Americans for Democratic Action records, 1932-1999.

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Americans for Democratic Action records, 1932-1999.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/173700195

Records of the ADA, founded in 1947 as a national, independent, liberal organization, and of its predecessor, the Union for Democratic Action, founded in 1941 to combat fascism at home and abroad. Included are correspondence, minutes, reports, membership and financial records, press releases, clippings, and mimeographed and printed materials documenting the organizations' activities. The UDA actively supported the war effort, supported a full post-war employment plan, and urged appointment of Henry A. Wallace as Secretary of Commerce. To avoid any taint of communism, UDA leaders proposed the formation of ADA as an organization explicitly democratic in purpose. Initially the ADA hoped to expand the social and economic legislation started by the New Deal. The support of civil liberties, concern for the domestic economy, backing for the United Nations and for international control of economic energy, and continued political and economic support of democratic governments throughout the world were among its aims. The collection concerns ADA's administration, legislative lobbying and political activities, its chapters throughout the country and on various campuses, conventions, and relations with other organizations. Administrative records include correspondence of leaders and Washington headquarters staff members such as Thomas Amlie, Francis Biddle, Evelyn Dubrow, Violet Gunther, Leon Henderson, Edward Hollander, Hubert Humphrey, Charles LaFollette, Richard Lambert, James Loeb, Jr., Robert Nathan, Reinhold Niebuhr, Natalie Panak, Sheldon Pollock, Joseph Rauh, Marvin Rosenberg, John F.P. Tucker, David C. Williams, Page Wilson, Wilson Wyatt, and Reginald Zalles. Mimeographed minutes, reports, and other records of the 1947 Organizing Committee are followed by similar records of the National Board and the Executive Committee. Records of the National Committee for Organization reflect the emphasis placed on organizing new chapters and assisting chapters' and members' programs. Contribution correspondence, audit reports, budget proposals and reports, and balance sheets document the group's often shaky finances. Organized labor's aid is documented as are various fundraising attempts. Chapter files vary considerably from chapter to chapter in quantity. They generally contain correspondence on local and national political action, internal organizational rivalries or personnel problems, and member activities; election campaign materials; and administrative and financial records of the chapter. Campus chapters were affiliated as Students for Democratic Action chapters, then after a 1959 revitalization effort as chapters of the Campus Division of ADA. Their files tend to concern civil rights issues and organizations, the draft, other youth organizations (both on the left and the right), and the U.S. National Student Association. ADA convention files concern both the practical aspects of a large meeting as well as policy issues and include correspondence with leading liberals. Legislative files document ADA's lobbying activities, principally at the federal level. They concern civil rights, cloture, small business issues, disarmament, electoral reform, aid to education, full employment, public housing, social security, foreign relations, and numerous other issues. Political files concern both presidential and congressional elections. They include correspondence, clippings, speeches, analyses of candidates and events, and other materials. Public relations files include both publicity materials and research files on topics and people of interest to the organization, e.g. right wing political groups, civil liberties, William O. Douglas, Dwight Eisenhower, Barry Goldwater, Joseph R. McCarthy, Leland Olds, Lillian Smith, Harold Stassen, and Harry Truman. The processed portion of this series is summarized above, dates 1932-1965, and is described in the register. Additional accessions date 1943-1999 and are described below.

163.6 c.f. (409 archives boxes, 14 v., and 2 packages); plusadditions of 45.6 c.f.,87 tape recordings,18 disc recordings,1068 photographs,105 negatives,118 transparencies, and10 videorecordings (8 mm)

Wisconsin Historical Society, Newspaper Project

Information

SNAC Resource ID: 6925404

Wisconsin Historical Society, Newspaper Project

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United States National Student Association

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The National Student Association was founded in 1947 as a confederation of student governments across the nation, united for the purpose of improving education. It advocated federal aid for education, student publications without censorship and it took a stand against discrimination. Smith College students began affiliation with the organization the year it was created. In 1978 it merged with the National Student Lobby, forming the United States Student Association....

Eisenhower, Dwight D. (Dwight David), 1890-1969

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Smith, Lillian Eugenia, 1897-1966

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"Lillian Smith was one of the first prominent white southerners to denounce racial segregation openly and to work actively against the entrenched and often brutally enforced world of Jim Crow. From as early as the 1930s, she argued that Jim Crow was evil ("Segregation is spiritual lynching," she said) and that it leads to social moral retardation."--"Lillian Smith (1897-1966)," New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved February 18, 2008: http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org. From the descri...

Dubrow, Evelyn, 1911-2006

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Trade-unionist. From the description of Oral history interview with Evelyn Dubrow, 1976. (Wayne State University, Archives of Labor & Urban). WorldCat record id: 32321596 Evelyn Dubrow was born in Passaic, New Jersey, in 1911. A graduate of New York University, Dubrow worked as a report for The Morning Call (Patterson, N.J.) and Secretary of the New Jersey organization of the American Newspaper Guild from 1943 to 1946, before becoming Educational Director for the Textile...

Truman, Harry S., 1884-1972

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Goldwater, Barry M. (Barry Morris), 1909-1998

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Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician, businessman, and author who was a five-term Senator from Arizona (1953–1965, 1969–1987) and the Republican Party nominee for president of the United States in 1964. Despite his loss of the 1964 presidential election in a landslide, Goldwater is the politician most often credited with having sparked the resurgence of the American conservative political movement in the 1960s. He also had a substantial impact on the...

Humphrey, Hubert H. (Hubert Horatio), 1911-1978

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Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American politician who served as the 38th vice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing Minnesota from 1949 to 1964 and 1971 to 1978. He was the Democratic Party's nominee in the 1968 presidential election, losing to Republican nominee Richard Nixon. Born in Wallace, South Dakota, Humphrey attended the University of Minnesota. At one point he helped run his ...

Wallace, Henry A. (Henry Agard), 1888-1965

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Tucker, John F. P.

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Shull, Leon

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Union for Democratic Action

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Wyatt, Wilson W. (Wilson Watkins), 1905-1996

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Lawyer. From the description of Reminiscences of Wilson W. Wyatt : oral history, 1969. (Columbia University In the City of New York). WorldCat record id: 122440831 ...

Williams, David C.

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David Charles Williams spent his entire career in public service, including many years with the Bureau of Land Management. From the description of The David Charles Williams papers. 19971-2002. (University of Utah). WorldCat record id: 227005252 ...

Panak, Natalie.

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Douglas, William O. (William Orville), 1898-1980

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Associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and professor of law. From the description of William O. Douglas papers, 1801-1980 (bulk 1923-1975). (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 71068743 William O. Douglas was nominated to the Supreme Court by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939. His nearly thirty-seven year tenure as a Supreme Court justice was the longest in the history of the court. From the guide to ...

Zalles, Reginald H., 1910-

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Democratic National Committee (U.S.)

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Niebuhr, Reinhold, 1892-1971

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Correspondence to Lewis Mumford from Reinhold Niebuhr and his wife, Ursula Niebuhr. From the description of Letters, 1935-1982, n.d., to Lewis Mumford. (University of Pennsylvania Library). WorldCat record id: 155873776 Theologian, philosopher, and author. From the description of Papers of Reinhold Niebuhr, 1907-1994 (bulk 1930-1990). (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 71063622 Theologian. From the description of Reminiscences of Reinhold Niebuhr...

Campus Americans for Democratic Action

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Wilson, Page, 1976-....

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Gunther, Violet.

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McCarthy, Joseph, 1908-1957

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Henderson, Leon, 1895-1986

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Leon Henderson (1895-1986) was born in Millville, New Jersey. He served in the U.S. Army in World War I. He graduated from Swarthmore College and taught at the Wharton School of Commerce and Finance at the University of Pennsylvania and at the Carnegie Institute of Technology. Henderson served as Deputy Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and worked at the Russell Sage Foundation in New York before moving to Washington, D.C. In Washington, he joined the National Recovery Administration...

La Follette, Charles Marion, 1898-1974

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Rauh, Joseph L., 1911-

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Lawyer. From the description of Reminiscences of Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. : oral history, 1967. (Columbia University In the City of New York). WorldCat record id: 122480930 Labor lawyer. From the description of Reminiscences of Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. : oral history, 1988. (Columbia University In the City of New York). WorldCat record id: 122513744 Lawyer, civil rights activist, and civil libertarian of Washington, D.C. Born Joseph Louis Rauh, Jr. Died 1992. ...

Amlie, Thomas R., 1897-1973

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Democratic Party (U.S.)

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Americans for Democratic Action

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Olds, Leland, 1890-1960

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Leland Olds (1890-1960), utility economist, began his government service making special economic studies for the Council of National Defense in 1917. In 1918 he became a statistician for the Shipbuilding Labor Adjustment Board and later that same year, the Administrator of Awards for the National War Labor Board. From 1920 to 1922 he headed the research bureau of the Railroad Employees Department of the American Federation of Labor, and from 1922 to 1931 was the industrial editor for Federated P...

Lambert, Richard 1846-1926

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Stassen, Harold E. (Harold Edward), 1907-2001

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Rosenberg, Marvin.

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United Nations

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In 1945, four individuals who had worked on the Manhattan project-John L. Balderston, Jr., Dieter M. Gruen, W.J. McLean, and David B. Wehmeyer-formed a committee and wrote a letter to 154 public figures asking for their opinions about the possibility of the creation of a world government. Over the next year, as the various public figures responded to the letter, the responses were correlated into a report that was released in 1947. From the guide to the Balderston, John L., Jr. Colle...

Students for Democratic Action.

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Loeb, James I. (James Isaac), 1908-

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James Isaac Loeb (1908-1992) was born in Illinois. After receiving his Ph.D. from Northwestern University in 1938, Loeb moved to New York City with his wife, Ellen. There, Loeb's belief in the Spanish republican cause and his passionate desire to combat totalitarianism led him into political activism, beginning what turned into a career of public service. A member of the International Labor Solidarity Committee of the Socialist Party, Loeb grew to detest the factionalism that he felt was damagin...

Nathan, Robert, 1894-1985

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Pollock, Sheldon.

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Hollander, Edward D. (Edward Drey), 1908-

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Biddle, Francis, 1886-1968

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Francis Beverley Biddle (1886-1968) was a graduate of Groton and Harvard. After Harvard Law School he served for one year as secretary to Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. A practicing attorney in Philadelphia for twenty-five years, Biddle was named the first chairman of the National Labor Relations Board in 1934, filling the post for one year. In 1939, Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him judge of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. In 1940, he was appointed Solicitor General of the U...