Arlan Stangeland - 1977 Election

1977 Election

Stangeland sought election as a Republican to the 95th congress in a special election on February 22, 1977, to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Robert Bergland, who left the House to become U.S. Secretary of Agriculture. In the primary on February 8, Stangeland defeated Richard Franson, "a frequent candidate who lived in Minneapolis, far from the district," with 97 percent of the vote.

Stangeland ran against the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party nominee Michael J. Sullivan, a former Walter Mondale aide, in the general election. During the campaign one controversy erupted when Roman Catholic bishop Victor Hermann Balke encouraged voters in the Diocese of Crookston to vote for Sullivan, whom he described as "very pro-church," and against Stangeland, whom he described as having a "very negative" voting record in the state house. Stangeland campaigned "on the theme that the heavily rural northwestern Minnesota needed another farmer, like Mr. Bergland, in Congress" and won the election, receiving 71,251 votes to Sullivan's 43,467. (Stangeland also defeated minor candidates Jim Born of the American Party and independent candidate Jack Bibeau).

Stangeland's victory was a political upset. The New York Times headline the day after the election read "Minnesota victory elates Republicans" and attributed Stangeland's success to "his lifelong residence in the district, his roots as a farmer in a mostly rural area, and his identification as a Lutheran in an area that is predominantly Protestant". and said Sullivan had been "handicapped by his Roman Catholic faith and his reliance on the support of name Democrats rather than grass-roots organizations."