Darlington Hoopes was born September 11, 1896 in Harford County, the son of farmers. He was a descendant of Joshua Hoopes, a Quaker from Yorkshire, England who had settled in Pennsylvania in 1683 to take part in William Penn's "Holy Experiment." Young Darlington attended the public schools of Maryland until the eighth grade, and then completed his education at a Quaker boarding school in Pennsylvania, George School, graduating in 1913. While attending George School, Darlington became a Christian Socialist. After high school, Hoopes returned to Maryland to work on the farm of his parents. In 1914, he began his studies at the University of Wisconsin, majoring in agriculture. He also visited the Madison office of the Socialist Party in October 1914 and joined the party. Hoopes only completed one year at the University before being called back to work on his parents' new farm in Pennsylvania. He changed his career goals and decided to study the law on his own, taking correspondence courses in public speaking and law from the socialist school People's College at Fort Scott, Kansas, as well as studying during the evening for a five-year period at a law office in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He passed his final Pennsylvania Bar Exam in 1921. Hoopes practiced law in Norristown from 1921 to 1927. From 1923 Hoopes served as the Executive Secretary and Treasurer of the Socialist Party of Pennsylvania. He was also a member of the Pennsylvania state grange. Hoopes relocated to Reading, Pennsylvania in December, 1927 following the victory of the Socialist Party there in the November, 1927 elections. In that election J. Henry Stump won the first of his three terms as Mayor of Reading, and saw the majority of Reading City Council won by members of the Socialist Party. Hoopes was hired in 1928 as an assistant city solicitor by the Stump Administration.
Political career
Hoopes' first election campaign was for judge in Berks County in 1929, but he was defeated. He did win his next election, as a Socialist candidate to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. For his work on outlawing child labor in Pennsylvania, Hoopes was voted as the "most able legislator" by Pennsylvania journalists. Also elected with Hoopes to the legislature was Lilith Martin Wilson, the first Socialist woman elected to any such body in the United States.
The 1936 split
In the summer of 1936 the Socialist Party of Pennsylvania severed its connection with the Socialist Party of America over ideological and tactical differences. Hoopes remained with the state organization outside of any national organization. On February 7, 1937 the Socialist Party of Pennsylvania called an "Eastern States Conference of Social Democratic Organizations" in Philadelphia which moved forward towards establishing a new organization, the Social Democratic Federation. Hoopes was named to the 7 member committee which issued a call for a National Convention in Pittsburgh, to be held May 29–31, 1937. Hoopes later left the Social Democratic Federation and returned to the Socialist Party.
National campaigns
Hoopes had also been the Socialist vice presidential candidate in 1944, as the running mate of Norman Thomas, and had also been a chairman of the party. He served in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives from 1930 to 1936, at one point being voted "most able legislator" by journalists. In both the 1952 and 1956 elections, his running mate was Samuel H. Friedman. In 1952 they received 20,065 votes, in 1956 only 2,044. The 1956 election would be the last presidential election the Socialist Party contested until after it broke into three groups in 1972-1973. In 1973 Hoopes joined the reconstituted Socialist Party USA, which resumed fielding presidential candidates and remains a small third party.
