I started my campaign about a month before Oregon’s congressional district nominating conventions began. In order to participate in these conventions you must declare a candidate caucus and register for the convention. This was after the Oregon Presidential Primary. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders and celebrity Donald Trump won their respective primaries in Oregon. Knowing that competition in the First Congressional District would be fierce for Bernie Sanders delegate slots, I decided to file for a Hillary Clinton delegate position.
I spent the next month getting my friends and family who were registered Democrats to sign up for the convention. I sent out weekly emails to all my sign ups to keep them informed about the latest updates from the campaign and from the convention organizers. I made some phone calls to late sign ups, but mostly, I knew I had a solid pool of voters coming to support me. What I did not know was, if I would win on the first ballot. To prepare, I designed and printed a campaign handout with a list of supporters on one side, and my biography on another.
I issued two political pins. Both were celluloids. One was a 3” blue pin and the other was a 1 ¾” white pin. Both are pictured below. The 3” pin includes the details of the convention.
It was popular to incorporate the Hilary H into names of people and places on campaign items throughout the country and I took advantage of the H in my last name. I was also able to fit it into the H of Philly. My father still wears the smaller pin in his hat.
2020 has seen a dramatic drop in items produced for delegate campaigns because of COVID-19. Buttons were already scarce, but due to state parties moving elections online with no conventions paper items have been virtually (get it?) wiped out this year.
There were 9 delegates in total for the First Congressional District. Five went to Bernie Sanders and 4 went to Hillary Clinton. Democratic delegates in Oregon are apportioned by gender. It worked out wonderfully that the Clinton delegation from the First District would yield 2 female delegates and 2 male delegates. I felt very good about my chances.
In 2008, I had helped a friend of mine be elected an Obama delegate from Oregon’s Fifth Congressional District. Due to the way the delegates were divided that year between the districts, Obama only had one male delegate from the 5th CD. There were over 200 candidates at that convention. I was very happy to hear there would be two chances. I just had to hope that I had recruited enough friends to come vote for me on the first ballot. The Green Papers is an excellent web resource that covers every state in the country and their primary or caucus. They include details about how delegates are elected in each state. Here is the 2016 Oregon Democratic Primary page: http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P16/OR-D
After we broke up into our respective caucuses the voting started. Candidates were given a chance to speak and we went back and forth bewteen male candidates speaking and voting to female candidates speaking and voting. Multiple ballots would be required for each gender. There were at least 20 male delegate candidates attending the Clinton Caucus. I made my two minute speech and sat down. The votes started. Waiting is sometimes the most difficult part. We had just taken the vote for the first round of female delegates when the convention organizers came in to announce the results from the first round of male delegate voting. Convention Chair Mike Bohan announced, ‘only one candidate received over a clear majority on the first ballot to be elected a delegate: Congratulations Carl Fisher!’. He then announced the 4 runners up that would be on the 2nd ballot.
I was ecstatic,even if I was hid behind a calm face. For many activists attending a national convention is the culmination of years of work and in many ways is recognition from your peers of that work and a show of trust that they have put in you to represent them for this event. I then had to run a second phase of the campaign. The fundraising. I don't think there is a single person that enjoys asking for money for anything. Especially politics. From presidents to precinct workers I think it is the least admired part of political campaigns. I knew I couldn't afford to attend the convention without raising some money. I set up a 'go fundme' and started asking. Thankfully, I was able to raise all that I needed and little more (which lucky for me as problems would come up).
Transportation to the convention was an ordeal. My friends and family that followed the journey via Facebook all suspected I may never get there. After three flight cancellations, (it was a good thing I had little bit of a cushion from fundraising) I arrived on Monday afternoon, the first day of the convention. I missed the welcome party on Sunday night. I missed credentialing Monday morning and was left with an alternate pass for the first night. That meant I was up in the rafters. Alternate Moses Ross ended up with my pass that night. He was kind enough to give me it for an hour or two so I could walk on the floor with the other Oregon delegates. As I was gazing up, taking all the sights in, I felt a smack on my back. I turned around and it was Governor Kate Brown. She said, ‘It’s about time you go here!’. I was glad to finally be at the convention.
Now looking back, it was a little funny. I had planned to leave a full two days early in order to spend time in Washington DC and Maryland visiting local sites and friends. Instead of being one of the first delegates to arrive, I was the last one to arrive for our delegation.
The Hillary Campaign provided two pins to delegates. One was a 3” pin that said Delegate 2016 on it. Another 3” pin was Red, White and Blue and given to Delegate Whip Captains. Oregon Bernie Sanders Delegates came with t-shirts and green 2 ¼” buttons The Whip Captain pin pictured in this article was worn by Oregon Clinton Delegate Rick Hartwig. The Hillary Clinton Delegate badge was worn by myself. I still need to get one of the green Bernie delegate pins. If you are looking for official pins produced by the campaign for the convention these are the two to get from the Clinton campaign.
The Oregon delegation had 7 pins that were given to all delegates. They all featured a photo of a donkey riding a bicycle, with a flag to represent a particular caucus. There was Labor, Veteran, LGBT, and Women. A fifth version just has a flag of 2016. They also gave delegates a 1” version of this pin. The seventh button was just a Democratic Party of Oregon, heat sealed celluloid logo pin.
I made sure my fellow CD1 delegates had their own special keepsakes from their convention experience. They were 3” celluloid pins. One for Bernie Sanders and one for Hillary Clinton delegates. Both are pictured below. The Sanders pin features a photo of him speaking at the Moda Center from a campaign stop in Oregon. The Clinton pin features prominent Oregon women, who were also delegates to the convention. The women featured are Governor Kate Brown, Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum (she was a national co-chair of the Association of Democratic Attorney Generals in 2016) and Congresswoman Suzanne Bonamici.
The Democratic National Convention also featured another interesting grouping. There were four delegates from Oregon House District 35 (my state house district). A source of pride from the four delegates. There were three Sanders delegates and 1 Clinton delegate. A 3” custom pin was made for each of us at the convention. Here is a photo of my pin. The pins all follow the same format. The name of the delegate and a photo of the candidate they represent.
I became known as the button master for the Oregon delegation. The following pins were all issued for Oregon delegates and their friends. I brought one button with me to trade on the convention floor. It was a 2 ¼” celluloid pin featuring Oregon’s Mt. Hood. in the Hillary H logo. It read ‘My Hood to Hillary - Oregon DNC 2016’. Playing off the Mt. Hood aspect to imply ‘From my neighborHOOD’. A small 1 ¼” Suzanne Bonamici button was made for Congresswoman Bonamici and her friends at the convention that featured her signature and the Hillary H logo. Three Kate Brown for Governor pins were given out during the convention to Oregon delegates. Two were 3” celluloids. One was a play on the 1992 Bill Clinton ‘Ask Me About My Governor’ pin and the other read ‘I was there with Kate Brown we nominated Hillary!’. A smaller 1 ¾” pin simply read ‘PDX to Philly Oregonians for Kate Brown’. The governor was very pleased to have pins to hand out to people on the convention floor.
Here is a photo of Oregon's US Senator Jeff Merkley, addressing the convention on the first night.
Mark Evan's Collectors Archive sales display. Lots of items to be found! I got to meet Mark and Larry Otter while exploring the convention center part of the DNC. Buses would pick us up and take us to and from the convention center in downtown Philly and the convention hall where we were having the event.
A photo of the Bonamici button. These two buttons were only made thanks in part to the fate of the airlines. Had I left on my original departure date these two pins would never have been made. Instead, with an extra weekend I was able to make these pins.
Overall, I had an enjoyable time, and was able to pick up a lot of
buttons and signs. Every night we came back to our hotel rooms full of
memorabilia. Here are some of the buttons I picked up on the floor at
the 2016 DNC. Even better, was meeting several fellow APIC members for
the first time at events around the convention.
If you are an APIC member that has attended a convention, I hope you will consider sharing your story and some of the items you have from the convention. I will update this post once I scan some of the items I was able to acquire on the convention floor.
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