Kent Harbinson Courtney, October 23, 1918 (St. Paul., Minn.) – August 12, 1997 (Alexandria, La.)
VP candidate for Conservative Party of New Jersey (aka Conservative Party) (1960)
Running mate with nominee: Joseph Bracken Lee (1899-1996)
Popular vote: 8,708 (0.01%)
Electoral vote: 0/537
The campaign:
Like some other third party figures (e.g. Symon Gould of the American Vegetarian Party) this is a case where the VP nominee was actually the true power behind the scenes.
Kent Courtney was a Louisiana-based extreme Right-wing segregationist, anti-communist and member of John Birch Society. Through the use of radio programs, pamphlets, letters to the editor, and his own newspapers he had been agitating for the creation of a new conservative third party.
Early in 1960 Courtney ran for Governor of Louisiana as a member of the States' Rights Party. After that failed he worked to have US Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ) become the Republican Party nominee. When Goldwater was defeated by Richard Nixon, Courtney returned to the notion of starting a new far-Right party. In 1960 there was a plethora of conservative political parties already in existence and it isn't clear by his actions if Courtney wanted to unite them under his leadership or simply do his own thing.
Also in 1960 Courtney was a States' Rights Party Presidential "Unpledged" Elector for Louisiana. This ballot choice finished with 20.99% of the vote in that state, winning in 17 parishes.
Courtney's efforts to create a strong conservative third party ticket ran into some problems. His idea of the ideal candidate was the populist segregationist Democratic Governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus. The Governor claimed he had to concentrate on being re-elected to the office he already held so he was dropped from consideration, but as it turned out the National States' Rights Party nabbed Faubus' name for their Presidential nominee. Next was US Sen. Strom Thurmond (D-SC), but at the end of August 1960 Thurmond refused to run: "I have declined previously to be a candidate of a third party for the presidency this year, and I again decline to be an independent candidate, or to permit my name to be used on such a ticket."
When the newly formed Conservative Party managed to file for the only state where they qualified for the ballot-- New Jersey-- they got around the Strom-for-President problem by making the Senator the VP nominee instead! Sen. Goldwater was listed as the nominee for President. But both senators wanted nothing to do with the Conservative Party of New Jersey, so at the last minute the embryonic political group put Joseph Bracken Lee in the Presidential slot and Kent Courtney as his running mate.
Lee, the former Republican Governor of Utah and 1956 VP nominee for the Texas Constitution Party, was now the newly elected Mayor of Salt Lake City. I could not locate any comment by Lee regarding his 1960 Presidential nomination.
On the ballot in New Jersey only, their 8708 poll amounted to 0.31% of the popular vote in the Garden State, where they placed 4th behind the Socialist Workers Party.
Election history:
1954 - City Council, New Orleans, La. (Democratic) - defeated
1960 - Governor of Louisiana (States's Rights Party) - defeated
1976 - US House of Representatives (Independent) - defeated
Other occupations: sailor (US Navy WWII), airline pilot, commercial officer with the British consulate in New Orleans, public relations, teacher, newspaper publisher, author, radio personality
Buried: Bayou Ridge Baptist Cemetery (Evergreen, La.)
Notes:
Also called Kent Harbenson Courtney
Reluctantly supported Goldwater in 1964 even though he felt the Senator was too liberal.
Worked in the American Independent Party for Wallace in 1968
Saw a UFO while piloting a plane from Brazil to Africa in 1944 and became a lifelong UFOlogist.
Was a close associate of JFK assassination conspiracy figure Guy Banister.
