# Highest elected public office held by Communist or Socialist in U.S.? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 16, 2004, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480 "2004-02-16T13:40:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2004, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480/1 "2004-02-16T13:40:50Z")
Just curious as to the electiblity of members of the Communist Party and the Socialist Party in the United States. What has been the highest elected public office held by a member of one of these parties? How many terms did the longest running holder of office serve? What part of the country do they get the most votes in? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2004, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480/2 "2004-02-16T14:59:51Z")
There have been Socialist mayors of American cities. Schenectady, NY had [George Lunn](http://www.msys.net/cress/ballots2/lunn.htm) for several terms. Lunn was also elected to Congress, but as a Democrat. [This site](http://www.policyreview.org/dec00/Liggio.html) indicates that there were other Congressmen who were elected purely as socialists. Depending on your definition, there is currently a socialist in the House of Representatives: Bernard Sanders of Vermont. He runs as an Independent, though, and hasn’t run as a member of the Socialist Party per se. ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2004, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480/3 "2004-02-16T15:25:53Z")
Answering all questions: Highest Office Held: Socialists: The Mayorship of Milwaukee, and two different House seats. Communists: Two seats on the New York City Council (back in the era of proportional representation) Longest Served: Socialists: Jasper McLevy served for 24 years as the Mayor of Bridgeport. Communists: No clue. Bases of Support: Socialists: Fairly wide base of support early on (mid-1910’s). Especially strong in the German community of Milwaukee, and on the Lower East Side. Communists: Even at their peak (1932), they were never that strong. The two aforementioned Communist members of the NYCC served Manhattan and Brooklyn. Complicating this, however, is the American Labor Party, active in NYC between the 1940’s and the early 1950’s. Throught most of the time that the NYCC was elected by PR, the ALP held more seats than the Republicans, and they elected two Congressmen (Vito Marcantonio of East Harlem, and one from the Bronx whose name escapes me at this time), a State Senator, and several State Assemblymen. ---
**Author:** ![obfusciatrist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/4af34b/32.png) [@obfusciatrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/obfusciatrist)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2004, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480/4 "2004-02-16T15:50:30Z")
There have been two members of the Socialist Party to have been elected to the House of Representatives. [Victor Luitpold Berger](http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=B000407) was elected five times, but barred by House resolutions from taking his seat the first two times. Quote from linked page: > [@](#): > > elected as a Socialist to the Sixty-second Congress (March 4, 1911-March 3, 1913); presented credentials as a Member-elect to the Sixty-sixth Congress, but the House by a resolution adopted on November 10, 1919, declared him not entitled to take the oath of office as a Representative or to hold a seat as such; having been opposed to the entrance of the United States in the First World War and having written articles expressing his opinion on that question, he was indicted in various places in the Federal courts, tried at Chicago, found guilty, and sentenced by Judge Kenesaw M. Landis in February 1919 to serve twenty years in the Federal penitentiary; this judgment was reversed by the United States Supreme Court in 1921, whereupon the Government withdrew all cases against him in 1922; his election to the Sixty-sixth Congress was unsuccessfully contested by Joseph P. Carney and the seat was declared vacant; presented credentials as a Member-elect to fill the vacancy caused by the action of the House and on January 10, 1920, the House again decided that he was not entitled to a seat in the Sixty-sixth Congress and declined to permit him to take the oath or qualify as a Representative; Henry H. Bodenstab unsuccessfully contested this election, and on February 25, 1921, the House again declared the seat vacant; elected as a Socialist to the Sixty-eighth, Sixty-ninth, and Seventieth Congresses (March 4, 1923-March 3, 1929); The second was [Meyer London](http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=L000408). He represented New York and won three out of five elections. For the record, here are the break-downs of people in Congress but not representing one of the four major parties we’ve had (Federalist, Whig, Democrat, Republican). I don’t know which of these might also represent socialist parties. Adams Democrat - 1 (House) American Laborite - 2 (House) American Party - 40 (House) Anti-Jacksonian - 44 (House) Anti-Mason - 30 (House) Conservative - 9 (8 House, 1 Senate) Conservative Republican - 2 (House, Delegate) Constitutional Unionist - 2 (House) Democrat Farmer Labor - 3 (House) Farmer Laborite - 13 (House) Free Silver - 1 (House, Delegate) Free Soil - 11 (5 House, 6 Senate) Greenbacker - 12 (House) Independent (unaffiliated) - 24 (20 House, 4 Senate) Independent Democrat - 27 (26 House, 1 Senate) Independent Radical - 1 (House) Independent Republican - 15 (14 House, 1 Senate) Independent Whig - 1 (House) Jackson Democrat - 1 (House) Jacksonian - A couple hundred, I’m not going to count them Law and Order - 1 (House) Liberal - 1 (House) Liberal Republican - 9 (6 House, 3 Senate) Non partisan - 1 (House) Nullifier - 13 (10 House, 4 Senate; one was in both) Oppostion - 14 (House) Populist - 45 (39 House, 6 Senate) Progressive - 23 (22 House, 1 Senate) Progressive Republican - 3 (House) Prohibitionist - 1 (House) Readjustor - 7 (5 House, 2 Senate) Silver Republican - 6 (4 House, 2 Senate) Socialist - 2 (House) State Rights Democrat - 2 (House) Unconditional Unionist - 24 (18 House, 6 Senate) Union Democrat - 2 (House) Union Laborite - 2 (House) Union Republican - 4 (House) Unionist - 51 (40 House, 11 Senate) ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2004, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/highest-elected-public-office-held-by-communist-or-socialist-in-u-s/229480/5 "2004-02-16T17:14:19Z")
Congressman Bernie Sanders of Vermont is an independent member of the Democratic Socialists of America. This isn’t an actual “party”, but it is affiliated with the Socialist movement worldwide. Two other congressmen, both part of the Democratic party are also Democratic Socialists. > **[Democratic Socialists of America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Socialists_of_America)** > > The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) is a multi-tendency socialist and labor-oriented nonprofit organization. Its roots are in the Socialist Party of America (SPA), whose prominent leaders included Eugene V. Debs, Norman Thomas and Michael Harrington. In 1973, Harrington, the leader of a minority faction that had opposed the SPA's transformation into the Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA) during the party's 1972 national convention, formed the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSO In... There are probably others who aren’t formally Socialists, but could be described as such - at least by the rather right-skewed standards of American politics: Dennis Kucinich, the late Paul Wellstone, and maybe Jesse Jackson. But that’s probably not in line with the OP’s question.