Black and white photographs of two men's head and shoulders with red text above and black text below on a white background

This button is from 1968, when George Wallace ran for the presidency as an independent candidate. Wallace, the governor of Alabama, chose Curtis LeMay as his running mate, and ran mainly in the hopes of ending attempts at desegregation. His platform mainly focused on continued segregation and increases in benefits for Social Security and Medicare. Though Wallace won the support of five southern states, he lost the election to Richard Nixon. After the election, he returned to being governor, but was paralyzed in 1972 as the result of a failed assassination attempt. This did not stop him from being elected governor of Alabama twice more, and having recanted his racist beliefs and asked forgiveness of the black community, Wallace retired from politics in 1987, and died in 1998.

George Wallace. (n.d.). Retrieved December 11, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Wallace.

Blue text on a white background and an illustration of a donkey with a blue outer edge

The words combined with the image of a donkey imply the phrase, “Oh, you ass.” Nathan Shure’s toy company, Cosmo Manufacturing Company, was founded in 1892 and was known for creating the trinkets found in Cracker Jack Boxes. In 1926, Cosmo Manufacturing Company bought the Dowst Brothers Company, which was famous for its tiny works created using metal (including buttons, cufflinks, and other metal accessories that were intended for promotional purposes). When Cosmo Manufacturing Company absorbed the Dowst Brothers Company, the name for the new combined business was Dowst Manufacturing Company. Although the Dowst Brothers Company was known for their metal items, any buttons that are labeled "Cosmo Manufacturing" were presumably made prior to 1926 when the companies merged and the name changed. In 1937, the repackaged board game “Monopoly” (which had first been released two years prior) included new metal tokens made by Dowst Manufacturing Company. Those token designs are still used in the classic edition of Monopoly today.

Yellow text on a red background

Mod, short for modernists, is a subculture that started in 1960's England. The original Mods were young people who listened to modern jazz and wore custom suiting in the Italian style. Because of the post-war economic boom, the younger generation was better educated with higher paying jobs, allowing them to have a disposable income. Mods used this income for their clothing and fashion went on to become a defining characteristic of this subculture. Mod culture became commercially successful with the “Swinging London” Mod style, made famous by It Girls, Edie Sedgwick and Twiggy. 

Music also plays a large role within the movement. In the 60’s, Mods frequented cafes and discotheques, staying up all night dancing to records that were a mix of modern jazz, ska, R&B, and psychedelic rock and roll. Bands such as The Who and The Kinks were popular Mod bands of the era who would go on find mainstream success. 

Mod culture went global and has many sub-groups, including the Swinging London scene, hard mods, and Scooter Boys. While this movement began in the 1960's, there have been revivals throughout the decades and Mod culture still lives on well into the 21st century.

White and black text on a red white and blue striped background

In 1992 Ross Perot, a businessman from Texas, announced on Larry King Live that he would run for the presidency as an independent candidate. Perot had no political experience but wanted to run out of a sense of dissatisfaction with politics and ran with the platform of increasing the war on drugs, balancing the federal budget, and making democracy easier by creating “electronic town halls”. Campaigning against Bill Clinton, who eventually won, Perot lost with 19% of the vote, the highest number of votes won by an independent candidate since 1912. Perot unsuccessfully ran against Bill Clinton again in 1996, and continues to be involved in politics and big business today.

Ross Perot Presidential Campaign, 1992. (n.d.). Retrieved December 2, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ross_Perot_presidential_campaign,_1992.

Illustration of an American flag with gold text above it on a white background

The Republican Party, also known as Grand Old Party (GOP), is one of two major political parties in the United States. The party was founded in 1854 supporting classical liberalism, opposing the expansion of slavery and supporting economic reform. However, the Republican ideology shifted in 1912 moving ideals to the right following the introduction of more political parties and ideals. After the Great Depression, Republican ideals shifted again further to the right, booting members of the party who the majority thought too socialist. Following the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Act of 1965, the parties core base shifted again becoming primarily Southern States composed of rural, men, and white Evangelical Christians, where the majority of its member demographics remain the same well into the 21st century.

Red text on a white background with blue and white photographs of two men in the middle and blue text between them

This button is for the 1996 re-election campaign of U.S. President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. They faced Republicans Bob Dole and Jack Kemp, as well as Ross Perot and Pat Choate of the Reform Party. Buoyed by a recovering economy and the portrayal of Dole as a clone of unpopular House of Representatives Speaker Newt Gingrich and one who would cut social programs, Clinton carried the election easily, 379 electoral votes to 159 for Dole and none for Perot.  The popular vote tally was 49.2% for Clinton, 40.7% for Dole, and 8.4% for Perot. The 49.0% voter turnout was the lowest for a presidential election since 1924.

Red and blue text on a white background with an illustration of a donkey in red white and blue in the center of the button

This button represents the United States Democratic Party and their use of the donkey as their official political party symbol. The first use of the donkey was in Andrew Jackson's 1828 presidential campaign. Jackson's opponents referred to him as a "jackass" due to his slogan, "Let the people rule!" Jackson embraced the donkey and later used it to describe himself as someone strong-willed and used it on his campaign posters. In 1870, political illustrator, Thomas Nast used the Democratic donkey inHarper's Weekly and is credited with making the donkey the Democratic party national symbol.  Nast used the donkey to illustrate an anti Civil War movement and the Democratic controlled newspapers in the South. By the 1880's the public incorporated the donkey as the unofficial party symbol.

Red text over an altertered photograph of four men in black and white striped prison clothes in front of a white background with measurements on it and black plaques in front of each man with their name and a number in white.

This button was created in 2004 to protest President Bush getting another term in the White House and to protest the Iraq War. President Bush and his Vice President Dick Cheney had been in office in 2003 when the United States began invading Iraq because of the erroneous belief that Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons following the 9/11 attacks. John Ashcroft was the Attorney General at the time and was a supporter of the Patriot Act, an unpopular act that allowed the government to monitor civilians suspected of terrorism, while Donald Rumsfeld served as the Secretary of Defense and had numerous allegations of torture and human rights abuses. There were many calls for the impeachment of the four, though most either resigned on their own or remained in office until Bush’s term was over in 2008.

The term “Gang of Four” has its origins in the four heads of the Chinese Communist Party after Mao Zedong’s death. The group included Jiang Qing, Zhang Chunqiao, Yao Wenyuan, and Wang Hongwen, all of whom faced trial for acting against the Communist Party, and all of whom were given long prison sentences for their crimes.

Gang of Four. (n.d.). Retrieved December 3, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_Four.

Iraq War. (n.d.). Retrieved December 3, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War.

White text on a blue stipe across the top of the button with a red bacckground on the bottom and a black and white photograph of two men in front of flags.

The photograph on this button is an offical White House photograph of U.S. President Richard Nixon and the King of Rock, Elvis Presley. The photo documents the bizarre encounter that occurred in the Oval Office on December 21, 1970, when Elvis Presley and President Nixon met. This is a humorous button suggesting Richard Nixon and Elvis Presley run for the 1996 presidential election. 

Red text on a dark blue background with a white outer ring and a red line through the middle

This button was for the 1968 presidential ticket of Republicans Richard M. Nixon and his running mate, Spiro Agnew. They campaigned on a platform of restoring law and order after widespread rioting following Martin Luther King's assassination and Vietnam War protests, appointing judges less active in influencing social policy, and ending the draft. Nixon and Agnew faced Democratic challengers Hubert H. Humprey and Edmund Muskie as well as George Wallace and Curtis LeMay of the American Independent Party. Humphrey, vice president under Lyndon B. Johnson, promised to continue his Great Society and War on Poverty policies. Wallace, former Governor of Alabama, campaigned as a segregationist and "law and order" candidate.

Though Wallace siphoned off some votes from Nixon supporters, Nixon won the election with 301 electoral votes to 191 for Humphrey and 46 for Wallace, who won 5 states. It was the last election in which a third-party candidate won all of a state's electoral votes, and also the last time New York had the most electoral college votes of any state. Agnew resigned in 1973 after pleading no contest to a charge of tax fraud. Nixon served as president before resigning in 1974 in the wake of the Watergate scandal.