The Citizens Party of the United States (Citizens Party) is a contemporary political party in the United States. Founded by Michael Thompson in Wayne, Pennsylvania in 2004 as the New American Independent Party (NAIP), the first meeting took place in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania on the day of the general election in 2004. The New American Independent Party officially changed its name to the Citizens Party^[1] in January 2011. The full transition to the Citizens Party lasted several months.^[2]

Ideology[link]

The Citizens Party claims to seek a more sustainable, self-reliant America through a platform combination of liberal, moderate, and conservative positions. The Citizens Party focuses heavily on middle class economic issues and government reform. The Citizens Party supports campaign finance reform and does not accept campaign contributions from political action committees (PACs). super PACs, labor unions or registered lobbyists.

Member engagement[link]

The Citizens Party describes itself as the most open and accessible political party in the United States for the average citizen. According to the party website, the average American will have the opportunity to rank the critical issues and help craft the party platform. Citizens can also submit questions and vote on questions through social media that all Citizens Party presidential candidates are required to answer before the convention. Members of the public can suggest potential candidates and draft candidates to run as party candidates. The party claims that it is the first and only political party to require the use of social media in the party's presidential nominating process by requiring their presidential and vice-presidential candidates to achieve a minimum number of online endorsements through social media before qualifying for the nominating convention ballot.

Main Street Platform[link]

The following is from the 2011 Citizens Party platform. The platform is copied verbatim; the numerous instances of inappropriate capitalization that occur below also occur on the website.^[3]

• Support fair trade agreements (not free trade agreements)
• Get out of the World Trade Organization, Central American Free Trade Agreement and North American Free Trade Agreement
• Eliminate the U.S. trade deficit
• Stop outsourcing American jobs and technology
• End tax breaks that reward companies for shipping jobs overseas
• Put in place a national manufacturing strategy
• Encourage the purchase of American-made goods
• Rebuild and redesign crumbling national infrastructure
• Keep vital American infrastructure in the hands of American companies
• Invest in research and development
• Secure U.S. ports and borders
• Seek U.S. energy independence through clean, renewable domestic sources
• Pass real financial reform (bring back Glass–Steagall Act and end "too big to fail")
• No more Wall Street bailouts
• Audit the Federal Reserve
• Eliminate the national debt
• Balance Federal, State and Local budgets and end wasteful pork spending
• End corporate special interest/lobbyist influence over elections and the legislative process.
• Create a fiscally sustainable health care system that dramatically cuts health care costs providing for greater access for legal citizens.
• Legalize the use of industrial hemp to boost the agriculture and industrial sectors
• Fight employer hiring policies that discriminate against the long term unemployed
• Get the unemployed back to work (including the long term unemployed - 99ers)
• Protect the family farmer, reduce factory farms
• Increase Veteran Benefits (health, job training, education)
• Use the U.S. military only when it is in the national interest
• Secure the homeland and stop actual terrorist threats
• Give local law enforcement and fire companies the funds they need for security and emergency prevention & response
• Use natural gas as a bridge fuel until renewable energy is more plentiful with regulations to protect from fracking
• Require oil and gas companies to contribute to a special emergency/spill/cleanup fund
• Require environmental impact assessments before approval for drilling for oil and natural gas
• Promote organic agriculture and a safe food supply
• End subsidies that pay farmers not to grow crops
• Support involved foreign policy but oppose isolationist and interventionist foreign policy
• More common sense neutral stance on Israeli/Palestinian conflict
• Seek a stable and sustainable U.S. population
• Enforce illegal immigration laws by punishing employers who hire illegal workers.
• Common sense H1B and L1 foreign work visa limits to protect jobs in technology and other sectors for Americans
• Limit incentives that encourage unsustainable population growth from the influx of illegal foreign nationals
• Protect the environment (clean water, air, land) and preserve and expand national parks and wildlife preserves
• Uphold the separation between church and state
• Preserve social security
• Fund education, reform education (all students in all neighborhoods deserve a quality education), make higher education more affordable
• Support the right to bear arms
• Harsher penalties for gun and weapons crimes
• Work to remedy inequalities so we can begin phasing out affirmative action programs- instead use empowerment programs for all citizens.
• Create a sensible tax policy with a simplified tax code
• Cut taxes through cutting spending - but, no tax cuts during wartime and no tax cuts that mostly benefit the wealthy
• Oppose any attempts to amend U.S. constitution to ban gay marriage
• Support an individual's right to same-sex marriage
• Support gay rights in anti-discrimination laws such as equal housing laws
• Oppose anti-choice legislation, this includes both abortion and end of life issues, i.e., assisted suicide
• Post all proposed congressional legislation on the internet for at least 10 days prior to a vote to allow public viewing and input.

Candidates (2012)[link]

Several Citizens Party candidates have already announced for the 2012 elections, including:

• James Pirtle for the U.S. Congress (Colorado)^[4]
• Max Riekse for U.S. President^[5]
• Mark B. Graham for U.S. President^[6]
• Keith John Ferguson for U.S. President
• Charles Earl Harvey for U.S. President
• JL Mealer for U.S. President

The Citizens Party encourages members to start draft campaigns to convince qualified individuals to run for office as Citizens Party candidates. Citizens Party members have started over two dozen 2012 draft campaigns^[7] so far including Dylan Ratigan (President), Frank McEnulty (President), Ralph Nader (U.S. Senate), Hillary Clinton (President), Dawn Stensland (U.S. Congress), Charlie Crist (President), Pat Choate (President), Lou Dobbs (President), David Walker (former U.S. Comptroller General)(President)), Richard Lamm (President), Paul Craig Roberts (President) and John Medaille (U.S. Senate) among others.

Citizens Questions[link]

The Citizens Party requires all of their declared Presidential candidates to answer a set of "Citizens Questions" at least 30 days before the 2012 Citizens Party National Convention. The "Citizens Questions" are selected from questions submitted by Citizens Party members via the party website or Youtube. The party states that the responses to the "Citizens Questions" will be posted on the internet for the public to view.^[8]

Previous candidates (2006-2010)[link]

In 2006, Michael Thompson ran as the party's first candidate when he ran for State Representative in Pennsylvania and received 4% of the vote.

In March 2008, the New American Independent Party nominated Frank McEnulty as its first presidential candidate.^[9] In July, McEnulty also became the vice-presidential nominee of the Reform Party.^[10] He continued his campaign as the NAIP presidential nominee in states where the Reform Party was unable to obtain ballot status.^[11] McEnulty received 828 votes (placing 15th of 23 ballot-qualified Presidential tickets nationwide) as the New American Independent Party nominee and 481 votes on the Reform Party ticket (placing 22nd out of 23 ballot-qualified Presidential tickets nationwide).^[12]

In October 2009, the NAIP endorsed independent candidate Chris Daggett for Governor of New Jersey.^{[citation needed]} Daggett finished third with 6% of the vote.

In 2010, the NAIP endorsed Jana Kemp,^[13] an Independent candidate running for Governor of Idaho.

In 2011, the Citizens Party announced that the party would no longer endorse independent candidates or candidates of other political parties.

References[link]

External links[link]

• VoteCitizens.Org, Citizens Party Official Social Network
• (old) New American Independent Party web site

The American Independent Party is a right-wing political party of the United States that was established in 1967 by Bill and Eileen Shearer. In 1968, the American Independent Party nominated George C. Wallace as its presidential candidate and retired Air Force General Curtis E. LeMay as the vice presidential candidate. Wallace ran on every state ballot in the 1968 presidential election, though he did not represent the American Independent Party in all fifty states; in Connecticut, for instance, he was listed on the ballot as representing the "George Wallace Party." The Wallace/LeMay ticket received 13.5 percent of the popular vote and 46 electoral votes.

Party history[link]

In 1969, representatives from 40 states established the American Party as the successor to the American Independent Party. In some places, such as Connecticut, the American Party was officially constituted as the American Conservative Party. (The modern American Conservative Party, founded in 2008, is unrelated to the Wallace-era party.) The official party flag adoption took place on August 30, 1970. The flag depicts an eagle holding a group of arrows in its left talons, over a compass rose, with a banner which reads "The American Independent Party" at the eagle's base. In 1972, the party nominated former Congressman John G. Schmitz of California for president and Tennessee author Thomas Jefferson Anderson for vice president. In 1976, the American Party split into the more moderate American Party, which included more northern conservatives and Schmitz supporters, and the American Independent Party, which focused on the Deep South. Both of the parties have nominated candidates for the presidency and other offices. Neither the American Party nor the American Independent Party has had much national success.

The American Independent Party has had ballot status in the state of California since 1968 and is still active there. As of early 2008, AIP's registration total was 328,261.^[1]

In the early 1980s, Bill Shearer led the American Independent Party into the Populist Party. Since 1992, the American Independent party has been the California affiliate of the national Constitution Party, formerly the U.S. Taxpayers Party. However, in 2008 one faction of the AIP broke with the Constitution Party and gave the ballot line (which it controlled) to Alan Keyes, candidate of the similarly named America's Party.

Many political analysts have theorized that the Party, which has received very few votes in recent California elections, maintains its state ballot status because people join the Party mistakenly believing that they are registering as an "independent," also known as a "non-partisan" or "decline-to-state" voter.^[2] One such voter was Jennifer Siebel, fiancée of San Francisco's liberal Democratic mayor Gavin Newsom; in 2008, Siebel attempted to change her party affiliation from Republican to Non-Partisan, but "checked the American Independent box thinking that was what independent voters were supposed to do," according to the San Francisco Chronicle.^[3]

2008 split[link]

A split in the American Independent Party occurred during the 2008 presidential campaign, one faction recognizing Jim King as chairman of the AIP with the other recognizing Ed Noonan as chairman. Noonan's faction claims the old AIP main website while the King organization claims the AIP's blog. King's group met in Los Angeles on June 28-29, elected King to state chair.^[4] Ed Noonan's faction, which included 8 of the 17 AIP officers, held a convention in Sacramento on July 5, 2008. Issues in the split were US foreign policy and the influence of Constitution Party founder Howard Phillips on the state party.^[5]

The King group elected to stay in the Constitution Party and supported its presidential candidate, Chuck Baldwin. It was not listed as the "Qualified Political Party" by the California Secretary of State and Baldwin's name was not printed in the state's ballots.^[6] King's group sued for ballot access ^[7] and their case was dismissed without prejudice.^[8]

The Noonan group voted to pull out of the Constitution Party and join a new party called America's Party, put together by perennial candidate Alan Keyes as a vehicle for his own presidential campaign.^[5] Since Noonan was on record with the California Secretary of State as (outgoing) party chairman, Keyes was added to the state ballots as the AIP candidate.^[9] This group elected Markham Robinson as its new chair at the convention.

The King faction website is now billed as the Constitution Party of California, stating "Vote Constitution Party--the only party fighting for a return to Constitutional government!"; but continuing with a list of "2010 California Candidates: We endorse the following candidates who are running under the "American Independent" banner in California for 2010!"^[10]

Presidential candidates[link]

• 1968 George C. Wallace/Curtis LeMay
• 1972 John G. Schmitz/Thomas J. Anderson
• 1976 Lester Maddox/William Dyke
• 1980 John Rarick/Eileen Shearer
• 1988 James Griffin/Charles Morsa
• 1992 Howard Phillips/Albion Knight, Jr. – U.S. Taxpayers Party
• 1996 Howard Phillips/Herb Titus – U.S. Taxpayers Party
• 2000 Howard Phillips/Curtis Frazier – Constitution Party
• 2004 Michael A. Peroutka/Chuck Baldwin – Constitution Party
• 2008 Chuck Baldwin/Darrell Castle – Constitution Party (disputed) (write-in candidate)
• 2008 Alan Keyes/Brian Rohrbough – America's Independent Party (disputed) (ballot candidate)
• 2012 Virgil Goode/Jim Clymer – Constitution Party

California gubernatorial candidates[link]

The American Independent Party has nominated the following candidates for governor of California since becoming the California affiliate of the Constitution Party:

• 1990 Jerome McCready
• 1994 Jerome McCready
• 1998 Nathan E. Johnson
• 2002 Reinhold Gulke
• 2003 Diane Beall Templin
• 2006 Edward C. Noonan
• 2010 Chelene Nightingale^[11]

Chairmen/Vice-Chairmen[link]

• Bill Shearer: 1967–1999
• Nathan Johnson: 1999–2002
• Jim King/Reed R. Heustis: 2002–2004
• Nancy Spirkoff: 2004–2006
• Edward C. Noonan/Mark Seidenberg: 2006–2008
• Disputed: Chair is either Jim King or Markham Robinson: 2008–present

References[link]

External links[link]

• American Independent Party King faction.
• American Independent Party of California Noonan faction.
• American Independent Party at JoinCalifornia

v t e Constitution Party Presidential tickets Phillips/Knight Phillips/Titus Phillips/Frazier Peroutka/Baldwin Baldwin/Castle Goode/Clymer Parties by state and territory State Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon (no State Party) Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming Territory District of Columbia Guam (no Territory party) Northern Mariana Islands (no Territory party) Puerto Rico (no Territory party) Virgin Islands (no Territory party) Affiliated organizations Young Constitutionalists National Veterans Coalition Related articles Electoral history National Convention Conservatism Portal

v t e California political parties Major parties (ballot-qualified) Democratic Republican Minor parties (ballot-qualified) American Independent Green Libertarian Peace and Freedom Minor parties (not ballot-qualified) Reform Socialist Political party strength in California

Several political parties are, or have been, called the Independent Party:

Denmark

• Independent Party (Denmark)

Uruguay

• Independent Party (Uruguay)

Kosovo

• Independent Party (Kosovo)

United States

• United States Greenback Party (1874-1884)
• Independent Party of Delaware
• Independent Party of Oregon
• The Independent Party is a name chosen by Ralph Nader for his 2008 presidential campaign to gain easier ballot access in some states

Defunct parties

• Independent Party (South Africa)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (August 2009)

New American Library (NAL) is an American publisher based in New York, founded in 1948. Its focus is affordable paperback reprints of classics and scholarly works, as well as popular and pulp fiction. Non-fiction, original and hardcopy issues are also produced.

Although U.S. distribution represented the major segment of sales, the international market also had an impact on NAL's success. In addition, the Peace Corps ordered 52 NAL titles totaling 150,000 books which were distributed to its volunteers and constituents overseas.^{[citation needed]}

History[link]

Victor Weybright and Kurt Enoch founded the New American Library of World Literature, Inc. (NAL), in 1948. NAL was established as an autonomous American publishing house after branching off from its British-based parent company, Penguin Books. Victor Weybright led the company as Chairman and Editor-in-Chief (1945—1947) while Kurt Enoch acted as President and Chief Executive Officer (1945—1947).^{[citation needed]}

NAL imprints included:

• Signet fiction
• Mentor (mostly) non-fiction (with the slogan, "Good reading for the millions")
• Signet science
• Signet Classics
• Signet Key (for young readers ages 10 to 14)
• Mentor-Omega (featuring Catholic philosophers)
• Mentor Executive Library (for businesspeople).

NAL published such notable and diverse authors as James Joyce, William Faulkner, Mickey Spillane, Arthur Koestler, Jim Thompson, Erskine Caldwell and Flannery O'Connor.

NAL's productions were not limited to softbound reprints. Original works of mystery, romance, and adventure proved to be profitable and popular. The company later initiated hard-copy original publications, such as the immensely popular James Bond "007" series written by Ian Fleming. NAL also published new editions of classic works — for example, a Shakespeare series — which featured renowned scholars, editors, and translators; many of these editions were oriented toward high school and college readership. These paperbound books included subjects in the humanities, the arts, and the sciences. They also published at least two notable "magazines in book form": New World Writing in the 1950s and early '60s, and New American Review in the latter '60s and early '70s (which then moved on to other publishers as American Review).

NAL enjoyed great success; by 1965, its Mentor and Signet books annually sold over 50 million volumes.^{[citation needed]}

The McCarthy era of the 1950s is notorious for its attacks upon communism and communistic influences in American life, and the object of federal investigations and trials was to eliminate this perceived "threat" and extinguish any and all communistic elements. NAL became involved with the censorship trials when certain books were deemed inflammatory and subsequently banned. Victor Weybright was asked to testify before a 1952 House Committee which examined pornography. Rather than accept government restrictions, Weybright endorsed a self-regulated censorship policy on the part of publishing companies.^{[citation needed]} Weybright commented thus:

I pointed out with some justification, but certainly not as my basic argument, that the Mentor list was essential as part of the character and prestige of our company and an indispensable exhibit when our more daring fiction — by Faulkner, Farrell, and Caldwell — was attacked by the censors ^[1].

NAL witnessed a change in ownership three times over a period of 27 years. In 1960 Times Mirror of Los Angeles bought NAL; however, NAL continued to operate autonomously within the Mirror Company. Similarly, NAL's management remained unchanged. In 1983 Odyssey Partners and Ira J. Hechler bought NAL from the Times Mirror Company for over $50 million dollars. In 1987, the NAL was reintegrated by purchase into the Penguin Publishing Company, its original parent company. New York University Library received the NAL archive as a gift from the NAL in the spring of 1965. ^[2]

Notes[link]

External links[link]

• New American Library: Signet, Onyx, Accent
• About NAL at Penguin Group (USA)

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