So, do communists ever stand for election to the U.S. Congress?

[Northern_Piper]

Reason I ask is that we’ve got one Communist candidate standing for election to the House of Commons from Saskatchewan in the upcoming election, in the Blackstrap riding. Do you ever get Communists standing for election in the U.S. at the federal level? state level?

[lonesome_loser]

Here is the CPUSA’s platform for 2004.

Be aware that clicking this link may put you on someones list.

http://www.cpusa.org/article/articleview/589/1/3/

[psychonaut]

In recent decades many if not most Communist (Leninist) and Trotskyist (henceforth simply “Communist”) parties around the world have opted not to focus their energies on fielding their own candidates. Occasionally a Communist member will run for parliament/congress/senate, but for the most part the Parties will recommend to sympathizers to vote for a designated leftist party. In the US, voters are instructed to vote for the Democratic Party; in Britain, the Labour Party; and in Canada, the NDP. Various reasons are given for this practice; I suspect they are all partially true:

1. The Party has infiltrated, or is trying to infiltrate, the left-wing party in question in an attempt to control or influence its policies. Many Communist Parties are quite open about their infiltration, publically and actively encouraging sympathizers to obtain dual membership in their Party and a major left-wing one. Most major left-wing parties are aware of this duplicity and deny membership applications from those professing Communist loyalty. I’m sure many people have lied their way in, but in any case, I don’t believe any such party has absorbed enough infiltrators for it to affect policy much.

In some cases, the major party encourages or at least tolerates the infiltration, provided it’s not widely publicized to the general public, since it gets them votes from the Communists. For example, the NDP has a Socialist Caucus with the professed aim of establishing a socialist/communist system in Canada; it tends to be ignored by the NDP leadership but is influenced by Communist groups. Likewise I believe that there is a sizeable Militant (Trotskyist) group operating within the British Labour Party.

2. The Party realizes that at this point in time, it is unlikely to garner enough votes to get a candidate in office, so instead it recommends people to vote for the major leftist party, figuring that leftist policies are much better than rightist policies. It hopes that voters will come to realize this, eventually marginalizing the rightist parties. The Communist Party then becomes the “new” leftist party, since it’s the only party left which is left of the Democrats/Labour/NDP.

3. The Party doesn’t seriously believe that the left-wing parties they tell people to vote for will really bring about better conditions for the working class. They hope that after voters realize that a vote for the left doesn’t result in any significant changes, they will give up on major parties altogether and vote Communist instead.

[Neptunian_Slug]

@Northern Piper

Reason I ask is that we’ve got one Communist candidate standing for election to the House of Commons from Saskatchewan in the upcoming election, in the Blackstrap riding. Do you ever get Communists standing for election in the U.S. at the federal level? state level?

The last Communist Party member that received votes for U.S. Congress looks like John Rummel in NJ-13 back in 1992.

Several members of the Socialist Workers Party have run for Congress as recently as 2004. New Jersey had four such candidates.

[psychonaut]

Following up on my previous post, here are some examples of the American Communist Party urging sympathizers to work within, cooperate with, and/or vote for the Democratic Party:

…Communists must join with other class-conscious left forces in exposing the class nature of the state in the course of their coalition activity. We must develop independent political activity outside of the Democratic Party. At the same time, we should work with those who feel they can contribute to this effort from within the Democratic Party, constituting a left force within it. —Why Can’t We Be Friends?

A cursory look could dismiss the Democrats as “no different than the Republicans” because they voted for the war and to undermine civil liberties and are weak on economic issues. A deeper, strategic and dialectical look is required…

If the elections blunt the Bush administration, it will give new possibilities to the peace movement and to demands on both Democrats and Republicans regarding policies in the Middle East, Colombia, and throughout the world.

In this sense, you could say that it is our “Peace Responsibility” to defeat the Republican majority, despite the individual records of the particular Democratic candidate in each Congressional or Senatorial district. —Vote to Defeat the Right-Wing on Nov. 5th and Build the Movement for Economic Justice & Equality, Democracy & Peace

[W]e should be mindful that the main class and social forces that utilize the Democratic Party to fight the right and who are critical themselves of it will in all probability continue to operate within its orbit.

For this reason (and other reasons for that matter) abstract appeals to break with the Democratic Party make no tactical sense, especially at this moment when Bush is claiming an election mandate. —No mandate, no surrender

You can find many more examples by using Google to search your favourite Leninist, Stalinist, or Trotskyist Party website for “Democratic Party” or whatever major left-wing party operates in your area.

[Crandolph]

Note that New Jersey has some of the more reasonable ballot access laws in the country, and running for Congress would require obtaining a few hundred signatures of registered voters instead of thousands as many states require. This might account for why there were or are more minor party candidates of any affiliation running there; it doesn’t necessarily mean there are more commies in NJ. Just in case anyone was wondering…

[Canadjun]

Actually, the Communist Party of Canada is running 21 candidates in the upcoming election, and the Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada is running 69 candidates.