New Alliance Party
Encyclopedia
The New Alliance Party (NAP) was an American
political party formed in New York City in 1979. Its immediate precursor was an umbrella organization known as the Labor Community Alliance for Change, whose member groups included the coalition of Grass Roots Women and the New York City Unemployed and Welfare Council. All of these groups were associated with controversial psychologist and political activist Fred Newman
, whose radical health care collective Centers for Change and Marxist International Workers Party
were active in grassroots politics in New York City. The NAP's first chairperson was then-South Bronx City Councilman Gilberto Gerena-Valentin, a veteran Puerto Rican political activist. http://turnstile.cssny.org/turnstile/userimages/VRAOpEd.pdf#search=%22%22gilberto%20gerena%20valentin%22%22. The party is notable for getting African American psychologist Lenora Fulani
on the ballot in all 50 states during her first Presidential
campaign in 1988, making her both the first African-American and woman
to do so.
. The New Alliance Party was founded as an electoral party that was independent of Democrats and Republicans and that could create "new alliances" of groups marginalized by the American electoral process, namely people of color, the lesbian and gay community
, progressives, and women
. The New Alliance Party described itself as "pro-socialist."
In 1984 the NAP made its entry into the Presidential campaign scene. Its candidate was Dennis L. Serrette
, an African-American union activist who would later leave the NAP alleging questionable methods used by Newman and others. Serrette's running mate was Nancy Ross, a NAP leader who had served on a community school board on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
In 1985 the NAP began its unusual political "relationship" with Jesse Jackson
. While Newman was initially dismissive of Jackson, Fulani had praised the popular activist during his 1984 Presidential run. After Jackson founded his Rainbow Coalition group, Newman and Fulani created the Rainbow Alliance, which at first lobbied for the benefit of small political parties. It later changed its name to the Rainbow Lobby and expanded its lobby to include issues of opposing U.S.-backed Joseph Mobutu's dictatorship in Zaire
and the Haiti
an dictatorship of Prosper Avril
. When asked about his political relationship to Fulani in the press Jackson said that there was no relationship at all. The Rainbow Lobby continued its lobbying activities into the early 1990s, while Fulani repeatedly rebuked Jackson for his support of the Democratic Party.
The 1988 presidential race
was a major step for the NAP. The Fulani campaign ran under the slogan "Two Roads are Better than One," supporting Reverend Jesse Jackson's campaign within the Democratic Party while launching her own run designed to challenge the African American community to sever their historic relationship to the
Democratic Party and embrace an independent path.http://www.independentvoting.org/activistcenter/fulani_keynote.html In the previous election, NAP was able to secure a ballot spot in only 33 states. This time around NAP pursued every avenue possible to gain ballot access
. This included attempts to gain the nomination of small independent parties which existed around the country, such as the Solidarity Party
in Illinois
. Fulani had six different running mates; different ones in different states, among them Joyce Dattner
and (in Oregon
only) Harold Moore, each "representing different constituencies." Asked which one would become Vice President if she won, she answered "If we got elected, we'd figure it out."
Fulani’s vote total throughout the country was 217,221, or 0.2% of the vote, coming in fourth place. She was the second most successful third party presidential candidate that year, behind Libertarian Ron Paul
. Also in the 1988 election, the NAP ran some candidates for other offices, including US Senate candidates in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Nebraska. Though the party had its strongest roots in the east coast, the best result for the NAP was in Nebraska, where they had a well-known candidate in independent state senator Ernie Chambers
who received 1.6% of the vote.
Fulani ran unsuccessfully as a New York gubernatorial candidate in 1990. She was endorsed by Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan
, who had recently been politically involved with Jesse Jackson's 1988 campaign only to be dropped at the recommendation of Jackson's campaign advisors. This was in the wake of Farrakhan being characterized in the press as anti-semitic, as well as Jackson's slipped comment of calling New York City "Hymietown". Fulani and Newman embraced Farrakhan, eliciting the anger of the Anti-Defamation League
(ADL). In the wake of this criticism, Fulani moderated a "historic conference" on Black-Jewish relations, featuring the "Jewish Marxist" Newman dialoguing with activist Reverend Al Sharpton
.
Fulani again ran for president in 1992 on the NAP ticket. Maria Elizabeth Muñoz
, a chicano
activist, was chosen as her running mate. Muñoz had previously run for Senate
and Governor in California on Peace and Freedom Party tickets. Fulani lost the party's nomination to Ron Daniels of Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition. She also entered the New Hampshire
primary for the Democratic Party Presidential nomination in 1992, and gained some press coverage for frequent heckling of Bill Clinton
's campaign appearances after she was excluded from the New Hampshire Democratic debates. In 1992, the NAP also ran some candidates in other races, including US Senate candidates in Arizona, Illinois, Indiana and New York. The best result for NAP Senate candidates was for Mohammad T. Mehdi in New York, who received 0.8% of the vote and fourth place.
By the mid 1990s the NAP and its weekly newspaper The National Alliance had been disbanded. In 1994, Fulani and Newman for a period joined the Patriot Party, one of many groups which would later compete for control over Ross Perot
's Reform Party
in the years to come. This same year, Fulani and former National Alliance editor Jacqueline Salit formed the Committee for a Unified Independent Party, an organization dedicated to bringing various independent groups together to challenge the bipartisan nature of American politics.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
political party formed in New York City in 1979. Its immediate precursor was an umbrella organization known as the Labor Community Alliance for Change, whose member groups included the coalition of Grass Roots Women and the New York City Unemployed and Welfare Council. All of these groups were associated with controversial psychologist and political activist Fred Newman
Fred Newman
Frederick Delano "Fred" Newman was an American philosopher, psychotherapist, playwright and political activist, and creator of a therapeutic modality called Social Therapy.-Early life:...
, whose radical health care collective Centers for Change and Marxist International Workers Party
International Workers Party
The International Workers Party is supposedly a secretive Marxist political organization founded by controversial organizer, playwright and psychotherapist Fred Newman.-Origins:The history of the IWP is itself controversial...
were active in grassroots politics in New York City. The NAP's first chairperson was then-South Bronx City Councilman Gilberto Gerena-Valentin, a veteran Puerto Rican political activist. http://turnstile.cssny.org/turnstile/userimages/VRAOpEd.pdf#search=%22%22gilberto%20gerena%20valentin%22%22. The party is notable for getting African American psychologist Lenora Fulani
Lenora Fulani
Lenora Branch Fulani is an American psychologist, psychotherapist, and political activist. She may be best known for her presidential campaigns and development of youth programs serving minority communities in the New York City area...
on the ballot in all 50 states during her first Presidential
President of the United States
The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....
campaign in 1988, making her both the first African-American and woman
Woman
A woman , pl: women is a female human. The term woman is usually reserved for an adult, with the term girl being the usual term for a female child or adolescent...
to do so.
Background and ideas
From 1974 to 1979, Newman had acquired some experience in politics in managing the International Workers PartyInternational Workers Party
The International Workers Party is supposedly a secretive Marxist political organization founded by controversial organizer, playwright and psychotherapist Fred Newman.-Origins:The history of the IWP is itself controversial...
. The New Alliance Party was founded as an electoral party that was independent of Democrats and Republicans and that could create "new alliances" of groups marginalized by the American electoral process, namely people of color, the lesbian and gay community
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
, progressives, and women
Female
Female is the sex of an organism, or a part of an organism, which produces non-mobile ova .- Defining characteristics :The ova are defined as the larger gametes in a heterogamous reproduction system, while the smaller, usually motile gamete, the spermatozoon, is produced by the male...
. The New Alliance Party described itself as "pro-socialist."
Electoral politics
The NAP's first impact on the New York city political scene was its participation in the early stages of what became known as the "Dump Koch" movement, which focused on then Mayor Edward I. Koch, a former liberal Congressman who had moved steadily rightward. http://www.gothamgazette.com/article//20051114/202/1652#8 http://www.independentvoting.org/magazine/Unpopular_Partnerships.pdf#search=%22%22dump%20koch%22%22 http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DEED71739F931A35755C0A96F948260 http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0DE1DD123BF935A3575AC0A963948260In 1984 the NAP made its entry into the Presidential campaign scene. Its candidate was Dennis L. Serrette
Dennis L. Serrette
Dennis L. Serrette, born in Harlem, New York in the 1940s, was the New Alliance Party candidate for United States President in the 1984 presidential election. His running mate was Nancy Ross. He split with the party after the election....
, an African-American union activist who would later leave the NAP alleging questionable methods used by Newman and others. Serrette's running mate was Nancy Ross, a NAP leader who had served on a community school board on Manhattan's Upper West Side.
In 1985 the NAP began its unusual political "relationship" with Jesse Jackson
Jesse Jackson
Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr. is an African-American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988 and served as shadow senator for the District of Columbia from 1991 to 1997. He was the founder of both entities that merged to...
. While Newman was initially dismissive of Jackson, Fulani had praised the popular activist during his 1984 Presidential run. After Jackson founded his Rainbow Coalition group, Newman and Fulani created the Rainbow Alliance, which at first lobbied for the benefit of small political parties. It later changed its name to the Rainbow Lobby and expanded its lobby to include issues of opposing U.S.-backed Joseph Mobutu's dictatorship in Zaire
Zaire
The Republic of Zaire was the name of the present Democratic Republic of the Congo between 27 October 1971 and 17 May 1997. The name of Zaire derives from the , itself an adaptation of the Kongo word nzere or nzadi, or "the river that swallows all rivers".-Self-proclaimed Father of the Nation:In...
and the Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
an dictatorship of Prosper Avril
Prosper Avril
Prosper Avril is a Haitian political figure who was President of Haiti from 1988 to 1990. A trusted member of François Duvalier's Presidential Guard and adviser to Jean-Claude Duvalier, Lt. Gen. Avril led the September 1988 Haitian coup d'état against a transition military government installed...
. When asked about his political relationship to Fulani in the press Jackson said that there was no relationship at all. The Rainbow Lobby continued its lobbying activities into the early 1990s, while Fulani repeatedly rebuked Jackson for his support of the Democratic Party.
The 1988 presidential race
United States presidential election, 1988
The United States presidential election of 1988 featured no incumbent president, as President Ronald Reagan was unable to seek re-election after serving the maximum two terms allowed by the Twenty-second Amendment. Reagan's Vice President, George H. W. Bush, won the Republican nomination, while the...
was a major step for the NAP. The Fulani campaign ran under the slogan "Two Roads are Better than One," supporting Reverend Jesse Jackson's campaign within the Democratic Party while launching her own run designed to challenge the African American community to sever their historic relationship to the
Democratic Party and embrace an independent path.http://www.independentvoting.org/activistcenter/fulani_keynote.html In the previous election, NAP was able to secure a ballot spot in only 33 states. This time around NAP pursued every avenue possible to gain ballot access
Ballot access
Ballot access rules, called nomination rules outside the United States, regulate the conditions under which a candidate or political party is either entitled to stand for election or to appear on voters' ballots...
. This included attempts to gain the nomination of small independent parties which existed around the country, such as the Solidarity Party
Solidarity Party
The Solidarity Party was an American political party in the state of Illinois. It was named after Lech Wałęsa's Solidarity movement in Poland, which was widely-admired in Illinois at the time .The party was founded in 1986 by Senator Adlai Stevenson III in reaction to the Democratic Party's...
in Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
. Fulani had six different running mates; different ones in different states, among them Joyce Dattner
Joyce Dattner
Joyce Dattner is a U.S. life coach and works and resides in San Francisco, California. Dattner was one of the six Vice Presidential candidates of the New Alliance Party and its candidate Lenora Fulani in the 1988 presidential election .-Coaching:...
and (in Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
only) Harold Moore, each "representing different constituencies." Asked which one would become Vice President if she won, she answered "If we got elected, we'd figure it out."
Fulani’s vote total throughout the country was 217,221, or 0.2% of the vote, coming in fourth place. She was the second most successful third party presidential candidate that year, behind Libertarian Ron Paul
Ron Paul
Ronald Ernest "Ron" Paul is an American physician, author and United States Congressman who is seeking to be the Republican Party candidate in the 2012 presidential election. Paul represents Texas's 14th congressional district, which covers an area south and southwest of Houston that includes...
. Also in the 1988 election, the NAP ran some candidates for other offices, including US Senate candidates in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Nebraska. Though the party had its strongest roots in the east coast, the best result for the NAP was in Nebraska, where they had a well-known candidate in independent state senator Ernie Chambers
Ernie Chambers
Ernest W. Chambers is a former Nebraska State Senator who represented North Omaha's 11th District in the Nebraska State Legislature. He is also a civil rights activist and is considered by most citizens of Nebraska as the most prominent and outspoken African American leader in the state...
who received 1.6% of the vote.
Fulani ran unsuccessfully as a New York gubernatorial candidate in 1990. She was endorsed by Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan
Louis Farrakhan
Louis Farrakhan Muhammad, Sr. is the leader of the African-American religious movement the Nation of Islam . He served as the minister of major mosques in Boston and Harlem, and was appointed by the longtime NOI leader, Elijah Muhammad, before his death in 1975, as the National Representative of...
, who had recently been politically involved with Jesse Jackson's 1988 campaign only to be dropped at the recommendation of Jackson's campaign advisors. This was in the wake of Farrakhan being characterized in the press as anti-semitic, as well as Jackson's slipped comment of calling New York City "Hymietown". Fulani and Newman embraced Farrakhan, eliciting the anger of the Anti-Defamation League
Anti-Defamation League
The Anti-Defamation League is an international non-governmental organization based in the United States. Describing itself as "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency", the ADL states that it "fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects...
(ADL). In the wake of this criticism, Fulani moderated a "historic conference" on Black-Jewish relations, featuring the "Jewish Marxist" Newman dialoguing with activist Reverend Al Sharpton
Al Sharpton
Alfred Charles "Al" Sharpton, Jr. is an American Baptist minister, civil rights activist, and television/radio talk show host. In 2004, he was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. presidential election...
.
Fulani again ran for president in 1992 on the NAP ticket. Maria Elizabeth Muñoz
Maria Elizabeth Muñoz
Maria Elizabeth Muñoz, a Chicana activist, was a third-party candidate for Vice President of the United States in the United States presidential election, 1992, representing the New Alliance Party as the running mate of Lenora Fulani...
, a chicano
Chicano
The terms "Chicano" and "Chicana" are used in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. However, those terms have a wide range of meanings in various parts of the world. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement, mainly among Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's...
activist, was chosen as her running mate. Muñoz had previously run for Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
and Governor in California on Peace and Freedom Party tickets. Fulani lost the party's nomination to Ron Daniels of Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition. She also entered the New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
primary for the Democratic Party Presidential nomination in 1992, and gained some press coverage for frequent heckling of Bill Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
's campaign appearances after she was excluded from the New Hampshire Democratic debates. In 1992, the NAP also ran some candidates in other races, including US Senate candidates in Arizona, Illinois, Indiana and New York. The best result for NAP Senate candidates was for Mohammad T. Mehdi in New York, who received 0.8% of the vote and fourth place.
By the mid 1990s the NAP and its weekly newspaper The National Alliance had been disbanded. In 1994, Fulani and Newman for a period joined the Patriot Party, one of many groups which would later compete for control over Ross Perot
Ross Perot
Henry Ross Perot is a U.S. businessman best known for running for President of the United States in 1992 and 1996. Perot founded Electronic Data Systems in 1962, sold the company to General Motors in 1984, and founded Perot Systems in 1988...
's Reform Party
Reform Party of the United States of America
The Reform Party of the United States of America is a political party in the United States, founded in 1995 by Ross Perot...
in the years to come. This same year, Fulani and former National Alliance editor Jacqueline Salit formed the Committee for a Unified Independent Party, an organization dedicated to bringing various independent groups together to challenge the bipartisan nature of American politics.