Ellen McCormack (1926 - )
She Was The First Woman To Receive Federal Funds For A Presidential Race
New York housewife Ellen McCormack campaigned for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination in 1976, entering 20 state primaries as an anti-abortion candidate. Her quest for the nomination was boosted by recent changes in the election law – she qualified for federal matching campaign funds.
In 1980, she ran again for president. This time, she was the candidate of the Right to Life Party and earned 32,327 votes from three states. Since then, the party has campaigned against abortion, especially in New York. The party supports a constitutional amendment to ban abortion. McCormack’s 1976 campaign was among the right-to-life movement’s first political responses to Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court’s 1973 landmark decision legalizing abortion.
