Dawn Neptune Adams

 

Dawn Neptune Adams, 1974 -

VP candidate for Progressive Party (aka Independent aka Progressive Party of Oregon aka Green Party of the United States and Independent Green Party) (2020)

Running mate with nominee: Dario David Hunter (b. 1983)
Popular vote: 5,408 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign:

Dario Hunter of Youngstown, Ohio initially filed with the FEC for US President on Feb. 18, 2019 as a member of the Green Party.

On Mar. 8, 2020 Hunter changed his FEC filing to reflect his campaign HQ had relocated to Walnut, Calif. and his running-mate was Darlene Elias of Massachusetts. In his quest for the nomination he placed second in the primaries with 20.5% behind Howie Hawkins (35.06%) and also finished as a formidable runner-up at the Green convention, July 9-11, 2020.

On July 16, 2020, having been unsuccessful in obtaining the nomination of the Green Party, Hunter changed his party designation to Independent in his FEC filing and continued his campaign. In the process he and Elias had been highly critical of the Green Party's leadership and what he contended was an unfair selection method biased in favor of eventual nominee Howie Hawkins.

On Aug. 15, 2020 his filing was amended yet again to reflect his VP was now Dawn Neptune Adams and they were running under the Progressive Party label. The reasons for the switch in running-mates was not given.

Hunter's autobiography from the campaign website--

Born April 21, 1983 in Livingston, New Jersey USA.

Raised in Jersey City and in Newark, New Jersey.

I was born in New Jersey to an African-American mother and a Persian father. We were a working poor family and for us life was a constant struggle to make ends meet. I held on to my goals, getting into Princeton and through three law degrees. I know what it’s like to come from a hard life, but I also know what it’s like to make good on little more than faith and hard work.

I've previously taught as a high school English teacher, served as a K-8 school administrator and as a community college instructor. I enjoy giving back through education and I believe that it is the key to our advancement as a country, just as it has been key to my own personal upliftment. I formerly practiced law in Canada and more recently as an international environmental lawyer at a firm in Haifa.

In Youngstown, OH, I served as a member of the Youngstown Board of Education (2016-2020), fighting the predatory effort of the State of Ohio to take over our district and trap our children in a CEO-run corporate failure. I fought to ban fracking and successfully took on local and state governments in court to uphold the public's right to public records.

Raised at the intersection of multiple cultural experiences, I have taken a very liberal and open-minded approach to spiritual leadership - converting to Judaism and becoming the first born-Muslim ordained as a rabbi. I was previously the campus rabbi for the College of Wooster (Wooster, OH) as well as a pulpit rabbi to a local congregation in Youngstown, Ohio.

Adams also had a biography on the campaign website--

Dawn Neptune Adams is a member of the Penobscot Nation and a journalist with Sunlight Media Collective. Her grassroots environmental activism began with protecting Indigenous Sacred sites in Huntington Beach, CA in 1998 and continues into the present with Indigenous advocacy at Penobscot Tribal, local, state, and national levels.

An activist for Indigenous rights, Dawn’s personal childhood story of Indigenous child removal was featured in the Emmy-winning documentary Dawnland.

Dawn is a Racial Justice Consultant to the Peace & Justice Center of Eastern Maine, an active member of Racial Equity & Justice of Bangor, and a former Indigenous Peoples' Policy Advisor for the Hunter/Elias 2020 Presidential campaign. Dawn is directly involved in politics for change, serving as the Wabanaki Liason to the Maine Independent Green Party as well as the current Vice Presidential Candidate to the Dario Hunter 2020 Presidential campaign.

When not battling polluters, plutocrats, and patriarchy, Dawn spends her time raising a pre-teen and building fine furniture. She dreams of a day when we can all eat Salmon from the Penobscot River and live together in peace.

Their platform in summarized form--

Employment

Together we will fight for the human right to food, water, housing and essential utilities.

We will fight for the right to a living wage job with wages indexed to cost of living and inflation (but never less than $15/hr).

Under the REAL Green New Deal there will be full employment – with public works jobs and green jobs.

We will protect workers rights and protect unions - ending firings without just cause.

We will achieve equal pay and equal rights for women, finally passing the Equal Rights Amendment.

Education

There will be tuition free education from grade school through to college.

And we will overcome the educational racism that plagues our schools, subjecting children of color to lessened educational opportunities and the racism of lowered expectations.

We will fight to keep local voice and choice in education – and keep privatization out of our educational system. Our children are not to be used as pawns for corporate profit.

Environment

We will secure clean air, water and soil for future generations and end the environmental racism that plagues minority communities with pollution. We will transition away from fossil fuels, ending their harmful extraction.

And we will set clear achievable goals to transition to 100% renewable energy.

Economy

Bought and paid for Republican and Democratic leaders will tell you that some banks are ‘too big to fail.’ There is no such thing. Break them up. And make corporations and rich pay their fair share. Corporations are not people - and we will no longer allow their interests to outrank the public good.

We shall give grants to green businesses and support community coops in minority communities.

We will democratize monetary policy, giving the public control of the money supply and the creation of credit.

Healthcare

There will be single payer health care for all Americans (i.e. Medicare for All), with no copays, deductibles or restrictions against pre-existing illness.

We will end racism in healthcare that causes a lack of resources and access for minority communities.

Immigration

We will halt the unwarranted deportations and detentions, night raids and the abusive separation of undocumented immigrant families.

We will create a path to citizenship for immigrants that is reasonable, achievable and appreciates the value immigrants bring to our country.

Democracy

Through ranked choice voting, proportional representation and open debates we will seek to perfect the revolution this country's founders started by bringing real democracy and real choice to America’s voters. We will remove the ballot access barriers put in place by the Republicans and Democrats (and their corporate masters).

Equal Rights

We will bring an end to the senseless killing of people of color by law enforcement – supporting the efforts of Black Lives Matter.

We will affirm tribal sovereignty, affirm all treaties, and restore tribal lands to our indigenous peoples – protecting their sacred sites and fighting racism.

Through targeted legislation, we will protect the rights and the lives of LGBTQIA+ persons.

We will stand up against colonialism in Puerto Rico, supporting Puerto Rico's self determination and independence.

We will fight for reparations for Americans of African descent who have been subjected to centuries of slavery and discrimination.

Policing/Prisons/Justice

We will end the war on drugs that feeds into our shameful system of mass incarceration – the new plantation system for African-Americans and people of color.

In response to the ongoing genocide by police, we will demilitarize, defund, disestablish and devolve power to local communities in law enforcement.

We will establish community oversight of public safety and end the quotas for enforcement actions that create a for profit law enforcement model.

We will end the abusive surveillance, spying and violation of our free speech that has occurred under Republican and Democratic administrations alike.

We will protect whistleblowers and publishers like Julian Assange from malicious prosecution with federal level legal protections.

Military/Wars

We will end the war budget and stop funding interventionist activities and wars, closing over 700 military bases abroad. And we will stop aiding and abetting human rights abusers around the world – such as Saudi Arabia and Israel.

We will fund instead a Department of Peace. Our best defense is the pursuit of diplomacy, a strong educational system (i.e. a well educated public) and a strong infrastructure.

And yet we will ensure the quality of veterans' health programs, and honor our military by dealing with the ongoing impact of the military sexual crime crisis outside of the broken military judicial system.

Hunter/Adams could be found on the ballots in Oregon (0.21%) and Colorado (0.01%). They were also registered as write-ins in at least half a dozen states, some of them under the Green Party designation. Nationally they finished in 15th place. Oregon gave them the lion's share of their popular vote.

Election history: none

Other occupations: activist, filmmaker, journalist

Notes:
aka Donna May Adams.

Ajamu Sibeko Baraka

 

Ajamu Sibeko Baraka, October 25, 1953 (Chicago, Ill.) -

VP candidate for Green Party of the United States (aka Independent aka DC Statehood Green Party aka Green Independent Party aka Green Rainbow Party aka Pacific Green Party aka Progressive Party aka Unaffiliated aka Mountain Party) (2016)
VP candidate for Wake Up (2016)

Running mate with nominee: Jill Ellen Stein (b. 1950)
Running mate with nominee: Charles R. Zerilli
Popular vote (Stein): 1,355,128 (0.99%)
Popular vote (Zerilli): 0 (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/538

The campaign (Stein):

Jill Stein was nominated as the Green Party standard bearer for the second time in 2016. Her official running-mate was Ajamu Baraka.

Stein's direction had veered a bit since 2012. In the 2016 election some critical observers felt she was starting to demonstrate what critics call "conspirituality," where New Age followers and the more cultish Trump adherents overlap in their denial of science and embracing a multitude of conspiracy theories. For example, the belief that Big Pharma controls the government regulatory agencies and vaccinations are harmful. Although Stein did not go full anti-vaxxer, she was accused by critics of pandering to that demographic through the use of linguistic "dog whistles." Critics also contended she used the same method in suggesting Wi-Fi causes brain damage and that the 9/11 attack deserved more investigation.

Although even skeptics agreed the Greens seemed to be more reality based when it came to environmental science, they pointed out their medical science was quite another thing (which is ironic considering Stein is a doctor), as demonstrated on the Green webpage--

Greens support a wide-range of health care services, not just traditional medicine which too often emphasizes “a medical arms race” that relies upon high-tech intervention, surgical techniques and costly pharmaceuticals. Chronic conditions are often best cured by alternative medicine. We support the teaching, funding and practice of holistic health approaches and as appropriate, the use of complementary and alternative therapies such as herbal medicines, homeopathy, naturopathy, traditional Chinese medicine and other healing approaches.

The rise and fall of the Bernie Sanders campaign left a good sized number of voters without a home. The Green Party was able to seize upon this opportunity. The Greens disdained Sanders' method of working within a major party, and felt everything the Democrats co-opted from them, such as the Green New Deal, became watered down after it had been essentially mainstreamed (hmm, interesting accidental aquatic wordplay there). Stein also did not seem to care if Trump emerged the winner in 2016--

The answer to neofascism is stopping neoliberalism. Putting another Clinton in the White House will fan the flames of this right-wing extremism. We have known that for a long time ever since Nazi Germany. We are going to stand up to Donald Trump and to stand up to Hillary Clinton!

Stein told the media she would step aside if Sanders was willing to run for President in the Green Party. She felt Clinton could do more damage if elected because she was competent where Trump was clearly in over his head.

The fact her running-mate Baraka was outspoken about his embrace of certain conspiracy theories did not help with the Greens escaping the "woo" image that took off like a rocket with Cynthia McKinney in 2008 and was now solidifying in 2016. He was particularly interested in what he viewed as US-generated "false flag" operations.

Baraka also held an unorthodox opinion regarding the 2015 Charlie Hebdo shootings. An essay he wrote on the subject includes this sample--

Je Suis Charlie has become a sound bite to justify the erasure of non-Europeans, and for ignoring the sentiments, values and views of the racialized “other.” In short, Je Suis Charlie has become an arrogant rallying cry for white supremacy that was echoed at the white power march on Sunday in Paris and in the popularity of the new issue of Charlie Hebdo.

It was published as part of his article, "The Paris Attacks and the White Lives Matter Movement" in Kevin Barrett's anthology entitled ANOTHER French False Flag?: Bloody Tracks from Paris to San Bernardino with contributions by Holocaust deniers, 9/11 Truthers, anti-Semites, and other conspiracy theorists. Baraka was forced to issue a statement that he had no idea of the overall scope of the monograph and found himself on the defensive for most of the campaign.

Baraka was not a fan of President Obama, who he called an "Uncle Tom," nor of Sen. Sanders and the majority of his supporters--

In their desperate attempt to defend Sanders and paint his critics as dogmatists and purists, the Sanders supporters have not only fallen into the ideological trap of a form of narrow “left” nativism, but also the white supremacist ethical contradiction that reinforces racist cynicism in which some lives are disposable for the greater good of the West.

And as much as the ‘Sandernistas ’ attempt to disarticulate Sanders “progressive” domestic policies from his documented support for empire (even the Obamaite aphorism “The perfect is the enemy of the good” is unashamedly deployed), it should be obvious that his campaign is an ideological prop – albeit from a center/left position – of the logic and interests of the capitalist-imperialist settler state.

The silence of the left on Yemen is not a trivial matter. The fact that so many white leftist supporters of Sanders can politically and psychologically disconnect his domestic program from his foreign policy positions that objectively support U.S. and Western neoliberal hegemony means that not only have they found a way to be comfortable collaborating with imperialism, but that they have also decided that they can support the implicit hierarchy that determines from an imperial perspective that lives in the White West matter more than others.

This is not to suggest that everyone who might find a way to support Sanders is a closet racist and supporter of imperialism. I know plenty of folks of all backgrounds who “feel the Bern.” There is, however, an objective logic to their uncritical support that they cannot escape and which I believe represents the ongoing crisis of radicalism in the U.S. and Europe.

For some reason Howie Hawkins once again ended up as a stand-in VP, this time in Minnesota, Vermont, and Washington. He was quoted by Politico during the Green convention with a statement that turned out to be prophetic--

The biggest threat to the Democrats isn't losing votes to the Greens ... Working class whites say, well, the Democrats don't have all that much for us. And Trump sounds like he's mad at the system. So they throw a protest vote to him ... the African-American, Latino, Asian working class. Barack Obama got them out twice, but he didn't do a lot for them, and he's not on the ticket this time.

Stein finished in 4th place with 1,457,288 votes (1.06%), the second highest result in the history of the Party. Of that, the Stein/Baraka team accounted for 1,355,128 votes. The ticket had their strongest results in: Hawaii (2.97%), Oregon (2.50%), Kansas (1.98%), California (1.96%), Maine (1.91%), Alaska (1.80%), and Montana (1.60%).

Some pundits point to Stein's percentages in Wisconsin (1.04%), Pennsylvania (0.81%), and Michigan (1.07%)-- all swing states that voted for Trump who won by margins below the Green total-- and accuse her of being a spoiler as they accused Nader in 2000. However, in all three states the Libertarians had considerably higher percentages than the Greens, placing third, which complicates the "spoiler equation." If anything, a case could be made both third parties drew away a significant number of "Protest Voters" who otherwise would have voted for Trump and he won those states in spite of that.

Baraka endorsed Howie Hawkins in 2020.

The campaign (Zerilli):

Charles R. Zerelli of Staten Island, N.Y. was a registered write-in in Minnesota and Washington under a party called Wake Up. In Minnesota he indicated Baraka was his running-mate.

One of Zarelli's Youtube's summarizes his platform in the introductory text--

After finding out that Radio-Active-Readings are approaching Cali. Shores.. Charles wants Fukuashima STOPPED NOW. Waters heating-up WILL spawn Poison gasses. SEE THIS VIDEO NOW.!!  He will go there and do this for America AND The Worlds benefit. "I'm Ready to go to China and help them ..to help US.  Redefining what a National Security Emergency really is.. A business plan and HOW Carbon-Foot-Print IS effecting US. Charles really cares for US, our retirement and our kids-kids NOW - Cha

No votes were reported.

Election history: none

Other occupations: US Army (Vietnam War), Amnesty International board member and regional director, executive director of the US Human Rights Network, teacher, editor, columnist

Notes:
Awarded the US Peace Prize by the US Peace Memorial Foundation in 2019.

Charlotta Amanda Spears Bass

 Bass compared to major party VP nominees Richard Nixon and John Sparkman

 During her acceptance speech with Hallinan

 With Hallinan and Paul Robeson

 With Robeson

Charlotta Amanda Spears Bass, February 14, 1874 (Sumter, SC) – April 12, 1969 (Los Angeles, Calif.)

VP candidate for Progressive Party (aka Independent Progressive Party) (1952)

Running mate with nominee: Vincent Hallinan (1896–1992)

Popular vote: 140,746 (0.23%)
Electoral vote: 0/531

The campaign:

After being badgered by the FBI and House UnAmerican Activities Committee and watching their 1948 leader Henry Wallace walk out in 1950 due to differences in foreign policy, the Progressive Party experienced a mass exodus in the short time since the previous Presidential election. Wallace came to support the Korean War and many of the more centrist members of the Party were not comfortable with the amount of Communist participation in their organization. By 1952 the Progressive Party was in the control of their Left flank.

For President in 1952, the Progressive Party nominated San Francisco-based attorney Vincent Hallinan who at the time was serving a short prison sentence in McNeil Island, Washington as a contempt of court charge while defending Harry Bridges. When he was released on August 17, 1952, a large crowd of supporters greeted him with a rally at the Steilacoom ferry dock. One of them had a sign that read, "From the Big House to the White House."

The running mate was a historic choice. Charlotta Bass was the first African American woman to be nominated for Vice-President. Her name was placed in nomination by Paul Robeson and seconded by W.E.B. Du Bois.

Sources vary on the date of her birth, but it seems she was 78-years old at the time she was nominated. She was mainly known as the publisher and editor of the California Eagle and used her influence to crusade for civil rights in many forms: racial, housing, labor, and voting as well as highlighting the abuses of police brutality. She was a registered Republican, even a Willkie organizer in 1940, until 1948 when she helped form the Progressive Party.

Most of her career had been made in California, but in 1951 she moved to New York.

Here are some excerpts from her acceptance speech:

I shall tell you how I come to stand here. I am a Negro woman. My people came before the Mayflower. I am more concerned with what is happening to my people in my country than in pouring out money to rebuild a decadent Europe for a new war. We have lived through two wars and seen their promises turn to bitter ashes. Two Negroes were the first Americans to be decorated for bravery in France in World War I, that war that was fought to make the world safe for democracy. But when it ended, we discovered we were making Africa safe for exploitation by the very European powers whose freedom and soil we had defended. And that war was barely over when a Negro soldier, returning to his home in Georgia, was lynched almost before he could take off his uniform. That war was scarcely over before my people were stoned and shot and beaten in a dozen northern cities. The guns were hardly silenced before a reign of terror was unloosed against every minority that fought for a better life.

...

Yes, we fought to end Hitlerism. But less than 7 years after the end of that war, I find men who lead my government paying out my money and your money to support the rebirth of Hitlerism in Germany to make it a willing partner in another war. We thought to destroy Hitlerism—but its germ took root right here. I look about me, at my own people—at all colored peoples all over the world. I see the men who lead my government supporting oppression of the colored peoples of the earth who today reach out for the independence this nation achieved in 1776.

Yes, it is my government that supports the segregation by violence practiced by a Malan in South Africa, sends guns to maintain a bloody French rule in Indo-China, gives money to help the Dutch repress Indonesia, props up Churchill’s rule in the Middle East and over the colored peoples of Africa and Malaya. This week Churchill’s general in Malaya terrorized a whole village for refusing to act as spies for the British, charging these Malyan and Chinese villagers who enjoyed no rights and no privileges—and I quote him literally—“for failing to shoulder the responsibility of citizenship.” But neither the Malayan people—nor the African people who demonstrate on April 6—will take this terror lying down. They are fighting back.

...

I have fought not only for my people. I have fought and will continue to fight unceasingly for the rights and privileges of all people who are oppressed and who are denied their just share of the world’s goods their labor produces. I have walked and will continue to walk in picket lines for the right of all men and women, of all races, to organize for their own protection and advancement. I will continue to cry out against police brutality against any people, as I did in the infamous zoot suit riots in Los Angeles in 1944, when I went into dark alleys and reached scared and badly beaten Negro and Mexican American boys, some of them children, from the clubs and knives of city police. Nor have I hesitated in the face of that most unAmerican Un-American Activities Committee—and I am willing to face it again. And so help me God, I shall continue to tell the truth as I know it and believe it as a progressive citizen and a good American.


...

The Progressive Party in 1952 was endorsed by the American Labor Party and for the second time in a row, the Communist Party USA. When Bass was accused of communist sympathies and "leaning to the Left" she replied, "How can I lean to the left when I am advocating what is right?"

The campaign suffered a blow in early September when newspaper supplement magazine This Week published an anti-Communist anti-Soviet article by Henry Wallace entitled "Where I was Wrong."

On the ballot in 28 states, the Progressive Party had a pretty feeble result especially compared to their 1948 showing. As bad as it was, they still placed third nationally. Best states: New York (0.90%), Maryland (0.81%), Oregon (0.53%), and California (0.46%) and it rapidly declines after that.

The Progressive Party disbanded in 1955. Hallinan was sent back to McNeil Island in 1954 to 1955 on a tax evasion conviction. Bass was considered a "security risk" by the FBI well into her 90s.

But Charlotta Bass had the last word, "Win or lose, we win by raising the issues."

Election history:
1945 - City Council, Los Angeles, Calif. - defeated
1950 - US House of Representatives (Calif.) (Independent Progressive) - defeated

Other occupations: newspaper editor and publisher, western regional director for Wendell Willkie 1940, National Chairman of the Sojourners for Truth and Justice 1952

Buried: Evergreen Cemetery (Los Angeles, Calif.)

Notes:
Buried in the same cemetery as Eddie Anderson, Matthew Beard Jr., and Katherine Grant.
Winner of the 1950 House race was Sam Yorty.
Wrote an autobiography, Forty Years (1960)
Her birth year is sometimes given as 1879 or 1880 and her birthplace as Rhode Island.
First African American woman to serve on a grand jury.
Believed to be the First African American woman to publish a newspaper.

Glen Hearst Taylor

Glen Hearst Taylor, April 12, 1904 (Portland, Ore.) – April 28, 1984 (Burlingame, Calif.)

VP candidate for Progressive Party (aka New Party aka Independent Progressive Party) (1948)

Running mate with nominee: Henry A. Wallace (1888-1965)

Popular vote: 1,157,328 (2.37%)
Electoral vote: 0/531

The campaign:

Just one of the many sideshows in the crazy 1948 election year included the battle of two FDR Vice-Presidents, Harry Truman (Democrat) and Henry Wallace (now in the newly created Progressive Party), with each claiming they were the true torch-bearer of Roosevelt's legacy.

The Progressive Party's 1948 platform mentions FDR several times in a positive light, linking the late President in what they saw as part of their political lineage:

Ten years ago Franklin Delano Roosevelt warned: "The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state. That, in its essence, is fascism."

Today that private power has constituted itself an invisible government which pulls the strings of its puppet Republican and Democratic parties. Two sets of candidates compete for votes under the outworn emblems of the old parties. But both represent a single program— a program of monopoly profits through war preparations, lower living standards, and suppression of dissent.

For generations the common man of America has resisted this concentration of economic and political power in the hands of a few. The greatest of America's political leaders have led the people into battle against the money power, the railroads, the trusts, the economic royalists.

We of the Progressive Party are the present-day descendants of these people's movements and fighting leaders. We are the political heirs of Jefferson, Jackson and Lincoln— of Frederick Douglass, Altgeld and Debs— of "Fighting Bob" LaFollette, George Norris, and Franklin Roosevelt.

The platform did have one important difference from the other political parties of the Left in 1948-- they all but embraced Stalin's Soviet regime as they condemned the Cold War. It didn't help that rather than run their own candidate in this election year, the Communist Party USA (now in the hands of the Stalinists) openly endorsed the Progressive Party. The fact that the CPUSA had influence in the Wallace/Taylor campaign is beyond dispute, but to what extent is still a matter of historical debate.

Wallace and Taylor, although not Communist themselves, refused to eschew CPUSA support on the grounds of that they did not wish to participate in the growing hysteria over "Reds" and be on the wrong side of what they called a freedom of speech and thought issue.

Wallace selected US Senator Glen Taylor of Idaho as his running mate. Taylor, a Democrat, was the very first pure Pacific Northwest third party Vice-Presidential candidate, having been born in Portland and raised in Idaho. Until he was elected to the US Senate in 1944, he had never been east of Chicago.

Taylor, who had considerable experience as an actor and musician, possessed a flair for publicity and fully understood how politics is frequently like theater. Known as the "Singing Cowboy" he has been noted for the distinction as one of the most Leftists members of the Senate since the 1930s. He had very mixed feelings about joining the Progressive Party and took several weeks in making his decision to be part of the ticket. In May, 1948 he told a reporter, "I knew I would probably kill my chances of being re-elected [to the Senate] in 1950 if I threw in with Henry. I'm not a lawyer. I've been in show business all my life, living hand to mouth, often in debt. I can't leave the Senate and practice law, like most of these fellows do. It was a tough decision ... I am running because I feel that the question of peace or war is more important than any other consideration."

During the campaign, in May, Taylor was convicted of disorderly conduct in Birmingham, Ala. for using a door reserved for African Americans as he took an action to protest the policy of segregation. Henry Wallace observed, "This dramatizes the hypocrisy of spending billions for arms in the name of defending freedom abroad, while freedom is trampled on here at home."

With votes recorded in 45 states, Wallace/Taylor finished strongest in New York (8.25%), California (4.73%), North Dakota (3.80%), Washington (3.50%), Montana (3.26%), Oregon (2.86%), Nevada (2.36%), and Taylor's Idaho (2.31%). It could be argued that the Progressive Party gave New York and Michigan to Dewey.

Election history:
1938 - Democratic primary for US House of Representatives (Id.) - defeated
1940 - US Senate (Id.) (Democratic) - defeated
1942 - US Senate (Id.) (Democratic) - defeated
1944-1951 - US Senate (Id.) (Democratic)
1950 - Democratic primary for US Senate (Id.) - defeated
1954 - US Senate (Id.) (Democratic) - defeated
1956 - Democratic primary for US Senate (Id.) - defeated
1956 - US Senate (Id.) (Independent write-in) - defeated

Other occupations: actor, country-Western singer known as "The Singing Cowboy," movie theater manager, President of Coryell Construction Co. 1950-1952, inventor and producer of custom toupees called Taylor Toppers (now Taylormade), painter's assistant,  sheet metal worker, shipyard worker during WWII, sheepherder, carpenter

Buried: Skylawn Memorial Park (San Mateo, Calif.)

Notes:
Winner of the 1956 US Senate race was Frank Church, a result hotly disputed by Taylor.
Brother of Jazz singer Lee Morse (1897-1954)
12th of 13 children.
Family moved to Kooskia, Idaho when Taylor was very young.
Divorced and remarried.
Died of Alzheimer's Disease.
Lost his hair early in life and invented his own toupee which turned into a successful business still
 run by a family member.
In an effort to publicize his need for housing in Washington, DC in 1945, he sang "Oh give us a
 home, near the Capitol dome, and a yard where the children can play..." to the tune of "Home on the
 Range" on the Capitol steps.
Attempted to organize a Farmer-Labor Party in Montana and Nevada, 1935.
Engaged in a fistfight with Republican Ray McKaig, breaking McKaig's jaw, on Election Day 1946
 in Boise.
"Even if it is only a psychological phenomenon, it is a sign of what the world is coming to. If we don't ease the tensions, the whole world will be full of psychological cases and eventually turn into a global nuthouse."--Sen. Taylor on the UFO claims regarding Roswell, NM, July 1947.
He rode his horse, Nugget, up the Capitol steps.
Taylor's brother Paul ran for US Congress in California as a Progressive Party candidate.
Returned to the Democratic Party in 1949.

John Clinton McGee

John Clinton McGee, July, 1863 (Algiers?, La.) - March 31, 1936? (New York, NY?)

VP candidate for National Progressive Party (aka Progressive Party aka Bull Moose Party) (1928)

Running mate with nominee: Henry Hoffman (b. 1851)
Popular vote: ? (0.00%)
Electoral vote: 0/531

The campaign:

Omaha grocer and naturopathic doctor Henry Hoffman age 77, an old Bull Mooser, made an attempt to revive the party. With a convention consisting of less than a dozen delegates meeting in the back room of Hoffman's store, no one voted to approve the doctor's platform, but Hoffman declared it passed anyway, "It makes no difference."

The tiny party's presidential nomination was filled by Hoffman himself. Jane Addams was nominated as the running mate but she declined the honor, so John "Suspender Jack" McGee was chosen. There is no record I can find so far of McGee, who was a well known character in New York City, accepting or declining the decision.

Among the old time populist planks in the platform was a cap of a million dollars on personal income.

The Hoffman/McGee active campaign appeared to have ceased after the nominations-- either that or they ran a stealth electioneering effort since they did not appear on any ballots. Nor did Hoffman withdraw and endorse another candidate.

Election history:
1915 - Progressive Party nomination for Sheriff of New York County - defeated

Other occupations: entertainer in Wild West Show (until 1890), the "cowboy cop" in New York City (dismissed ca. 1902), sidewalk notary public, Pony Express rider, scout for the 5th US Cavalry, hunter for the Union Pacific Railroad, served in the AEF in Europe as Chief of the Bureau of Effects of Deceased

Buried: ?

Notes:
Known as "Suspender Jack" for using suspenders as reins on horses.
Arrested in 1902 for failure to pay alimony.
Started a stampede for nominating Oscar Straus for Governor via a stirring speech at the 1912 New
 York Progressive Party convention.
Worked on behalf of Harry Thaw in 1914.
Was involved with the Independence Party in 1908.
Arrested during a Hearst-related political disturbance in New York City, Nov. 1905.
In Washington DC in 1880, his father Thomas was a clerk.
After the Civil War his father went to Brazil as a "Confederado" and took the family with him for
 several years.
Performed with King & Franklin Circus and Wild West in 1887
Toured in Europe with "Mexican Joe" in August 1887.

Burton Kendall Wheeler

 Note how Sen. La Follette makes up for the height difference in spite of the tall hair

 Wheeler and 1912 Progressive Party VP nominee Sen. Hiram Johnson

Burton Kendall Wheeler, February 27, 1882 (Hudson, Mass.) – January 6, 1975 (Washington, DC)

VP candidate for Progressive Party (aka Independent Progressive Party) (1924)

Running mate with nominee: Robert M. La Follette (1855-1925)
Popular vote: 4,831,706 (16.61%)    
Electoral vote: 13/531

The campaign:

Wisconsin Republican Senator Robert La Follette and Montana Democratic Senator Burton K. Wheeler combined forces in a significant third party effort that enjoyed high voter turnout in the Northwestern quarter of the US and the Far West. More agrarian and radical than the the previous Bull Moose Progressive Party, this new incarnation even gained the endorsement of the Socialist Party of America and the American Federation of Labor.

The VP nomination was first offered to Justice Louis Brandeis, who declined. Wheeler was then given the opportunity and after some consideration decided to accept. He did not renounce his loyalty to the Democratic Party, but could not support Davis. "I am a Democrat but not a Wall Street Democrat," Wheeler explained. He also wanted to use the VP nomination as a way to make his Senate investigations into the Harding scandals more public.

The platform included stands that were anti-monopoly, pro-free speech, pro-equal rights for women, pro-public ownership of utilities, promotion of public works, pro-public control of natural resources, pro-union, and anti-war.

Wheeler used the empty chair gimmick while "debating" an absent Coolidge apparently to great acclaim. Clint Eastwood attempted the same showmanship at the 2012 Republican National Convention but comic timing was not his forte.

It was the 5th largest popular vote percentage for a third party in US history, surpassed since then only by Ross Perot in 1992. It was the 7th best third party vote from the Electoral College.

On the ballot in every state except Louisiana, the La Follete/Wheeler ticket won the standard bearer's home state of Wisconsin (53.96%) and placed second in 11 more states, nearly winning in North Dakota. After Election Day La Follette and Wheeler returned to their parties of origin.

Wheeler later reflected: "Our trouble was that we were ahead of the times. The Progressive Party platform of 1924 became the ideological basis for the New Deal in 1933 and much of it found its way to the statute books by 1935."

Election history:
1910-1912 - Montana House of Representatives (Democrat)
1920 - Governor of Montana (Democrat) - defeated
1923-1946 - US Senate (Mont.) (Democrat)
1946 - Democratic primary for US Senate (Mont.) (Democrat) - defeated

Other occupations: traveling book salesman, stenographer, attorney, Delegate to the Democratic National Convention 1932-1940, US District Attorney of Montana 1913-1918

Buried: Rock Creek Cemetery (Washington, DC)

Notes:
Buried in the same cemetery as Alice Lee Roosevelt Longworth, Frank Mankiewicz, George S.
 McGovern, Tim Russert, Upton Sinclair, and Gore Vidal.
Was headed to Seattle to start his law career but lost his shirt in a poker game in Butte, Mont. along
 the way and stayed.
Author of the Wheeler Resolution limiting AM radio to 50,000 watts.
Broke with FDR over the court-packing plan and later became an isolationist until Dec. 7, 1941.
Isolationists urged him to run as a third party presidential candidate in 1940.
If La Follette/Wheeler had won in 1924, Wheeler would have been President June 18, 1925 upon the
 death of La Follette.