For Dark Horses, the Race Can Be Lonely

For third-party presidential candidates, “third” often seems too generous. On the campaign trail, they stay in supporters’ guest rooms. No press corps records their every word. Heck, in many cases, the campaign press secretary is a Web site and an answering machine.

But on the ballot, where the order is determined by random drawing, the longshots look just like the front-runners. Kip Lee’s name is printed just as large as Al Gore’s; George D. Weber appears well above George W. Bush. Of the 23 men on the ballot for California’s March 7 primary, there are 11 you probably have never heard of and two more third-party candidates whose names might ring a bell.

Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate, is there, running a second campaign for the environmentalist Green Party nomination. Nader received 685,128 votes in 1996, but that was only 0.71% of the votes cast.

Remember John B. Anderson, whose independent candidacy in 1980 earned him a chance to debate Ronald Reagan? This year, at age 78, a reluctant Anderson was drafted as a Reform Party candidate through the Web site of a supporter who was 5 years old during Anderson’s first campaign.

“I’ve had a Compaq Presario in my possession for some time,” Anderson said, “so it didn’t take me too long to find out that this caper had occurred.”

Although he doesn’t call himself a candidate, for now the self-described “old political junkie” is happy to play along.

And what would a presidential election be without Lyndon LaRouche--who has run once as a third-party candidate and now six times as a Democrat. LaRouche campaigned once from prison, where he served five years for conspiracy and tax evasion.

Now the rest of the dark-horse stable:

Harry Browne had not voted for almost 30 years before his wife talked him into running for president on the Libertarian Party’s ticket in 1996. The Nashville investment advisor is back in 2000 for a second try.

True to the Libertarian philosophy of bare-bones government, Browne promises to “order a carload of pens from Office Depot and veto everything that comes up from Capitol Hill.”

“I believe that the Republican and Democratic candidates are arguing over who best is able to run your life,” he said.

Redding “free trade economist” Kip Lee, science fiction writer L. Neil Smith of Colorado and Alta Loma bus driver Dave Lynn Hollist also appear as Libertarian candidates.

Then there’s former Marine Larry Hines of Los Angeles, who bills himself as an openly gay and HIV-positive candidate. Hines is still listed on the ballot as a Libertarian, but he broke away two weeks ago to join Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura’s newly formed Independence Party.

Those still in the Libertarian Party say Browne, having already raised $1.1 million, is almost certain to be the party’s nominee again.

Candidate Seeks Third-Party Coalition

For the Greens, New York professor Joel Kovel is challenging Nader by focusing on the environmental issues that launched the party.

Howard Phillips has already secured the nomination of the Constitution Party, which he helped to found as the U.S. Taxpayers Party. But he is listed on California’s ballot with the American Independent Party, an affiliate of the Constitution Party. Phillips, 59, boasts that he was twice elected student council president at Harvard.

On the White House trail a third time is John Hagelin, the Natural Law candidate, who holds a Harvard PhD and a professorship at the Fairfield, Iowa-based Maharishi University of Management, which is rooted in transcendental meditation. Requiring labels on genetically engineered foods is at the center of his California campaign. Hagelin is also trying to unite the 8-year-old party he helped to found with the fractious Reformers and the Greens in a third-party coalition.

“There is certainly more that unites us than divides us, and I think there’s much more to be gained if we join together,” Hagelin said. “The press, I really believe, desires at least one--probably only one--alternative or reform candidate.”

Like Anderson and Donald Trump (who decided not to run, but too late to get his name off the ballot), Missouri real estate broker George D. Weber, Georgia cattle rancher Charles Collins and Robert Bowman, a former Air Force lieutenant colonel from Florida, are listed as Reformers. Bowman is campaigning in a motor home he calls Bertha.

Patrick J. Buchanan is not listed, however. He dropped out of the Republican race to vie for the Reform nomination--and its attendant $12.6 million in federal matching funds, which 1996 nominee Ross Perot earned by garnering 8% of the popular vote. But Buchanan asked to be kept off Calfornia’s primary ballot, calling it a “beauty contest.”

That’s true for third-party races in general. Unlike the Democrats and Republicans, third parties do not rely on primaries to select delegates to their nominating conventions. Thus, contests like California’s can merely ratify a nominee who has already been selected, or can separate the serious contenders from those who just want their obituary to call them a “onetime presidential candidate.”

Spots on the ballot are awarded at the broad discretion of California’s secretary of state, who looks at Federal Election Commission filings and consults third-party leaders to determine the serious candidates.

“There are some who write us . . . who definitely are a little nutty,” said Beth Miller, press secretary to Secretary of State Bill Jones. “But they never make it to the ballot.”

The dream for any third-party presidential candidate, aside from moving into the White House, is debating the Republican and Democratic nominees. “If we had an opportunity to debate those candidates,” Natural Law’s Hagelin said, “we’d put their feet to the fire on issues they won’t touch.”

The reality for third-party presidential candidates is that they lose in November, usually sharing less than 2% of the popular vote with the other obscure also-rans. Their party might be lucky to pick up a state legislator here and there.

“Mine’s the most difficult,” Hagelin said of his Natural Law candidacy. “At the presidential level, people are least willing to risk their vote.”

For third parties, many of them founded in the last decade, putting up a presidential candidate is an exercise in party-building, trying to lay the foundation for a broadly viable nominee in 2004--or 2044.

Depending on the person, a third-party candidacy can be a crusade or a hobby. “The pleasure I gain in all this is presenting my ideas,” said Libertarian Dave Hollist.

To folks in the mainstream, these candidates’ lonely attempts can look a bit sad: While Hollist debated fellow Libertarians in San Diego, his wife and son went to Legoland.

A late-night comic recently cracked that Hollist’s party, for one, will hold its convention this summer at a McDonald’s in Anaheim.

“That’s good,” front-runner Browne said, laughing. “We used to have them in phone booths. We’re spreading out.”

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Candidates on the Web

Longshot candidates agree: The Web makes it easy to get out their names and messages. You can find out more about the third-party presidential candidates who appear on California’s primary ballot from these sites and phone numbers.

American Independent Party

Howard Phillips

https://www.constitutionparty.org

(703) 242-0613

Green Party

Joel Kovel

https://www.greens.org/ny/kovel

(914) 679-2756

Ralph Nader

https://www.votenader.com

(202) 296-1600

Libertarian Party

Harry Browne

https://www.harrybrowne.org

(800) 777-2000

Larry Hines

https://www.gaywired.com/larryhinesin2000

(818) 771-8003

Dave Lynn Hollist

https://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/constitution

(909) 980-4198

Kip Lee

(530) 245-0330

L. Neil Smith

https://www.webleyweb.com/lneil

Natural Law Party

John Hagelin

https://www.hagelin.org

(800) 332-0000

Reform Party

John B. Anderson

https://www.draftanderson.org

(818) 543-0863 ext. 2

Robert Bowman

https://www.Bowman2000.org

(321) 952-0601

Charles Collins

https://www.america-collins.com

(912) 994-4064

George D. Weber

https://www.georgedweber.com

(636) 938-3824