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Tag Archives: Republican

Book of the Week — The Democratic Book

25 Monday Jul 2016

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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Tags

administration, attorney, banking, Bay Area, book, cabinet, California Zephyr, Chicago, Constitution, convention, Democrat, democratic, Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, election, endpapers, first lady, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, funeral, Geneva Steel, gilt, Herbert Hoover, judge, morocco, platform, President, railroad, Reconstruction Finance Corporation, Republican, Rio Grande, San Francisco, silk, The Democratic National Convention, Third District Court, train, Utah, vista-dome cars, Wilson McCarthy

JK2313-1936-D38-frontisJK2313-1936-D38-signature

“Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.” — Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1936

THE DEMOCRATIC BOOK, 1936
Philadelphia?, 1936?
JK2313 1936 D38 oversize

This book was given to delegates at the 1936 Democratic convention, held that year in Philadelphia. It contains information such as the party’s platform, election results, and statements from the President, his cabinet members, other important members of his administration, and the first lady.

This copy belonged to Wilson McCarthy (1884-1956), a judge who sat on Utah’s Third District Court in 1919. He left the bench a year later and earned a fortune as a private practice attorney. In 1926 he was elected to the Utah state senate. A lifelong Democrat, he was appointed by Republican President Herbert Hoover to the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in 1932. A year later, he began a career in banking in San Francisco. In 1934, the RFC asked him to take control of the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad, which had just defaulted on a $10 million loan. It took McCarthy and others nearly two decades to rehabilitate the company. In 1937 alone, $18 million was pumped into the property.

Under McCarthy’s administration the Rio Grande built more than 1100 bridges and laid more than two million railroad ties. By the end of World War II, the railroad’s revenues had increased from $17 million to $75 million per year. During this time, McCarthy anchored the Rio Grande between Salt Lake City (his birthplace) and Denver. Freight time between these two points dropped from 54 hours to just under 24 hours. McCarthy, in conjunction with the Western Pacific Railroad began the “California Zephyr,” a luxury service between Chicago and the Bay Area. He also added the train’s signature vista-dome cars.

In addition to his turn-around of the fortunes of the railroad, McCarthy helped bring Geneva Steel to Utah. On the day of his funeral, every Rio Grande train stopped, their crews observing two minutes of silence.

This book was also published, with some variations, under the title The Democratic National Convention, 1936. The book contains dozens of contemporary advertisements, many in color. Illustrated with nineteen full-page portraits and dozens of in-text half-tones and illustrations, and a facsimile of the Constitution. Bound in full brown morocco gilt, watered silk endpapers, top edge gilt. Limited edition of unknown quantity. University of Utah copy is no. 1464, stamped in gilt “Wilson McCarthy” and signed by Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Gift of Wilson McCarthy.

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Book of the Week – Immediate Epic; the final statement of the plan…

01 Monday Sep 2014

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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atheist, California, communist, End Poverty League, EPIC, Great Depression, Montreal Gazette, pension, Republican, sales tax, tax reform, Upton Sinclair


Immediate Epic; the final statement of the plan…
Upton Sinclair (1878-1968)
Los Angeles, CA: End Poverty League, 1934?
HC107 C2 S53

Author and socialist Upton Sinclair won the Democratic nomination for governor of California in August 1934. He based his campaign on his “End Poverty in California” (EPIC) plan. Sinclair called for tax reform, including a repeal of the sales tax, legislature for a graduated state income tax (to 30% for those earning $50,000 per year), an increase in state inheritance tax, an increase in taxes of privately owned public utility companies and banks, a pension of $50 per month to needy persons over the age of sixty, a payment of $50 per month to the disabled, and a pension of $50 per month to widows with dependent children. He lost the governorship by 260,000 votes to a Republican campaign that labeled him as an atheist, a communist and a “crackpot.”

Sinclair claimed only 37% of the vote, but the Republican candidate received only 48%. A third party candidate received 13%. The turnout for this election was quite large, demonstrating a strong response from the public for politicians to bring the nation out of the Great Depression. Sinclair’s campaign drew national and international attention. In November, 1934, the Montreal Gazette wrote, “It will be surprising if the Californians vote for a plan that calls for yet more taxation.” And, indeed, they did not.

alluNeedSingleLine

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Memorial Day 2014

26 Monday May 2014

Posted by rarebooks in Book of the Week

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1st South Carolina Volunteers, abolition, American Civil War, Arlington, Decoration Day, Harvard Divinity School, Kaleidograph Press, labor rights, Luise Putcamp jr, Massachusetts, Memorial Day, Newburyport, Reed Smoot, Republican, slavery, Sonnets for Survivors, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Union, Unitarian, Utah, Washington, women's suffrage

Memorial Day

If sudden statues rose for all who fell
They would not inundate the parks with stone
Where the forgotten heroes ride alone
To slow tongue of an abandoned bell.
Flaunting the remnants of their final hell
They would regain the streets their feet had known
Under the skies where their first words were sown
And stand as an alien citadel.

So rooted they would still with carven ear
The threadbare speech, the momentary tear,
With carven eye transfix the mocking flowers,
Wilt token flags above forgetful towers.
Who then would dare to go the usual way
Crowding the dead into a single day?

Luise Putcamp jr.
from Sonnets for the Survivors, Kaleidograph Press, 1952
“Memorial Day” published here with permission of the poet

 


Address on Decoration Day
Thomas Wentworth Higginson (1823-1911)
s.l.: s.n., 1904
E642 H53

“Without distinction of nationality, of color, of race, of religion, those men gave their lives to their country. Without distinction of religion, of color, of race, of nationality, their graves are being garlanded today….the war gave peace to the nation; it gave union, freedom, equal rights…”

Thomas Wentworth Higginson was graduated from Harvard Divinity School in 1847. He accepted the appointment of ministry of a Unitarian church in Newburyport, Massachusetts. His support for women’s suffrage, labor rights, and the abolition of slavery was too radical for the conservative community. He was asked to resign two years after his appointment. As a Union colonel in the American Civil War, Higginson commanded the 1st South Carolina Volunteers, the first federally authorized regiment of African-American soldiers.


Memorial Day Address at Arlington, VA.
Reed Smoot (1862-1941)
Washington: Govt. Printing Office, 1914
E642 S66 1914

“In all we say about the soldier, let us not forget the part taken and willingly assumed by the American women in time of war. What shall we say of the wives and the mothers who gave their husbands and their sons for their country? No woman who has not passed through this terrible ordeal can describe or measure the sacrifice our women made, or the horrors and hardships and sorrows they endured. What say you of the loving sisters who gave their brothers, yes, and their lovers too?”

Reed Smoot was a Republican senator from Utah, serving from 1903 to 1933.

 

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