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Our Story
Vice President Hubert Humphrey, one of the first speakers at the Union
Founding planners of the Stanford Political Union, 1953
In 1953, saddened by a campus that he observed to be “in the throes of the McCarthy era,” senior Wayne Fuller ’54 JD ’57 wanted to create a space where people of dramatically different political persuasions and political involvements could freely discuss the issues of the day. Fuller, along with a group of students and faculty, conceived the Stanford Political Union. Its founding mission was “to create political awareness among students and to give this awareness an opportunity for expression.” The keynote address of SPU’s first meeting was fittingly entitled “Students’ Interest in Political Affairs.”
After a 1954 address by Richard Graves, the Democratic nominee for Governor of California, students had the opportunity to ask him questions and discuss the role of politics in public educational institutions.
SPU has also long been interested in local political questions. In 1957, the student body voted on a proposition to remove the student government (ASSU)’s power over the election of the editor of The Stanford Daily. In the run-up to the referendum, SPU hosted a debate with former managing editor Jim Palmer and ASSU President Steve Nye.
In 1959, SPU sponsored visits to Stanford from both Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. When these two men ran against each other in the 1960 Presidential Election, the Union became a primary organization for political discussion at Stanford. With a host of conservative and liberal speakers, faculty debates, and a straw vote, SPU aimed to facilitate open political thought at the start of a chaotic decade.
At the end of the 1960s, a surprise cut to its budget prevented SPU from hosting the community-wide symposia it had planned. Because of these financial constraints, SPU was forced to cancel the 1969 appearance of former Republican Presidential nominee Barry Goldwater. As Founder Wayne Fuller notes, by the 1970s, the Union had been “replaced…by other student political organizations.”
In 2017, after a long hiatus, SPU once again opened its doors. Its first event featured Mark Duggan, Barack Obama’s senior economist for healthcare policy; Lanhee Chen, a longtime Mitt Romney adviser; and undergraduate students Justin Hsuan ’18 and Schyler Cole ’17 in a discussion on the merits of the Affordable Care Act. This iteration of SPU hosted many successful events and saw huge turnouts, before fizzling out during the COVID years.
The Stanford Daily article, 2017
During Fall 2020, Jackson Richter ’22, a then-junior from New York City, sought to keep SPU alive with a new cohort of student leaders. However, the club struggled to gain traction over the next two years and became non-operational.
In 2022, Aden Beyene ’24 and YuQing Jiang ’25, former members of the Richter-led SPU, saw a pressing need to revive the organization and cultivate a culture of constructive dialogue at Stanford. Beyene and Jiang — along with Kaleb Houle-Lawrence ’27, Ziyad Broker ’27, Garret Molloy ’27, and Kevin Malaekeh ’24 — developed a vision for SPU, planned a full year of engaging programming, and reestablished the organization’s presence on campus. This is the SPU today.
As new cohorts of student leaders have come aboard, the Stanford Political Union continues to grow, build, and learn. Committed to fostering constructive dialogue, we provide a forum for students to engage in meaningful discussions with one another about pressing political and social issues.
Every quarter, we host a robust schedule of community discussions, speaker events, and collaborative gatherings, welcoming speakers and students with diverse perspectives, backgrounds, majors, and levels of knowledge in politics.
Through open, reasoned, and curiosity-driven dialogue, SPU aims to expose students to diverse viewpoints, develop their ability to engage in disagreement, and inspire deeper civic engagement.