Mary Cal Hollis

Mary Cal Hollis, January 13, 1952 (Pine Bluff, Ark.) -

VP candidate for Socialist Party of the United States of America (aka Socialist Party USA aka Socialist Party aka Liberty Union Party aka Independent) (2000)
VP candidate for Socialist Party of the United States of America (2004)

Running mate with nominee (2000): David McReynolds (1929-2018)
Running mate with nominee (2004): Walter Frederick Brown (b. 1926)
Popular vote (2000): 5,602 (0.01%)
Popular vote (2004): 216 (0.00%)
Electoral vote (2000, 2004): 0/538

The campaign (2000):

Mary Cal Hollis of Colorado had been the Socialist Presidential candidate in 1996, but in 2000 she joined a small subset of former standard bearers who took the second place on the ballot in a subsequent election. David McReynolds had been the Socialist nominee in 1980 and two decades later was making another run for the White House. 

A former Democrat, Hollis put ideology over party loyalty and belonged to not only the Socialist Party USA but also the Green Party and Labor Party. "We need to educate the people that ninety percent of us have a lot in common, we shouldn't be splintered as the ruling class makes us, she said. "We need to give up the idea that a coalition means 'Quit your group and join mine.'"

In Vermont the Socialists managed to secure the nomination of the Liberty Union Party.

The McReynolds/Hollis ticket made the ballot in 7 states and had recorded write-in votes in an additional 7. Best showings: New Jersey 0.06%, Vermont 0.05%, Colorado and North Carolina 0.04% each, Washington 0.03%, Rhode Island 0.01%. What is impressive is that their North Carolina result was entirely a write-in effort with 1,226 votes.

The campaign (2004):

In 2004 the Party nominated attorney Walter F. Brown, a former Democratic State Senator in Oregon (PNW trivia alert!!!) for President and Mary Alice Herbert for VP. Hollis was the runner-up in the Vice-Presidential contest, but she was on the ballot with Brown only in the State of Colorado, where they finished with 0.01% of the vote in that jurisdiction.

Election history:
1996 - Peace and Freedom Party nomination for US President - defeated
1996 - Green Party nomination for US President - defeated
1996 - US President (Socialist Party of the United States of America) - defeated
2003 - Socialist Party of the United States of America nomination for President - withdrew
2003 - Socialist Party of the United States of America nomination for Vice-President - defeated

Other occupations: special education

Notes:
The first Arkansas-born third party VP to achieve ballot status in a national election.
"Debs felt that US citizens had fought two revolutions, one against royalty and one against slavery.
 He felt that the Third American Revolution would be against the wealthy ruling class. So, here's to
 the Revolution-it is surely inevitable. I just hope it can be done peacefully this time."--Mary Cal
 Hollis, 1997

Eric Thomas Chester

 Eric Chester in 1989

 

Eric Thomas Chester, August 6, 1943 (New York, NY) -

VP candidate for Socialist Party of the United States of America (aka Socialist Party USA aka Socialist Party aka Liberty Union Party aka Independent) (1996)

Running mate with nominee: Mary Cal Hollis (b. 1952)
Popular vote: 4,767 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

The Socialist Party USA in 1996 ran Mary Cal Hollis of Colorado for President and Eric Chester of Massachusetts as her VP.

Their platform and priorities were summed up in the voters pamphlet for Oregon:

A Single-Payer National Health Program = We must remove profit from health care. It is the basic right of every person to lead a healthful life. Health care must emphasize preventive medicine, the right to choose alternative types of care, increased publicly-funded  research to combat widespread disease, and the elimination of poverty, a major source of illness.

Corporate Accountability = In corporate America, only profits count! Our government has allowed the ravaging of ancient forests and public lands, and contamination of our soil, air and water. This disregard for the health of families makes a mockery of "family values." We must reign in corporate America and hold them responsible for their actions! 

A Humane Foreign Policy = We must slash our defense budget, stop arming the world and refuse aid to human rights abusers. It  has  been the Democratic and Republican administrations- more concerned with corporate profits than human rights- who have rationalized granting  "most favored nation" status to Communist China, guaranteeing the payment of wheat to Iraqi Dictator Saddam Hussein, and restoring the solid gold plumbing in the Emir's palace in Kuwait!

An Economy that Benefits All = Only the rich favor "trickle down" economics. We support living wages, worker control of industry  through democratic control of the workplace, a punitive tax on runaway corporations, and the repeal of NAFTA, GATT, so-called "right to work" laws, and the Taft-Hartley Act.

The Party had made an attempt to act as an umbrella for other groups on the Left and were successful in gaining the support of Vermont's Liberty Union Party, but failed to convince the Green Party and Peace and Freedom Party. Hollis herself was actually a member of the Green Party as well.

The advent of Internet became an unexpected recruiting tool as the SPUSA experienced a spike in interest from young voters.

Chester had compared the mainstream choice of Clinton-Dole in the 1996 election to that of Carter-Ford in 1976, suggesting there was not much daylight between the two in terms of economic policy.

During the low-budget campaign Hollis described an all too common scenario for third party candidates of driving her own car around the country, depending on the support of volunteers for lodging and food, and having her campaign schedule be interrupted by a real life job which in her case was serving as a teacher in special education.

At some point in 1996 Chester was apparently involved in a serious automobile accident in New York City which sidetracked him for a bit while he recovered from injuries.

Hollis and Chester had expressed a hope the SPUSA would be on the ballot in 15 to 20 states but they were listed in only five, and recorded write-ins in seven more. Their ballot vote results: Oregon 0.14%, Vermont 0.11%, Arkansas 0.06%, Colorado and Wisconsin 0.04% each.

Election history:
1968 - University of Michigan Board of Regents (New Politics Party) - defeated
1999 - Socialist Party of the United States of America nomination for President - defeated
2002 - US House of Representatives (Mass.) (Socialist Party of the United States of America) - defeated
2003 - Socialist Party of the United States of America nomination for President - defeated
2006 - US House of Representatives (Mass.) (Socialist Party of the United States of America) - defeated
2007 - Socialist Party of the United States of America nomination for President - defeated

Other occupations: author, economics professor, Elector for the New Politics Party 1968, member of Industrial Workers of the World.

Notes:
Was an Elector for the Cleaver/Hochman New Politics Party ticket in Michigan 1968
Now lives in Glasgow, Scotland
Joined the SPUSA around 1980

Barbara Garson

Barbara Garson, July 7, 1941 (New York, NY) -

VP candidate for Socialist Party of the United States of America (aka Socialist Party USA aka Socialist Party aka Liberty Union Party aka Independent) (1992)

Running mate with nominee: John Quinn Brisben (1934-2012)
Popular vote: 1,689 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

In 1992 the Socialist Party nominated J. Quinn Brisben for President. He had previously been the VP nominee for the Party in 1976.

Brisben predicted bad economic times for the years ahead. Reforming the health care system was a topic he highlighted.

Brisben's speeches had some very quotable lines:

The major parties are simply pawns to the military industrial complex. They accept huge campaign donations, figure out who they need to do favors for and come up with the most electable candidate.

This presidential Gong Show does nothing to serve the people's interest.

First we need to start freeing our minds by not watching any commercial TV. I can assure you that you don't need anything they advertise.

More Greens are becoming Reds as they realize they're not going to get much sympathy for the spotted owl if they can't save the job of the lumberman.

Once involved in socialism, people are often surprised at how popular many of our ideas really are. We stand for universal health care, women's rights, national day care and housing and jobs for everyone.

One good thing about running as a socialist, you can prepare your concession speech months in advance.

We would be better off with a parliamentary system as the British have because our electoral system is a disaster waiting to happen.

I'll probably end up losing more elections than Basil Rathbone lost sword fights ... This campaign is an educational effort. That's a left-wingy way to say we're going to lose but it's worth it anyway.

Early in the campaign Brisben was arrested in Orlando, Fla. for raising his cane at a law enforcement officer he felt was mishandling someone in a wheelchair. He was literally raising cane.

Brisben's VP was William D. "Bill" Edwards, the Party's first African American national nominee. The Bay Area-based Edwards was a labor organizer, former longshoreman, and anti-Apartheid activist. Sometimes the media called him "Edward D. Williams."

Unfortunately Edwards, who was 72, died on Aug. 5, 1992. By the end of the month the VP position was filled by Barbara Garson. She was already something of a public figure through her anti-war play MacBird! (which I enjoyed very much at the time it was released).

As Garson explained in a piece written late Oct. 1992:

Late this summer, I found a message on my answering machine saying that the vice presidential candidate of the Socialist Party had died. Could I help get his obituary into the papers? ("And by the way, you wouldn't want to run for vice president, would you?")

I'm a proud, though inactive, member of the Socialist Party and I agree with the platform. Still, I hesitated to become a candidate. Could I withstand the media scrutiny?

When asked by C-SPAN what she would do if elected Vice-President, Garson replied, "I'd demand a recount!"

Although the Liberty Union Party in Vermont endorsed the ticket, they did not achieve ballot status there. They were also endorsed by Dr. Benjamin Spock and singer Pete Seeger.

On Election Day, Edwards was still on the ballot in Tennessee. The Brisben/Garson appeared in the District of Columbia (probably) with 0.08% of the vote, Wisconsin 0.05%, and Utah 0.02% (placing 13 out of 13). Brisben was also write-in candidate in a dozen states.

Election history: none

Other occupations: coffee house worker, playwright, author.

Notes:
Third party figure Austin Burton aka Chief Burning Wood (1976) said Garson's MacBird! inspired
 him to invent the name from this line:
"MacBird shall never, never be undone/
 Till burning wood doth come to Washington."
Washington State trivia triple alert: First, Garson worked in the Shelter Half in Tacoma, Wash. ca. 1969, an anti-war coffee house where soldiers from nearby Fort Lewis could hang out. Second, the above-mentioned Burton was born in Washington State. Third, when I was college I played the McGovern role in a radio drama broadcast on KAOS-FM. The author, another student had written a play spinning off of  MacBird! but instead the topic was Nixon.

Ronald C. Ehrenreich

Ronald C. Ehrenreich, April 16, 1950 -

VP candidate for Socialist Party of the United States of America (aka Socialist Party USA aka Socialist Party aka Independent aka Liberty Union Party) (1988)

Running mate with nominee: Willa Kenoyer (1933-2020)
Popular vote: 3,882 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

In 1984 the Socialist Party of the United States of America had endorsed the Citizens Party but by 1988 they were back on their own. Presidential nominee Willa Kenoyer, a freelance writer in Michigan, had previously served as the Co-chair of the Citizens Party. It seems VP nominee Ron Ehrenreich of Syracuse, NY had also been active in the Citizens Party.

In the Vermont primary Kenoyer gained the support of the Liberty Union Party. Ehrenreich lunched with Burlington Mayor Bernie Sanders in the course of that primary campaign.

Kenoyer expressed a desire to eliminate the CIA and FBI, create a national health program, use the Pentagon to promote peaceful activities, create full employment at union wages, create federally funded child care, lifelong free education, public ownership of utilities and large corporations, and "socialize the Fortune 500."

Ehrenreich had no illusions about electoral victory. The SPUSA had other goals, he told the press: "We want to address the Reagan legacy and ask the question, 'Are the Democrats the only alternative to this legacy?' ... What we seek is a transformation of the economy to eliminate poverty and a transformation of society to eliminate injustice ... The campaign is a protest of the two-party dictatorship, where elections are rigged to prevent the participation of small parties, where choices are limited to Tweedledee and Tweedledum."

They had hoped to make the ballot in 38 states and finish with a five digit popular vote but only made it to six states plus DC and finished with four digits. 67% of the Kenoyer/Ehrenreich total popular vote came from New Jersey, where they placed 7th of out of 11 with 0.08%. Their other showings were not exactly something to write home about as they placed at the bottom or near it in almost every result: District of Columbia 0.07%, Vermont 0.06%, Iowa 0.03%, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and Utah 0.02% each. They also received a smattering of reported write-in votes half a dozen states.

Election history:
1999 - Onondaga County, NY Comptroller (Green Party) - defeated

Other occupations: credit union officer, teacher

Notes:
Washington State triva alert!!! Kenoyer was born in Tacoma!
Ehrenreich has lived in Syracuse, NY since 1973.
Burned his draft card in 1971 while a student at Temple University.

Nancy Ross

 today

Nancy Ross, ca1943-

VP candidate for New Alliance Party (aka Alliance Party aka Independent aka Independent Alliance Party aka United Citizens Party aka Liberty Union Party) (1984)

Running mate with nominee: Dennis L. Serrette (b. ca1940)
Popular vote: 43,460 (0.05%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

Fred Newman (1935-2011) was a Maoist with pretensions of being a psychologist (he wasn't) who had formed a communal movement around 1970 combining Leftist politics with New Age pseudoscience. Within a short time he had temporarily joined forces with Lyndon LaRouche, but personality-driven political parties can only tolerate one guru at a time, so they parted company-- or so it seemed. A possible subsequent Newman-LaRouche connection would forever be a point of conjecture.

From 1975-1978 Newman's group, now called the International Workers Party and claiming allegiance to Marx, Mao, and Lenin, attempted to work with the confederation of organizations and parties that collaborated under the umbrella of the People's Party. In 1976 the People's Party ran the Presidential ticket of Margaret Wright and Benjamin Spock. Apparently Newman and his entourage were shown the door out of the People's Party in 1978 by other progressive activists who held the IWP in low esteem.

In 1979 the New Alliance Party was formed by Newman with Lenora Fulani, who unlike her mentor was a real psychologist. Critics charged that the group was using a technique called "Social Therapy," designed to keep followers in line and manipulated with techniques such as large group awareness training, social isolation, and assignment of party-oriented tasks that were so time consuming there was little room for individual pursuits or critical self-reflection. There were charges that the supposedly defunct International Workers Party was simply operating on an underground basis and involved in secret authoritarian decision-making while using the NAP as a front organization.

Their first Presidential ticket was comprised of African American activist Dennis Serrette and Newman loyalist Nancy Ross. She had the distinction of being the first of Newman's followers to be elected to public office when she successfully gained a seat on the Community School Board 3 in New York City in 1977.

Ross was also head of the "Rainbow Lobby" (the lobbying branch of Newman's "Rainbow Alliance"), an opportunistic and unauthorized variant of the term "Rainbow Coalition" as popularized by the Jackson campaign. Rev. Jesse Jackson himself had co-opted the phrase from earlier more radical political elements. Later Jackson had to clarify that he had nothing to do with the NAP "Rainbow" incarnations.

Lifting the term "Rainbow Alliance," the NAP acted as if was continuing the work of Jackson, who had failed in his attempt to gain the nomination of the Democratic Party. Note Serrette's tactical use of the term "second party"--

We want to get enough votes so someone like Jesse can win in 1988. Let me make it clear. We're not going to win by numbers but by impact. We're starting the embryo of a second party that will express the needs of the people. We are taking up the issues the Democratic party has rejected. We will be out in the streets the day after election day building this second party momentum.

Realizing that many Democrats felt their party had compromised too much and drifted to the Right in order to attract centrist voters, Serrette and Ross attempted to woo this bloc of voters by stating they were upholding the true progressive ideals. "Mondale is not the lesser of two evils," said Ross, "He is the loser of two evils." Their rhetoric was Left of center but somewhat vague on details.

There was a bit of bad press surrounding the running mate question. Dorothy Muns Blancato, an interior decorator and Jazz pianist from Vanport, Penn. was selected as the VP and planned to be listed in three states: Alabama, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Although news reports indicate she was originally intended to be a stand-in candidate, in August 1984 she withdrew from the ticket without informing Serrette first and instead endorsed Sonia Johnson of the Citizens Party. Part of the result of this complicated episode was that Serrette failed to find a place on the Pennsylvania ballot. 

Amazingly well funded compared to other Leftist parties, NAP managed to gain ballot positions in DC and 31 states. A very impressive achievement for a first-time national run. Ross was the running mate in all but three states. In Kansas the VP nominee was Naomi L. Azulay. Mississippi and West Virginia voters found a blank spot in the VP slot with Serrette where other parties included the name of the running mate.

Of the remaining 28 states the Serrette/Ross ticket finished strongest in such diverse places as: South Dakota 0.36%, Massachusetts 0.31%, Ohio 0.27%, Arkansas 0.21%, Nebraska 0.16%, Maine and Vermont 0.14% each. The Party overall placed 7th nationally with 46,853 votes (0.05%), behind Lyndon LaRouche and Sonia Johnson incidentally. The ticket with Ross accounted for 43,460 of those votes.

Serrette broke with the NAP shortly after the election. In a scathing article written in 1988, he concluded with:

These few pages offer but an overview of a complex, and, in my opinion, dangerous organization. Dangerous, not only to the innocent, well-intentioned people who are caught in its grasp, but to the many it will try to exploit. Dangerous, because it uses a very progressive line, and untold millions of dollars, to prey on black communities, to attack black leaders and institutions, and to assault progressive organizations at whim. Dangerous because it can lie outright— lie about being black-led when blacks do not sit on the top, do not control the resources, do not control personnel; lie to its members about its participation with LaRouche; lie about Charles Tisdale; lie about me; lie about whatever serves Newman's interests, and put forth spokespersons who come to believe these lies. Dangerous because many members will do whatever they are told to do without ever evaluating what they have been told.

In conclusion, while I believe it is important that NAP be exposed for what it truly is, it is our job not to dwell on the organization, which craves controversy, but to concentrate our energies in our communities and organize, organize, organize. It is a vacuum that has been left open that allows NAP and other oppressive organizations to abuse our communities. We must fill that vacuum with genuinely pro­gressive, community-controlled organizations.

Meanwhile, Fred Newman has been recognized by the Cult Education Institute as a historical cult figure and leader.

Election history:
1977-1978 - Community School Board 3, New York, NY (Nonpartisan)
1981 - New York City Council (Democratic) - primary - defeated
1982 - Governor of New York (New Alliance Party) - defeated
1984 - Peace and Freedom Party nomination for US Vice-President - defeated

Other occupations: housewife, Parents Association President Public School 75 (NYC), head of the Rainbow Lobby, "part-time psychologist," founder of Independent Options LLC (2005), board member and officer of Committee for a Unified Independent Party, board member of Transpartisan Alliance

Notes:
Graduate of New York University
Jewish
Winner of the 1982 race was Mario Cuomo.
Was part of the Reform Party and then the Independence Party of New York.

Julius Wilson Hobson

Julius Wilson Hobson, May 29, 1919 (Birmingham, Ala.) – March 23, 1977 (Washington, D.C.)

VP candidate for People's Party (aka Liberty Union Party aka Peace and Freedom Party aka Independent aka New Party aka Common Good Party aka Human Rights Party) (1972)

Running mate with nominee: Benjamin McLane Spock (1903–1998)
Popular vote: 78,759 (0.10%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

The People's Party was an attempt to form an umbrella political party for the far Left. It was comprised of elements from the Peace and Freedom Party (Calif, Idaho, Ind.), Liberty Union Party (Vt.), Common Good Party (NY), Human Rights Party (Mich., Utah), and the New Party.

The New Party attempted to draft consumer advocate Ralph Nader for President, but he refused to run that year. The Peace and Freedom Party, now mostly centered in California, joined the coalition to form the People's Party. Michigan's Human Rights Party declined to place Dr. Spock's name on the ballot in deference to Sen. McGovern. Efforts to place Spock on the ballot in New York and Utah came to nothing.

After seriously considering backing the nomination of US Sen. George McGovern (D-SD), the Party chose to nominate Dr. Benjamin Spock, with Julius W. Hobson as his running mate. Dr. Spock stated he was merely a stand-in candidate and would gladly step down if someone else with more stature such as Rep. Shirley Chisholm agreed to run in his place.

Hobson, who by 1972 was something of a political gadfly, had evolved into an increasingly militant activist to battle various manifestations of segregation in Washington, DC using original and effective tactics on the streets, in court, and serving in public office. The man had a unique blend of being part political theater showman and part researcher. In 1971 he was given just six months to live as a result of multiple myeloma, a cancer of the spine, but fooled everyone by surviving until 1977 although he eventually was restricted to a wheelchair. In at least one photo from the 1972 campaign Hobson can be seen using crutches.

The platform, according to the New York Times, included "immediate withdrawal of all American troops abroad; free medical care as a right; an end to tax preference; an allowance of $6,500 for a family of four; the legalization of abortion on demand and marijuana, and an end to discrimination against women and homosexuals." Unfortunately for the People's Party the Democratic Party nomination of McGovern, easily the most Leftist candidate that party has offered since FDR, absorbed a group of voters who otherwise would have supported Spock if someone like Hubert Humphrey or Henry "Scoop" Jackson had been chosen instead.

On the ballot in ten states the Spock/Hobson ticket finished strongest in California 0.66%, Vermont 0.54%, Idaho 0.29%, and Colorado 0.25%.

Election history:
1968-1969 - District of Columbia Board of Education
1969 - District of Columbia Board of Education - defeated
1971 - US House of Representatives Delegate (DC Statehood Party) - defeated
1975-1977 - Council of the District of Columbia (DC Statehood Party)

Other occupations: custodian, paper company worker, soldier (WWII), Library of Congress researcher, Social Security Administration economist and statistician, teacher, Chair of the District of Columbia’s chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), founder of Association Community Teams (ACT), author

Buried: ?

Notes:
Some sources give his year of birth as 1922
"For 25 hell-raising years, Mr. Hobson shook Washington in unorthodox, unpredictable ways. As
  often as not, he was the lone front-line fighter against some aspect of racial discrimination, the
 gruff-and-ready tickler for equal education. He was always fast with an irreverent quip, and he never
 let up on his lawsuits, his books, his thorough research, his provocative political activities and his
 extraordinary ability to intimidate, embarrass or fool officialdom into doing something about civil
 rights."--Washington Post obituary.
In 1981 the Washington Post revealed that Hobson had been a paid informer for the FBI in the 1960s.
 Many of his supporters suspect he was playing a game of supplying misinformation or using the
 Bureau to thwart his enemies.
In Vermont in 1972 Bernie Sanders was downticket running for Governor also as part of the Liberty Union slate.