Reform Party of the United States of America
The Reform Party of the United States of America (RPUSA), generally known as the Reform Party USA or the Reform Party, is a centrist political party in the United States, founded in 1995 by Ross Perot.
This article is about the party founded by Ross Perot. For the short-lived party formed in Wisconsin in 1873, see Reform Party (19th-century Wisconsin). For the Mormon Reform Party, see Reform Party (Mormon). For the British Reform party, see Reform UK.
Reform Party of the
United States of America
United States of America
Perot believed Americans were disillusioned with the state of politics as being corrupt and unable to deal with vital issues. After he received 18.9 percent of the popular vote as an independent candidate in the 1992 presidential election, he founded the Reform Party and presented it as a viable alternative to Republicans and Democrats. As the Reform Party presidential nominee, Perot won 8.4 percent of the popular vote in the 1996 presidential election. Although he did not receive a single electoral vote, no other third-party or independent candidate has since managed to receive as high a share of the popular vote.
The party has nominated other presidential candidates over the years, including Pat Buchanan and Ralph Nader. Its most significant victory came when Jesse Ventura was elected Governor of Minnesota in 1998, although he left the party shortly into his term. Donald Trump was a member of the Reform Party during his brief 2000 presidential campaign. In around the year 2000, party infighting and scandals led to a major decline in the party's strength. Beginning with Buchanan's poor showing in the 2000 election, no Reform Party presidential nominee since 1996 has been able to gather 1 percent of the popular vote.
The Ross Perot movement[edit]
Ross Perot's 1992 presidential election campaign[edit]
The party grew out of Ross Perot's efforts in the 1992 presidential election, where—running as an independent—he became the first non-major party candidate since 1912 to have been considered viable enough to win the presidency. Perot received attention for focusing on fiscal issues such as the federal deficit and national debt; government reform issues such as term limits, campaign finance reform, and lobbying reform; and issues on trade. A large part of his following was grounded in the belief he was addressing vital problems largely ignored by the two major parties.[3]
A Gallup poll showed Perot with a slim lead; however, on July 19, he suspended his campaign, accusing Republican operatives of threatening to sabotage his daughter's wedding.[4][5] He was accused by Newsweek of being a "quitter" in a well-publicized cover-page article.[6] After resuming his campaign on October 1, Perot was dogged by the "quitter" moniker and other allegations concerning his character.[7] On Election Day, many voters were confused as to whether Perot was actually still a candidate. He ended up receiving about 18.9 percent of the popular vote, a record level of popularity not seen in an independent candidate since former President Theodore Roosevelt ran on the "Bull Moose" Progressive Party ticket in 1912. He continued being politically involved after the election, turning his campaign organization (United We Stand America) into a lobbying group. One of his primary goals was the defeat of the North American Free Trade Agreement during this period.[3]
Foundation and rise of the party[edit]
In 1995, Republicans took control of the House of Representatives, largely on the strength of the "Contract with America", which recognized and promised to deal with many of the issues Perot's voters had mobilized to support in 1992. However, two of the major provisions (Constitutional amendments for term limits and the balanced budgets) failed to secure the two-thirds congressional majorities required to be submitted to the states.
Dissatisfied, the grassroots organizations that had made Perot's 1992 candidacy possible began to band together to found a third party intended to rival the Republicans and Democrats. For legal reasons, the party ended up being called the "Reform Party" ("Independent Party" was preferred, but already taken, as were several variants on the name). A drive to get the party on the ballot in all fifty states succeeded, although it ended with lawsuits in some regions over state ballot access requirements. In a few areas, minor parties became incorporated as state party organizations.[3]
Apex: 1996 presidential election[edit]
Nomination campaign[edit]
At first, when the 1996 election season arrived, Perot held off from entering the contest for the Reform Party's presidential nomination, calling for others to try for the ticket. The only person who announced such an intention was Dick Lamm, former Governor of Colorado. After the Federal Election Commission indicated only Perot and not Lamm would be able to secure federal matching funds—because his 1992 campaign was as an independent—Perot entered the race. Some were upset that Perot changed his mind because, in their view, Perot overshadowed Lamm's run for the party nomination. This built up to the beginning of a splinter within the movement, when it was alleged certain problems in the primary process—such as many Lamm supporters not receiving ballots, and some primary voters receiving multiple ballots—were Perot's doing. The Reform Party claimed these problems stemmed from the petition process for getting the Reform Party on the ballot in all of the states since the party claimed they used the names and addresses of petition signers as the basis of who received ballots. Primary ballots were sent by mail to designated voters. Eventually, Perot was nominated for president and he chose economist Pat Choate as his vice presidential running mate.[3] The results of the party's presidential primary were: Perot 32,145, Lamm 17,121.
Exclusion from the debates[edit]
Between 1992 and 1996, the Commission on Presidential Debates changed its rules regarding how candidates could qualify to participate in the presidential debates. As Perot had previously done very well in debates, it was a decisive blow to the campaign when the Commission ruled that he could not participate on the basis of somewhat vague criteria — such as that a candidate was required to have already been endorsed by "a substantial number of major news organizations," with "substantial" being a number to be decided by the commission on a case-by-case basis. Perot could not have qualified for the debates in 1992 under these rules, and was able to show that various famous U.S. presidents would likewise have been excluded from the modern debate by the Commission on Presidential Debates.[3]
Despite legal action by the Perot team, and an 80 percent majority of Americans supporting his participation in the debates, the Commission refused to budge and Perot was reduced to making his points heard via a series of half-hour "commercials". In the end, Perot and Choate won 8 percent of the vote.[3]
Plateau and decline[edit]
1997[edit]
By October 1997, factional disputes began to emerge with the departure of a group that believed Perot had rigged the 1996 party primary to defeat Lamm. These individuals eventually established the "American Reform Party" (ARP). The ARP is actually a minor political action committee. Then chairman, Roy Downing, said the split came about when it was "...discovered [that the Reform Party] was a top-down party instead of a bottom-up organization."[8] Although members of the group attempted to persuade former Colorado Governor Dick Lamm – Perot's chief rival for the nomination – to run for president as an Independent, he declined, pointing out that he had promised before running that he would not challenge the party's decision. During this time, Perot himself chose to concentrate on lobbying efforts through United We Stand America.[3]
Collapse[edit]
Activities of the party in 2005[edit]
In 2005, a dispute arose: the number of National Committee members required under the party's by-laws to call meetings of the National Committee, and the executive committee did so. These members came from several states including Texas, Michigan, and Florida. At both meetings, it was determined that a national convention would be called and held in Tampa, Florida. The chairman at the time and National Committee members from Arizona, California, and Oklahoma boycotted the National and executive committee meetings, claiming the meetings were illegitimate. As a result, those states held a second convention in Yuma, Arizona.[3]
In response to a suit filed by the group that met in Tampa, leaders of the Reform Party filed a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) complaint claiming the Tampa group were extremists and guilty of conspiracy.[25]
2006 candidates[edit]
In 2006, the Reform Party nominated candidates in Arizona, and petitioned to regain ballot access in several other states where state Reform Party organizations were active. The Reform Party of Kansas nominated a slate of candidates, led by Iraq War veteran Richard Ranzau. In Colorado's 4th congressional district, "fiscal conservative" Eric Eidsness (a former assistant U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator and Navy veteran) ran on the Reform Party ticket.[26] He received 11.28 percent of the vote, five times the winning candidate's margin of victory;[27] he later switched his affiliation to the Democratic Party.[28] The Florida Reform Party granted use of its ballot line for governor to Max Linn of Florida Citizens for Term Limits (a Republican-leaning organization) in the 2006 Florida gubernatorial election. Linn retained professional campaign staff with connections to the Perot and Ventura campaigns,[29][30] but received only 1.9 percent of the vote. By March 2007, the Reform Party had ballot access for the 2008 presidential election in four states (Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi) and had already started petitioning in an additional four.[31]
2008 National Convention[edit]
The Reform Party held its 2008 National Convention in Dallas, July 18–20.[32]
At the national convention, Ted Weill of Mississippi was nominated to be the party's 2008 presidential candidate. Frank McEnulty of California, the 2008 presidential candidate of the New American Independent Party, was nominated to be the party's 2008 vice-presidential candidate. David Collison of Texas was elected national chairman of the party. However, the party could not announce the results of the national convention on its web site until October because of a court order obtained by a dissident faction associated with the Independence Party of New York.[33] Therefore, the Weill/McEnulty ticket appeared on the ballot only in Mississippi, in which it received 481 votes.[3]
An erroneous news report was broadcast by ABC News that stated the party had endorsed John McCain.[34] Frank MacKay of the dissident Independence Party of New York faction had made the endorsement, not the Reform Party USA. Reform Party USA Reference[3] David Collison, the Reform Party's chairman, said during a 2009 interview, "Do you believe that any legitimate national party would endorse the Republican candidate for President rather than have a candidate of their own?"[3][35]
The candidates for the nomination included:[3]
The Reform Party platform includes the following:[3]
A noticeable absence from the Reform Party platform has been social issues, including abortion and gay rights. Reform Party representatives had long stated beliefs that their party could bring together people from both sides of these issues, which they consider divisive, to address what they considered to be more vital concerns as expressed in their platform. The idea was to form a large coalition of moderates; that intention was overridden in 2001 by the Buchanan takeover which rewrote the RPUSA Constitution to include platform planks opposed to any form of abortion. The Buchananists, in turn, were overridden by the 2002 Convention which reverted the Constitution to its 1996 version and the party's original stated goals.
The party's active state affiliates are:[3]
