America has always been afraid of interesting candidates
Taft was the man in the middle. He was neither as commanding as Roosevelt nor as dishonest as Wilson and was neither able to compete with Roosevelt for the emotional support of Republicans nor curry favor with the Democrats. Debs who received only 6% of the vote is nevertheless correctly included in Chace's analysis because he represented the emerging electoral forces that the nascent middle class would bring to American politics. In the century that has passed it is the middle class that now decides the elections. In 1912, for the first time, their views have a national voice although this voice would be stilled in 1919 when Debs was sentenced to jail for ten years by those who saw in his invective evidence of treason. It was he who, when sentenced, after recognizing his "kinship with all living beings," famously said "while there is a lower class, I am in it, while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and where there is a soul in prison, I am not free."
The parallels to the politics of 2005 are striking. We are still arguing over whether to save trees. We still debate whether power should rest more with the federal government or with the states. We continue to be enveloped in periodic national paranoia that leads us to attack other countries under the guise of protecting ourselves. What are most changed are two things. The first is that the middle class decides the elections so they who must be won over to secure electoral victory. The second is that the middle class, while being sold, must always be sold a bill of goods. Theirs is an empty power. They are manipulated and double crossed but always in ways that leave few fingerprints. So every four years the parties rerun the Presidential election and blame the other side for what they promised to do but somehow never accomplished. So they need another chance but this time they need a larger electoral margin because last time it wasn't quite enough.
Looking back on 1912 it wasn't pretty but it seems, while tawdry, more honest than the crappy rhetoric we hear spewing from the White House today. The President's friends and his financial supporters grow richer. Tax breaks flow through the Republican dominated Congress like a broken toilet. Neither party seems to be interested in anything except personal advantage. Somewhere in this is the America we all learned about in school but it is not the America we live in today. And day by day more Americans are killed in Iraq protecting the American businesses that directly profit from our unreasonable compulsion to control other people's oil while claiming we are making the world a safer place.
Come to think of it 1912 was better. It was tawdry but honest. Today it is just tawdry.
Mr. Chace died unexpectedly in Paris in October, 2004. As he would have wanted his voice continues to be heard. Today this book is new. In time it will be old and part of various collections. In a thousand years someone clutching their example of this 21st century incunabula will ask a dealer the value of this book and be told "It is in the reading." It will be true then. It is true now.
It is available in hardcover and paperback online and in bookstores around the world.
1912 by James Chace. Published by Simon & Schuster. 323 pages including indexes.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Letter Signed ("Martinus Luther") to His Friend the Theologian Gerhard Wiskamp ("Gerardo Xantho Lampadario"). $100,000 - $150,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: An Exceptionally Fine Copy of Austenís Emma: A Novel in Three Volumes. $40,000 - $60,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Presentation Copy of Ernest Hemmingwayís A Farewell to Arms for Edward Titus of the Black Mankin Press. $30,000 - $50,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Manuscript Signed Integrally for "The Songs of Pooh," by Alan Alexander. $30,000 - $50,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Manuscript of "Three Fragments from Gˆtterd‰mmerung" by Richard Wagner. $30,000 - $50,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Original Preliminary Artwork, for the First Edition of Snow Crash. $20,000 - $30,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Letter Signed ("T.R. Malthus") to Economist Nassau Senior on Wealth, Labor and Adam Smith. $20,000 - $30,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides Finely Bound by Michael Wilcox. $20,000 - $30,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: First Edition of Lewis and Clark: Travels to the Source of the Missouri River and Across the American Continent to the Pacific Ocean. $8,000 - $12,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Original Artwork for the First Edition of Neal Stephenson's Groundbreaking Novel Snow Crash. $100,000 - $150,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: A Complete Set Signed Deluxe Editions of King's The Dark Tower Series by Stephen King. $8,000 - $12,000.
Bonhams, Dec. 8-18: Autograph Letter Signed ("John Adams") to James Le Ray de Chaumont During the Crucial Years of the Revolutionary War. $8,000 - $12,000.
Sotheby’s Book Week December 9-17, 2025
Sotheby’s, Dec. 17: Francesco Colonna. Hypnerotomachie, Paris, 1546, Parisian calf by Wotton Binder C for Marcus Fugger. €200,000 to €300,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 17: Nausea. De principiis dialectices Gorgias, and other works, Venice, 1523, morocco gilt for Cardinal Campeggio. €3,000 to €4,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 17: Billon. Le fort inexpugnable de l'honneur, Paris, 1555, Parisian calf gilt for Peter Ernst, Graf von Mansfeld. €120,000 to €180,000.
Sotheby’s Book Week December 9-17, 2025
Sotheby’s, Dec. 16: Salinger, J.D. The Graham Family archive, including autographed letters, an inscribed Catcher, a rare studio photograph of the author, and more. $120,000 to $180,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 16: [Austen, Jane]. A handsome first edition of Sense and Sensibility, the author's first novel. $60,000 to $80,000.
Sotheby’s, Dec. 16: Massachusetts General Court. A powerful precursor to the Declaration of Independence: "every Act of Government … without the Consent of the People, is … Tyranny." $40,000 to $60,000.
Heritage Auctions Rare Books Signature Auction December 15, 2025
Heritage, Dec. 15: John Donne. Poems, By J. D. With Elegies on the Author's Death. London: M[iles]. F[lesher]. for John Marriot, 1633.
Heritage, Dec. 15: Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan of the Apes.
Heritage, Dec. 15: F. Scott Fitzgerald. Tender is the Night. A Romance.
Heritage, Dec. 15: Jerry Thomas. How to Mix Drinks, or the Bon-Vivant's Companion, Containing Clear and Reliable Directions for Mixing All the Beverages Used in the United States…
![<b>Sotheby’s, Dec. 16:</b> [Austen, Jane]. A handsome first edition of <i>Sense and Sensibility,</i> the author's first novel. $60,000 to $80,000.](https://ae-files.s3.amazonaws.com/AdvertisementPhotos/9a74d9ff-42dd-46a1-8bb2-b636c4cec796.png "<b>Sotheby’s, Dec. 16:</b> [Austen, Jane]. A handsome first edition of <i>Sense and Sensibility,</i> the author's first novel. $60,000 to $80,000.")
![<b>Heritage, Dec. 15:</b> John Donne. <i>Poems, By J. D. With Elegies on the Author's Death.</i> London: M[iles]. F[lesher]. for John Marriot, 1633.](https://ae-files.s3.amazonaws.com/AdvertisementPhotos/8caddaea-4c1f-47a7-9455-62f53af36e3f.jpg "<b>Heritage, Dec. 15:</b> John Donne. <i>Poems, By J. D. With Elegies on the Author's Death.</i> London: M[iles]. F[lesher]. for John Marriot, 1633.")
