It may have happened and I just don't remember it, but has a major political party ever declined to nominate its own incumbent President who wanted another term? I think the GOP denied former president Teddy Roosevelt nomination, but he was not incumbent at the time
Yeah, Ford is the only possibility I can think of. And like you, I'm not sure that happened to Ford.
The results of most US Presidential elections, all the way back to the founding era, are available on line. You could check all the elections that followed a one term president to see if the incumbent was his party's candidate.
Richard M. Nixon was (re)elected President of the US, with a fellow named Spiro Agnew (anagram: "Grow a penis") as his running mate (Vice President) in '72.
In '73, Agnew resigned as Vice President due to a corruption investigation into monies he took before (and into) his term(s) as VPOTUS. Nixon selected the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Gerald R. Ford, as being a guy that would be easy to get congressional approval for VP (the early 70's was prime Cold-War territory, and the Speaker is #3 in the order of presidential succession).
So GRFord was not nominated for VP, never was elected as VP, but became VP because of "this one simple trick."
Some time later, in '74, Nixon resigned as POTUS due to the Watergate scandal. Ford was then promoted from VP to POTUS. Still never won a national election, nor ever campaigned at a national level.
If you snoop around on Wikipedia you can find a list of the various cabinet secretaries and department heads during the Nixon/Ford era. It is somewhat disturbing how many names remained in play in DC for an entire generation. GHWBush, Cheney, Rumsfield, etc.
Ford served long enough that the 25th(?) amendment timer kicked in -- he could run for one re-election as President, making 74-76 and 76-80 (or some later term) his "two terms." He would not be able to run for more terms, per the "FDR amendment".
In 1976, the Republican primary put Ford up against Reagan and another guy (who got few votes). Reagan lost to Ford, but would come back again in a few years.
Ford went on to lose to Jimmy Carter in the 1976 general election. He won his primary, finally campaigned nationally, but still never won election as President or Vice President. (And this answers the question: the GOP definitely supported him for his re-election bid.)
Carter served one term, undone by the Iran Hostage crisis and the failure of Operation Eagle Claw. Reagan took power in 1980, and ... yeah.
Nixon selected the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Gerald R. Ford
Ford was NOT Speaker of the House. Democrats controlled the US House, and the Speaker was Carl Albert (D-OK) who served as Speaker from '71-'77.
It's a bit odd, but 1868. Johnson was vice president on the Republican ticket, but personally was a Democrat. He tried for the Democratic nomination in 1868, and failed.
Biden got nomination in 2024, but who switched it to Harris? Is this situation similar to the original question?
He was convinced to concede the nomination by the hierarchy of the Democratic Party as his mental and physical health were both failing.
Being a life-long Lib myself, Joe should never have run for reelection. There should be an age limit to run. Just my opinion.
There should be an age limit to run.
There is. You must be at least 35 years old to be president.
As to a maximum age, there are 80-year-olds as sharp as 50-year-olds, and 50-year-olds as [you fill in the adjective for lack of mental capacity] as 80-year-olds.
The point is more that nobody's brain works as well at 80 as it did at 50. If you start with someone clever then they might still get by at 80, day to day, but it will be a deterioration.
So if your starting point is a TV show host, and the job involves remembering and processing an immense amount of information, it's going to be problematic isn't it. Windmills , Bibi, ICE, all these simplifications. Joe, the same, like Afghanistan.
Warren Buffet is 95 years old and finally retiring. I think he was pretty sharp at 80.
It's not the number of years. It's their mental capacity.
Or lack thereof.
And in Joe's case, even Ronald Reagan was making jokes about Biden's mental capabilities while he (Reagan) was in office. More than 30 years before Biden managed to attain the presidency.
It wasn't just about his mental capacity. Biden repeatedly lied about personal history from childhood through his entire adult life.
C'mon man. Don't diss an old warrior. Joe fought in every American war since the Battle of 1812.
Being a life-long Lib myself, Joe should never have run for reelection. There should be an age limit to run. Just my opinion.
I consider my self a conservative leaning libertarian, a minarchist. Joe should never have run (full stop).
I agree on the upper age limit, but that would take a constitutional amendment.
The two most recent 'near misses' were Ronald Reagan (vs Ford) in 1976 and Teddy Kennedy (vs Carter) in 1980.
You were close.
After serving for two terms (he served most of POTUS McKinley's second term, after he was assassinated), TR (Theodore Roosevelt) 'sponsored' Taft to be the GOP nominee for the 1908 election; Taft was elected POTUS. However, TR challenged Taft, the incumbent POTUS, for the 1912 GOP Nomination for POTUS. The GOP chose the current incumbent, Taft, over TR.
Roosevelt then formed the "Bull Moose" Party; resulting in Wodrow Wilson getting elected...
and I believe that was the last time a major party candidate finished out of the top 2 in electoral votes. But yes, Teddy split the R votes, allowing Wilson to win the election.
Joe Biden, comes to mind. No Dem primary just handed off to his VP.
He got the nomination then withdrew.
It may have happened and I just don't remember it, but has a major political party ever declined to nominate its own incumbent President who wanted another term?
I think what I am finding fascinating is the number of people who apparently have no idea and are simply guessing.
But this has happened five times, with two others possible.
John Tyler was the first in 1844. He was a Whig and William Henry Harrison's VP. And assumed the Presidency after Harrison's death in 1841. And he had many battles with the Whigs during his term of office (including a Whig supported impeachment), and by the end of his first year as President he was ejected from the party. In 1844 he attempted to rejoin the Democratic Party, but they rejected him also. So he would be the first, as his own party had kicked him out even before the next elections.
Millard Fillmore was another, in 1852 and also a Whig. And once again, a VP who assumed the office after the death of Zachary Taylor in 1850. But after multiple cases of pushing for compromise with rising Southern resentment he supported things like the Missouri Compromise and the Fugitive Slave Act to try and keep the nation together. And in the end alienated his own party. And after a contentious convention he lost the party nomination for the 1852 election to Winfield Scott.
Then we have Franklin Pierce in 1856. He was a Democrat, but by that time the Democratic Party had largely been divided into two lines, and his support for slavery alienated the Northern Democrats to such a degree that James Buchanan won the nomination.'
Then there is the interesting case of Andrew Johnson in 1868. A Democrat that had joined Lincoln's "National Union Party" during the Civil War, he was rejected by both Democrats and Republicans so neither party nominated him.
Then there is Chester Arthur in 1884. As is common, he assumed the Presidency after the assassination of James Garfield, and alienated the Republicans over his soft stance on the end of Reconstruction and several other issues. An d in the 1884 convention James Blaine defeated him for the nomination.
Then we get to the "Maybe" cases. In 1868, Lyndon Johnson was able to do the math, and after his poor performance in the primaries withdrew as he knew the odds of continuing on to secure the nomination were low.
Joe Biden is another case that is similar. He actually had enough votes to secure the nomination, but by that time people were questioning his mental status so he withdrew to allow more time for his VP to run her own campaign.
But it is interesting looking back, in that in most of the cases where a President was not nominated by their own party, they had not actually run for the Presidency at all. And had assumed it after being elected as Vice President.