VP candidate for Native American Party (aka American Party) 1852
Running mate with nominee: Jacob Broom (1808-1864)
Popular vote: 2,667 (0.08%)
Electoral vote: 0/296
The campaign:
It would be another four years before the "Know Nothings" would be a significant force in a presidential election. In 1852 the xenophobic, anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant party was still building steam. At the start of their July 1852 convention they were called the Native American Party with a ticket of Daniel Webster and George Corbin Washington (Pres. Washington's grandnephew) but by Election Day they were the American Party with the ticket of Jacob Broom and Reynell Coates.
They nominated US Sec. of State Daniel Webster without his blessing or permission with George Washington Corbin as his running mate. It is unclear exactly when Coates was made the running mate, since Washington apparently dropped out as the VP nominee. When Webster died 9 days before the election on Oct. 24, 1852, the hastily paired names of Jacob Broom and Reynell Coates appeared on the ballots in three states. The results were dismal for the American Party: Mass. 158 (0.12%), PA 1,678 (0.43%), NJ 831 (0.88%).
Election history: none.
Other occupations: physician, US Navy ship's surgeon, natural scientist, scientific and medical author and editor, poet.
Buried: Friends Southwestern Burial Ground (Upper Darby, Penn.)
Notes:
Apprentice to Dr. Benjamin Rush.
Founder of the Patriotic Order Sons of America 1847, a youth offshoot of the United Sons of
America, a secret fraternity associated with the Native American Party.
Went bankrupt in 1844.
Quaker.
Said to have slapped Andrew Jackson in the face during a political argument in 1829.
Had an intense dislike of homeopathy.
Moved to Camden, NJ in 1845 after the death of his wife and only child.
"When he went over the river he had little money and less inclination for work, and used to sleep on a board with a block of wood for a pillow, in a little room over the Camden dispensary. When he got hungry he used to go and catch a mess of fish which he fried in his chamber, where he did all his cooking."--From his obituary in the Boston Daily Globe, Apr. 28, 1886.
