Charter party
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The Charter Committee
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| Leader | Michael Goldman |
| Founded | June 6, 1924 |
| Ideology | Independent Progressive |
| Website | |
| http://www.chartercommittee.org | |
The Charter Party or Charter Committee is a minor political party, the third party of Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. Members of this party are called "Charterites."
The Charter Party claims to be "the oldest third party in the nation that has continually elected officials to office". It was founded in 1924, during a time when Cincinnati government was under the control of the Republican Party. Cincinnati was infamous for being the most corruptly governed major city in the United States, the era of Boss Cox (established by George Cox in the 1880s), controlled then by his protégé Rudolph Hynicka, who spent most of his time in New York in the management of the Columbia Burlesque Circuit.
Republican reformers, led by members of the Republican Executive and Advisory Committee, then began the Cincinnatus Association. In 1923, Republican lawyer Murray Seasongood became the leader of the reformers' successful anti-tax campaign.
The Cincinnatus Association then led to the formation of the Birdless Ballot League, which advocated nonpartisan elections. (The term "birdless" referred to the use of the Republican eagle and Democratic rooster as party symbols on the ballot). In 1924, the Birdless Ballot League joined with other reformers to create the City Charter Committee.
The pre-1925 charter established a 32-member city council, six of whom were elected at-large. Only candidates nominated in a city-wide primary by the Republican and Democratic parties were eligible to run. In 1924, there were 31 Republicans and one Democrat on the council. Between 1913 and 1925, only five Democrats had managed to get elected to the council. The real power behind government was held by Hynicka's Republican Central Committee, comprising Republican ward and township captains, which held the real power in the Republican party, to the disadvantage of the Executive and Advisory Committee.
The new municipal charter enacted in 1925 as part of the Charterite movement established a Council-Manager form of government (abolishing the mayor-council system) and a civil service bureaucracy to replace political patronage. The new charter, which created a nine-member council, also mandated nonpartisan municipal elections and proportional representation with preference-ranked voting.
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