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Green Party of Mississippi
| Green Party of Mississippi | |
 | |
| Basic facts | |
| Location: | Oxford, Miss. |
| Type: | Political party |
| Affiliation: | Green |
| Top official: | Jan Hillegas, Chair |
| Year founded: | 2002 |
| Website: | Official website |
The Green Party of Mississippi is the Mississippi political party affiliate of the national Green Party. The group is headquartered in Oxford, Mississippi.
Note: This party was previously ballot-qualified in Mississippi. As of March 8, 2022, it is no longer ballot-qualified. The content here reflects the most current information as of March 8, 2022.
Background
During the 2000 presidential election, over 8,000 Mississippi voters supported Ralph Nader, the Green Party candidate. In 2002, the growing Green movement in the state resulted in the establishment of the Green Party of Mississippi. In 2004, John M. Wages Jr. became the first Green Party candidate elected to public office in Mississippi. Wages won the race for election commissioner in the 3rd Supervisor District of Lee County. Over the years, the Green Party of Mississippi has worked to advocate for renewable energy and oppose the Keystone XL pipeline.[1][2][3][4]
Platform
The party's stated platform is composed of 34 main issues:[5]
- Corporate intrusion into the political process
"The greatest threat to what is left of our democracy after many years of assaults on the sovereignty of the American people is the ability of special interests to purchase the loyalty of those who are nominally the people's elected representatives." - Instant runoff voting
" We support instant runoff voting. Instant runoff voting is already in use in several other countries and some municipalities in the U.S." - "Clean money" laws
" We favor the passage of a "clean money" law such as that of Arizona whereby any candidate who gathers 200 checks from individuals of $5 each becomes eligible for more than $25,000 in public money." - Corporate pesonhood
"The intrusion of corporations into American political life must be stopped. Corporations are artificial persons not endowed with the same rights to free speech, freedom of religion, and other constitutional rights as natural persons." - Party organization
"Municipal political parties should be allowed to organize without the existence of state or county parties. County political parties should be allowed to organize without the existence of a state party." - Fusion laws
"We favor the passage of a fusion law similar to that of the state of New York allowing different political parties to nominate the same candidate for state, county, and municipal political offices." - Party membership
" Individuals should be allowed to be members of a state political party without being members of a county or municipal party." - At-large elections
"We oppose at-large elections as diluting the voting strength of minorities." - Elected official compensation
" No Mississippi elected official should be compensated by law at more than twice the individual median income for Mississippians. If our elected officials want salary increases they should be required to earn them by raising the standard of living of the people they presumably represent." - Sunshine laws
"We support sunshine laws that open up the political system to access by all citizens. We call for vigorous enforcement of existing open meeting and open records laws in Mississippi." - Election days
" We call for election days to be designated state holidays and for other measures calculated to inform, educate, and motivate voters." - Voting rights for felons
"The state law denying felons their voting rights even after they have served their sentences and completed their paroles is unjust to ex-convicts who are sincerely attempting to rehabilitate themselves and unconstitutional under the Eighth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. We believe that it should be repealed." - Education
"The ultimate purpose of education, although it should include job training, is to help children become scholars and citizens taught to question, reason, and discern, not employees and consumers taught to produce, consume, and obey." - Healthcare
" We believe that the state of Mississippi should support publicly owned county and regional hospitals as a step towards universal healthcare." - Economic justice/social safety net
"We support an immediate increase of the legal hourly wage to at least $2.00 over the federal minimum wage in all municipalities and counties in the state of Mississippi and in all state funded hourly wage positions." - Management-labor relations
"Mississippi right-to-work laws must be repealed. We support the right of employees to form unions and engage in collective bargaining." - Criminal justice
"Abolish private prisons. Allowing private individuals to profit by subjecting their fellow citizens to involuntary servitude is suggestive of slavery." - Civil and equal rights
"We support the formation of a State Commission on Civil Rights to examine and recommend action on past and present injustices and inequities among Mississippians." - Free speech
"The right of the individual to freedom of speech is inherent in his or her existence as a human being and should in no way be abridged by the state of Mississippi. This principle includes state government employees and teachers and students in public schools." - Native Americans
"We support the self-determination of the Choctaw and any other Native American tribe indigenous to Mississippi and resident in the state before 1900." - Immigration
"State laws allowing employers to import employees from foreign countries and pay them less than minimum wage by hiring them as temporary workers are a form of peonage. We favor and call for their immediate repeal." - Housing
"We support passage of equitable landlord-tenant laws in all counties and municipalities." - Community involvement
"We support legislation and public policies that encourage establishment of consumer co-ops, micro loan funds, and local currencies." - Banking for people
"We support a law capping interest rates on all loans including credit cards in the state of Mississippi at 1% over the Prime lending rate." - Energy policy
"We oppose the deregulation of utilities. Public utilities are too important to our citizens and businesses to allow prices to become subject to the vagaries of the marketplace." - Nuclear energy policy
"We oppose nuclear energy and call for a decommissioning and phase-out of current nuclear plants." - Waste disposal
"We support local ordinances and state laws requiring businesses applying for zoning permits to disclose any toxic substances which may be used or produced at the site." - Fossil fuels
"We support incentives to enable local communities to build bike paths and sidewalks in order to reduce auto-based transportation." - Renewable energy
"We support the use of tax-exempt bonds to allow publicly owned utilities to finance conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy project." - Transportation policy
"We support publicly financed mass transit in Mississippi's metropolitan areas." - Clean air
" We favor state legislation on the California model requiring stricter clean air and fuel efficiency standards." - Land use
"We support the full funding and expansion of our state parks system." - Water
"We support the promotion of water conservation by the state of Mississippi." - Agriculture
"We support organic farming methods and endorse the efforts of Mississippi's organic farmers to organize statewide to promote them."
Rules and bylaws
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Note: This article is not intended to serve as a guide to running for public office. Individuals should contact their state election agencies for further information.
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- See also: Rules of the Mississippi Green Party
The state party is governed by a set of rules and bylaws. Typically, these give structure to the different levels of organization—local, county, and state committees—and establish protocol for electing committee members. The bylaws also typically give details on the party's process for nominating and sending delegates to the national party convention during presidential elections. The following is a summary of the Mississippi Green Party's rules. This summary focuses on the structure and governance of the party:[6]
- The party holds a state convention every four years.
- The party is headed by the state executive committee and organized into county, congressional district and municipal executive committees.
- The state executive committee meets on a quarterly basis.
Convention
The 2016 convention for the Green Party of Mississippi, when the party selects its delegates for the 2016 Green National Convention, was held on May 21, 2016.[7]
Leadership
The Green Party of Mississippi has the following state leadership:[7][8]
- Jan Hillegas, Chair
- William Ashley Vaughan, Secretary
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms 'Mississippi Green Party'. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Green Party of the United States, "Green Party of Mississippi statement on the Keystone XL pipeline," October 31, 2012
- ↑ Mississippi News Now, "Green Party pushes for net metering law," January 27, 2011
- ↑ Green Party of Mississippi, "Home," accessed November 5, 2015
- ↑ Green Party of Mississippi, "Mississippi voters elect first Green," November 8, 2004
- ↑ Green Party of Mississippi, "Platform," accessed November 4, 2015
- ↑ Green Party of Mississippi, "Bylaws," accessed November 4, 2015
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Green Party of Mississippi, "2016 Political Plan," accessed April 20, 2016
- ↑ Green Party of the United States, "Green Party of Mississippi statement on the Keystone XL pipeline," October 31, 2012
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