Jasper McLevy

Jasper McLevy
Portrait of Mayor Jasper McLevy from the 1936 convention program of the Socialist Party
43rd Mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut
In office 1933–1957
Preceded by	Edward Buckingham
Succeeded by	Samuel J. Tedesco
Personal details
Born	(1878-03-27)March 27, 1878 Bridgeport, Connecticut, United States
Died	November 20, 1962(1962-11-20) (aged 84) Bridgeport, Connecticut, United States
Political party	Socialist
Spouse(s)	Mary Flynn 1915 (d. 1918) Vida Stearns, 1929
Residence	Bridgeport, Connecticut
Religion	Presbyterian

Jasper McLevy (March 27, 1878—November 20, 1962) was an American politician who served as mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut from 1933–1957. He was a member of the Socialist Party, later leaving in protest to join the Social Democratic Federation.

Jasper McLevy was born to Scottish immigrants Hugh and Mary Stewart McLevy in Bridgeport on March 27, 1878. McLevy worked first as a roofer, learning the trade from his uncle after his own father died when he was 14. After reading Edward Bellamy's futuristic, utopian novel Looking Backward, he became a socialist, and helped form the Bridgeport Socialist Party in the early 1900s. The 24-year-old idealist first ran for the Connecticut General Assembly under the Socialist banner in 1902, collecting 215 votes. He ran another 20 unsuccessful campaigns for local, city, state and federal offices over the following years, including nine tries at mayor, the last in 1931. In all these races he ran as a Socialist at a time when socialists were portrayed as anarchists and bomb-throwers.

In the early 1930s, Bridgeport, an industrial city in southern Connecticut, was plagued by corruption and hard hit by the Great Depression. In 1931, voters had ousted the incumbent Republican mayor for Democrat Edward Buckingham and McLevy only lost by a couple thousand votes. By 1933, dissatisfaction had spread to both parties and McLevy trounced the competition, bringing along a Socialist majority on the Board of Aldermen, Bridgeport's city council. While people familiar with local politics had seen the writing on the wall in the 1931 results, the national media was astonished to find the Socialists in control in a New England city.