Society for Political Education. Popular Economic Tracts. 1880-1891

During the decade of the 1880s the Society for Political Education founded by the independent Republican (“Mugwump”) Richard Rogers Bowker (1848-1933) published a series of popular works on politics and economics so that American voters might educate themselves concerning the great issues of their day. I came across this organization after checking up on David A. Wells who later endowed a prize in his name for works written at Harvard in political economy (a few past winners: Paul Samuelson, Robert Solow, Michael Spence, Peter Kenen, Deirdre McCloskey, Edward Chamberlin, Harry Dexter White). Wells was the head of the Society’s Finance Committee.

I became curious about Wells after reading in Joseph Dorfman’s The Economic Mind in American Civilization, Vol. 3, 1865-1918, pp. 81-82 that Wells attached a couple of conditions to his prize:

“The prizes ‘shall be paid in gold coin of standard weight and fineness,’ or in the form of a medal of gold of corresponding value. ‘No essay shall be considered which in any way advocates or defends the spoliation of property under form or process of law; or the restriction of commerce in times of peace by legislation, except for moral or sanitary purposes; or the enactment of usury laws; or the impairment of contracts by the debasement of coin; or the issue…by government of irredeemable notes…as a substitute for money.’”

This posting includes (i) an overview of Bowker and his Society for Political Education taken from his biography, (ii) front-and-back cover material describing the Society, its purpose and leadership and (iii) links to almost every single publication

One might regard the Society for Political Education as a counterpoint to William Rainey Harper’s (first president of the University of Chicago) Methodist summer school at Chautauqua where Richard Ely regularly taught his variant of popular economic doctrine.

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[Overview of R. R. Bowker’s Society for Political Education]

…It was clear to him [R. R. Bowker] that to get free trade and other desired reforms under the democratic system, it was eternally necessary not only to educate the voter but to perfect the machinery whereby the voter was able to register his will. To these ends he continued to work through his Society for Political Education and a half-dozen other reform organizations to inform and rally the average citizen, to promote ballot reform and civil service reform. In this he was, perhaps, most typically fulfilling the social-engineering mission of the scholar to which he had committed himself.

In directing the fortunes of the Society for Political Education which he had founded in 1880, Bowker had the continuous counsel of Putnam, the Society’s publisher, Wells, who undertook to raise funds for its program, and Richard Dugdale, its indefatigable secretary. Its basic purpose of educating the voter through inexpensive, sound reading matter was pushed without pause. Its Economic Tracts contained original contributions from Horace White, A. D. White, Talcott Williams, W. C. Ford, and Shepard; the second series of its Library of Political Education contained works by Blanqui, Jevons, Mill, Wells, and Herbert Spencer. In addition, the Society distributed gratuitously 1,700 copies of Henry George’s Progress and Poverty and an equal number of his Irish Question, as well as 1,500 copies of Atkinson’s pamphlet on “The Elements of National Prosperity.” It then planned an “Auxiliary Series” of tracts to be given away.

Dugdale’s death in 1883 was a great blow, but his work was ably taken up by Worthington C. Ford. In 1889 George lles, an energetic Canadian liberal with a strong interest in bibliography became the Society’s secretary. Tracts were planned to cover tariff, education, prison legislation, municipal reform, the Southern question, and Canadian relations. The Society’s last publication, issued in 1891, was, perhaps, its finest, The Reader’s Guide in Economic, Social, and Political Science. In this Bowker and lles collaborated with the assistance of twenty-five specialists, including E. R. A. Seligman, W. C. Ford, James Bryce, Gifford Pinchot, D. R. Dewey, D. A. Wells, Andrew D. White, and Horace White. The result was a comprehensive list, not confined to the writings of any one school of economics or one nation. The Reader’s Guide met with hearty response from both librarians and professors of economy, and by 1903 had to be reissued in a second and revised edition.

With such an admirable program of service and a membership fee of only fifty cents, the Society might have been expected to flourish, but it most emphatically did not. Nothing, perhaps, is more indicative of the basic lack of popular support for Bowker’s version of the liberal program than the fact that the Society’s membership never exceeded 1,000 during these years. By the end of 1890 the number of subscribers fell to 113, and income from the casual sale of its pamphlets did not exceed seventy dollars a year. lles felt that the field which the Society had entered as a pioneer was now supplied by such organizations as the American Economic Association and the new trend toward social essays in Century, Forum, and Harper’s magazines. It was therefore decided to close the Society’s books.

From Bowker’s own pen came several items to strengthen the cause of civic education. At the end of 1883 the Society published his first popular summary of economic principles, Of Work and Wealth. The little volume was dedicated to Richard Dugdale, acknowledged in particular its indebtedness to such economists as Walker, Jevons, and Henry George, and deliberately steered a commonsense course between the extremes of the Manchester school and the German school. For some time Bowker had felt the need of a simple presentation of elementary economic principles for the man in the street, and this effort was a very considerable success. Professor Johnson of Princeton reported that his students were “delighted” with it, President Hadley of Yale was enthusiastic, and Wells called it “exceedingly clever.”…

Source: Fleming, Edward McClung. R.R. Bowker: Militant Liberal. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, pp. 219-220

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The Society for Political Education.
(ORGANIZED 1880.)

OBJECTS. — The Society was organized by citizens who believe that the success of our government depends on the active political influence of educated intelligence, and that parties are means, not ends. It is entirely non-partisan in its organization, and is not to be used for any other purpose than the awakening of an intelligent interest in government methods and purposes tending to restrain the abuse of parties and to promote party morality.

Among its organizers are numbered Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, who differ among themselves as to which party is best fitted to conduct the government, but who are in the main agreed as to the following propositions:

The right of each citizen to his free voice and vote must be upheld.
Office-holders must not control the suffrage.
The office should seek the man, and not the man the office.
Public service, in business positions, should depend solely on fitness and good behavior.
The crimes of bribery and corruption must be relentlessly punished.
Local issues should be independent of national parties.
Coins made unlimited legal tender must possess their face value as metal in the markets of the world.
Sound currency must have a metal basis, and all paper money must be convertible on demand.
Labor has a right to the highest wages it can earn, unhindered by public or private tyranny.
Trade has the right to the freest scope, unfettered by taxes, except for government expenses.
Corporations must be restricted from abuse of privilege.
Neither the public money nor the people’s land must be used to subsidize private enterprise.
A public opinion, wholesome and active, unhampered by machine control, is the true safeguard of popular institutions.
Persons who become members of the Society are not, however, required to endorse the above.

METHODS .— The Society proposes to carry out its objects by submitting from time to time to its members lists of books which it regards as desirable reading on current political and economic questions; by selecting annual courses of reading for its members; by supplying the books so selected at the smallest possible advance beyond actual cost; by furnishing and circulating, at a low price and in cheap form, sound economic and political literature in maintenance and illustration of the principles above announced as constituting the basis of its organization; and by assisting in the formation of reading and corresponding circles and clubs for discussing social, political, and economic questions.

ORGANIZATION. — The Society is to be managed by an Executive Committee of twenty-five persons, selected from different sections of the United States. At the end of the first year the Executive Committee is to resolve itself into three sections, holding office respectively one, two, and three years from that date, and at the expiration of the term of office of each section, the remaining two thirds of the Committee shall elect, by ballot, members to fill vacancies. The correspondence of the Society is to be divided among five secretaries, one each for the East, the Northwest, the Southeast, the Southwest, and the Pacific Slope.

MEMBERSHIP. — Active Members are such persons as will pledge themselves to read the Constitution of the United States, and that of the State in which they reside ; who will agree to read at least one of the annual courses as included in the Library of Political Education, and who will pay an annual fee of 50 cents (which may be forwarded in postage-stamps), entitling the member to receive the tracts and lists published by the Society during the year.

Parents, guardians, or teachers will be considered as having fulfilled the above obligations if they make their children, wards, or pupils follow the prescribed course of reading.

In order to make the membership widespread, and especially to enable students in the public schools and colleges to take part in the Society, the annual fee for Active Members has been made so small that the proceeds are inadequate to carry out the objects of the Society. To provide for the resulting deficiency, the Executive Committee has established a special membership for such public-spirited persons as wish to promote political and economic education, as follows: —

Any person may become a CO-OPERATING Member on the annual payment of $5.00 or more, which shall entitle such member to receive the tracts and lists published by the Society, and to nominate two Fellowship Members. To persons so nominated the Secretary will send the series of Economic Tracts for 1880-81, stating that they are presented through the courtesy of such Coöperating Member.

FIRST YEAR’S WORK, 1880-81. — During the past year the Society has received fees from one thousand five hundred members, of whom one hundred and seventy-five are Coöperating Members, and one hundred and five Lady Members. There have also been seven Auxiliary Societies established, of which two are in connection with colleges or schools.

For the first series of the Library of Political Education, the following elementary works were selected for the year’s course of reading :

Politics for Young Americans, by Chas. Nordhoff. (Including the Constitution of the United States, etc.) Harper & Bros. [Copyr. 1875.] 200 pp., 75 cents.
History of American Politics by Alex. Johnston. Henry Holt & Co. [Copyr. 1879.] 12×274 pp., 75 cents.
Introduction to Political Economy, by Prof. A. L. Perry. Chas. Scribner’s Sons. [Copyr. 1877.] 348 pp., $1.50.
Alphabet in Finance, by Graham McAdam. G. P. Putnam’s Sons. [Copyr. 1876.] 22×210 pp., $1.25.

The price of the set of four books of the first series, delivered at any post-office in the United States, will be $3.25. (If bought separately, in the publishers’ editions, these volumes would cost $4.25,) The price of the Society’s edition of the second series (the three volumes of which are issued by the publishers at $7.00) will be $5.00.

If any member cannot procure these books from the local booksellers, he should address Messrs. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 27 and 29 West 23d Street, New York; Jansen, McClurg & Co., 119 State Street, Chicago ; or W. B. Clarke & Carruth, 340 Washington Street, Boston, Mass., who are the publishing agents of the Society.

The official year begins on the 1st of January.

Letters of inquiry should enclose return postage.

Money should be sent by draft, postal order, or registered letter to the Secretary.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

Finance Committee:
Hon. David A. Wells, Norwich, Conn.; Geo. S. Coe, New York City; Horace White, New York City.

E. M. Shepard, Treasurer (120 Broadway), office address, 4 Morton St.,
R. L. Dugdale, Secretary for the East, 4 Morton St., N. Y. City.
Edwin Burritt Smith, Secretary for the Northwest, 142 Dearborn St., Chicago, Ill.
B. R. Forman, Secretary for the Southwest, P. O. Box 2415, New Orleans, La.
F. W. Dawson, Secretary for the Southeast, P. O. Box D 5, Charleston, S. C.
W. W. Crane, Jr., Secretary for the Pacific Slope, P. O. Box 915, Oakland, Cal.

Prof. W. G. Sumner, Yale College, New Haven, Ct.
Charles Francis Adams, Jr., Boston, Mass.
Geo. Haven Putnam, New York City.
R. R. Bowker, New York City.
A. Sydney Biddle, Philadelphia, Pa.
Jno. Watts Kearny, Louisville, Ky.
Worthington C. Ford, Brooklyn, N. Y.
Horace Rublee, Milwaukee, Wis.
Archibald Mitchell, New Orleans, La.
Franklin MacVeagh, Chicago, Ill.
Gen. Bradley Johnson, Baltimore, Md.
Robert P. Porter, New York City.
John H. Ames, Lincoln, Neb.
Geo. Mason, Galveston, Texas.
Peter Hamilton, Mobile, Ala.
E. D. Barbour, Boston, Mass.
M. L. Scudder, Jr., Chicago, Ill.

The following Economic Tracts have been issued during the year (series 1880-81):

“What is a Bank ? What Services does it Perform?” by Edward Atkinson, of Boston. Price 10 cents.

“Political Economy and Political Science”: a priced and classified list of books on political economy, taxation, currency, land tenure, free trade and protection, the Constitution of the United States, civil service, co-operation, etc., compiled by Prof. W. G. Sumner, of Yale College, David A. Wells, W. E. Foster, R. L. Dugdale, and G. H. Putnam. Price, 25 cents.

“Present Political and Economic Issues”: a collection of questions for debate, and subjects for essays on current topics in American politics; with an appendix of questions proposed for discussion before the Political Economy Club of London, by J. Stuart Mill, George Grote, and others; and questions debated by the Société d’ Économie Politique of Paris. Price 10 cents.

“The Usury Question”: comprising an abridgment of the famous essays of Jeremy Bentham and the letters of John Calvin; the speech of the Hon. Richard H. Dana, Jr., before the Massachusetts Legislature; a summary of the results of the present usury laws of the United States, by the Hon. David A. Wells ; and a short bibliography on the subject of interest. Price, 25 cents.

There have been six thousand of these Economic Tracts distributed, every member receiving a set of the series for his membership fee. (These tracts may still be obtained of the Secretary at the prices named, or by forwarding 50 cents for the series.)

A series of tracts will be published and distributed to members during 1882 as in 1880-81, the subjects of which will be announced from time to time.

The Executive Committee has selected the following books for the course of reading for 1882, which will constitute the second series of the LIBRARY OF POLITICAL EDUCATION:

A History of Political Economy in Europe, by Jérôme-Adolphe Blanqui; translated by Miss Emily J. Leonard. 628 pp., $3.50.

Money and the Mechanism of Exchange, by J. Stanley Jevons. 402 pp., $1.75.

On Liberty, by John Stuart Mill, 204 pp., $1.50.

Members who join for the year 1882 may read either the first or the second series of the Library, but the Committee recommends them to begin with the first series, unless they have already read the books comprised in it.

In order to enable persons in places where no public library is accessible, to procure, at a reduced rate, the volumes recommended by the Executive Committee for the annual courses of reading, the Committee has arranged for special editions of these in uniform binding, with the imprint of the Society upon the cover, which will be issued in annual series under the general title of the Library of Political Education, and can be supplied only in sets.

Source: From the front and back material included with Alphonse Courtois, Political Economy in One Lesson. Translated from the Journal des Économistes by Worthington C. Ford. New York: The Society for Political Education, Economic Tract No. V., 1882.

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