Socialist Party Seeks Support | Democracy, elections and voting at Democracy Chronicles

Ballot Access News had a new really interesting post Socialist Alternative Hopes to Use its Success in November 2013 Elections to Expand by election reform expert Richard Winger. Third parties like the Libertarian Party and the Green Party have also had local successes. See our Libertarian Party page and our Green Party page. The new Socialist Mayor of Seattle shows support for major parties is fraying at the edges. Take a look:

Socialist Alternative is asking for funds, to increase the number of branches around the U.S., and also to pay off its campaign debt. The organization has much greater visibility than it did in the past, as a result of electing Kshama Sawant to the Seattle city council, and also coming close to electing Ty Moore to the Minneapolis city council. See the party’s fund appeal here. The party also had a candidate in 2013 for City Council in Boston, Seamus Whelan.

However he did not do as well as the party’s other two candidates. He polled 3,118 votes for city-council-at-large, placing 15th among 19 candidates, with four to be elected. The Socialist Party, the Freedom Socialist Party, and Socialist Action, have all issued statements congratulating the Socialist Alternative Party for its success. However, The Militant, weekly newspaper of the Socialist Workers Party, has not mentioned Socialist Alternative.

Don’t forget Democracy Chronicles Third Party Central which has information on all the socialist parties (of which there are many). Also, there was more information about their appeal on the Socialist Alternative Party website:

Every winter, Socialist Alternative appeals to fellow activists, union members, co-workers, friends and family to support our important and necessary work through donations. We usually raise tens of thousands of dollars. This year, with the possibilities of new branches throughout the country, with increased media attention, with the debt we took on fighting the establishment, we need you to dig deep more than ever.

The Socialist Alternative Party website is pretty extensive and has tons of information about their organization. From the Socialist Alternative Party:

We believe the Republicans and Democrats are both parties of big business, and we are campaigning to build an independent, alternative party of workers and young people to fight for the interests of the millions, not the millionaires. We see the global capitalist system as the root cause of the economic crisis, poverty, discrimination, war, and environmental destruction. As capitalism moves deeper into crisis, a new generation of workers and youth must join together to take the top 500 corporations into public ownership under democratic control to end the ruling elites’ global competition for profits and power.

We believe the dictatorships that existed in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe were perversions of what socialism is really about. We are for democratic socialism where ordinary people will have control over our daily lives. Socialist Alternative is also in political solidarity with the Committee for a Workers’ International, a worldwide socialist organization in 37 countries, on every continent.