VP candidate for Straight-Out Democratic Party (1872)
Running mate with nominee: Charles O'Conor (1804-1884)
Popular vote: 18,602 (0.3%)
Electoral vote: 0/352
The campaign:
The Straight-Out Democratic Party was part of a major double-split reflecting one of the shifts in post-Civil War party politics.
The first split came from the Republicans. A significant number of Republicans were dissatisfied with the Grant administration and formed the Liberal Republican Party as an alternative, nominating journalist Horace Greeley. The Democratic Party threw in with the LRP and endorsed Greeley as well. Well, not all Democrats.
The conservative "Bourbon" Democrats didn't want Grant or Greeley and formed the short-lived Straight-Out Democratic Party. They nominated New York attorney Charles O'Conor for President and John Quincy Adams II for VP. O'Conor had already declined the nomination of the Labor Reform Party (a group that fizzled and later endorsed the Straight-Out Democrats) and also declined the nomination of the second party. Sources conflict, but it appears Adams was not so reluctant about being on the ticket.
The Straight-Outs forged ahead anyway and placed the O'Conor/Adams ticket on the ballot of 18 states. Grant won in a landslide and Greeley died shortly after the election throwing the Electoral College into disarray.
The Straight-Outs did not collect an impressive amount of popular votes, but it is interesting how they went beyond a regional appeal. The states where they polled more than 1% were pretty spread out: Oregon 587 (2.91%), Delaware 488 (2.24%), Texas 2,580 (2.21%), Michigan 2,875 (1.30%), Kentucky 2,374 (1.24%), California 1,061 (1.11%), Vermont 553 (1.04%), Iowa 2,221 (1.03%).
Election history:
1865 - Massachusetts House of Representatives (Republican)
1867 - Massachusetts House of Representatives (Democratic)
1867 - Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1868 - Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1868 - Democratic nomination for US President - defeated
1869 - Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1870 - Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1870 - Massachusetts House of Representatives (Democratic)
1871 - Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1873 - Massachusetts House of Representatives (Democratic)
1873 - Lt. Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic) - defeated
1875 - Lt. Governor of Massachusetts (Democratic/Liberal Republican) - defeated
1879 - Governor of Massachusetts (Independent Democratic) - defeated
Other occupations: attorney, US Army Colonel in the Civil War,
Buried: Mount Wollaston Cemetery (Quincy, Mass.)
Notes:
Son of Charles Francis Adams Sr., Free Soil Party VP candidate 1848
Ran an experimental model farm
Harvard graduate 1853
Considered for a Cabinet position by Pres. Cleveland in 1893.
Son Charles Francis Adams III was US Navy Sec. in the Hoover administration.
Grandfather of behavioral sociologist George Casper Homans.
