VIRGINIA ELECTION BALLOT, 1948. SIGNED BY THE PRESIDENTIAL & VICE-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES FOR 5 OF THE 6 CONTESTING PARTIES.

Broadside, 17 x 8 1/2 in. One small chip to the upper outer corner of the ballot, not affecting text. The official printed ballot for the General Election to be held on November 2, 1948, in Bedford County, Virginia. The candidates for the offices of President and Vice-President of the United States are shown for the Democratic, Republican, States Right's Democrats, Socialist Labor, Progressive, and Socialist Parties, as well as the candidates for U.S. Senator, House of Representatives for the Sixth District, for the full term, and for the special election unexpired term. The ballot has been boldly signed, over the appropriate printed sections for their parties, by Harry Truman and Allen W. Barkley; Thomas E. Dewey and Earl Warren; J. Strom Thurmond and F[ielding] L[ewis] Wright; Henry A. Wallace and Glen Taylor; and Norman Thomas and Tucker P. Smith. Only the Socialist Labor Party candidates Edward D. Teichert and Stephen Emery are lacking. There is an ink blot near Dewey's signature, but all the autographs are quite legible. Item #60236

The 1948 Presidential election pitted Harry Truman of the Democratic party against his primary opponent Thomas Dewey of the Republican party. Post war upheaval in social and economic conditions also gave rise to a re-created Progressive party and the "Dixiecrats" of Strom Thurmond. The Socialist Party fielded Norman Thomas as their candidate. Though Truman was leading in the popular vote, the general consensus was that the Democrats would lose, in a splintered environment. The "Chicago Daily Tribune" went so far as to print their infamous headline before the polls closed: "Dewey Defeats Truman."
This broadside electoral ballot contains the signatures of all the major players in Presidential politics of the post-Roosevelt era. Truman took Virginia, and the election.

Price: $4,500.00