John Mason was the Continentalist Party candidate for President in the 1839 Mexican elections. Mason was a Jeffersonian planter who left for California soon after gold was discovered there in 1838. Within a year of his arrival in California, Mason had amassed a fortune, and won the Continentalist nomination for President of the U.S.M. Sobel does not say how Mason was able to win the presidential nomination over various Continentalist state governors, members of Congress, and members of President Andrew Jackson's Cabinet. Presumably, Mason was either able to bribe his way to the nomination, or managed to win Jackson's endorsement.
During the election, Mason, downplayed his Jeffersonian origins, calling himself "a Californian, by God, and proud of it!" Mason promised to continue Jackson's policies, but he also echoed Liberty Party nominee Miguel Huddleston in calling for more independence from France, assistance to the poor of Durango and Chiapas, and the development of Arizona. In this way, Mason attempted to straddle both the issues and the parties, but succeeded only in alienating both Continentalists and Libertarians: the Jeffersonian Anglos considered him a turncoat, while the Hispanos and Mexicanos looked upon him as an interloper and a pretender.
Mason was unable to secure the elections of any Continentalist Senate candidates in his adopted home state of California. The Continentalists won only Jefferson's four seats, two in Mexico del Norte, and one in Arizona. As a result, Huddleston was chosen as president by the seventeen Libertarian Senators.
Mason does not have an entry in Sobel's index. He is mentioned on pages 116-117 of For Want of a Nail ....
Sobel's source for John Mason's presidential run is Martin York's The Election of 1839 (Mexico City, 1970).