Unsuccessful VP Nominees as Later Presidents

William O. Butler in 1852 is by far one of the easiest: have him be slightly quieter on slavery in the run-up to the convention and it’s very likely he gets the nod instead of Pierce and then goes on to beat Scott easily.

Zachary Taylor / John Sergeant in 1848 (with Taylor then dying) seems vaguely reasonable by the standards of the time, even if Sergeant doesn’t bring all that much to the ticket.

Charles Fairbanks if he lived slightly longer could maybe fill the space Harding did IOTL in 1920?

If the War of 1812 goes _seriously_ pear-shaped then President Rufus King is at least somewhat a possibility.

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Nathaniel Macon is a possibility in the same way Frank Knox is - if Adams and Calhoun both die in late 1826 for some reason, he’s third in line.

And if John A. Logan becomes President Pro Tempore in 1885 instead of John Sherman, then you just have to kill off Grover Cleveland rather quickly.
 
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I'm surprised there isn't more love for Edmund Muskie in this thread, as he seems like one of the more plausible cases to go from failed VP nominee to POTUS. Off the top of my head, you just need a few things to happen. First, someone needs to come in during the lead up to the 1972 election, hit him on the back of the head, and tell him that running in primaries is going to be different than anything that he's dealt with before or up to this point. He'll need to hire a campaign staff that reflects the new reality of campaigning for the nomination. Second, he needs a stronger response to the Canuck Letter and political attacks in general. That should be sufficient to get him the nomination that year.

I don't know that he can defeat Nixon in '72 without significant changes, but it's certainly likely that he will make the race more competitive. My thought is that if he loses a bitter election to Nixon, having been on the receiving end of the President's dirty tricks, he might take a more active role in bringing down Nixon which would keep his name front-and-center for 1976. The results of the Watergate scandal would show that Muskie had been more or less cheated out of the presidency by chicanery, and that is a wave he could ride right through 1976 and into the White House.
 
What about Robert Dole, Ford's running mate in his unsuccessful re-election bid in
1976 IOTL? Yes, I know he lost to Bill Clinton
in 1996 IOTL but in retrospect that was the
wrong year for him to run. If instead he had
(somehow)managed to beat out H.W. Bush
& get the G.O.P. nomination in 1988, the
likelihood of Dole going on to beat Dukakis
in the general is, I think, quite good(though
I personally agreed with Dukakis on most
issues I think Dole would have just flat out-
campaigned him). Thoughts people?
 
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What about Robert Dole, Ford's running mate In his unsuccessful re-election bid in
1976 IOTL? Yes, I know he lost to Bill Clinton
in 1996 IOTL but in retrospect that was the
wrong year for him to run. If instead he had
(somehow)managed to beat out H.W. Bush
& get the G.O.P. nomination in 1988, the
likelihood of Dole going on to beat Dukakis
in the general is, I think, quite good(though
I personally agreed with Dukakis on most
issues I think Dole would have just flat out-
campaigned him). Thoughts people?

Yeah if he gets past Bush in the primary, he enters the general without any contra baggage, so he'd stand a pretty good chance.
 
There are stories that Sargent Shriver was a top choice for McGovern but he was in Europe at the time of the convention and it was a last minute decision by the McGovern campaign to pick Sen. Eagleton.

So if that is true, a lot of the stories that the McGovern campaign was hopelessly incompetent would not have been written and McGovern may have won one or two more states.
 
I'm surprised there isn't more love for Edmund Muskie in this thread, as he seems like one of the more plausible cases to go from failed VP nominee to POTUS. Off the top of my head, you just need a few things to happen. First, someone needs to come in during the lead up to the 1972 election, hit him on the back of the head, and tell him that running in primaries is going to be different than anything that he's dealt with before or up to this point. He'll need to hire a campaign staff that reflects the new reality of campaigning for the nomination. Second, he needs a stronger response to the Canuck Letter and political attacks in general. That should be sufficient to get him the nomination that year.

I don't know that he can defeat Nixon in '72 without significant changes, but it's certainly likely that he will make the race more competitive. My thought is that if he loses a bitter election to Nixon, having been on the receiving end of the President's dirty tricks, he might take a more active role in bringing down Nixon which would keep his name front-and-center for 1976. The results of the Watergate scandal would show that Muskie had been more or less cheated out of the presidency by chicanery, and that is a wave he could ride right through 1976 and into the White House.

I too have a soft spot for Muskie. Unfortu-
barely, with hindsight- & of course too late
to help Muskie- 1972 IOTL was exactly the
wrong year for him to run. Democratic Party
voters that year were in a agitated, even
angry, mood. Muskie's campaign rested on
the premise that voters should trust him, a
pitch that they felt too vague & insufficent
(especially when McGovern was running to
Muskie's left on a firm anti-Vietnam War
platform, a conflict Muskie had previously
been in favor of). By 1976 IOTL, by contrast,
with the war over & Nixon out of office, the
voters had calmed down & were instead
looking for reassurance. So they voted for
Jimmy Carter whose pitch, as noted colum-
nist Jeff Greenfield pointed out, was "trust
me"- the same approach Muskie had used
four years earlier(SEE Greenfield's book THE
REAL CAMPAIGN, 1982). If this worked for
the previously unknown Carter in 1976 IOTL,
maybe it might have have worked for Muskie
(who @ his best was called "Lincolnesque" as
witness IOTL his famed broadcast opposite
Nixon on the eve of the 1970 Congressional
elections). In politics, as in so much of life,
timing can @ times be everything.
 
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William O. Butler in 1852 is by far one of the easiest: have him be slightly quieter on slavery in the run-up to the convention and it’s very likely he gets the nod instead of Pierce and then goes on to beat Scott easily.

The problem is that as long as he was backed by people like Francis Preston Blair, he would be viewed with intense suspicion by the South, which under the two-thirds rule could block any nominee.

"Welles spoke glowingly of Houston, but Blair doubted whether the Texan was acceptable to the South, which was currently leaning toward Buchanan and Douglas. He and Benton were still supporting William 0. Butler of Kentucky, a well-known Indian fighter who looked like Andrew Jackson, though they were quite willing to back Houston if he could develop any strength in the slave states—an unlikely prospect. Blair added that most of Douglas' legion of enemies were partial to Butler. Preston King agreed, doubtless mentioning the fact that Hannibal Hamlin and 'Prince' John Van Buren, the ex-President's gifted son, were trying, with Marcy, to arrange a solid New York delegation for Butler. Welles was bound to respect these comments, since Benton, Blair, and King were among the most knowledgeable politicians in the party. He still thought Houston 'the strongest candidate we can bring out,' but he was not as confident about his chances for the nomination after the. Blair dinner. Typically, he gave vent to his feelings in his diary: 'There is uncertainty and worthlessness in the party's organization . . . intrigues that are disgusting ... the compromise measures and the union movements have deranged parties and broken down principles. . .'

"No sooner had Welles returned to Hartford than Butler was accused of making a deal with the free-soil faction of the Democratic party. Though he denied the allegation, the Kentucky legislature forced him to state publicly that Congress had no power over slavery in the territories. This declaration took him effectively out of the running. Free-soil Democrats on the verge of joining their Hunker brethren drew back, making it plain they could not support anyone who would permit slavery in the territories north of the Missouri Compromise line. .." https://books.google.com/books?id=GGjRCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA246

If Butler had kept quiet about the Kentucky legislature's resolution, perhaps he could have kept his northern support, but the opposition of the South would almost certainly have doomed him. (Southerners much preferred a northern "doughface" to any southerner suspected of "free soil" tendencies.)
 
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