La Follette's Autobiography: A Personal Narrative of Political Experiences (Annotated)

Description

Robert Marion La Follette, Sr., was voted as one of the top five senators in United States history. Yet he remains ever so slightly outside the mainstream of historical argument. Associated with the Progressive Era, he tends to fall behind Theodore Roosevelt, as he did in the 1912 campaign for the Republican nomination for President. The final chapters of this book represent a diary of that campaign. It is quite a story. Part of the myth of "Fighting Bob." But you might discover that that myth is not as mythical as it may appear. That the man stood apart from his fellow politicians because he was simply not of their kind. He was beloved in Wisconsin, not just because of his success. He was beloved because of how he achieved that success. An accomplished speaker, he chose to speak for the people of Wisconsin. Not the people who already had a voice, but those who didn't: the farmers, the workers, the women, the minorities, the rest of Wisconsin. When he talked about trusts, unlike Roosevelt, he actually wanted to do something about them. He talked about the Referendum, Recall and Initiative. He talked about them not as grand ideas, but as practical means of extending democracy to the people he represented. The only downfall of this book is that it was published in the middle of his career. But it still burns with the passions that informed that missing period. Annotations have been added to give you some understanding of the people mentioned in the text.

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  La Follette's Autobiography: A Personal Narrative of Political Experiences

  • 1960
  • 349 pages
  • Paperback
  • Univ of Wisconsin Press