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{{Short description|American Presbyterian minister and socialist politician (1884–1968)}}
{{other people}}
{{Infobox officeholder
|name        = Norman Thomas
|image       = Norman Thomas 1937.jpg
|caption     = Thomas in 1937
|office      = National Chairman of the<br />[[Socialist Party of America]]
|term_start  = July 16, 1936
|term_end    = June 1, 1942
|predecessor = [[Leo Krzycki]]
|successor   = [[Maynard C. Krueger]]
|birth_name  = Norman Mattoon Thomas
|birth_date  = {{birth date|1884|11|20}}
|birth_place = [[Marion, Ohio]], U.S.
|death_date  = {{death date and age|1968|12|19|1884|11|20}}
|death_place = [[Huntington, New York]], U.S.
|party       = [[Socialist Party of America|Socialist]]
|spouse      = {{Marriage|Frances Stewart|1910|1947|end=died}}
|children    = 5
| relatives  = [[Evan Thomas]] (grandson)<br />[[Louisa Thomas]] (great-granddaughter)
|alma_mater  = {{ubl | [[Bucknell University]] | [[Princeton University]] | [[Union Theological Seminary (New York City)|Union Theological Seminary]]}}
}}
'''Norman Mattoon Thomas''' (November 20, 1884 – December 19, 1968) was an American [[Presbyterian]] [[religious minister|minister]], political activist, and [[perennial candidate]] for president. He achieved fame as a [[socialism|socialist]] and [[pacifism|pacifist]], and was the [[Socialist Party of America]]'s candidate for president in six consecutive elections between [[1928 United States presidential election|1928]] and [[1948 United States presidential election|1948]].

==Early years==
Thomas was the oldest of six children, born November 20, 1884, in [[Marion, Ohio]], to Emma Williams (née Mattoon) and Weddington Evans Thomas, a Presbyterian minister. Thomas had an uneventful Midwestern childhood and adolescence, helping to put himself through Marion High School as a paper carrier for [[Warren G. Harding]]'s ''[[Marion Daily Star]]''.<ref>[[Bill Kauffman|Kauffman, Bill]] (2010-08-01) [http://www.amconmag.com/article/2010/aug/01/00050/ Up Against the Wall] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110518180811/http://amconmag.com/article/2010/aug/01/00050/ |date=2011-05-18 }}, ''[[The American Conservative]]''</ref> Like other paper carriers, he reported directly to [[Florence Kling Harding]]. "No pennies ever escaped her," said Thomas. The summer after he graduated from high school his father accepted a pastorate at [[Lewisburg, Pennsylvania]], which allowed Norman to attend [[Bucknell University]]. He left Bucknell after one year to attend [[Princeton University]], the beneficiary of the largesse of a wealthy uncle by marriage.<ref>David A. Shannon, ''The Socialist Party of America: A History''. New York: Macmillan, 1955; p. 189.</ref> Thomas graduated magna cum laude from [[Princeton University]] in 1905.<ref>Johnpoll, Bernard K. ''Pacifist's Progress: Norman Thomas and the Decline of American Socialism''. Quadrangle Books, 1970. p. 13.</ref>

After some [[settlement house]] work and a trip around the world, Thomas decided to follow in his father's footsteps and enrolled in [[Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York|Union Theological Seminary]]. He graduated from the seminary and was ordained as a Presbyterian minister in 1911.<ref>Shannon, ''The Socialist Party of America'', pp. 189–90.</ref>  After assisting the [[Henry van Dyke Jr.|Rev. Henry Van Dyke]] at the fashionable [[Brick Presbyterian Church (New York City)|Brick Presbyterian Church]] on [[Manhattan]]'s [[Fifth Avenue]], Thomas was appointed pastor of the East Harlem Presbyterian Church, ministering to Italian-American Protestants.<ref>''Current Biography 1945'', pp. 688–91.</ref> Union Theological Seminary had been at that time a center of the [[Social Gospel]] movement and liberal politics, and as a minister, Thomas preached against American participation in the First World War. This [[pacifist]] stance led to his being shunned by many of his fellow alumni from Princeton, and opposed by some of the leadership of the Presbyterian Church in New York. When church funding of the American Parish's social programs was stopped, Thomas resigned his pastorate.<ref name="ReferenceA">''Current Biography 1945'', p. 688.</ref> Despite his resignation, Thomas did not formally leave the ministry until 1931, after his mother's death.<ref name="ReferenceA"/>

It was Thomas's position as a [[conscientious objector]] that drew him to the [[Socialist Party of America]] (SPA), a staunchly [[antimilitarist]] organization. When SPA leader [[Morris Hillquit]] made his campaign for [[mayor of New York]] in 1917 on an antiwar platform, Thomas wrote to him expressing his good wishes. To his surprise, Hillquit wrote back, encouraging the young minister to work for his campaign, which Thomas energetically did.<ref>Shannon, ''The Socialist Party of America'', p. 190.</ref> Soon thereafter he himself joined the Socialist Party.<ref>Shannon, ''The Socialist Party of America'', pp. 190–91.</ref> Thomas was a [[Christian socialism|Christian socialist]].<ref name="autogenerated191">Shannon, ''The Socialist Party of America'', p. 191.</ref>

Thomas was the secretary (then an unpaid position) of the pacifist [[Fellowship of Reconciliation]] even before the war. When the organization started a magazine called [[The World Tomorrow (magazine)|''The World Tomorrow'']] in January 1918, Thomas was employed as its paid editor. Together with [[Devere Allen]], Thomas helped to make ''The World Tomorrow'' the leading voice of liberal Christian social activism of its day.<ref name="autogenerated191"/> In 1921, Thomas moved to secular journalism when he was employed as associate editor of ''[[The Nation (U.S. periodical)|The Nation]]'' magazine. In 1922 he became co-director of the [[League for Industrial Democracy]]. Later, he was one of the founders of the [[National Civil Liberties Bureau]], the precursor of the [[American Civil Liberties Union]].{{citation needed|date=November 2016}}

==Electoral politics==
[[File:New Leader 1927-10-29 Front Page.jpg|thumb|right|Front page of ''[[The New Leader]]'' featuring Thomas as an Aldermanic candidate, October 19, 1927]]
Thomas ran for office five times in quick succession on the Socialist ticket—for [[governor of New York]] in [[New York state election, 1924|1924]], for mayor of New York in [[1925 New York City mayoral election|1925]], for [[New York State Senate]] in 1926, for [[New York City Council|alderman]] in 1927, and for mayor of New York again in 1929. In [[New York state election, 1934|1934]], he ran for the US Senate in New York and polled almost 200,000 votes, then the second-best result for a Socialist candidate in New York state elections; only [[Charles P. Steinmetz]] polled more votes, almost 300,000 in [[New York state election, 1922|1922]] when he ran for [[New York State Engineer and Surveyor|State Engineer]].<ref name="autogenerated191"/>

Thomas's political activity also included attempts at the US presidency. Following [[Eugene Debs]]'s death in 1926, there was a leadership vacuum in the Socialist Party. Neither of the party's two top political leaders, [[Victor L. Berger]] and Hillquit, was eligible to run for president because of their foreign birth. The third main figure, [[Daniel Hoan]], was occupied as mayor of [[Milwaukee|Milwaukee, Wisconsin]].<ref name="autogenerated191"/> Down to approximately 8,000 dues-paying members, the Socialist Party's options were limited, and the little-known minister from New York with oratorial skills and a pedigree in the movement became the choice of the 1928 National Convention of the Socialist Party.

The 1928 campaign was the first of Thomas's six consecutive campaigns as the presidential nominee of the Socialist Party. As an articulate and engaging spokesman for [[democratic socialism]], Thomas had considerably greater influence than the typical [[perennial candidate]], but never achieved Debs's level of popularity, topping out at 2.23% of the vote in the [[1932 United States presidential election|realignment election of 1932]]. Although most upper- and middle-class Americans found socialism unsavory, the well-educated Thomas—who often wore three-piece suits and looked and talked like a president—gained grudging admiration.{{Citation needed|date=May 2025}}

Thomas frequently spoke on the difference between socialism, the movement he represented, and [[communism]] and revolutionary [[Marxism]]. His early admiration for the [[Russian Revolution of 1917|Russian Revolution]] had turned into energetic [[Anti-Stalinist left|anti-Stalinism]]. (Some revolutionaries thought him no better; [[Leon Trotsky]] criticized Thomas on more than one occasion.)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1938/morals/morals.htm|title=Their Morals and Ours |author= Leon Trotsky |publisher=The New International|date=June 1938|access-date=21 June 2018 | quote= "The drawing-room socialist, Thomas, is [...] only a bourgeois with a socialist 'ideal'. [...] His personal life, interests, ties, moral criteria exist outside the party. With hostile astonishment he looks down upon the Bolshevik to whom the party is a weapon for the revolutionary reconstruction of society, including also its morality." [...] "This righteous man expelled the American 'Trotskyists' from his party precisely as the GPU shot down their co-thinkers in the U.S.S.R. and in Spain."}}</ref>

He wrote several books, among them his passionate defense of World War I [[conscientious objector]]s, ''Is Conscience a Crime?'', and his statement of the 1960s [[Social democracy|social democratic]] consensus, ''Socialism Re-examined''.

==Socialist Party politics==
[[File:Socialist Candidates 1928.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Norman Thomas and [[James H. Maurer]] as candidates for President and Vice President, 1928]]
Thomas favored work to establish a broad Farmer–Labor Party upon the model of the Canadian [[Cooperative Commonwealth Federation]],<ref>Johnpoll, ''Pacifist's Progress'', pp. 138–39.</ref> but remained supportive of the Militants and their vision of an "all-inclusive party", which welcomed members of dissident communist organizations (including [[Lovestoneites]] and [[Trotskyists]]) and worked together with the [[Communist Party USA]] in joint [[Popular Front]] activities. The party descended into a maelstrom of factionalism in the interval, with the New York Old Guard leaving to establish themselves as the [[Social Democratic Federation (U.S.)|Social Democratic Federation of America]], taking with them control of party property, such as the [[Yiddish|Yiddish-language]] ''[[The Jewish Daily Forward]]'', the English-language ''[[New Leader]]'', the [[Rand School of Social Science]], and the party's summer camp in Pennsylvania.

In April 1938, Thomas was the center of national controversy when he came to [[Jersey City, New Jersey]] to defend labor organizers' free speech and challenge the political machine of Mayor [[Frank Hague]]. Hague was a close ally of Franklin Roosevelt and controlled federal patronage in the state. Though denied a permit for political reasons, Thomas came anyway to speak at an outdoor rally. The police arrested him as soon as he got out of his car. As the officers prepared to expel him from the city, Thomas quipped, "So this is Jersey justice". People across the political spectrum, including the 1932 and 1936 Republican presidential nominees, [[Herbert Hoover]] and [[Alfred M. Landon]], criticized Hague for his suppression of free speech and Roosevelt for his silence about the incident. Thomas and Landon became good friends as a result of the incident..<ref>{{cite book | last=Beito | first=David T. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kjvazwEACAAJ|title=The New Deal's War on the Bill of Rights: The Untold Story of FDR's Concentration Camps, Censorship, and Mass Surveillance | edition=First | pages=63–68| location=Oakland | publisher=Independent Institute | year=2023 | isbn=978-1598133561}}</ref>

==Causes==
[[File:Norman Thomas speaking at an outdoor STFU meeting.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Thomas speaking at a [[Southern Tenant Farmers Union|STFU]] meeting in 1937 (by [[Louise Boyle]]) ]]
Thomas was initially as outspoken in opposing [[World War II|the Second World War]] as he had been with regard to the First World War. Upon returning from a European tour in 1937, he formed the Keep America Out of War Congress, and spoke against war, thereby sharing a platform with the non-interventionist [[America First Committee]].<ref>Norman Thomas, ''A Socialist's Faith''. (1951); pp. 312–13.</ref> In the 1940 presidential campaign he said Republican [[Wendell Willkie]] was the candidate of "the Wall Street war machine" and that he "would take us to war about as fast and about on the same terms as Mr. Roosevelt".<ref>''Facts on File: World News Digest''  November 5, 1940</ref>

In testimony to Congress in January 1941 he opposed the proposed [[Lend Lease]] program of sending military supplies to Great Britain, calling it "a bill to authorize undeclared war in the name of peace, and dictatorship in the name of defending democracy". He said that the survival of the British Empire was not vital to the security of the United States, but added that he favored helping Britain to defend herself against aggression.<ref>''Facts on File: World News Digest'', January 28, 1941.</ref>

After [[Attack on Pearl Harbor|the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor]] on December 7, 1941, a bitter split took place in the Socialist Party regarding support for the war; Thomas reluctantly supported it, though he thought it could have been honorably avoided. His brother and many others continued their pacifist opposition to all wars.<ref>Swanberg, ''Norman Thomas'', p. 260</ref> Thomas later wrote self-critically that he had "overemphasized both the sense in which it was a continuance of World War I and the capacity of nonfascist Europe to resist the [[Nazi]]s".<ref>Thomas, ''A Socialist's Faith'', p. 313.</ref>

Thomas was one of the few public figures to oppose [[Franklin Delano Roosevelt|President Roosevelt's]] [[Japanese American Internment|incarceration of Japanese Americans]] following the attack on Pearl Harbor. He accused the ACLU of "dereliction of duty" when the organization supported the forced mass removal and incarceration.<ref>The ACLU national board supported the government and tried to stop a rogue chapter on the West Coast from going to court. [http://encyclopedia.densho.org/American_Civil_Liberties_Union/ "American Civil Liberties Union,"  ''Densho Encyclopedia'' (2013)]</ref><ref>For more detail see {{cite book|author=Samuel Walker|title=In Defense of American Liberties: A History of the ACLU|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hdkrBVJ37I4C&pg=PA139|year=1999|publisher=SIU Press|pages=139–43|isbn=978-0809322701}}.</ref> Thomas also campaigned against [[racial segregation]], environmental depletion, and anti-labor laws and practices, and in favor of opening the United States to Jewish victims of Nazi persecution in the 1930s.

Thomas was an early proponent of birth control. The birth-control advocate [[Margaret Sanger]] recruited him to write "Some Objections to Birth Control Considered" in ''Religious and Ethical Aspects of Birth Control'', edited and published by Sanger in 1926. Thomas accused the Catholic Church of hypocritical opinions on sex, such as requiring priests to be celibate and maintaining that laypeople should have sex only to reproduce. "This doctrine of unrestricted procreation is strangely inconsistent on the lips of men who practice celibacy and preach continence."<ref>''The Abortion rights controversy in America, A Legal Reader,'' edited by N.E.H. Hull, William James Hoffer and Peter Charles Hoffer, 2004. p. 60</ref>

Thomas also deplored the secular objection to birth control because it originated from "racial and national" group-think. "The white race, we are told, our own nation—whatever that nation may be—is endangered by practicing birth control. Birth control is something like disarmament—a good thing if effected by international agreement, but otherwise dangerous to us in both a military and economic sense. If we are not to be overwhelmed by the 'rising tide of color' we must breed against the world. If our nation is to survive, it must have more cannon and more babies as prospective food for the cannon."<ref>The Abortion Rights Controversy, p. 61</ref>

==Later years==
After 1945, Thomas sought to make the [[anti-Stalinist left]] the leader of social reform, in collaboration with labor leaders like [[Walter Reuther]]. In 1961, he released an album, ''The Minority Party in America: Featuring an Interview with Norman Thomas'', on [[Folkways Records]], which focused on the role of the third party.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://folkways.si.edu/norman-thomas/the-minority-party-in-america-featuring-an-interview-with/american-history/music/album/smithsonian|title=The Minority Party in America: Featuring an Interview with Norman Thomas |publisher=folkways.si.edu|date=2020-02-08|access-date=2020-02-08}}</ref>

Thomas actively campaigned for [[Lyndon B. Johnson]] in the 1964 presidential election. He was critical of Johnson's foreign policy, but praised his work on civil rights and poverty. Thomas called Johnson's opponent [[Barry Goldwater]] a "personable man with good stands on domestic issues" but also described him as "the greatest evil" due to his views on foreign policy.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1964/05/30/archives/johnson-is-lauded-goldwater-scored-by-norman-thomas.html|title=Johnson Is Lauded, Goldwater Scored By Norman Thomas|work=The New York Times |date=30 May 1964 }}</ref><ref>Norman Thomas: The Great Dissenter; Raymond F. Gregory, 2008</ref>

Thomas's 80th birthday in 1964 was marked by a well-publicized gala at the [[Hotel Astor]] in Manhattan. At the event Thomas called for a cease-fire in Vietnam and read birthday telegrams from [[Hubert Humphrey]], [[Earl Warren]], and [[Martin Luther King Jr.]] He also received a check for $17,500 ({{Inflation|US|17500|1964|r=-2|fmt=eq}}) in donations from supporters. "It won't last long," he said of the check, "because every organization I'm connected with is going bankrupt."<ref>{{cite magazine|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,876478-2,00.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081019064335/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,876478-2,00.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=October 19, 2008|title=People |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]]|date=1964-12-18|access-date=2015-05-13}}</ref>

In 1966, the conservative journalist and writer [[William F. Buckley, Jr]] chose Thomas to be the third guest on Buckley's new television interview show, ''[[Firing Line (TV series)|Firing Line]]''. In 1968, Thomas signed the "[[Writers and Editors War Tax Protest]]" pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the [[Vietnam War]].<ref>"Writers and Editors War Tax Protest", ''New York Post'', January 30, 1968.</ref>

Also in 1966, Thomas traveled to the [[Dominican Republic]] along with future Congressman [[Allard K. Lowenstein]] to observe that country's [[Dominican Republic general election, 1966|general election]]. The two were leaders of the "Committee on free elections in the Dominican Republic", an organization based in the U.S. that monitored the election, in which [[Juan Bosch (politician)|Juan Bosch]] of the [[Dominican Revolutionary Party]], affiliated with the [[Socialist International]], was beaten closely but decisively by the conservative ex-president [[Joaquín Balaguer]]. Balaguer continued to govern the country on and off for the next 30 years.<ref name="Forman1972">{{cite book|last=Forman|first=James|title=The Making of Black Revolutionaries|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y2RIhBEy7dEC&pg=PA358|access-date=16 September 2017|year=1972|publisher=University of Washington Press|isbn=978-0295976594|pages=358–}}</ref> In the autumn of that year, Thomas received the second [[Eugene V. Debs Award]] for his work in promoting world peace.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://debsfoundation.org/index.php/landing/eugene-v-debs-award/|title=Eugene V. Debs Award|date=2017-09-18|website=Eugene V. Debs Foundation Website|publisher=Eugene V. Debs Foundation}}</ref>

==Personal life==<!-- Much of this is WP:NOTGENEOLOGY. The various names don't add anything to the understanding of Thomas himself -->
[[File:Norman Violet and Evan Thomas 1928.jpg|thumb|right|Thomas with his wife Violet and youngest son Evan {{circa}} 1928]]
In 1910,<ref name="NYTWedding">{{cite news|title=Rev. N.M. Thomas Weds Miss Stewart; Assistant Pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church and His Bride Active in Charities. "Angel of Hell's Kitchen" Bride Endeared to the Poor by Her Devotion to Them – She Aided Mr. Thomas In Summer Garden Work.|url=http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1910/09/02/104949099.html?pageNumber=9|access-date=13 April 2016|work=[[The New York Times]]|date=September 2, 1910}}</ref> Thomas married Frances Violet Stewart (1881–1947),<ref name="PrincetonWeekly">{{cite magazine|title=Princeton Alumni Weekly|date=January 1, 1947|volume= 48|page=20|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3Q9bAAAAYAAJ&q=Frances+Violet+Stewart+thomas&pg=PA20|access-date=April 13, 2016|magazine=Princeton Alumni Weekly}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Frances Violet Stewart Thomas|url=http://www.ourcampaigns.com/CandidateDetail.html?CandidateID=133187|website=www.ourcampaigns.com|publisher=Our Campaigns|access-date=April 13, 2016}}</ref> the granddaughter of [[John Aikman Stewart]], financial adviser to Presidents [[Abraham Lincoln|Lincoln]] and [[Grover Cleveland|Cleveland]], and a trustee of Princeton for many years.<ref name="PrincetonUMattoon">{{cite web|title=Thomas, Norman [Mattoon]|url=http://etcweb.princeton.edu/CampusWWW/Companion/thomas_norman.html|website=etcweb.princeton.edu|publisher=Princeton University|access-date=April 13, 2016}}</ref> Together, they had three daughters and two sons:<ref name="PrincetonWeekly"/>
* Mary "Polly" Thomas (1914–2010),<ref>{{cite news|title=Paid Notice: Deaths Miller, Mary (Polly)|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9406E5DC103AF932A3575BC0A9669D8B63|access-date=April 13, 2016|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=August 1, 2010}}</ref> who married Herbert C. Miller Jr,<ref name="PrincetonWeekly"/> a professor and chairman of pediatrics at the [[University of Kansas]]<ref>{{cite web|title=The Country And Our State Are Looking To Us|url=http://kuhistory.com/articles/the-country-and-our-state-are-looking-to-us/|website=KU History|publisher=[[University of Kansas]]|access-date=April 13, 2016}}</ref>
* Frances Thomas (1915–2015), who married John W. Gates, Jr. (died 2006)<ref>{{cite news|title=Deaths: Gates, Frances Thomas|url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E06E6D8113AF93BA25751C1A9639D8B63|access-date=13 April 2016|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=18 December 2015}}</ref>
* Rebekah Thomas (1918–1986),<ref>{{cite web|title=1940 Vassar Alumnae/i Hub|url=http://alums.vassar.edu/connect/class/1940s/1940/|website=alums.vassar.edu|publisher=Vassar College|access-date=April 13, 2016|archive-date=May 30, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160530144158/http://alums.vassar.edu/connect/class/1940s/1940/|url-status=dead}}</ref> who married John D. Friebely<ref name="PrincetonWeekly"/>
* William Stewart Thomas (1912–1988){{Citation needed|date=May 2025}}
* Evan Welling Thomas II (1920–1999),<ref>{{cite news|title=Evan Thomas II|url=http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Evan-Thomas-II-2943468.php|access-date=April 13, 2016|work=SFGate|date=March 6, 1999}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Paid Notice: Deaths Thomas, Evan Welling II|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1999/03/01/classified/paid-notice-deaths-thomas-evan-welling-ii.html|access-date=April 13, 2016|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=March 1, 1999}}</ref> who married Anna Davis (née Robins) in 1943<ref>{{cite news|title=Paid Notice: Deaths Thomas, Anne Davis Robins |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/28/classified/paid-notice-deaths-thomas-anne-davis-robins.html|access-date=April 13, 2016|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=March 28, 2004}}</ref>
** [[Evan Thomas|Evan Welling Thomas III]] (b. 1951)

===Death===
Thomas died at the age of 84 on December 19, 1968, at a nursing home in [[Huntington, New York]].<ref name = Whitman>{{Cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1968/12/20/76945486.html|title=Norman Thomas, Socialist, Dies; He Ran for President Six Times|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=December 20, 1968|access-date=May 31, 2022|last=Whitman|first=Aiden|url-access=subscription|page = 1}}</ref> Pursuant to his wishes, he was cremated and his ashes were scattered on [[Long Island]].

===Legacy===
The [[Norman Thomas High School]] (formerly known as Central Commercial High School) in [[Manhattan]] and the Norman Thomas '05 Library at [[Princeton University]]'s [[Forbes College]] are named after him, as is the assembly hall at the [[Three Arrows Cooperative Society]], where he was a frequent visitor. He is also the grandfather of ''[[Newsweek]]'' columnist [[Evan Thomas]] and the great-grandfather of writer [[Louisa Thomas]].<ref>[http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKthomas.htm]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061231160323/http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKthomas.htm|date=December 31, 2006}}</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist|colwidth=30em}}

==Further reading==
* Fleischmann, Harry, ''Norman Thomas: A Biography''. New York, Norton & Co., 1964.
* Hyfler, Robert, ''Prophets of the Left: American Socialist Thought in the Twentieth Century''. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1984.
* Gregory, Raymond F., ''Norman Thomas: The Great Dissenter.'' Sanford, NC: Algora Publishing, 2008.
* Johnpoll, Bernard K., ''Pacifists Progress: Norman Thomas and the Decline of American Socialism''. Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1970.
* Seidler, Murray B., ''Norman Thomas: Respectable Rebel''. Binghamton, New York, Syracuse University Press, 1967. Second Edition.
* Swanberg, W. A., ''Norman Thomas: The Last Idealist''. New York, Charles Scribner and Sons, 1976.
* Thomas, Louisa, ''Conscience: Two Soldiers, Two Pacifists, One Family – A Test of Will and Faith in World War I''. New York, The Penguin Press, 2011.
* Venkataramani, M.S., "Norman Thomas, Arkansas Sharecroppers, and the Roosevelt Agricultural Policies, 1933–1937", ''Mississippi Valley Historical Review'', vol. 47, no. 2 (Sept. 1960), pp.&nbsp;225–46. {{JSTOR|1891708}}.

==External links==
{{Wikiquote}}
* {{Internet Archive film clip|id=gov.archives.arc.95979|description="Longines Chronoscope with Dr. Norman Thomas"}}
* [http://www.ajcarchives.org/AJC_DATA/Files/571.PDF Letter] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210516165813/http://www.ajcarchives.org/AJC_DATA/Files/571.PDF |date=2021-05-16 }} from Thomas to [[Salah al-Din al-Bitar|Salah Bitar]]
* [https://archive.org/details/CuarentaAosDeComunismoPromesasYRealidades Thomas, Norman. ''Cuarenta anos de comunismo: promesas y realidades'' New York: Instituto de Investigaciones Internacionales del Trabajo,1957]
* Norman Thomas's [[FBI]] files, hosted at the [[Internet Archive]]:
** [https://archive.org/details/foia_Thomas_Norman_M.-HQ-1 Part 1]
** [https://archive.org/details/foia_Thomas_Norman_M.-HQ-1A Part 1A]
** [https://archive.org/details/foia_Thomas_Norman_M.-HQ-2 Part 2]
** [https://archive.org/details/foia_Thomas_Norman_M.-HQ-14 Part 14]
<!-- I know it's weird, but these are the only parts they seem to have right now -->
* {{PM20|FID=pe/036033}}
*[http://dlib.nyu.edu/findingaids/html/tamwag/tam_423/ Norman Thomas Papers, Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives at New York University Special Collections]
* {{Librivox author |id=16830}}
* [https://archives.nypl.org/mss/2975 Norman Thomas papers, 1904-1967, held by the Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library]
* [https://archives.nypl.org/mss/186408 Norman Thomas family correspondence, 1903-1974, held by the Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library]

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{{s-ttl|title=[[Socialist Party of America|Socialist]] nominee for President of the United States|years=[[1928 United States presidential election|1928]], [[1932 United States presidential election|1932]], [[1936 United States presidential election|1936]], [[1940 United States presidential election|1940]], [[1944 United States presidential election|1944]], [[1948 United States presidential election|1948]]}}
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{{Socialist Party of America}}
{{Historical left-wing third party presidential tickets (U.S.)}}
{{United States presidential election, 1928}}
{{United States presidential election, 1932}}
{{United States presidential election, 1936}}
{{United States presidential election, 1940}}
{{United States presidential election, 1944}}
{{United States presidential election, 1948}}
{{Navbox Gandhi Peace Award laureates}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomas, Norman}}
[[Category:1884 births]]
[[Category:1968 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Presbyterians]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:20th-century American Presbyterian ministers]]
[[Category:American anti-capitalists]]
[[Category:American anti-communists]]
[[Category:American anti-fascists]]
[[Category:American Christian pacifists]]
[[Category:American Christian socialists]]
[[Category:American anti-racism activists]]
[[Category:American Civil Liberties Union people]]
[[Category:American conscientious objectors]]
[[Category:American democratic socialists]]
[[Category:American socialists]]
[[Category:American male non-fiction writers]]
[[Category:American pacifists]]
[[Category:American political writers]]
[[Category:American Presbyterians]]
[[Category:American tax resisters]]
[[Category:American anti-poverty advocates]]
[[Category:American anti–Vietnam War activists]]
[[Category:American anti–World War I activists]]
[[Category:American anti–World War II activists]]
[[Category:Activists for African-American civil rights]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1928 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1932 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1936 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1940 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1944 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1948 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:Members of the Executive of the Labour and Socialist International]]
[[Category:The Nation (U.S. magazine) people]]
[[Category:People from Cold Spring Harbor, New York]]
[[Category:People from Marion, Ohio]]
[[Category:People from Ridgefield, Connecticut]]
[[Category:Presbyterian socialists]]
[[Category:Princeton University alumni]]
[[Category:Socialist Party of America politicians from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Socialist Party of America presidential nominees]]
[[Category:Writers from New York (state)]]
[[Category:Writers from Ohio]]
[[Category:American magazine founders]]
[[Category:Socialism in the United States]]
[[Category:Left-wing populism in the United States]]