VP candidate for Louisiana Taxpayers Party (aka US Taxpayers Party) (1992)
Running mate with nominee: Howard Jay Phillips (1941-2013)
Popular vote: 1,552 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538
The campaign:
If the old saying that religious converts turn into the most zealous believers is true, Howard Phillips might serve as a case study. Raised in the Jewish faith, he converted and became an evangelical Protestant as an adult in the 1970s and founded the US Taxpayers Party, known today as the Constitution Party.
Phillips had been a loyal Republican Party foot soldier and eventually worked in the Nixon administration as the director of two agencies but resigned due to what he perceived as the liberal drift of his party. It was during the era when the Watergate scandal was unraveling, so Phillips' timing was excellent for the purposes of finding an alternative. He briefly identified himself as a Democrat and ran for the US Senate as such.
As he felt no satisfaction with either major party, Phillips founded the Conservative Caucus in 1974. By the 1980s-early 1990s even the Reagan and Bush administrations were too liberal as well as fiscally irresponsible for him. He supported the Libertarian Party in the 1988 election but felt they were much too permissive in their social policies. In the meantime he had been busy networking with other conservative activists and in 1991 served as a co-founder of the US Taxpayers Party. Unlike the major parties, the US Taxpayers Party was more of a confederation than a union.
Phillips was the USTP Presidential nominee in 1992, his first of three runs. His running mate was Albion W. Knight, Jr., a retired US Army Brigadier General who resigned from his position as an Archbishop of the United Episcopal Church of North America in order to run. Phillips had two other VPs, Stephen C. Graves in Louisiana and Robert Tisch in Michigan.
Graves, based in Arkansas, was serving as a member of the US Taxpayers Party Executive Committee.
The US Taxpayers Party made it to the ballot under variations of that name in 14 states. In addition some older political parties climbed on board and endorsed the USTP. The Independent American Party of Nevada (no relation to the national Independent American Party) had Phillips/Knight on their ballot line. Parts of two rival parties that hated each other, the American Party (Rhode Island and South Carolina) and American Independent Party (California), also joined up. In Massachusetts Phillips won the Independent Voters primary. In cases where he competed for votes, Phillips' main competitor was Bo Gritz.
One party the USTP failed to absorb was the Right to Life Party in New York. Instead of Phillips the RTLP endorsed president Bush for re-election.
The USTP platform included: Cut federal spending by $500 billion a year -- Abolish the IRS -- Support capital punishment -- Appoint only judges who oppose abortion -- oppose Planned Parenthood -- Repeal quotas -- Support the Electoral College -- Promote Biblical philosophy in government -- oppose gun control -- Sever US ties with the UN, World Bank, and IMF -- End foreign aid -- Oppose Gay rights -- No women in combat -- Eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts -- Eliminate pensions for elected officials -- Eliminate the Public Broadcasting Service.
There are not a lot of examples of Graves taking an active role in the 1992 electioneering.
On the ballot in 21 states and write-ins in six others, the USTP finished with 43,400 votes (0.04%) on Election Day, somewhat under the 50,000 predicted by some pundits. 33,585 of those votes were for the Phillips/Knight ticket. They probably would have placed with a higher percentage but it is reasonable to conclude that a good number of their targeted base voted for Ross Perot or Bo Gritz.
The Phillips/Graves ticket resulted with 0.09% of the vote in Louisiana.
Election history: none
Other occupations: US Taxpayers Party Executive Committee
Notes:
Another mystery VP nominee.
