New Jersey and Abraham Lincoln

[Starbucks Union Thug HokeyPuck]

Strikes me as odd that New Jersey was the only state north of the Mason-Dixon line to not vote for Lincoln, and they did it twice!  Seems very strange that a state fighting for the Union side would vote against Lincoln in the middle of the Civil War. 

[Joe Republic]

I can't account for 1860, but George McClellan (Lincoln's opponent in 1864) was from New Jersey.

[Colin]

This might help you from my good friend Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey_in_the_19th_century#Slavery_and_Civil_War

New Jersey was the last Northern state to make slavery illegal. New Jersey was also one of the states that originally was opposed to the constitutional amendment banning slavery. So this might have had an impact against Lincoln's presidential campaign.

[The Dowager Mod]

New Jersey's electoral votes were split, four for Lincoln, three for Douglas.

[Kevinstat]

Exactly. Lincoln won New Jersey in 1860, but New Jersey split its electoral votes. In 1864, McClellan was from New Jersey and ran on an anti-war platform. New Jersey, as the only farming state in the North, would have been very happy to be the only farming state in the Union.

Actually, Stephen Douglas won the popular vote in New Jersey in 1860 (click here to verify).  I don't know why Lincoln won 4 of the state's then-seven electoral votes.  Perhaps New Jersey used a Maine-Nebraska-type system for electing its Presidential electors back then, and Douglas only carried one of New Jersey's five congressional districts (probably heavily) even though he won the overall popular vote in the state.  I'm not sure, but I'm sure one could look it up on-line somewhere.  I have to be getting to bed though.

[ill ind]

  The reason for the split in New Jersey's electoral vote in 1860 is this:
  At the time one voted for the individual electors by casting a ticket with the names of the various electors printed on it.  If one did not want to vote for a particular elector then one could cross out their name and a vote would not be counted for that individual.
  The opposition to Abraham Lincoln combined into a fusion ticket of 3 Douglas electors, 2 Breckenridge electors, and 2 Bell electors.  When election day came around, the vote total difference between the two tickets (pro-Lincoln, and anti-Lincoln) was pretty close.  The Anti-Lincoln ticket did indeed get the most votes, but enough people casting that ticket crossed off the names of the 4 Bell and Breckenridge electors that they got less votes than the Lincoln electors electing the 4 with the highest vote total.  I assume that this was done by people who had a pro-Northern sentiment who had no problem voting for Douglas, but didn't want to vote for electors for what were perceived as pro-south/pro-slavery candidates.
  Several other states had Fusion tickets in the field as well.  The Anti-Lincoln tickets in New York, and Rhode Island were composed of electors representing the other three candidates as well, but none won.  In Pennsylvania, there was partial success in uniting the Breckenridge/Douglas forces behind a joint ticket, but some of the Douglas electors balked leaving an incomplete Douglas ticket still out there.  In 'official results' the Breckenridge total from Pennsylvania was actually the vote for the joint Breckenridge/Douglas ticket, and the Douglas vote was for the 'rump' ticket of the 12 (I think)Douglas electors that refused to sign onto the joint ticket.
  There was also some attempt at a joint opposition ticket in Connecticut too, which accounts for Breckenridge's unusually high percentage in that Northern state.  The Breckenridge vote was for the 'Fusion' ticket, while the Douglas vote was for a 'pure' ticket of Douglas electors.

Hope this explains the situation a bit.

Ill Ind

[Kevinstat]

That explains a lot.  Thanks.

[jimrtex]

  The reason for the split in New Jersey's electoral vote in 1860 is this:
  At the time one voted for the individual electors by casting a ticket with the names of the various electors printed on it.  If one did not want to vote for a particular elector then one could cross out their name and a vote would not be counted for that individual.
  The opposition to Abraham Lincoln combined into a fusion ticket of 3 Douglas electors, 2 Breckenridge electors, and 2 Bell electors.  When election day came around, the vote total difference between the two tickets (pro-Lincoln, and anti-Lincoln) was pretty close.  The Anti-Lincoln ticket did indeed get the most votes, but enough people casting that ticket crossed off the names of the 4 Bell and Breckenridge electors that they got less votes than the Lincoln electors electing the 4 with the highest vote total.  I assume that this was done by people who had a pro-Northern sentiment who had no problem voting for Douglas, but didn't want to vote for electors for what were perceived as pro-south/pro-slavery candidates.

In addition, in New Jersey, the Breckinridge and Bell electors were not the same in all counties.

This was prior to the adoption of the Australian ballot in the United States, and elections were actually all write-in.  However, political parties could print up ballots with lists of their favored candidates.  Voters could edit these ballots, because they were in fact casting a write-in ballot.  Or they could simply write their only list.

The conventional practice in cases where electors were chosen as individuals is to report the vote total of the leading candidate of each slate.