By Patricia Horn
"The United States will have a third party", says Tony Mazzocchi, a founder of Labor Party Advocates and secretary-treasurer of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Union.
Is he right? Are the times right for a third party? A June New York Times/CBS News poll and a June Wall Street Journal/NBC poll both found that more than 50% of people in the US want a third party. Union polls have found that more than 50% of the rank and file want a labor party. And H. Ross Perot's independent campaign for president confirms that many people are fed up with the Republicans and Democrats.
The left has also jumped into the fray. With the economy in a funk, distrust of the two parties running high, and many progressives wary of the Democrats, several progressive organisations have founded or are exploring the creation of national third parties. The 21st Century Party, the New Party, Campaign for a New Tomorrow, Labor Party Advocates and the Green Party USA are the five drawing the most attention.
Members of the US left have repeatedly attempted to create national third parties. But sectarianism has cost older left parties such as the Socialist Workers Party and the Communist Party USA wide progressive support. This year's crop, however, is pursuing a nonsectarian, one could say "big tent", progressive agenda.
Past attempts to build a broader progressive party have not fared well. Neither Henry Wallace's Progressive Party of 1948 nor the 1968 Peace and Freedom Party, which nominated Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver for president, gained lasting influence nationally. The current US electoral system clearly favours the Democrats and Republicans, and unless the system is changed, a new party must overcome countless barriers to national electoral success.
In addition, the new progressive parties, or hope-to-be parties, reflect the fragmented state of the left. They are divided by race, gender, cause, political agenda and strategy. To build a third party, progressives must put single-issue and identity politics second to unity, and devote to it the resources, organising skills and discipline a party needs.
No pot of gold
1992 may be remembered as the year the left could have had an organised, well-known third party to harvest discontented voters. Many Rainbow Coalition members believe the Rainbow should have been that party. But Jesse Jackson's refusal to run and his reluctance to let the Coalition become an independent grassroots force in national politics left progressives bereft of an organisation to influence the 1992 elections.
If Jackson had been willing to leave the Democrats and create a third force during his 1984 or 1988 campaigns, says former Rainbow Coalition director Ron Daniels, the left could have built a party. Activists from different movements had been willing to subsume their agendas to that of the Rainbow, says Daniels. Because of the Rainbow, the Greens and other progressives held back from creating a third party.
But the Rainbow faded. Many supporters believed that Jackson's goal was the vice-presidential spot on the Democratic ticket, not building a strong grassroots movement. As a result, members drifted away and chapters died. Only eight to 10 Rainbow chapters around the country still meet regularly.
Five points of light
The Rainbow legacy does live on, however. Jackson's campaigns paved the way for today's parties. The campaigns taught different parts of the left that they could work together for a common agenda. And its former activists learned how to build an electoral organisation. Leading or supporting new third party efforts are a number of people formerly active in the Rainbow. The five most prominent progressive third parties are:
- The Greens, founded in 1983, with organising committees in all 50 states. They have elected 39 local officials and expect 100 Greens to run in local elections this year. They established a national party, the Green Party USA, in 1991.
- Campaign for a New Tomorrow, the African-American-led organisation/movement behind Ron Daniels' campaign. Though not officially a party, this organisation will identify, develop and advance candidates, including its own, who share the Campaign's agenda. It will work with other parties as well. The Campaign hopes to use Daniels' 1992 presidential bid as a way to build its organisation.
- 21st Century Party, led by women. It grew out of the 1989 National Organisation for Women Convention. Its founding convention was in August 1992.
- Labor Party Advocates, inspired by Tony Mazzocchi, who has long been committed to founding a US
labor party. The Advocates are signing up new members, mainly from unions, and hope to officially launch a party in 1994.
- The New Party, which was first discussed in 1989. Its founders, including Daniel Cantor, former labor coordinator for the Jackson campaign, officially launched it in January. It hopes to draw members from all movements and backgrounds. Committees are now forming in 18 states.
Though most of these new organisations are building a base by focusing initially on different constituencies, they will inevitably compete with each other as they seek to win more supporters from a broader spectrum of voters. The 21st Century Party hopes to reach beyond women to other progressives and labor; Labor Party Advocates wants to reach all working people, not just union members. But it is doubtful that the 21st Century Party will attract union women away from the a Labor Party, or that a Labor Party will attract non-union women away from the 21st Century Party.
Building trust
Progressives don't need five or more parties; they need one. Unless the new parties meld into one organisation soon, or some of these new parties fade and their members join other efforts, none of the third parties can pull in enough members to succeed.
Creating that one party means resolving the distrust between blacks and whites, women and men, labor and environmentalists. This is an independent party's biggest obstacle, says Howard Hawkins of the Greens. "How do you build a multicultural movement where people really trust and rely on each other? You have to deal with gender, race, class dynamics and dynamics on how to work together. That's difficult."
The new organisations have met several times to discuss working together. "People are eager to hold conversations", says Daniels, who has led the efforts to pull groups closer together, "but no-one is eager to give up their initiatives".
Local third parties, such as California's Peace and Freedom Party and New York State's Greens, and some elements of Democratic Socialists of America have worked to support Daniels' presidential campaign. And his Campaign for a New Tomorrow organised the People's Progressive Convention this past August in Ypsilanti, Michigan, to bring together organisations, nascent third parties and progressive leaders.
"I've seen a lot more openness to working together", says Sandy Pope, national organiser for the New Party. But, she continues, "we have such a strong history of fragmentation on
the left that must be overcome. We are going to look like idiots to the people we want to attract if we keep on bickering." She and other members of the New Party believe that, for a third party to succeed, the new organisations must develop ties early on at the local level, where less competition and fewer suspicions between groups and people exist.
Lack of media access, difficulties in raising money and getting on the ballot and a first-past-the-post electoral system are serious problems for third party campaigns. But these external barriers can be surmounted by a unified, fired-up movement. Overcoming political apathy, the "lesser of two evils" argument and movement disunity are even greater problems facing the new progressives. The immediate task is to overcome these obstacles to form a single united, dedicated party.
[Patricia Horn is an editor of Dollars & Sense, a US monthly magazine offering interpretations of current economic events from a socialist perspective.]