Elected While In A Coma (1980)

This Day in Esoteric Political History

Jody Avirgan & Radiotopia

History

4.6 • 982 Ratings

🗓️ 5 November 2023

⏱️ 14 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

It’s November 5th. This day in 1980, voters in the Maryland 5th Congressional District have just re-elected Gladys Noon Spellman — despite the fact that she is in a coma from which she would never recover.

Jody, Niki, and Kellie discuss the twists and turns of the election, how Congress reacted, and how this moment led to the political career of one of the most prominent Democrats in the House.

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Our team: Jacob Feldman, Researcher/Producer; Brittani Brown, Producer; Khawla Nakua, Transcripts; music by Teen Daze and Blue Dot Sessions; Audrey Mardavich is our Executive Producer at Radiotopia

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from radiotopia.
0:07.0	My name is Jody Avergan.
0:09.0	This day, November 5th, 1980.
0:15.0	It is the day after the Maryland 5th Congressional District has its election.
0:19.6	They just re-elected their Congressional Representative Gladys Noon-Spelman.
0:23.4	Not a very notable event, a popular incumbent representative getting re-elected to office happens all the time,
0:29.8	except for one catch.
0:31.6	At the time of the election, Representative Spellman was in a semi-comatose state, one
0:37.1	from which she would never recover.
0:39.6	So let's talk about the time that the people of Maryland elected a woman in a coma and the way
0:44.0	that the issue got resolved and the really interesting sliding doors political
0:47.4	moment that this set up. So here is always Nicole Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly
0:51.9	Carter Jackson of Wellesley.
0:53.4	Hello there.
0:54.4	Hello Jody.
0:55.4	Hey there.
0:56.4	And a special shout out to our listener, Lindsay, who flagged this for us.
0:59.2	And we do get these like, remember the time that someone elected X, and sometimes it's like a dead person or
1:05.1	sometimes it's a dog or sometimes it's whatever we have this nice little throughline here.
1:10.0	Are you telling me we get esoteric tips?
1:12.0	Yes, exactly.
1:14.0	Exactly.
	...

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