In 200+ years, has a primary ballot ever been cast for a woman for President?

Some names come to mind, but did it ever happen? I'd like to hear from the historians.

Carry A. Nation

Eleanor Roosevelt

I was too young to really know or pay attention to politics at the time, but wasn't Shirley Chisolm (sp?) running in the early seventies? Did she get on the ballot? She was an African American Female.

was on the ballot in every state. I would have voted for her but felt it was important to vote for Eugene McCarthy, hoping to send a message to the party to run a peace candidate. Of course they chose Hubert Humphrey, who was tied to Vietnam since he was LBJ's VP, while Nixon promised a "secret plan" to end the war and won handily.

But I don't have any buttons. :shrug:

...and pulled in a decent number of votes.

because she loved her I admired her as well, but we ended up with my dad making us distribute McGovern flyers on cars. That must have been a truly exciting year. I wish I'd been older, so I could have understood it better. VietNam must have been going.

That was a major part of his platform.

He only carried Massachusetts, though. Friend of mine from MA had a bumper sticker that said "Massachusetts: The Lone Star State," which was great.

His campaign was damaged by revelations that his VP nominee, Sen. Thomas Eagleton, had suffered from severe depression more than once, been hospitalized and had electric shock treatments. He had not disclosed this to McGovern, which was really unfair, because it put McGovern in an impossible situation.

McGovern said he was "100% behind" Eagleton when the news first came out but was put in the position of having to decide whether to keep him on the ticket or not and no matter what he did he was going to be criticized. There was much more of a stigma against mental illness then and voters would understandably be concerned that the man who would be a heartbeat away from the presidency had a history of depression serious enough to require shock treatments. The negative comments in the media convinced McGovern to accept Eagleton's offer to withdraw from the ticket. Then the press said McGovern was "indecisive"!!! Same old shit they keep doing to Dems while letting the GOPers skate.

I think he's a really decent man who'd have been a good president but Nixon won in a landslide, despite opposition to the war being very high and his "secret plan to end the war" of 1968 having never been revealed, much less worked. I guess a lot of people who opposed the war didn't bother to vote.

After Eagleton dropped off the ticket, Sargent Shriver was hus running mate. I had to go to Wikipedia because I couldn't remember that, and I read the "100% behind" comment there. I remember him saying it, but didn;t until I saw it at Wikipedia. Then I read thisL

"An infamous incident took place late in the campaign. McGovern was giving a speech and a Nixon admirer kept heckling him. McGovern called the young man over and said "Listen you son of a bitch, why don't you kiss my ass!" Mississippi Senator James Eastland later asked the Senator if that was what he had said. When McGovern said yes, Eastand replied that was the best thing he had ever said in the whole campaign."

:rofl: But I don't know why they said it was "infamous." I don't remember it even being reported. We moved in late August of '72 but that's not really late in the campaign and back then I always read "The Progressive," and a big city paper plus the Christian Science Monitor, which is very good, is doing excellent coverage of the war in Iraq now.

At least he didn't say it on an open microphone like Bush and the guy had been heckling him whereas Bush just took off on Adam Clymer for what he'd written in the past.

we moved to a different state in 1972 and I remembered she was on the ballot in our old home. But I checked and you're right. We voted in the primary in our our former home state.

But Wikipedia revealed she did do something important in 1968, which could be part of my misremembering:

"In 1968, she became the first African American woman elected to Congress. On January 23, 1972, she became the first African American candidate for President of the United States. She won 162 delegates. Other women who ran for President of the United States in 1972 include Linda Jenness and Evelyn Reed."

Nixon didn't win 50% of the vote, nor did he have even a 1% margin of victory. The electoral college admittedly was more of a spread.

The vote totals were:

43.4% for Nixon

42.7% for Humphrey

13.5% for George Wallace

Wallace got a lot of protest votes because people didn't like Nixon or Humphrey.

The parties keep giving us "lesser of two evils" choices and it allows a third party or independent candidate to affect the outcome.

I am kind of glad we didn't give his voters that choice.

the Democratic nominee might have beaten Nixon, with some of the votes that went to Wallace.

I thought that was clear from what I wrote but I guess not because you seem to think I was suggesting nominating Wallace or something; I really don't understand what you're saying here.

My father-in-law voted for Wallace as a protest because he couldn't stand Nixon or Humphrey. He knew Wallace wouldn't win and didn't want him to, he was just trying to send a message to both parties to nominate better candidates. Given the widespread disgust with the nominees that year, I think a lot of votes for Wallace were votes against Nixon and Humphrey, not votes for Wallace.

Maybe you have a quote from the article? I'm allergic to posts that include links but no quotes. ;-)

"Maybe you have a quote from the article?"
That's the headline of the article, honest.

Didn't mean to be snarky, it's just that a lot of people post links without quotes, even in OPs, and it seems to be more common lately. I never comment on articles unless I read them but without a quote, I don't know if I want to read them.

I should probably read this one for laughs, though it sounds as if it's intended as an insult to Edwards, which makes it insulting to women, too, like being a woman is a bad thing. :grr:

the article, weren't they?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Chase_Smith
http://www.mcslibrary.org/bio/biolong.htm

1964 Senator Margaret Chase Smith, United States of America

Republican member of the House of Representatives 1940-49 and Senator 1949-73. In 1964 she was Presidential candidate in the primary elections. She was defeated by Barry Goldwater in the party convention. Chairperson of the Republican Conference in the Congress 1967-72.

http://www.guide2womenleaders.com/Candidates1870.htm

Not the only woman who was a candidate for President, but she was a serious contender, finishing in second place behind Barry Goldwater in the balloting.

Later, on the Democratic side, there was Rep. Shirley Chisholm, who ran for President in 1972; the nomination went to Sen. George McGovern that year.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_Chisholm

3rd Party Candidates:
1872 and 1892 Victoria Chaflin Woodhull, United States of America
Candidate for The Equal Rights Party in a number of States.

1884 and 1888 Belva Ann Bennet McNall Lockwood, United States of America
Candidate for National Equal Rights Party. In 1878 she was the first female attorney to practice before the supreme court. Her running mate in 1884 was Marietta Lizzie Bell Stow.

http://www.guide2womenleaders.com/Candidates1870.htm

Mental block? Senior moment?

:shrug:

She was a pioneer in the Senate so I admire her, GOP or not. Besides, the GOP wasn't as bad then. Ike may not have done much but play golf but that meant he didn't get us in much trouble. He did send some advisors into Vietnam but I think Truman had earlier sent some.

Do you know how far behind Goldwater she was in the balloting? I didn't remember she came in second, don't recall who else was running. I guess I was demoralized after JFK was assassinated, but I think I watched most of the conventions. That was my senior year and I was very busy; I remember 1960 better.

http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2005/chisholm/

And she was on the ballot in multiple states:
http://www.jofreeman.com/polhistory/chisholm.htm

Margaret Thatcher in UK, Golda Meir in Israel, Indira Gandhi in India
and the presnt chancellor in Germany were the heads of state.

So those countries are far ahead of us.

Her name has been in the news a lot lately.

on corruption charges. But my main point is many of the
world's democracies have had a female as head of state.
We are behind no matter how you look at it.

USA is behind the world when it comes to equality of sexes.

Corazon "Cory" Aquino was president from February 1986 to June 1992.

Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has been president of the RP since January 20, 2001.

This is quite an accomplishment for a culture that is very much dominated by men. Looking at the names of the two women who have been presidents of the Republic of the Philippines, you can see that Macapagal is the only name that's not Spanish in origin. That reflects centuries of being a Spanish colony, before the US took over the Philippines in our first imperialist war, defeating the Spanish in Manila Bay with our new navy commanded by Commodore George Dewey. The war lasted from 1898-1902 and is hidden away in most history books as the "Philippine Insurrection" following the Spanish-American War. It's not recognized as a war, though we had 160,000 men who served in it.

Afterward, in the Treaty of Paris, we agreed to pay $20,000,000 to Spain, which meant that we were effectively buying each Filipino man, woman, and child for $2 a head. Of course, we called them "niggers," "jujus," and other derogatory terms and slaughtered many thousands in taking (more or less, mostly less) possession of the seven thousand islands. The difficulties in controlling seven thousand islands don't require much imagination. We tortured many more, destroyed their villages and towns. We had to teach them democracy and civilize them, you understand.

But those uncivilized Filipinos have already elected two women to the presidency, and Cory Aquino was the first woman president in Asia.

It always makes me angry to think of how we treated the Filipinos because I've lived there and they are wonderful people. We gave them their independence in 1946 or '47 and leased land for military bases until they declined to renew them nearly twenty years ago. It's a beautiful country with much poverty and much wealth held by a small upper class, which is the direction we're heading in ourselves.

The Right Honourable Kim Campbell PC QC



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Campbell

Again my main point is USA as the world's oldest democracy is
behind other democracies.

She was Canada's prime minister for a little over four months in 1993.

Also, wouldn't Greece be the world's oldest democracy?

The U.S. is the oldest existing democratic republic and the oldest written constitution

You are right, Ancient Greece did have some form of democracy,
not sure what kind. So, amongst the democratic nations as they
exist today, US is the oldest, India is the largest by population.

None of those countries actually have "commanders in chief", and Elizabeth II is the head of state of Great Britain etc. (the PM being the head of government), and Indira Gandhi and Golda Meir were Prime Ministers as well, but anyhow ... we know you yanks get all confused about these things.;)


Canada: Kim Campbell became Prime Minister (head of government) June 1993 when she was elected leader of the Progressive Conservative Party, lost the election a few weeks later when her predecessor Brian Mulroney's legacy of corruption bit the party hard.

Canada: Jeanne Sauvé, formerly first woman Speaker of the House of Commons (1980), appointed Governor General (figurehead representative of figurehead head of state) 1984. The position has also since been held by Adrienne Clarkson, an English-Chinese immigrant from Hong Kong, and is now held by Michaêlle Jean, a black immigrant from Haiti.


edited -- of course I got your point, and it's sound! ... But really, the US isn't accurately characterized as the world's oldest democracy. Or even republic.

Didn't she run for President in 1972?

Ad intro:

Is America really ready to have a woman President?
Photo montage and video of Rudy in drag:

Well, perhaps she should have served as a senator first.

Fade out to Hillary

LMAO ROFL

We forget pretty fast.

late 19th century. I don't think there were any primaries then, but she is the first woman to run for President.

On the Free Love ticket, I believe.

but Eugene Dwebs did run for the socialist party and got some votes

She got a few votes at the GOP Convention.

Shirley Chisholm had her name place in nomination at the 1964 Democratic Convention.

I don't remember her running in 1964.

:-)