James Sherman

James Schoolcraft Sherman was a New York lawyer, businessman, congressman, and the twenty-seventh vice president of the United States. Known as "Sunny Jim" because of his friendly personality, Sherman spent most of his political career in the House of Representatives, where he became an experienced Republican legislator. He served as William Howard Taft's vice president but died only days before the 1912 presidential election.

Sherman was born on October 24, 1855, in Utica, New York. His father, Richard Updike Sherman, was a lawyer and newspaper publisher, while his mother, Mary Frances Sherman, was the daughter of a prominent New York family. Sherman attended Hamilton College and graduated in 1878. He studied law and was admitted to the New York bar in 1880.

Sherman established a law practice in Utica and became involved in local Republican politics. He served as mayor of Utica from 1884 to 1886 and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1886. Although he left Congress briefly, he returned in 1897 and remained there until becoming vice president in 1909. His long congressional service made him one of the experienced legislative leaders of the Republican Party.

Sherman was elected vice president alongside William Howard Taft in 1908. The Republican ticket defeated William Jennings Bryan and John W. Kern, and Sherman took office on March 4, 1909. As vice president, he presided over the Senate and supported the Taft administration's legislative program. He was renominated with Taft in 1912, but the Republican Party split when Theodore Roosevelt challenged Taft and became the Progressive Party's presidential nominee.

Sherman's health deteriorated during 1912. He continued campaigning despite suffering from a serious kidney condition and died at his home in Utica on October 30, 1912, only six days before the presidential election. Because ballots had already been printed, Republican electors were instructed to vote for Nicholas Murray Butler, the Republican National Committee chairman, for vice president. Taft and Butler lost the election to Woodrow Wilson and Thomas R. Marshall.

Sherman's death created one of the unusual episodes in American electoral history: he remains the only major-party vice-presidential nominee to die between the party's nomination and the presidential election of the same year. His career otherwise represents the traditional congressional route to the vice presidency during the early twentieth century.