Rare Book Monthly
Articles - February - 2004 Issue
“Unusual” American Imprints<br>from David Lesser
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Item 118 is an 1880 message To the Voters of Massachusetts from Samuel Hoar, Chairman of the Massachusetts State Temperance Commission. Hoar’s interest in temperance seems primarily to be an excuse to attack the state’s Irish population. He states that prohibition would be particularly useful to deal with “Irish grog-shops which infest our cities and larger towns.” Hoar goes on to smear the Irish by describing them as “strangers to principle, and accustomed to the dominion of their priests, they can be ruled by law alone.” $150.
Somewhere in between the good and bad must lie item 97, from the Indiana Yearly Meeting of Friends of 1838. This is an Address to the People of the United States, and to the Members of Congress in Particular. On the Civilization and Christian Instruction of the Aborigines of our Country. In it, the Friends acknowledge how the Indians have been removed from their homes and recognize “the debt which they [Americans] owe to this much injured people.” However, their remedy for the wrongs is to extend their concept of “civilization” to this people who “when roused to resentment; they carry on war with indiscriminate slaughter…” $250.
That which is special and good in the American character can be traced to one man in particular. Though he no longer seems to get the press of a Lincoln or Jefferson, no one is more responsible for the character of this nation than George Washington. Kilborn Whitman, in his 1798 Oration…Pronounced at Bridgewater… points out how unusual it was that the Continental Army, rather than asserting its power after the win in the Revolution, simply dispersed. This was based on Washington’s command. Rather than choosing power, Washington turned the government over to a representative democracy. Americans have much reason to be grateful to this man. Item 188. $350.
In 1844, George Collins wrote Fifty Reasons why the Honorable Henry Clay should be Elected President of the United States. By an Irish Adopted Citizen. This was unusual as Clay’s Whig Party had more of the old line British on their side. Irish immigrants, in an affiliation which still to a lesser extent remains today, joined the Democrats. Collins argues that Clay is not anti-immigrant. Unfortunately for Collins, he needed at least fifty-one reasons why people should vote for Clay. Fifty proved insufficient. Clay lost to James Knox Polk. Item 49. $250.
Not all southerners were in a rush to secede. Howell Cobb, who served in various public offices in Georgia and the U.S., and eventually the Confederacy, opposed Calhoun’s rumblings about secession in 1849. He would later serve in President Buchanan’s administration and remain a unionist, almost until the end of his term, when Cobb resigned. Many southerners felt, and rightly so, they could better preserve slavery in their homeland by remaining in the union and cooperating more with the North on other issues. Ultimately, the secessionists prevailed, and as a result, slavery in the South came to an end a few short years later. Item 48. is an address by Cobb headed To Our Constituents in which he lambastes Calhoun. $450.
