Stanley in Atlanta, Tracy Shryer in Chicago, Doug Conner in Seattle and Lianne Hart in Houston and special correspondent Mike Clary in Miami.

Voter Turnout

Nationwide turnout for presidential elections: 1992: 55.0% 1988: 50.2% 1984: 53.3% 1980: 53.2% 1976: 54.4% 1972: 55.2% 1968: 60.7% 1964: 61.8% 1960: 63.1% 1956: 59.3% 1952: 61.6% 1948: 51.1% 1944: 56.0% 1940: 58.9% 1936: 56.9% 1932: 52.4% Source: Associated Press