Thomas Geoghegan

Tom Geoghegan
Democratic candidate for U.S. Representative for Illinois, 5th District
Election date April 7, 2009
Incumbent	Rahm Emanuel
Personal details
Born	January 1949 (age 75) Cincinnati, Ohio
Political party	Democratic
Alma mater	Harvard University, Harvard Law School
Profession	attorney, author
Website	Despres, Schwartz and Geoghegan Ltd., GeogheganForCongress.com

Thomas Geoghegan (b. 1949, Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American labor lawyer and author based in Chicago.

In 1967, Geoghegan graduated from St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati. He later graduated from Harvard University and Harvard Law School. Geoghegan has represented the United Mine Workers, Teamsters for a Democratic Union, and currently works at Despres, Schwartz and Geoghegan Ltd.. He has been a staff writer and contributing writer to The New Republic and his work has also appeared in the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, Dissent, The American Prospect, The Nation, and Harper's Magazine. His commentary has been featured on National Public Radio, Nightline, The Today Show, CBS Sunday Morning, CNN, CNBC, and PBS's WTTW-11.

Geoghegan was a Democratic candidate for Rahm Emanuel's seat in Illinois's 5th congressional district special election, 2009. The primary for the special election took place on March 3, 2009, and was won by Mike Quigley. The general election was won by Quigley on April 7, 2009.

His name is pronounced /ˈɡeɪɡən/ (rhymes with "Reagan").

Life and work

Tom Geoghegan advances the idea that American society can benefit from an increased commitment to democracy at home and abroad. Geoghegan argues that the United States can improve the process of presidential elections through the National Popular Vote. The states of Maine and Nebraska are examples of National Popular Vote. In See You in Court, Geoghegan makes the case that this reform would increase responsiveness, transparency and accountability.

In addition, Geoghegan insists that the U.S. House of Representatives is insufficiently responsive to the American people. A specific solution advanced by the labor lawyer is based on the Iowa system through which attorneys could sue in order to "get a process." polling data and voting data should not be used in the formation of congressional districts. Fewer than 10 % of Congressional districts are in play in every election and this discourages voter participation.

Geoghegan argues against the filibuster. Fewer than 9 % of the population resides in 20 states representing 40 seats in the United States Senate. In the January 11, 2010 New York Times op-ed article, Geoghegan argues that since the vice-president's job is to vote in the Senate when the Senate is equally divided and since a filibuster under revised Senate Rule 22 removes the vice-president's ability to make that vote, it is an unconstitutional rule. He also argues that the Article requirement for just a bare majority to form a quorum supermajorities were expressly disapproved by the Founders. He says In Federalist 75, Hamilton dismissed a supermajority rule for a quorum thus: "All provisions which require more than a majority of any body to its resolutions have a direct tendency to embarrass the operation of government and an indirect one to subject the sense of the majority to that of the minority." Geoghegan continues, It would be illogical to preclude a supermajority {for a...} quorum while allowing it on an ad hoc basis any time a minority wanted to block a vote.

Geoghegan describes the process through which Federalism inhibits the expression of popular majorities on issues.

Geoghegan's 2010 book Were you Born on the Wrong Continent? compares the American and European economy and quality of life, arguing that "countries like Germany do both capitalism and socialism better than we do".

Works

• 1991: Which Side Are You On?: Trying to Be For Labor When It's Flat On Its Back (FSG), ISBN 0-374-28919-0
• 1998: The Secret Lives of Citizens: Pursuing the Promise of American Life (Pantheon Books), ISBN 0-679-42153-X
• 2002: In America's Court: How a Civil Lawyer Who Likes to Settle Stumbled into a Criminal Trial (New Press), ISBN 1-56584-732-6
• 2005: The Law in Shambles (Prickly Paradigm), ISBN 0-9728196-9-X
• 2007: See You in Court: How the Right Made America a Lawsuit Nation (New Press), ISBN 978-1-59558-099-3
• 2010: Were you Born on the Wrong Continent?
• 2011: Boeing's Threat to American Enterprise (WSJ)

See also

• Illinois's 5th congressional district special election, 2009
• Illinois' 5th congressional district

External links

• Tom Geoghegan's website
• “Infinite Debt: How Unlimited Interest Rates Destroyed the Economy" on Democracynow.org, March 24, 2009
• Tom Geoghegan for U.S. Congress official campaign website

• Profile at Vote Smart
• David Sirota, Six little words San Francisco Chronicle, July 25, 2008
• Kathy G. Tom Geoghegan, mensch and hero The G Spot, July 31, 2008
• James Fallows Tom Geoghegan for Congress The Atlantic, January 4, 2009
• Articles in The New Republic
• Articles in The Nation
• Articles in The American Prospect
• Review by Ted Frank of Geoghegan's book See You In Court