Meet your 2012 Prohibition Party Presidential Candidate
Fellure has formally campaigned for President of the United States in every presidential election since 1988 as a member of the Republican Party.[1] He asserts on his campaign website that his platform based on the 1611 Authorized King James Bible has never changed.[2] As a candidate, he calls for the elimination of the liquor industry, abortion and pornography, and advocates the teaching of the Bible in public schools and criminalization of homosexuality.[1] He has blamed the ills of society on those he has characterized as “atheists, Marxists, liberals, queers, liars, draft dodgers, flag burners, dope addicts, sex perverts and anti-Christians.”[3]
In 1992, Fellure filed to run in the New Hampshire, West Virginia and Kansas Republican primaries. By November 1991, he had spent $40,000 of his own money on the campaign, and he sent a King James Bible to the FEC as a copy of his platform.[4] Regarding the 1611 English version of the Bible, translated by 47 Church of England scholars at the request of King James, he said, “God wrote it as the supreme document and final authority in the affairs of all men, nations and civilizations, for time and eternity…Â It shall never be necessary to change it.”[4] He received 36 votes in the New Hampshire primary and complained that President George H.W. Bush and commentator Pat Buchanan were receiving all the media attention.[5]
During the 1996 presidential election while running for the Republican Party presidential nomination, he criticized former President George H.W. Bush as a man “responsible for inestimable damage toward the destruction of this sovereign democratic constitutional republic [who] continued to water the seeds of international, Satanic Marxism to the exclusion of our national sovereignty”.[3] He added that President Bill Clinton “merely shifted into overdrive the socialistic, Marxist New World Order agenda.”[3] In the general election, Fellure received one write-in vote in Idaho.[6]
He again ran in 2000,[7] and in 2004, challenged incumbent President George W. Bush for the Republican Party nomination. He was the only candidate to appear alongside Bush in the North Dakota caucus, as he met the Federal Election Commission requirement of $5,000 in receipts. He lost all 26 delegates to Bush.[8]
I had thought the Prohibition Party was basically controlled with an iron grip by James Hedges. I wonder how this guy managed to lead an insurrection into the party.
The ten voting Prohibition Party convention delegates and a few guests met for the National Convention, which began on Monday at the Holiday Inn Express in Cullman. Tuesday featured a short greeting from Cullman Mayor Max Townson, followed by addresses from Libertarian consultant Stephen P. Gordon, Ballot Access News publisher Richard Winger, and Eunie Smith of the Eagle Forum.
Gordon, who previously worked as the e-Campaign manager for the 2008 Bob Barr presidential campaign, jokingly commented that his speech “stunk”. He opened his address with the joke that “the way to pick out the libertarian at a Prohibition Party function is that I’m the one wearing the Jerry Garcia tie.” He discussed how third party candidates could utilize new media to their advantage, but avoided any ideological topics.
Winger, an expert on election law, discussed ballot access and the history of the Prohibition Party. He notably explained how the party had cost the Republicans presidential victories in the elections of 1884 and 1916, which forestalled the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment by Republicans, who wanted to do away with the alcohol issue. Gordon later commented that Winger’s speech was well-received by the audience.
After Winger’s speech, the convention broke for lunch. Afterwards, Smith, the widow of former Congressman Albert L. Smith, Jr., focused on immigration and education in her address. When asked about the Eagle Forum’s participation in the fight against alcohol, she commented that the group was focused on more pressing issues such as gambling.
Sounds exciting!