With three electors committed to a fusion ticket that would support one of the three Democrats with the best chance of winning after Election Day, Abraham Lincoln was able to secure four electoral votes in New Jersey in 1860.
Lincoln was not put to a popular vote. Rather, the Electoral College candidates ran independently. Lincoln received seven pledges, Northern Democrat Stephen Douglas received three, Southern Democrat John Breckenridge received two, and John Bell, another Democrat, received two.
With 49.3% of the statewide vote, Lincoln’s electorate behind the Democratic Fusion ticket by 1,568 votes.
The New Jersey State Library was contacted by the New Jersey Globe to provide a county-by-county analysis of the results of the 1860 presidential election.
The Globe calculated an average vote for each slate of seven elector candidates since votes were dispersed among the fourteen elector candidates, and votes were cast for an additional 37 elector candidates.
Ten counties were won by Lincoln:
60 percent AtlanticBurlington (58%)Cape May (60%)Cumberland (68%)Gloucester (57%).Mercer (51%).Morris (54%).Ocean (67%).Passaic (54%).Salem (61%).
Eleven counties were won by the Democratic Fusion Ticket; the Lincoln electors’ percentages are as follows:
Bergen (41%).Camden (49%).Essex (48%).Hudson (41%).Hunterdon (43%).Middlesex (45%)Monmouth (42%).Somerset (46%).Sussex (41%).Union (44%).Warren (46%).
Freshman Republican incumbents John Nixon (R-Bridgeton) and John Stratton (R-Mount Holly) were re-elected to second terms in that year’s House elections.
Democrats George Cobb (D-Morristown) and William Steele (D-Somerville) were elected to the seats after two Democratic congressmen chose not to run for reelection.
It was an upset to take the fifth position.
The incumbent speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Rep. William Pennington (R-Newark), lost his reelection campaign. He lost to Nehemiah Perry (D-Newark), the former speaker of the New Jersey Assembly, by a mere 400 votes.
