Editing Thomas Eagleton (section)

==1972 vice-presidential candidacy==
{{Main|1972 United States presidential election}}

==="Amnesty, abortion, and acid"===
On April 25, 1972, as George McGovern won the Massachusetts [[Democratic Party presidential primaries, 1972|Democratic primary]], conservative journalist [[Robert Novak]] phoned Democratic politicians around the country. On April 27, 1972, Novak reported in a column his conversation with an unnamed Democratic senator about McGovern.<ref name=PCOLKansascitystar>{{cite news| newspaper=Kansas City Star | title = With another disclosure, Novak bedevils the dead | first1= Steve | last1= Kraske | date=July 28, 2007 | url= http://www.kansascity.com/news/columnists/steve_kraske/story/209499.html | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20071018194343/http://www.kansascity.com/news/columnists/steve_kraske/story/209499.html |archive-date=October 18, 2007}}</ref><ref name=PCOLColumbiatribune>{{cite news | url=http://archive.columbiatribune.com/2007/aug/20070819Feat004.asp | work=Columbia Tribune | title=A slice of history: Biographers of the late U.S. Sen. Thomas Eagleton of Missouri will find some vivid anecdotes when they comb through his large collection of journals, letters and transcripts housed in Columbia | first1=Terry | last1=Ganey | date=August 19, 2007 | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130607015253/http://archive.columbiatribune.com/2007/aug/20070819Feat004.asp | archive-date=June 7, 2013 }}</ref> Novak quoted the senator as saying: <blockquote>The people don't know McGovern is for amnesty for draft dodgers, abortion, and legalization of pot. Once middle America—Catholic middle America, in particular—finds this out, he's dead.<ref name="PCOLKansascitystar" /> </blockquote>Because of the column McGovern became known as the candidate of "amnesty, abortion, and acid",<ref>{{cite news| url= https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=dAQuAAAAIBAJ&pg=6956,894523&dq=amnesty+abortion+and+acid&hl=en |title= Coalition Breaking |first1= Victor |last1= Riesel |newspaper=Rome News-Tribune |location= Rome, Georgia| date=July 6, 1972}}</ref><ref name="PCOLMeetthepress">{{citation| url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna19694666 |work=[[Meet the Press]] |date=July 15, 2007 |title=Interview with Robert Novak | publisher=NBC News}}</ref> even though he only supported the [[Decriminalization of non-medical cannabis in the United States|decriminalization of marijuana]] and maintained that legalized abortion fell under the purview of [[states' rights]].<ref>[https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna19694666 "Interview with Robert Novak"], ''Meet the Press'', NBC News, July 15, 2007. Retrieved January 21, 2011</ref><ref>Ganey, Terry (August 19, 2007), [https://web.archive.org/web/20130607015253/http://archive.columbiatribune.com/2007/aug/20070819Feat004.asp "A slice of history"], Columbia Tribune, archived from the original on June 7, 2013.</ref><ref>Boller, Paul F., ''Presidential Campaigns: From George Washington to George W. Bush'', Oxford University Press, 2004, [https://books.google.com/books?id=fq8pY-vThDUC&pg=PA339 pp. 339]</ref>

On July 15, 2007, several months after Eagleton's death, Novak said on ''[[Meet the Press]]'' that the unnamed senator was Eagleton.<ref name=PCOLMeetthepress/> Novak was accused in 1972 of manufacturing the quote, but said that to rebut the criticism, he took Eagleton to lunch after the campaign and asked whether he could identify him as the source; Eagleton refused.<ref name= PCOLKansascitystar/> "Oh, he had to run for reelection", Novak said. "The McGovernites would kill him if they knew he had said that."<ref name=PCOLMeetthepress/> Political analyst [[Bob Shrum]] says that Eagleton never would have been selected as McGovern's running mate if it had been known at the time that Eagleton was the source of the quote.<ref name=PCOLMeetthepress/> "Boy, do I wish he would have let you publish his name. Then he never would have been picked as vice president," said Shrum.<ref name=PCOLMeetthepress/> "Because the two things, the two things that happened to George McGovern—two of the things that happened to him—were the label you put on him, number one, and number two, the Eagleton disaster. We had a messy convention, but he could have, I think in the end, carried eight or 10 states, remained politically viable. And Eagleton was one of the great train wrecks of all time."<ref name=PCOLMeetthepress/>

===Selection as vice-presidential nominee===
After a large number of prominent Democrats declined to be McGovern's running mate, Senator [[Gaylord Nelson]] (who was among those who declined) suggested Eagleton. McGovern chose Eagleton after only a minimal background check, as was customary for vice-presidential selections at the time.<ref name="McGovern, George S. 1977, pp. 190">McGovern, George S., ''Grassroots: The Autobiography of George McGovern'', New York: Random House, 1977, pp. 190–191</ref><ref>Theodore White, ''The Making of the President, 1972'', (1973), pp. 256–258</ref> Eagleton did not mention his hospitalizations, and in fact decided with his wife to keep them secret from McGovern while he was flying to his first meeting with McGovern.

===Replacement on the ticket===
On July 25, 1972, just over two weeks after the [[1972 Democratic National Convention|1972 Democratic Convention]], Eagleton said that news reports that he had received electroshock therapy for clinical depression during the 1960s were true. McGovern initially said he would back Eagleton "1,000 percent". McGovern consulted confidentially with preeminent psychiatrists, including Eagleton's doctors, who advised him that a recurrence of Eagleton's depression was possible and could endanger the country should Eagleton become acting president.<ref>McGovern, George S., ''Grassroots: The Autobiography of George McGovern'', New York: Random House, 1977, pp. 214–215</ref><ref>McGovern, George S., ''Terry: My Daughter's Life-and-Death Struggle with Alcoholism'', New York: Random House, 1996, pp. 97</ref><ref>Marano, Richard Michael, ''Vote Your Conscience: The Last Campaign of George McGovern'', Praeger Publishers, 2003, pp. 7</ref><ref>''The Washington Post'', "George McGovern & the Coldest Plunge", [[Paul Hendrickson]], September 28, 1983</ref><ref>''The New York Times'', "'Trashing' Candidates" (op-ed), George McGovern, May 11, 1983</ref> On August 1, nineteen days after being nominated, Eagleton withdrew at McGovern's request, and after a new search by McGovern, was replaced by [[Sargent Shriver]], former U.S. Ambassador to France, and former (founding) director of the [[Peace Corps]] and the [[Office of Economic Opportunity]].<ref>Theodore White, ''The Making of the President, 1972'', (1973), pp. 260</ref>

A ''Time'' poll taken at the time found that 77% of the respondents said "Eagleton's medical record would not affect their vote." Nonetheless, the press made frequent references to his "shock therapy", and McGovern feared that this would detract from his campaign platform.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/03/26/MN9NVQGO2.DTL | work=The San Francisco Chronicle | first=Joe | last=Garofoli | title=Obama bounces back – speech seemed to help | date=March 26, 2008}}</ref>

McGovern's failure to vet Eagleton<ref name="McGovern, George S. 1977, pp. 190"/> and his subsequent handling of the controversy gave occasion for the Republican campaign to raise serious questions about his judgment. In the general election, the Democratic ticket won only Massachusetts and the District of Columbia.