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Every candidate, no matter how unusual, creates an opportunity to think about elections and how we are governed. What lessons can we find in these unusual candidates?
In 1938, a small-town Washington mayor jokingly nominated a mule to be the Republican Party’s county representative. He brought a mule named Boston Curtis to the local courthouse, and used the mule’s hoof to sign a nomination form. The mayor then signed off as the mule’s witness, and Boston was in the race.
Not surprisingly, the mule had no platform and gave no speeches. Yet his gag campaign took an unusual twist. Nobody else came forward to run for the position. This meant that Boston Curtis was the only Republican candidate on the ballot. With many Republican supporters unaware of the mayor’s gag, the mule received 51 votes, winning the position.
The mayor later said that the mule’s victory showed that some people will blindly vote for anyone, based on nothing more than their party affiliation.
In 1940, Gracie Allen and her husband George Burns—a popular American comedy duo—dreamed up a gag of having Gracie run for president. Gracie embraced her ditzy comedy style, and took a run for president as the Surprise Party candidate.
The campaign caught fire across America, becoming the focus of the duo’s national radio show for twelve weeks. Gracie toured 34 communities, proposing silly ideas that kept with her campaign song lyrics: “Even big politicians don’t know what to do; Gracie doesn’t know either, but neither do you.” Even America’s First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, loved the campaign. She invited Gracie to speak at the National Women’s Press Club.
Gracie never officially entered the presidential race. However, some American jurisdictions allow voters to write-in a candidate’s name on a ballot. Through write-ins, Gracie received several thousand votes.
In the early 1980s, a 22-year-old Regina resident, David Loblaw, was concerned with low voter turnout. To create interest in the 1982 civic election, he threw his name in for Regina mayor as satirical candidate Bob Loblaw.
Loblaw campaigned as “Anybody’s Mayor.” He proposed having city council meet on mats so that they could resolve disputes through wrestling matches. He suggested improving Regina’s drinking water by turning Moose Jaw into a sinkhole, creating a basin for collecting fresh rainwater. Some residents were not amused. One caller to a local radio show said he should be shot.
Loblaw’s campaign caught plenty of attention, but it did not spur voter turnout. In fact, Regina voter participation has dipped as low as 20% in recent years. Looking back in 2016, Loblaw told the CBC that “Perhaps it’s far too easy for anyone to run and potential voters are tired of sifting through the long list of candidates, both legitimate and wacko.”
The right to run for office means that people from marginalised communities have the opportunity to challenge the status quo. Trans rights activist Enza Anderson put this right into action by running for mayor in Toronto’s 2000 civic election. As she told the Globe and Mail “If nothing else, I’m creating a bit of excitement in a campaign that would be pretty dull without me.”
Anderson frequently campaigned on busy street corners, holding up a home-made sign that read “A Super City Deserves a Super Model!” While Anderson’s identity was remarkable, her campaign transcended her identity. She talked about a broad range of issues affecting the most vulnerable, including poverty, homelessness, and crime.
News outlets around the world carried stories about Anderson. Global attention, however, did not translate into a landslide victory at home. She came in a distant but respectable third.
