Friday political trivia: Warm bucket of spit edition

Since Maryland has never elected a president from its state, and with ticket-talk in full swing, here are the Marylanders who found themselves vying for the ‘warm bucket of spit’ that is the vice presidency.

1972 was the last time a Marylander was on the ballot in a presidential election – on both major party tickets.

Former Peace Corps. and OEO Director Sargent Shriver moved back to Silver Spring after his ambassadorship to France ended in 1970. He was Sen. George McGovern’s  1972 fallback-fallback-fallback, after revelations about Sen. Thomas Eagleton’s mental health and several others turned McGovern down. McGovern-Shriver were crushed by Richard Nixon and former Gov. Spiro Agnew that year, though neither would finish out their terms in office. Agnew does have the last laugh, in being the highest elected official in state history, and the only one to be on a federal ballot twice.

There was another year in which two Marylanders ran for the vice presidency: 1816.

John Eager Howard, a Federalist, should be considered the first to make a serious bid for the vice presidency. He had a long and distinguished career, having been a member of the Continental Congress, military leader, governor, state Senator, and President pro temporare of the U.S. Senate.

New York Gov. Daniel D. Tompkins crushed Howard in the Electoral College, but he did finish ahead of the other Federalist VP candidates that year: James Ross, John Marshall and fellow Marylander Robert Goodloe Harper.

Harper had actually been a Congressman from South Carolina, but because his father-in-law was Charles Carroll, a transition to Maryland politics came easily. He served as a state and U.S. Senator before his 1816 Federalist candidacy.

Harper ran for the vice presidency again in 1820, receiving only 1 Electoral College vote in a two-way tie for third among the Federalist candidates.

As for minor parties, state Del. William Daniel was the 1884 Prohibition Party vice presidential candidate.