A perennial candidate is one who runs for public office with a record of success that is infrequent, if existent at all. Perennial candidates are often either members of non-major political parties or have political opinions that are not mainstream. They may run without any serious hope of gaining office, but in order to promote their views or themselves instead. They may also overestimate their chances for election or have little in the way of campaigning skill or voter appeal. John C. Turmel is, according to the Guinness Book of Records, the most persistent perennial candidate, having run 77 and lost in 76 elections (the other being a by-election that was cancelled by a general election call).
Famous quotes containing the words perennial and/or candidate:
“There is no arguing with the pretenders to a divine knowledge and to a divine mission. They are possessed with the sin of pride, they have yielded to the perennial temptation.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“A candidate once called his opponent “a willful, obstinate, unsavory, obnoxious, pusillanimous, pestilential, pernicious, and perversable liar” without pausing for breath, and even his enemies removed their hats.”
—Federal Writers’ Project Of The Wor, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)