Paul Leonard Newman, January 26, 1925 (Shaker Heights, Ohio) – September 26, 2008 (Westport, Conn.)
VP candidate for New Party (1968)
Running mate with nominee: Eugene McCarthy (1916-2005)
Popular vote: 178 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538
The campaign:
In 1968 an obscure political figure, US Sen. Eugene McCarthy (Minn.), challenged incumbent President Johnson in the Democratic primaries. McCarthy's anti-war stance energized a whole new generation of young activists who were really in the first wave of voters to have grown up entirely in the shadow of the atomic/nuclear mushroom cloud and thus felt a visceral sense of urgency the older generations for the most part failed to grasp.
McCarthy became a David to Johnson's Goliath, and within a short time LBJ decided to drop out of the race, opening it up for Sen. Robert Kennedy and Vice-President Hubert Humphrey. McCarthy soon found himself outspent and outflanked by the better known candidates and was marginalized to the far Left by the Democratic Party establishment. After the Party convention McCarthy waited until the very last week of the campaign to finally give a lukewarm endorsement to Humphrey.
In the meantime, McCarthy's followers were not so easily defeated. The 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago was a bloody affair and Humphrey was seen as being too closely tied to the unpopular LBJ. McCarthy's followers were prepared to go all the way to November, attempting to get his name on the ballot in several states as a "fourth party" since George Wallace already had the primo "third party" position.
By early September 1968 it was too late for McCarthy's followers to place him on the ballot in many states, so energetic write-in campaigns were waged. In Georgia, Oregon, and Rhode Island groups sprang up to work for McCarthy. In Michigan there was the McCarthy Write-In Committee, Massachusetts had three groups pushing for the Senator-- Citizens for Participation Politics, Conference for New Political Action, and the Flag Party-- and in New York there was the Coalition for Independent Candidacy (aka Coalition Party). As far as I could ascertain, none of the above proposals included a running mate.
McCarthy had various running mates and different party banners in other states. The most coordinated effort, such as it was, concerned the New Party, formed chiefly by Marcus Raskin, co-director of the Institute for Policy Studies. "If we cannot force a realignment of political structures," said Raskin, "There will be mass violence."
Raskin's document Why the New Party? included:
Across the nation there is a general revulsion for the political parties which in reality have built their power on the interests of special groups that have no base among the people, which maintain power through war and cold war, privilege selling and the granting of favors to the few.
Young people, workers on the line in the factory and in the offices, women, farmers, black and brown people have come to believe that the two political parties are far too deeply implicated in causing the basic problems of American society to do anything toward resolving them.
The Democratic and Republican parties have allowed the cities to decay, encouraged and sustained a huge military establishment, supported a reckless and morally indefensible colonial war in Vietnam, and diverted the economy for wasteful and dangerous activity.
Although the Party was born in the Left, Raskin voiced a belief his anti-Establishment message could resonate with George Wallace voters as well.
The New Party thought about nominating McCarthy, as well as considering Sen. George McGovern, actor Paul Newman, NYC Mayor John Lindsay, Dr. Benjamin Spock, and Justice William O. Douglas. But in the end they decided to allow each state to nominate whatever ticket they wanted. It is difficult to say if the New Party operated under variant names across the country.
McCarthy himself disavowed this fourth party activity and took steps to keep his name off the November ballot. Raskin didn't care. He said McCarthy was going to be nominated whether he liked or not. They wanted his name and star power.
The New Party in Florida passed over NYC Mayor John Lindsay as the VP choice and instead nominated an unusual running mate for Eugene McCarthy-- the actor Paul Newman.
Newman was a politically active liberal Democrat who had campaigned for McCarthy in the primaries. In the general election he supported Humphrey. He had begun filming for Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid about the same time the New Party nominated him.
The Florida platform called for legalizing abortions, decriminalization of marijuana, ending conscription, and supported a cease-fire in Vietnam.
Voting for the McCarthy/Newman ticket was a complicated affair. Instead of writing-in the names of the candidates, voters in the Sunshine State were required to write-in the names of all 14 Electors. 178 voters went to the trouble to do just that.
Election history: none
Other occupations: actor, sailor (US Navy WWII), philanthropist, food products, race car team owner, race car driver, author
Buried: cremated
Notes:
Endorsed John Anderson for President in 1980
One of his proudest personal political achievements was being included in Nixon's original enemies
list
Dubbed "Quite a guy" by Time.
