Conscious Choice: Green Party Growing in Illinois

February 2004

Green Party Growing in Illinois

by Mandy Burrell

Ralph Nader’s high-profile presidential run in 2000 sparked record participation levels in Green Party efforts throughout the nation, with Illinois no exception. Though the Greens have yet to get a candidate elected to office in Illinois, 20 active locals exist throughout the state today, compared with six locals before Nader’s run.

Capitalizing off that surge of energy, Chicago area Greens made some important moves to establish the party. For instance, Green Party members Julie Samuels and Jason Farbman gathered more than enough signatures in 2002 to get on the ballot as independents in the November election that year. Samuels and Farbman ran as candidates for state representative in Cook County’s 8th and 14th districts, respectively. Though neither candidate won, both of them earned more than enough votes to officially establish the Green Party in their districts, a party first in the Chicago area. Julie Samuels is seeking election again, Farbman is not.

Official party status means that the Greens have the right this year to elect ward committeeman in those two districts, which cover more than a dozen wards in Chicago and the near west suburbs of Oak Park, North Riverside, Berwyn, Proviso and Lyons. Amanda Solon, Marc Loveless, Robert Rudner and Rex English are running uncontested as Green Party Committeeman in Chicago’s 40th, 48th, 49th and 50th wards, respectively, while the Green Party is still trying to drum up candidates for committeeman in several of the other wards. Committeeman help to organize party efforts and raise funds in their respective wards. Perhaps more importantly, they plant the "grass root" seeds that allow communities to become familiar with a third party that heretofore might have seemed distant and esoteric.

While such positive moves have excited the imaginations of local Greens, the changes have also created internal dialogue about how to stay true to its principles. One issue is how to meld the fresh perspective of new Greens — many of whom are Democratic Party defectors — with the traditional Green Party philosophy. In the U.S., the party philosophy is embedded in its Ten Key Values (see below), developed to maintain the connection between the U.S. Green Party and its international counterparts, led by the German Greens who are most recognized as the founding mothers of the international Green Party.

The hope is that educating folks about the thrust of successful local Green Party accomplishments — such as its efforts to close the polluting Clark Oil Refinery in Blue Island — will provide common ground for future party work. "After Nader, the idea was that new people would just meet us where we are, but that didn’t work," says committeeman candidate Loveless. "People had no bridge, no sense of what the Green Party had done in the Chicago area." In other words, because these former Democrats were fed up with their party’s move to the right and wanted something different, they joined the Greens — despite the fact that they were unfamiliar with the full scope of the Green Party platform.

Other local Green Party issues revolve around how to drum up campaign funding and select candidates in such a way that the party doesn’t compromise its principles, particularly since separation of government and corporate interests is one of the party’s primary concerns.

Voting reform also tops the list of Green things to do. An Illinois state house bill that is pending vote, would enable municipalities to enact instant runoff voting, a system in which voters rank their choices in order in case of a tie. Greens point to the 2000 presidential election as a perfect example of how instant runoff voting would open doors for third-party candidates, increase voter participation, and most importantly, ensure that the person elected actually earned a majority of citizens’ votes. The party is also pushing local municipalities such as Cook County to adhere to legislation already on the books that allows a hybrid ballot for primaries. A hybrid ballot would allow people to vote on a ballot that represented both the Green Party and one of the two major parties, so that folks who want to support third-party activities can also have a say in mainstream elections. Currently voters must align themselves with only one party.

The presidential election might seem a setback to national Green Party growth. "Most of us are faced with not voting for our own party this time just to get rid of Bush," says Charles Shaw, Chicago Green Party member, activist and editor of Newtopia, a Web zine. However, the party is dedicated to remaining close to its values, even if it means temporarily slowing the party’s growth.

Mandy Burrell is the associate editor of Conscious Choice magazine.

Get More Info:

For more information on the Illinois Green Party’s efforts, visit the Web site: www.ilgreenparty.org

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