“President Johnson should be free to select his own running mate”

“As for your interest in the proclamation of May 14, 1948, any document or statement issued by the President goes through a series of statements to make certain of its accuracy and clarity of meaning. I continue to hope that a reign of peace will soon come to pass.”

In this 1970 letter, Truman writes to Benjamin Cohen that his proclamation recognizing Israel’s independence was handled like any other presidential document. In reality, Truman’s recognition of Israel was sent only eleven minutes after receiving the news that Israel had proclaimed independence at midnight on May 14/15, 1948 (in the U.S., May 14, 6 pm, E.S.T.) The hastily typed original, with quick handwritten edits, is preserved in Truman’s Presidential Library. Secretary of State George C. Marshall and many others opposed the creation of a Jewish state. Any mention by Truman of his recognition of Israel is extremely rare.

This presentation copy to William H. McReynolds, the Liaison Officer for Personnel Management, is signed by all the committee members, including the chairman, Justice Stanley Reed, Justice Felix Frankfurter, Justice Frank Murphy, Attorney General Robert H. Jackson, Leonard D. White, General Robert E. Wood, and Cooper Union President Gano Dunn.

Former President Franklin Pierce worries that young Frank Pierce – like most undergraduates – is occupying himself with things other than his studies at Princeton.

Writing to a New York City philanthropist, President Theodore Roosevelt advocates equal rights for African-Americans and frames his sentiments in historical context. “I have never seen that letter. I am genuinely interested in it and of course heartily admire the way in which the Virginia President saw the kernel of the situation. What he says about emancipation is just as true now in reference to the policy of fair and square treatment of the freed blacks.”

“I am a good example of the melting pot—and I am straight United States.”

From his summer residence in Oyster Bay, Long Island, Theodore Roosevelt writes to historian Theodore C. Blegen.  While Blegen would go on to a prominent career in higher education, at this time, he was teaching high school in Minnesota.  Here, the former President criticizes Woodrow Wilson’s immigration policies while discussing his own family’s immigration experience.

Apparently unrecorded, this broadside extra prints President Monroe’s last annual message to Congress, delivered on December 7, 1824. Covers relations with Great Britain, the slave trade, Indian relations, the comprehensive survey of possible road and canal sites in the interior, and an elaboration on the Monroe Doctrine, providing the rationale for exhorting European states not to interfere with the evolution of the newly independent Latin American states. “Separated as we are, from Europe by the great Atlantic Ocean, we can have no concern in the wars of the European governments, nor in the causes which produce them. The balance of power between them, into whichever scale it may turn, in its various vibrations, cannot affect us. It is the interest of the United States to preserve the most friendly relations with every power, and on conditions fair, equal, and applicable to all. But in regard to our neighbours, our situation is different. It is impossible for the European governments to interfere in their concerns, especially in those alluded to, which are vital, without affecting us …”

Just ten days into his impactful two-year stint as President of the Board of Police Commissioners, Roosevelt attempts to shape the complex debate over competing reform proposals in the state legislature. In part due to Roosevelt’s advocacy, and veteran upstate legislator D.A. Ainsworth’s reversal of positions, the “Supplemental Re-Organization Bill,” granting autocratic powers to longtime Police Chief Thomas Byrnes, was defeated. “Only a brave and honorable man will frankly and openly revise his action, when he receives trustworthy information that the measure is not what it seemed to him to be…”

“On the issue of the war are staked our national sovereignty.”

Monroe enters office in a time of peace and prosperity well deserving of its moniker, the Era of Good Feelings. Still, the president outlines a plan for the future in his first message to Congress.

Key political circular from the first-year Republican President written to influence off-year elections in New Mexico and other places. Harding justifies, and praises, the rapid postwar dismantling of America’s military by Congress, while backhandedly criticizing the inattention of his predecessor – Woodrow Wilson – to the peacetime transition. “Vast expenditure without proper consideration for results, is the inevitable fruit of war.”

“I am against this bill because it is a compulsory program for all citizens whether they need help or not. It doesn’t seem to me that you & I should be taxed to provide govt. paid medical care for people who have ample incomes, or even are millionaires.”

“She lived in the White House / With her Dad and Mother / For her father was President / Better than any other…”

Casts of Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt from Mount Rushmore. On verso, the Lincoln head has been signed by the artist, Gutzon Borglum; the Roosevelt head bears a period provenance note: “MOUNT RUSHMORE MEMORIAL This is one of the few models taken from the first and final casting of Gutzon Borglum’s Head of Theodore Roosevelt.” (It is entirely possible that the Roosevelt head is signed beneath the affixed note.)

Featuring Franklin Roosevelt’s acceptance speech at the 1936 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, the 1936 Democratic National Platform, and the results of the election of 1936, this lavish book includes statements by the first lady and cabinet members, sketches of other party leaders, histories of the Democratic Party, Congress, and the White House, and biographies of Roosevelt and Vice President John Nance Garner. With fantastic illustrations and advertisements.

President Roosevelt signed colorful printed illustrations of the White House, which were bound into this souvenir book created by the DNC to pay down the post-election campaign deficit.