1980: an overview: Election-year politics (12/28/80)

1980: an overview

Election-year politics

1980 was a federal election year in both the United States and Canada, and politicians of all stripes courted favor with the "ethnics," including Ukrainians. In the process, they scored a number of firsts.

Joe Clark, then-prime minister of Canada, became the first head of state in recent memory to address a program commemorating the independence of Ukraine. Perhaps with an eye on the calendar and the upcoming February 19 elections, he took advantage of the opportunity to denounce the Kremlin for its human and national rights violations and its invasion of Afghanistan, and touched upon his government's positions on the Madrid Conference and multiculturalism.

In April, President Jimmy Carter personally accepted a gift of pysanky from a group of Philadelphia Ukrainians and met with the group for some 10 minutes.

In May, Vice-President Walter Mondale wrote "Ukrainians" on his campaign schedule and slated a stopover at the New Jersey home of Myroslaw and Camitle Smorodsky, thus becoming the first U.S. vice-president in history to be hosted at a Ukrainian home.

Republican presidential hopeful Ronald Reagan, accompanied by his wife Nancy, decided to take in some Ukrainian culture and cuisine, and possibly collect some Ukrainian votes, at the sixth annual Ukrainian Festival at the Garden State Arts Center. The Carter camp was represented by the president's ethnic affairs adviser, Dr. Stephen Aiello, and his oft-mentioned Ukrainian assistant, Natalie Sluzar.

Rosalynn Carter did her part for her husband's campaign among ethnics when, in late October, she visited St. John the Baptist Ukrainian Catholic Parish in Newark, N.J., to meet with school children and senior citizens. The visit - the first ever by a First Lady to Ukrainian institution - seemed to recognize that New Jersey would be a key state if the president was to be re-elected.

Both Gov. Reagan and President Carter sent their representatives, Gen. Alexander Haig and Dr. Zhigniew Brzezinski, respectively, to the UCCA congress held in October in Philadelphia.

In sum, Ukrainians were beginning to be noticed by the powers that be. In fact, an increasing number of persons was beginning to get personally involved in election campaigns of candidates. Several - most notably Steve Postupack, executive director of the Nationalities Division of the Reagan/Bush Campaign Committee - were named to high-level positions.

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