Our Collection

At the Institute’s core is the Gilder Lehrman Collection, one of the great archives in American history. More than 85,000 items cover five hundred years of American history, from Columbus’s 1493 letter describing the New World through the end of the twentieth century.

Cooley, Stoughton (1861-1934) to Richard Henry Dana

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Gilder Lehrman Collection #: GLC03481.23 Author/Creator: Cooley, Stoughton (1861-1934) Place Written: Chicago, Illinois Type: Typed letter signed Date: 7 January 1893 Pagination: 1 p. ; 28 x 21.6 cm. Order a Copy

Cooley writes from the American Proportional Representation League to Dana, lawyer and son of Richard Henry Dana, Jr. States "In view of the national conference for good city government to be held in Philadelphia the 25th instant, permit me to call your attention to a practical means whereby the end sought can the more easily be attained. However intelligent and virtuous the citizenship may be come, whatever its aims may be, the better the tools with which is has to work the better will be the results. Proportional representation is the best political tool yet devised for accomplishing political action..." Typed on America Proportional Representation League stationery.

Dana organized Associated Charities of Boston and drafted the Civil Service Reform Act of Massachusetts in 1894. Cooley wrote the article "Proportional Representation" published in the New England Magazine, March 1893.

Dana, Richard Henry, 1851-1931
Cooley, Stoughton, 1861-1934

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