Get Out the Vote!

The Asso­ci­at­ed Press reports that “Rough­ly 3 in 4 Amer­i­cans believe the upcom­ing pres­i­den­tial elec­tion is vital to the future of U.S. democ­ra­cy” (Swen­son & Sanders, 2024, para. 1). Whichev­er can­di­date wins in Novem­ber will car­ry the immense respon­si­bil­i­ty of gov­ern­ing a nation divid­ed by par­ti­san­ship. How­ev­er, sev­er­al pres­i­dents faced grave cir­cum­stances dur­ing their terms of office, most notably Abra­ham Lin­coln, who gov­erned dur­ing our country’s Civ­il War.

Abraham Lincoln

A recent sur­vey of pres­i­den­tial schol­ars con­duct­ed between Novem­ber 15 and Decem­ber 31, 2023, finds Abra­ham Lin­coln remains America’s great­est pres­i­dent (Rot­ting­haus & Vaughn, 2024). For the author-illus­tra­tor pair Ingri and Edgar Parin d’Aulaire, “Lin­coln was America’s shin­ing sym­bol of democ­ra­cy, fair­ness, and tol­er­ance, … stand­ing against tyran­ny, prej­u­dice, and injus­tice” (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). Their 1940 Calde­cott Medal win­ner Abra­ham Lin­coln has nev­er gone out of print. The d’Aulaires trav­eled through­out Ken­tucky and Illi­nois, draw­ing in their note­books to cap­ture authen­tic details of Lincoln’s world from his birth to the pres­i­den­cy (Gross, 2015). Work­ing as a team on both art and text, they were once described as “one uni­ty with two heads, four hands, and one hand­writ­ing” (Hoke, 2002, p. 119).

The illus­tra­tions for their book were cre­at­ed with “lith­o­graph­ic pen­cil on stone” (ALSC, 2020, p. 166). This process involved “etch­ing the draw­ing five times on indi­vid­ual stone slabs (weigh­ing from 50 – 100 pounds) and print­ing these per­fect­ly matched stones in five col­ors.” This was labor inten­sive work, but the d’Aulaires chose the “ … process of stone lith­o­g­ra­phy to cre­ate books they believed offered the child read­er the beau­ty and col­or inten­si­ty of hand draw­ings” (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). Rea Berg, edi­tor and founder of Beau­ti­ful Feet Books, said, “They were con­sid­ered the first illus­tra­tors to actu­al­ly make children’s books an art form” (Gross, 2015, para. 3).

After a time, print­ers were unwill­ing to con­tin­ue work­ing with the heavy stone slabs required for lith­o­g­ra­phy. They switched to acetate film, which some felt lacked the “qual­i­ty, clar­i­ty, and col­or” of the orig­i­nal art (Berg, 2008, Publisher’s Note). So, in 1957, the d’Aulaires began redraw­ing the illus­tra­tions for all their books, includ­ing Abra­ham Lin­coln. Read­ers may not be able to dis­tin­guish dif­fer­ences in “qual­i­ty, clar­i­ty, and col­or” in the new edi­tion, but there are some slight dif­fer­ences in the illus­tra­tions, and also in the page lay­outs and text. The orig­i­nal 1939 edi­tion includ­ed cul­tur­al stereo­types from that time peri­od, and they were not all erased in the 1957 edition.

Abraham Lincoln
Orig­i­nal 1939 edi­tion of Abra­ham Lin­coln, as recre­at­ed by Beau­ti­ful Feet Books 
Abraham Lincoln
Abra­ham Lin­coln, the 1957 edition

In 2008, to hon­or the d’Aulaire’s art, Beau­ti­ful Feet Books pub­lish­ers scanned repro­duc­tions of the orig­i­nal art for Abra­ham Lin­coln acquired by Yale Uni­ver­si­ty. They want­ed to recre­ate a book as close as pos­si­ble to the orig­i­nal. In 2015, Beau­ti­ful Feet Books pub­lished a 75th Anniver­sary edi­tion, and with per­mis­sion from the D’Aulaire estate, they made “minor mod­i­fi­ca­tions to the orig­i­nal art and text to reflect con­tem­po­rary views of race pol­i­tics and to reflect his­tor­i­cal accu­ra­cy” (Gross, 2015, para. 9). One exam­ple is Lin­coln walk­ing down the street with enslaved peo­ple bow­ing to him. Gross quotes pub­lish­er Berg, “The orig­i­nal didn’t say that he actu­al­ly shook hands with them. So we altered his face and made him shake hands with the for­mer slaves and added in what he actu­al­ly said in the his­tor­i­cal record, which was, ‘Do not kneel to me.’”

Abraham Lincoln
illus­tra­tion from Abra­ham Lin­coln, 2008 edition
Abraham Lincoln
illus­tra­tion from Abra­ham Lin­coln, 2015 edition

Lin­coln is often referred to as “Hon­est Abe.” In the 2001 Calde­cott Medal book So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, Judith St. George advis­es, “One thing is cer­tain, if you want to be Pres­i­dent — and stay Pres­i­dent — be hon­est.” She humor­ous­ly com­pares and con­trasts pres­i­dents from George Wash­ing­ton to Bill Clin­ton with David Small’s droll polit­i­cal car­toon style illus­tra­tions in “water col­or, ink, and pas­tel chalk”  (ALSC, 2020, p. 115 ) that are com­i­cal “with­out being too offen­sive” (Small, 2001, p. 414).

There have been two revised edi­tions of the book in 2004 and 2012. With thought­ful lay­outs and com­po­si­tion, Small deft­ly left room for addi­tions to his illus­tra­tions. Note spaces in the end­pa­pers of the 2000 edi­tion that allowed Small to insert both George W. Bush on the rec­to and Barack Oba­ma on the ver­so in the 2012 edition.

So You Want to be President
illus­tra­tion © by David Small from So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2000 edition
So You Want to Be President
illus­tra­tion © by David Small from So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2012 edition

Also, on the page on which St. George writes, “A Pres­i­dent in your fam­i­ly tree is a plus,” Small inserts George H. W. and George W. Bush pop­ping out of a bush.

So You Want to Be President
illus­tra­tion © David Small from
So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2000 edition
So You Want to Be President
illus­tra­tion © David Small from
So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2012 edition

On anoth­er page, St. George states, “No per­son of col­or has been Pres­i­dent … Almost two hun­dred years passed before a woman — Geral­dine Fer­raro — ran for Vice Pres­i­dent.” In the 2000 edi­tion, Jesse Jack­son and Geral­dine Fer­raro are roped off from the pres­i­den­tial cock­tail par­ty. In the 2012 edi­tion, Barack Oba­ma bounds into the room replac­ing Jack­son and Fer­raro and the sen­tence “No per­son of col­or has been Pres­i­dent” has been removed. Sad­ly, Judith St. George passed away in 2015, so it is doubt­ful there will be anoth­er edition.

So You Want to Be President
illus­tra­tion © David Small from So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2000 edition
So You Want to Be President
illus­tra­tion © David Small from So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?, 2012 edition

In his Calde­cott accep­tance speech, Small explained that he had been an edi­to­r­i­al artist for The New York­er, The New York Times, and The Wash­ing­ton Post. He described illus­trat­ing this book as a “chance to com­bine the work I’d been doing for years as an edi­to­r­i­al artist … with the work I’d been doing — also for years — in children’s books” (Small, 2001, p. 413). Small treats the pres­i­dents with dig­ni­ty while incor­po­rat­ing car­i­ca­tur­is­tic and amus­ing details about each of them. Ani­ta Sil­vey writes, “If on elec­tion day you are eager for some humor and light­heart­ed­ness, pick up So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent?” (Sil­vey, 2012, p. 307).

After a long and bru­tal cam­paign, we may need some light­heart­ed­ness. Some may not even want to vote. But, we should not take our right to vote for grant­ed. Not every­one always had that right; they had to fight for it, as did Fan­nie Lou Hamer. In free-verse poems, Car­ole Boston Weath­er­ford tells the sto­ry of Hamer and all she suf­fered in this strug­gle: she was arrest­ed and beat­en, received death threats and had to flee, all in the effort to reg­is­ter peo­ple to vote. Ekua Holmes illus­trates Hamer’s brave life in rich earth tone col­lages incor­po­rat­ing his­tor­i­cal pho­tos, newsprint, maps, fab­ric, lay­ers of paint, and musi­cal scores. She won a 2016 Calde­cott Hon­or, 2016 Sib­ert Hon­or, and 2016 Coret­ta Scott King John Step­toe New Tal­ent Illus­tra­tor Award for Weatherford’s Voice of Free­dom: Fan­nie Lou Hamer, Spir­it of the Civ­il Rights Move­ment.

Hamer grew up in Sun­flower Coun­ty, Mis­sis­sip­pi, and one of Holmes’ motifs through­out the book is the sun­flower. She says, “The sun­flower is my icon” (Holmes, 2017, p. 45). She uses yel­low to show hope and dark­er hues for the more somber poems.

illus­tra­tion © Ekua Holmes from Voice of Free­dom Fan­nie Lou Hamer
illus­tra­tion © Ekua Holmes from Voice of Free­dom Fan­nie Lou Hamer

Hamer didn’t learn she had the right to vote until 1962 when she was in her 40s. While the 15th Amend­ment secured vot­ing rights to all races, states could still deter­mine qual­i­fi­ca­tions for suf­frage such as lit­er­a­cy tests and poll tax­es. She tried vot­ing, failed, and was sin­gled out for attacks by night rid­ers. In the illus­tra­tion above, a fun­nel of light focus­es on Hamer, dressed in yel­low, while her assaulters recede in shad­ow. Hamer cast her first vote in 1964 for her­self as she ran for Con­gress in the Mis­sis­sip­pi Demo­c­ra­t­ic primary.

Though she nev­er won an elec­tion, Hamer con­tin­ued to work for civ­il rights and vot­ing rights. Weath­er­ford writes,

I couldn’t rest — no, I couldn’t.

Not as long as blacks was poor,

Schools was segregated,

And black teach­ers was dis­crim­i­nat­ed against.

Not as long as laws be hold­ing women back.

Weath­er­ford goes on to quote Hamer as say­ing, “We serve God by serv­ing our fel­low man.”

Judith St. George echoes that sen­ti­ment as she ends her book So You Want to Be Pres­i­dent? She writes, “If you want to be Pres­i­dent — a good Pres­i­dent — pat­tern your­self after the best. Our best have asked more of them­selves than they thought they could give. They have had the courage, spir­it, and will to do what they knew was right. Most of all, their first pri­or­i­ty has always been the peo­ple and the coun­try they served.”

These are words to pon­der when choos­ing a can­di­date for pres­i­dent. Peo­ple like Fan­nie Lou Hamer fought for everyone’s right to vote. You have that right. Exer­cise it.

vote button
Picture Books Cited

d’Aulaire, I. & E.P. (1939, 1957). Abra­ham Lin­coln. Dou­ble­day.

d’Aulaire, I. & E.P. (2008, 2015). Abra­ham Lin­coln. Beau­ti­ful Feet Books.

St. George, J. & Small, D. (2000, 2012). So you want to be pres­i­dent? Philomel Books.

Weath­er­ford, C. B. & Holmes, E. (2015). Voice of free­dom: Fan­nie Lou Hamer, spir­it of the civ­il rights move­ment. Can­dlewick Press.

References

Asso­ci­a­tion for Library Ser­vice to Chil­dren (ALSC). (2020). The New­bery and Calde­cott Awards: A Guide to the Medal and Hon­or Books. Amer­i­can Library Association.

Berg, R. (2008). Publisher’s note. In I. & E.P. d’Aulaire, Abra­ham Lin­coln. Beau­ti­ful Feet Books.

Gross, A. (2015, Decem­ber 1). Small Calif. press revives Calde­cott book on Abra­ham Lin­coln. Pub­lish­ers Weekly.

Hoke, E.C. (2002). D’Aulaire, Edgar Parin, D’Aulaire, Ingri. In A. Sil­vey (Ed.). The Essen­tial Guide to Children’s Books and Their Cre­ators (pp. 118 – 119). Houghton Mifflin.

Holmes, E. (2017, January/February). Non­fic­tion hon­or books. The Horn Book Mag­a­zine, 44 – 45.

Rot­ting­haus, B. & Vaughn, J.S. (2024). Offi­cial results of the 2024 Pres­i­den­tial Great­ness Project expert sur­vey. Pres­i­den­tial Great­ness Project.

Sil­vey, A. (2012). Children’s Book-a-Day Almanac. Roar­ing Brook Press.

Small, D. (2001, June/July). Calde­cott accep­tance speech. The Horn Book Mag­a­zine, 411 – 419.

Swen­son, A. & Sanders, L. (2024, August 8). Major­i­ty of US adults say democ­ra­cy is on the bal­lot but they dif­fer on the threat: AP-NORC poll.

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

0 Comments
Oldest
Newest
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments