Negative political campaigns are nothing new
By Don Lark
Friday, September 05, 2008 at 12:23 p.m.
Read more: Local, Politics, Election
SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY -- A display of campaign memorabilia now on exhibit at Syracuse University's Bird Library confirms that negative presidential election campaigns are nothing new. This collection was donated by a local attorney who had been captain of the SU football team back in 1899.
"It's hard to get much nastier than some of the earliest elections in our nation's past" says Sean Quimby, director of the Special Collections Research Center at Syracuse University Library. "My personal favorite item comes from the 1940 election which shows a wild haired anarchist indicating that he'd like to vote for Roosevelt, thereby associating all Roosevelt supporters with that sort of personality."
Sean Quimby says the timing of this display is no accident, coinciding as it does with the Barack Obama - John McCain Campaign. "I would say what makes this election curious more than anything else, is that there's the claim of niceness even while these same sorts of attacks are being made."
The public is invited to visit the Bird Library display between until January 20, 2009. That, of course, is the date our next president will take the oath of office. The exhibit will then come down, but will always be available for scholarly research.
