Write-in candidate
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A write-in candidate is a candidate in an election whose name does not appear on the ballot, but for whom voters may vote nonetheless by writing in the person's name. Write-in candidates rarely win, and votes are often cast for ineligible people or fictional characters. Most jurisdictions require write-in candidates to be registered as candidates before the election. This is usually mandatory in elections with large pools of potential office-holders, as there may be multiple people with the name that is written in.
Notable write-in candidates include:
- Strom Thurmond in 1954 became the only person ever to be elected to the United States Senate as a write-in candidate.
- Dale Alford became the second Congressman when he was elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1958.
- Joe Skeen was the third write-in candidate elected to Congress in 1980.
- Ron Packard was the fourth write-in candidate elected in 1982 and the only one to defeat the candidates of the Democratic and Republican parties.
- Charlotte Burks was a Write-in candidate for Tennessee State Senate after the death of her husband, Tommy. She ran against Byron Looper, the man who had murdered her husband.
- Anthony A. Williams, the Washington, DC Mayor was forced to run as a write-in candidate in the 2002 Democratic primary, because he had too many invalid signatures for his petition. He won the Democratic primary, and went on to win re-election.
- John Adams became an Orange County, California judge in November 2002 after running along with 10 other write-in candidates in the primaries on March 5, 2002 against incumbant Judge Ronald Kline [1]. After the filing deadline in which no candidate filed to run against Kline, a computer hacker discovered that Judge Kline had child pornography on his home computer . Kline got less than 50% of the vote in the primaries, requiring a runoff between him and write-in candidate John Adams (who actually received more votes than Kline) [2]. After some legal manuevers, Kline's name was removed from the general elections, leaving the general election a runoff between Adams and Gay Sandoval, who was the second highest write-in vote getter [3]. Charges against Kline were eventually thrown out [4].
- Donna Frye ran as a write-in candidate for Mayor of San Diego in 2004. Frye was subject to lawsuits over the validity of her candidacy [5] and of the write-in votes themselves [6].
- On March 15, 2005, James Maher won the mayorship of Baxter Estates, New York as a write-in candidate with 29 votes. Being the only one on the ballot, the incumbant mayor, James Neville, did not campaign, as he did not realize that there was a write-in campaign going on. Neville received only 13 votes [7].
- Michael Sessions, an 18-year-old high school senior, won as a write-in candidate for Mayor of Hillsdale, MI in 2005. He was too young to qualify for the ballot in the spring.
During the 2002 United States Congress Elections, filmmaker Michael Moore led a campaign for voters to submit a ficus tree as a write-in candidate. This campaign was replicated across the country and was recounted in an episode of The Awful Truth.
History
Write-in candidates are a holdover from the time when ballot papers were blank, and had no names printed on them at all. Gradually, the ballots were arranged to have all the names of the candidates printed on them, with a "write-in" provision for latecomers.
International
In most jurisdictions around the world, write-in candidates are not recognised.
A strange incident involving a fictitious write-in candidacy occurred in the small town of Picoazà, Ecuador in 1967. A company ran a series of campaign-themed advertisements for a foot powder called Pulvapies. Some of the slogans used included "Vote for any candidate, but if you want well-being and hygiene, vote for Pulvapies", and "For Mayor: Honorable Pulvapies." The foot powder Pulvapies ended up receiving the most votes in the election.<ref>Urban Legends Reference Page: (Politics) Political Podiatry</ref>
Notes
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