Tag: Elections

The references to “manly firmness” are everywhere in late-18th-century political sources.  For example, Edward Dilly wrote to John Adams from London in 1775 to praise the men in the Continental Congress, “for the Wisdom of their Proceedings — their Unanimity, and Manly firmness.”  In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson listed the crimes of the… Read more →

Before 2016, conversations at school pickup time in my affluent suburb nearly always revolved around kids’ activities and home remodeling.  We stayed away from political topics mostly; it seemed impolite to provoke a fellow PTO member.1 If anyone temporarily put up something as unaesthetic as a lawn sign amongst their manicured shrubs, it said something… Read more →

The most important thing to know about the late Representative Shirley Chisholm (D-NY) is not that she was a Black woman who made a serious bid to become the Democratic party nominee for President in 1972.  The most important thing to know about Shirley Chisholm is that she was a Black woman who made a… Read more →

As racially charged rhetoric takes over civil political discourse and “true” patriots warn of an impending leftist gun-grab, we should be reminded that this type of fear-mongering is not new to the American political scene.  Agnes Waters, single-mother and outspoken nationalist, ran for president numerous times during the 1940s and 50s.  She relied on exploiting… Read more →

I was born into 1970s feminism.  I came into the world in 1972, the year Free to Be You and Me came out.  It must have made a big impression on my elementary school teachers, because I saw the filmstrip version of it in school at least three times.  I loved it at least as… Read more →

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.  Radio ratings are slipping for a pair of married comedians.  They are looking for a new gag to hook their audience.  Wouldn’t it be hilarious if the wife — A WOMAN — ran for president?!  So started the 1940 presidential campaign of Gracie Allen.  Unlike the other… Read more →

Thus far in the Run Like A Girl series, we’ve met pathbreaking women who — with the notable exception of Lenora Fulani — have long since passed on.  Today, we turn to recent history, to a former presidential candidate who is very much alive, if no longer politically active: Carol Moseley Braun.  Carol Moseley Braun made… Read more →

Universal healthcare.  Free university education.  The regulation of the big banks.  No my friends, I’m not talking about Bernie Sanders in 2016.  I’m referring to Dr. Lenora Fulani (b. 1950), the most successful female minor party candidate in US history.  As a member of the New Alliance Party in the 1980s and 1990s — a… Read more →

Most women who run for president experience some degree of notoriety.  Certainly this was the case for Sonia Johnson, who ran for president in 1984 as the candidate for the left-wing U.S. Citizen’s Party.  Although Johnson held a Ph.D. in English, she spent much of her adult life as a Mormon housewife with limited involvement… Read more →

In his analysis of Donald Trump’s fitness for office, Brookings Institution fellow Robert Kagan recently wrote that “we can leave it to the professionals” to label with precision the relationship between Donald Trump’s behavior and what may be a clinically defined mental illness or personality disorder.  Other commentators are less reluctant to diagnosis Mr. Trump….  Read more →