Pennsylvania’s Protestant Politics

Chapter 9 discusses how Pennsylvania gave Franklin more room for his talents, doubts, and questions than Boston did, thanks to the Quakers’ commitment to intellectual and religious freedom. The colony’s religious diversity, especially among German Protestants, was a challenge to its well-being especially when Quaker pacifism proved a liability in defending against French and Native American military forces. It shows how Franklin continued to rely on his knowledge of Protestantism and skills as a civic leader while he served in the Pennsylvania Assembly during the French and Indian War and then as the colony’s chief negotiator in London with the Penn family and British government officials in efforts to secure a royal charter for Pennsylvania.

EDWARD EVERETT GORE: CONTRIBUTIONS OF AN EARLY 20TH CENTURY CPA AND CIVIC LEADER

Edward Everett Gore was the president of the American Institute of Accountants from 1922-1924. At the same time he was leading the accounting profession, he was the president of the Chicago Association of Commerce. He was later founder and president of the Chicago Crime Commission during the era when Alphonse Capone was terrorizing the city. He was responsible for the passage of the first Illinois CPA law and the establishment of the Journal of Accountancy and the AICPA Benevolent Fund . He wrote portions of the 1913 tax law and campaigned for the establishment of the Internal Revenue’s Board of Tax Appeals (Tax Court). He played an important leadership role in professionalizing public accounting during the first quarter of the twentieth century, and his civic work in the Chicago area extended his legacy beyond the realm of accountancy.

Pens, Planes, and Politics

This chapter combines political, labor, and cultural history methodologies to compare the Lockheed aircraft factory in Marietta, Georgia, and the Scripto pen and pencil factory in nearby Atlanta. While the mostly male employees at Lockheed, a majority-white plant, enjoyed the job security delivered by defense contracts at the height of the Cold War military-industrial complex, the Scripto workers, the majority of whom were African American women, faced the more capricious turns of the market. Many of the disparities between these factories stemmed from their common management history found in the career of attorney, businessman, and civic leader, James V. Carmichael. Although situated within close geographical proximity, Lockheed and Scripto helped create disparate racial, political, and cultural worlds in the mid-twentieth century. The tale of these two factories uncovers the stark contrasts between the ways race, gender, and government intervention shaped different sectors of the postwar southern economy.

The Barrister

As a legislator, James Hughes drafted laws to reform the muddled property laws inherited from Virginia; as an attorney, he litigated the myriad land cases that clogged the new commonwealth’s courts. While waiting to have his many cases heard in the Kentucky Court of Appeals, he took detailed notes on the cases he observed. To these accounts he added notes from his own arguments and those of his friends and fashioned the first case reporter for the state of Kentucky. Hughes was also a Lexington civic leader.

The Reporter Who Was Not

Achilles Sneed was the clerk of the Kentucky Court of Appeals from 1801 until he was ousted in 1824 as a result of the Old Court–New Court controversy. He was a Frankfort civic leader, and his home still stands near the Old Capitol and adjacent to the Kentucky Historical Society.

The Banker

The details of the life of James Parks Metcalfe are elusive, despite his success as a lawyer, banker, and civic leader. He thrived as a behind-the-scenes operator, advising both politicians and clients while quietly building a fortune that would take him from his widowed mother’s rural home to an estate in the suburbs of Lexington. He was an adviser to Kentucky governor Lazarus Powell and to congressman, US vice president, and Confederate general John C. Breckinridge, as well as a member of the Central Committee of the Kentucky Democratic Party. He promoted Lexington’s growth through the establishment of the University of Kentucky.