Contributions
Eder is considered a founding father of the Green Party in Portland. In the years since Eder first won his historic election, the Greens have gone from holding one seat on Portland's School Committee to simutaneously holding as many as eight seats across various municipal legislative bodies in Portland.
Eder is further credited with changing Portland's political landscape by bringing young voters in Portland into the political process and paving the way for the Greens to assume their present role as the second party of contention in Portland, Maine's largest city. Several young activists who Eder mentored have since won political office in Portland. Former Eder campaign volunteers David A. Marshall and Kevin Donoghue took seats on the Portland City Council, becoming the first registered Greens to serve on that body. In 2010, his former Legislative Aide, Ben Chipman, won a seat in the Maine Legislature.
Eder was the first member of a third-party to serve in the Maine Legislature since 1915 when representatives of Theodore Roosevelt's Progressive Party (United States) held legislative offices there. Eder remains the only state legislator in the country to serve a full term as a Green and to be re-elected as a Green.
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