Albert William Watson (August 30, 1922 – September 25, 1994) was an American politician, a Democrat-turned-Republican state and U.S. representative from South Carolina.

[2] His family moved and he was reared near the state capital of Columbia in Lexington County, where he attended public schools.

During World War II, Watson served as a weather specialist in the United States Army Air Forces.

In 1962, Watson first ran for South Carolina's 2nd congressional district seat in the U.S. House to fill the opening created when fellow Democrat John J. Riley died on New Year's Day.

[6] After securing the Democratic nomination, Watson faced Floyd Spence, a fellow state representative from neighboring Lexington County, who had turned Republican a few months earlier.

While Watson headed the South Carolina "Democrats for Goldwater" organization, Thurmond went as far as switching parties and becoming a Republican on September 17, 1964.

Another Deep South congressman, John Bell Williams of Mississippi, lost his seniority for supporting Goldwater as well.

As a measure of how weak the Republicans were in South Carolina for most of the post-Reconstruction era, in most elections since losing the governorship in 1892 they hadn't even fielded a candidate.

He faced strong competition from the Democratic nominee, Lieutenant Governor John C. West, originally from Camden.

In 1971, Thurmond asked Nixon to appoint Albert Watson to the United States Court of Military Appeals, but Democratic U.S.