Lighting the Way or Attack Politics

Lighting the Way: Nine Women Who Changed Modern America

Author: Karenna Gore Schiff

Karenna Gore Schiff's nationally bestselling narrative tells the fascinating stories of nine influential women, who each in her own way, tackled inequity and advocated change throughout the turbulent twentieth century.

Ida B. Wells-Barnett, who was born a slave and fought against lynching; Mother Jones, an Irish immigrant who organized coal miners and campaigned against child labor; Alice Hamilton, who pushed for regulation of industrial toxins; Frances Perkins, who developed key New Deal legislation; Virginia Durr, who fought the poll tax and segregation; Septima Clark, who helped to register black voters; Dolores Huerta, who organized farm workers; Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias, an activist for reproductive rights; and Gretchen Buchenholz, one of the nation's leading child advocates.

Gore Schiff delivers an intimate and accessible account of the nine trail-blazing women who deserve not only to be honored but to have their example serve as beacons.

Karenna Gore Schiff has worked as a journalist, lawyer, and most recently, Director of Community Affairs for the Association to Benefit Children. The eldest daughter of Al and Tipper Gore, she lives in New York City with her husband and two children. This is her first book.

The New York Times - Alexandra Starr

… it is amazing to contemplate just how much these women were able to accomplish. They were intimately involved in some of the defining crusades of the 20th century, agitating for the end of Jim Crow laws in the South, basic worker protections and child labor regulations.

The fact that it's almost incomprehensible today that those policies were ever controversial speaks to the lasting nature of these women's legacies.

The Washington Post - Sara Sklaroff

That Schiff can write fluently of the faults and failures of these women bespeaks a triumph of feminism: Our heroes are not so fragile that we need coddle their memories. Wells-Barnett allows pride to cloud her judgment; Hamilton makes an incorrect scientific finding about the 1902 Chicago typhoid epidemic that allows city officials to stage a fatal coverup; even Anthony has a bad moment, criticizing Wells-Barnett for having the gall to take a husband. These are not paper-doll heroines: They are fully realized, flesh-and-blood women, flawed but all the more impressive for such complexity … at its best, Lighting the Way is solid popular social history, like a textbook for advanced high school students. By which I mean no insult: If these women's lives were now routinely taught in our schools, Schiff could consider her work a major success.

Publishers Weekly

Schiff, who is most notably Al Gore's oldest daughter and a lawyer and journalist, has put together a collective biography of nine outstanding American women of the 20th century-some unjustly little known. The more celebrated are Ida B. Wells-Barnett (1862-1931), an African-American journalist who brought the horrors of lynching to public attention; Mother Jones (c. 1837-1930), an Irish immigrant and lifelong crusader for workers' rights; and Frances Perkins (1882-1965), the first woman Cabinet member, appointed by FDR. Schiff also illuminates less renowned but highly influential figures, including Alice Hamilton (1869-1970) a physician and pioneer in calling attention to the dangers of industrial poisons, and Septima Poinsette Clark (1898-1987), child of a former slave, who became a teacher and tireless advocate for racial equality. Several of the subjects are still alive, like Dolores Huerta, cofounder with Cesar Chavez of the United Farm Workers, and Gretchen Buchenholz, who established the Association to Benefit Children. Schiff has done excellent research, and though her prose isn't especially stylish, she shows her heroines as fully rounded figures. She points out, for example, that Wells-Barnett's feud with the NAACP was counterproductive and that Mother Jones's opposition to women's suffrage limited her reach. (Feb. 8) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

KLIATT

In this collection of nine biographies, Schiff writes about women who were highly influential in the area of social justice. Some are better known than others, and the author highlights the important contributions of each and also points out some of their mistakes, which made them less effective, but very human. Many of the women knew each other or were strongly influenced by the others; three areas of social justice—workers' rights, women's and children's rights and civil rights—are well represented. Mother Jones, Alice Hamilton and Delores Heurta worked to protect workers' rights and their health; and Frances Perkins, the first female cabinet member worked within the government to create legal protections for workers. Ida B. Wells worked to stop lynching, Virginia Durr to abolish poll taxes, Septima Clark to educate people to be able to vote. Helen Rodriguez-Trias and Gretchen Buchenholz work on children's and women's health issues. These crusaders' childhoods and private lives are part of the larger picture and none are painted as saints, but instead as real women who sacrificed, made mistakes and achieved greatness. This is a wonderful book that will be an inspiration for girls especially.

Library Journal

In this spirited and engaging first book, Schiff, daughter of former Vice President Al Gore and Tipper Gore, profiles nine women who helped change the course of history by overcoming injustice in their own lives. Selected because they resonated with Schiff personally, these stories show how "political movements are built from the ground up, often by people who never receive credit for their eventual successes." The book is well researched and illustrated with black-and-white photographs throughout. Biographical details are placed in historical context, resulting in rich portraits that illustrate each woman's impact upon specific conditions of her day. For example, Schiff describes the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in her essay on Frances Perkins, FDR's secretary of labor, and explains the yellow fever epidemic of 1878 that orphaned Ida B. Wells, who became an antilynching activist and journalist. Schiff's other past and present women include the greater and lesser known: Mother Jones, Alice Hamilton, Virginia Durr, Septima Poinsette Clark, Dolores Huerta, Helen Rodriguez-Trias, and Gretchen Buchenholz, who founded the child advocacy organization where Schiff works. A prominent display of the dates of each woman's life would have helped general readers get oriented. Recommended for public libraries.-Donna L. Davey, Tamiment Lib., NYU Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

Lawyer and activist Schiff resurrects nine little-known heroines who played a crucial role in America's humanitarian development. The best antidote to current cynicism about politics, notes former vice president Al Gore's eldest, is to offer "stories of those who fought against it by keeping politics grounded in public service." Her narrative of grassroots activism begins with Ida B. Wells's 1890s campaign to bring the lynching of blacks to greater public attention and closes with Gretchen Buchenholz's dogged, ongoing crusade to promote the welfare of New York City's homeless families through the Association to Benefit Children (where Schiff formerly served as director of community affairs). Many of the stories discern the connection between personal experience and the crusade for social justice: After losing her husband and four children during the 1867 yellow-fever epidemic, Mother Jones transformed her devastation into tireless work for miners and children forced into unspeakable labor. Among other women featured is public-health official Alice Hamilton, whose work identifying unsafe factory conditions gained her a grudging invitation to teach at Harvard in 1919, making her the first woman to be appointed to the faculty, and Frances Perkins, the first female cabinet member, who paved an important direction in labor relations under FDR. Virginia Durr and Septima Poinsette Clark, as far apart in race, class and upbringing as two Southern women could be, helped turn back the pernicious tide of racism during the civil-rights era. Mexican-American Dolores Huerta collaborated with Cesar Chavez in establishing basic human rights for farm workers. Placed at the head of the beleaguered LincolnHospital's Pediatrics Collective in the South Bronx in 1970, Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias grew over the years into a passionate critic of forced sterilization and inequities of healthcare. Schiff takes particular note of the fact that many of her subjects sacrificed a happy home life to pursue their missions, entangled in the age-old conflict between family and work. Important reading for young and old alike.

Table of Contents:

	Ida B. Wells-Barnett	1
	Mother Jones	51
	Alice Hamilton	95
	Frances Perkins	130
	Virginia Durr	190
	Septima Poinsette Clark	252
	Dolores Huerta	297
	Helen Rodriguez-Trias	341
	Gretchen Buchenholz	390

New interesting book: Against the Terror of Neoliberalism or Fundamentals of Fire Fighter Skills

Attack Politics: Negativity in Presidential Campaigns since 1960

Author: Emmett H Buell

Ask most Americans, and they'll tell you that presidential campaigns get dirtier and more negative with every election. But Emmett Buell and Lee Sigelman suggest that may not be as true as we think. From Jimmy Carter's use of "fear arousal" in attacking Ronald Reagan to George Bush's allusions to the "L word" to disparage Michael Dukakis's liberalism, Buell and Sigelman show how, over the last dozen elections, negativity may have been well publicized but hasn't increased—and that John Kennedy waged the most negative campaign of all.

Buell and Sigelman focus on both presidential and vice-presidential nominees as sources and targets of attacks and also examine the actions of surrogate campaigners like the Swift Boat Vets. Drawing on the New York Times as a research base—more than 17,000 campaign statements extracted from nearly 11,000 news items—they provide a more comprehensive assessment of negativity than anything previously attempted.Beginning in 1960, Buell and Sigelman categorize campaigns according to their level of competitiveness—from runaways like 1964 to dead heats like 2000 and 2004—to demonstrate how candidates go negative as circumstances warrant or permit. They break down negativity into different components, showing who attacked whom, how frequently, on what issues, how they did it, and at what point in the campaign. They also compare their findings with previously published accounts of these campaigns—including first-hand accounts by candidates and their confidants. And, as an added bonus, each chapter features "echoes from the campaign trail" that reflect the invective exchanged by rival campaigns. Attack Politics pinsdown much about negative campaigning that has previously been speculated on but never subjected to such systematic research. It offers the best overview yet of modern presidential races and is must reading for anyone interested in the vagaries of those campaigns.This book is part of the Studies in Government and Public Policy series.

Donna L. Davey, Margaret Heilbrun - Library Journal

Political and media junkies will appreciate-and even be surprised by-the who, what, when, and how that Buell (public policy, Denison Univ.) and Sigelman (political science, George Washington Univ.) present up through the 2004 election. Looking at both presidential and vice-presidential nominees, they base their findings on campaign statements quoted in the New York Times, as well as published accounts by those involved in the campaigns. Cogent research and analysis, plus choice quotes, mean this deserves a place in every political history collection.

What People Are Saying

Richard Lau
This tour de force joins John Geer's In Defense of Negativity as a 'must read' for all scholars studying negative campaigns, but also for students of political communication, democratic deliberation, and campaign strategy more generally. (Richard Lau, author of Negative Campaigning: An Analysis of U.S. Senate Campaigns)

James W. Ceaser
In this remarkable book Buell and Sigelman provide not only the most systematic treatment of negative campaigning, but also the best account yet written of the development of the modern presidential campaign. Both political scientists and practitioners will want to have this work ready at hand in their library; it is the indispensable 'bible' on the subject. (James W. Ceaser, coauthor of Red over Blue: The 2004 Elections and American Politics)

Richard Lau

This tour de force joins John Geer's In Defense of Negativity as a 'must read' for all scholars studying negative campaigns, but also for students of political communication, democratic deliberation, and campaign strategy more generally. (Richard Lau, author of Negative Campaigning: An Analysis of U.S. Senate Campaigns)

James W. Ceaser

In this remarkable book Buell and Sigelman provide not only the most systematic treatment of negative campaigning, but also the best account yet written of the development of the modern presidential campaign. Both political scientists and practitioners will want to have this work ready at hand in their library; it is the indispensable 'bible' on the subject. (James W. Ceaser, coauthor of Red over Blue: The 2004 Elections and American Politics)