identify presidental candidate

August 24, 2005 10:39 AM

Who was the person that ran as an independent candidate in either the 1928, 1932 or 1936 presidential election whose platform was that all goods and commodities should be priced according the the amount of energy that went into their production?
posted by Raybun to law & government (11 comments total)

Probably one of these guys (Wikipedia links if available):

• William Z. Foster, Communist, 1924, 1928, 1932
• Norman Thomas, Socialist, 1928, 1932, 1936, 1940, 1944, 1948
• Verne Reynolds, Socialist Labor, 1928, 1932
• John Aiken, Socialist Labor, 1936, 1940
• Earl Browder, Communist, 1936, 1940
• William Lemke, Union, 1936

posted by kirkaracha at 10:52 AM on August 24, 2005

From what I know of history (and after quite a bit of google searching), I'm skeptical that the price of energy (coal, oil, natural gas, electricity, animal power [?]) was considered that important in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Do you have a source for your question - some evidence that such a person actual existed?
posted by WestCoaster at 11:24 AM on August 24, 2005

This was in an article that I read many, many years ago. It might have been either in the Bpston Globe or the Atlantic. It was an intersting thought at the time that I should have been prursued. This tidbit pops up often now whenever I read about our current energy problems. The only other thing that I remember was that this fellow was an engineer. I do not believe that he was presenting this as an idea to be applied to any specific energy situations that existed at that time but was presenting this as a way of looking at how we were creating value in ouir manufacturing efforts.
posted by Raybun at 11:45 AM on August 24, 2005

Huey P. Long threatened to run many times until FDR had him offed. His platforms always centered around ideas like these. He was discussed as a nominee by both the socialists and the fascists.
posted by Pollomacho at 12:09 PM on August 24, 2005

It sounds like something that could have come out of the Robert LaFollette campaign for president in 1924. He was the candidate of the Progressive Party.
posted by Independent Scholarship at 12:31 PM on August 24, 2005

WestCoaster: I'm pretty sure he didn't mean 'coal/electricity/etc' energy, but effort energy. The idea that the value of products should or should not be based on how much effort was expended in producing them goes back at least to the 1700s, and a core of the Socialist/Communist movements was the idea that capitalism had destabilized the natural balance between value and work.
posted by koeselitz at 1:29 PM on August 24, 2005

Pollomacho: There's no evidence I know of that FDR had Huey Long "offed." Long was killed by the son-in-law of one of his Louisiana enemies, of which he had many.
posted by cerebus19 at 3:10 PM on August 24, 2005

I can't see any mention of presidential campaigns, but I came across a page on wikipedia here about a "Technocratic movement" which mentions a proposal for an energy based system of pricing which seems to date back to just after the end of the First World War.
posted by comraderaoul at 5:36 PM on August 24, 2005

Also, it's leader apparently assumed the title Chief Engineer.
posted by comraderaoul at 5:43 PM on August 24, 2005

If koeselitz is barking up the right tree, you may wish to start your search with the LTV.
posted by Kwantsar at 6:17 PM on August 24, 2005

Cerebus19, you are probably a crumbler too, aren't you?
posted by Pollomacho at 6:28 AM on August 25, 2005