See How They Ran
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
See How They Ran explores why candidates campaign as they do, why Americans complain about it, and what these evolving patterns and changing images tell us about American democracy itself.
On the eve of every election, many Americans become convinced that this presidential campaign is worse than it has ever been. Frustrated, we long for the good old days of dignified campaigns and worthy candidates. However, as Gil Troy’s fascinating history demonstrates, they never existed.
Originally, candidates did not run for office, but awaited the people’s call in dignified silence. When Stephen Douglas campaigned in 1860, he pretended to be visiting his mother as he traveled, not actively campaigning. In the post-1945 world, however, both Democratic and Republican candidates have stopped to kiss babies, donned hard hats, and pumped hands along the campaign trails. From the founding of our nation, Americans have wanted a leader who is simultaneously a man of the people and a man above the people.
In See How They Ran, Troy shows that our disappointment with current presidential campaigns is simply the latest chapter in a centuries-long struggle to make peace with the idea of leadership in a democratic society. This is an engrossing and essential read.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
McGill University history professor Troy offers an original, fascinating and admirably focused account of American presidential campaigns from George Washington to George Bush. The author sees the evolution of campaigns as an attempt to balance the contradictions of republican and democratic principles inherent in our government since the nation was founded: ``The president was to be both king and prime minister, a national figurehead and the people's representative.'' Up to and including the candidacy of Andrew Jackson--whose election is said to have signaled the triumph of popular democracy--candidates ``stood'' for rather than ``ran'' for office. In 1880 James Garfield's single brief trip from his native Ohio to New York introduced ``stumping,'' which figured prominently in William Jennings Bryant's 1896 campaign. In Troy's view, Theodore Roosevelt was first to manipulate the press; Franklin Roosevelt used the radio to greatest advantage; and Dwight Eisenhower's aides made TV a potent weapon. Troy does not adopt the common view that the presidential election process has degenerated; instead he sees merely a shift in emphasis.
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