Third-party Candidates always lose or so we think. In the 1836 presidential election. Martin Van Buren is elected president. However due to financial panic he loses the next presidential election. The interesting thing is that Anti-Slavery/Liberty Party candidate James Birney came in with 0.3% of the vote. Going with his anti-slavery theme he tries again four years later and slightly jumps to around 2% of the vote. So the question I have is between 1844 and 1848 was emancipation considered impossible to implement.
1848 was the rise of the Free Soil Party, which was another anti-slavery movement. in that presidential election, the liberty party nominated anti-slavery Congressman Gerrit Smith and the anti-slavery Free Soil party nominated former President Martin Van Buren. Buren got 10% and Smith got 0.1%. The presidency went to a rich man outsider from a dying whig party.
How about in 1852 when Free Soil nominated Senator John P. Hale for president and got 4.9% of the vote. Hale was the first United States Senator to come out against slavery. Factions of the whigs were starting to break off. Congressman Jacob Broom was a pro-slavery whig that became the American Party.
The Free Soil Party and activists from the liberty movement merged with anti-slavery whigs and formed the Republican Party. Their first candidate was abolitionist John Freemont. Well, the nativist knows nothing movement nominated former President Millard Filmore. Fillmore got 21% of the vote.
Before the civil war, the American Party and a bunch of southerners formed the Constitutional Union Party and fielded a presidential candidate in the 1860 election and got 12% of the vote. However, with the Democrats splitting into two groups the election went to Abraham Lincoln who signed the emancipation proclamation to abolish slavery in 1863.
The issue of abolishing slavery started with a third party candidate who got 0.1% of the vote. It took almost 20 years to abolish slavery. but change doesn't happen in one presidency. Change doesn't come from one single president. President Lincoln freed the slaves but look how many abolitionists came before him. Even if they only get 0.1% of the vote they don't stop fighting.
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Things were bad in 1873. America was going to the gold standard. There was a huge currency debate and rural farmers were hurting due to inflation. In 1874 the populist uprising of the Greenback Party fielded a candidate and received 0.99% of the vote. Greenbacks wanted to expand currency beyond the implementation of the gold standard. The Greenback party gained 13 seats in the U.S. House. They worked to pass an act that coined the silver dollar as a legal tender. The Greenback Party fielded Greenback Congressman James Weaver in the 1880 Presidential Election and received around 3% of the vote.
The Greenback Party faded away but their ideas did not. Their rebirth came in the form of the Anti- Monopoly Party. The party advocated populist measures such as direct election of senators by popular vote, a graduated income tax, arbitration of industrial labor conflicts, establishment of labor bureaus to enhance the legal rights of organized labor, and antitrust legislation to break the power of the giant monopoly corporations The Anti-Monopoly Party fielded Massachusetts Governor Ben Butler about 1.5% of the vote.
The Anti-Monopoly Party did score a victory when The Sherman Antitrust Act was signed into law. It regulated the power of monopolies. The Anti-Monopoly party soon transformed into the Peoples Party (Populist) and fielded a Congressman James Weaver. Weaver carried 4 states and got 22 electoral votes.
The populist movement fused itself into the Democratic Party and field Congressman William Jennings Bryan. However, he came up short with 46% of the vote. He tried again in 1900 but lost with 45% of the Vote. They fielded Thomas Watson in 1904 but the presidency went to Teddy Rosevelt.
After William Howard Taft was elected president he drew a third party challenge from Teddy Rosevelt. Running as a Progressive he was part of a 4-way race. The populist movement that came out of the Greenback Party was infused in the Democratic Party and fielded Woodrow Wilson and won. He named William Jennings Bryan his Sec. of State.
In 1913 Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act. This made the U.S Dollar legal tender and in the 16th amendment was passed by congress and ratified by the states. This gave the government permission to collect income taxes.
Republican Joseph Bristow lost renomination by his own party. However, not before he changed the political climate entirely. He introduced a constitutional amendment that called for the direct election of U.S. Senator. The 17th amendment was ratified and that is how we elect our senators, not the State Legislature.
Think about it. The Greenback Party wanted to expand currency, but only got 3% of the vote. Over the next 40 years, they grew larger by infusing themselves with a populist/labor movement. They infused their ideas into the Democratic Party and started winning elections and changed America.
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Economic dislocation caused by American entry into the war put agricultural prices and workers' wages into imbalance. In this time of War the Farmer-Labor Party emerged. They brought together populists, activists, progressives and the labor movement. They even had a presidential candidate. Party Christensen got 0.99% after campaigning on establishing a 8 hour work day and nationalization of industries.
in 1924 The Farmer-Labor Party and the Socialist Party worked with Teddy Roosevelts Progressive/Bullmoose Party. They nominated progerssive crusader Robert La Follette Sr for president. Fighting Bob got around 17% of the vote. I often compare Elizabeth Warren to Bob La Follette. He is always one of my political heroes. The Farmer-Labor Party started to fade away and only came away with only 0.02 % of the vote in the 1928 Presidential Election.
The Farmer-Labor Party continued on being a third party but their ideas were implemented into Federal Law. The Democrats were united against President Hoover and nominated Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt. He won by a large margin.
The new deal included Industrial Recovery Act guaranteed that workers would have the right to unionize and bargain collectively for higher wages and better working conditions. He asked Congress to end prohibition. In July 1935, the National Labor Relations Act, also known as the Wagner Act, created the National Labor Relations Board to supervise union elections and prevent businesses from treating their workers unfairly.
FDR also signed bills that limited the work week to 40 hrs and set a minimum wage. That overtime pay will be a time in a half. FDR was the longest serving president in American history.
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2016 was a change year in politics. We saw a populist uprising in the Democratic Party. People are angry and scared. An Independent Socialist from Vermont infused himself into the Democratic Party and took the progressive wing of the party with him. He created a revolution of new democratic voters. The party has been flipped upside down. Senator Sanders campaigned on creating a single-payer health care system, ending the use of gerrymandering and free college. Now establishment folks consider most of Sanders proposals unrealistic and can never be implemented. So think for second how unrealistic is it. Change does not come from one single president or presidential candidate. Senator Sanders may never be president but his ideas will eventually become implemented to public policy. Fighting Bob was never elected president but look at the astounding effects he has in our political history.