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If you're on the fringes of the political spectrum - right or left - you may have a PR problem running for a position in Illinois government. Though it's optional, candidates are encouraged to sign a loyalty oath, a short statement affirming they are "not affiliated directly or indirectly with any communist organization or any communist front organization, or any foreign political agency, party, organization or government which advocates the overthrow of constitutional government." WBEZ reports that most candidates turned in the oath with their ballot petitions.
The oath is a cold war relic dating back decades. In 1969, a federal panel of three judges found that requiring Illinois state employees to take an oath was unconstitutional. Loyalty oaths like this are common however. Federal employees have to sign a similar document, though the language about communists has been removed. I once even had to sign a document with similar language, affirming that I am not a communist, to rent an American Legion hall in Northwest Indiana.
At a time when students are required out of habit to recite the pledge of allegiance and when republicans are considering their own type of loyalty oath, it may seem like just another procedural exercise, but not everyone is happy about it. In an interview with WBEZ, Illinois communist organizer John Bachtell said, "The very fact that it's on the books is wrong and it should be repealed...If we want to further democratize elections and remove the stain of McCarthyism from our country it should just be completely taken off the books." Republican gubernatorial candidate Adam Andrzejewski said the oath is, "truly an arcane and anachronistic provision in the election code."
Illinois doesn't yet have a formal tea party (yet) or a large contingent of oath keepers (yet), but both groups may be the type of right wing organizations whose loyalty to "not advocate the overthrow of constitutional government" could come into question. If that's the case, politics would truly make strange bedfellows, putting both the far left and far right (who often accuse each other of disloyalty to America) in the same box.
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would you care to document your assertion that tea-party organizers are advocating for the overthrow of our constitutional gov't, or is this just typical liberal slant?
So Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin can't run in Illinois? What a loss.
Think that's hyperbole? Limbaugh was talking about how the troops at West Point should "detain" President Obama on his show this week.
Every day that some idiot follower of these jamokes hasn't done something awful and violent to "strike a blow for freedom!" is one I'm grateful for.
I consider myself to be one of the tea partiers. Like the commenter above, I disagree with using the tea party reference in this post.
Somehow, you have used this goofy anti-communist oath as a means to wise-crack about the tea party movement.
Remember that it is the pro-Obama crowd, not the tea partiers, who have children singing Soviet-style songs in praise of the Dear Leader.
Correction: Rich Whitney, the Green Party candidate for gov said that the loyalty oath was "truly an arcane and anachronistic provision in the election code"not Andrzejewski.
Andrzejewski said that he would try to find an notary and actually sign the oath.
All the Green Party candidates for state wide office didn't sign the oath it looks like. Good on them.
America is a nation that values political pluralism and these loyalty oaths are pretty arcane indeed.
10KV FTW: would you please expand upon your comment re political pluralism? how does accepting into public office an official that belongs to a group that actively promotes overthrow of the gov't further your concept of political pluralism?
The Green Party does not advocate the "overthrow of the US Government." Or Gov't which you, bizarrely, call it. The Greens do look to do away with arcane nonsense like the electoral college (which did a bang up job of giving us George Bush in 2000 and generally serves to minimize the importance of one person, one vote nationally) but that's hardly the overthrow of the government. One of the ten key principles of the green movement is non-violence.
Here read.
http://www.gp.org/tenkey.shtml
the discussion here is whether or not it makes sense to require public officials to reject the notion of overthrowing the constitutional gov't. at no point did i assert that the green party [or any other party] does so. you are creating straw men. if you would like to debate the actual issue i am happy to do so
would you care to document your assertion that the green party advocates the overthrow of our constitutional gov(ernmen)t, or are you just here to waste time?
see above: i've made no such assertion
Then who were you talking about?
I vote Green Party and there's nothing in the platform about 'overthrowing the government', vastly improving, yes.
Anyway you can read it all here: http://www.gp.org/platform/2004/
idiot. take an intro to logic course and learn to follow a line of reasoning
Maybe if you weren't using childish insults, and actually bothered to be clear in who you were referring to (you still haven't answered), people could understand your "logic" better.
again, there i singled out no group. try to follow a line of argument or shut the hell up
in context with the comment to which you replied, the "group" you refer to is read as the Green party. Your mistake. Do a better job next time.
The mis-informed, paranoid tea-partiers and their fear-mongering leaders are a bigger threat than any Communist candidate could ever hope to be.
are you competing with navin to take 'top numbnuts' title? learn to follow a logical discussion then come back and debate with the big boys
"big boys" usually don't start screeching about "idiots' and "numbnuts" when asked to simply explain their statements.
ah i see i have hit a nerve. crying like a little girl is not typical of the big boys either. you have asked me to explain nothing. standard debate format has left a question in your court since we bgan this thread that you have failed to address.
"you have asked me to explain nothing"
My first response:
"Then who were you talking about?"
/comments.
Ward Up, please read http://thinkprogress.org/2006/04/17/katrina-song/
Then think for a minute...
Are you now a racist?
;)
Oh, what a pissing contest this thread turned out to be.
Commencing thread shutdown in 3,2,1...
(I wish)
I signed a loyalty oath in college, to get a library job.
Always amused me to think they were hedging their bets-- if they can't get you for anything else when you try to violently overthrow the government, they can always nail you for breach of contract.