During the presidential contest of 1884, Republicans used singing as a campaign tactic at rallies, meetings, and parades. Their songs may be divided into several categories, such as rally songs, songs of praise for the party and its candidate, "bloody shirt" songs, mudslinging songs, and issue-based songs. Songs provide a perspective on the overall tenor of the campaign, while a lack of songs on certain topics, such as temperance, reflects the party's reluctance to alienate voters by taking a strong stand on controversial issues. Although the campaign has often been called one of the dirtiest in American history, this negativity is not reflected in the majority of the songs.

Conservative males traditionally dominated Texas politics. In 1930, however, Sarah T. Hughes, a liberal woman from Maryland, began a spectacular career in state politics despite obstacles because of her gender and progressive ideas. First elected to the Texas Legislature in 1930, she remained active in politics for the next fifty years. Hard work, intelligence, and ability allowed her to form solid friendships with Texas's most powerful politicians. She became the first woman in Texas to hold a district judgeship, the first woman from Texas appointed to the federal bench, and the only woman to swear in a U.S. president. Hughes profoundly influenced state politics, challenging the long-standing conservative male domination. She helped to create a more diverse political field that today encompasses different ideologies and both genders.

This study analyzes the impact of eighteenth-century commercialization on the evolution of the English and southern American landed classes with regard to three genteel leadership qualities--education, vocation, and personal characteristics. A simultaneous comparison provides a clearer view of how each adapted, or failed to adapt, to the social and economic change of the period. The analysis demonstrates that the English gentry did not lose a class struggle with the commercial ranks as much as they were overwhelmed by economic changes they could not understand. The southern landed class established an economy based on production of cash crops and thus adapted better to a commercial economy. The work addresses the development of class-consciousness in England and the origins of Virginia's landed class.

The purpose of this study is to examine how English natural philosophers of the seventeenth century—in particular, Robert Boyle (1627-1691) considered and assessed the personal traits of skill and experience and the significance of these characteristics to the practice of seventeenth-century science. Boyle's writings reveal that skill and experience impacted various aspects of his seventeenth-century experimental natural philosophy, including the credibility assessment of tradesmen and eyewitnesses to natural phenomena, the contingencies involved in the making of experiments, and Boyle's statements about the requisite skills of experimental philosophy in contrast to other traditions. Subtopics explored include the popularization of science and Boyle's expectations concerning the future improvement of natural philosophy.

Much work has been done over the last fifty years in the study of the English ecclesiastical courts. One court that thus far has escaped much significant scholarly attention, however, is the one located in Chester, England. The author analyzes the acta of that court in order to determine what types of cases were being heard during the years 1540-42. His analysis shows that the Chester court did not deviate significantly from the general legal and theological structure and function of Tudor church courts of the period.

This thesis will demonstrate that the British leaders saw the policy of non-intervention during the Spanish Civil War as the best option available under the circumstances, and will also focus on the role of the Royal Navy in carrying out that policy. Unpublished sources include Cabinet and Admiralty papers. Printed sources include the Documents on British Foreign Policy, newspaper and periodical articles, and memoirs. This thesis, covering the years 1936-37, is broken down into six chapters, each covering a time frame that reflected a change of policy or naval mission. The non-intervention policy was seen as the best available at the time, but it was shortsighted and ignored potentially serious long-term consequences.

I analyze the behavior of Jews imprisoned in the Treblinka, Sobibór, and Birkenau extermination camps in order to illustrate a systematic process of deception and psychological conditioning, which the Nazis employed during World War II to preclude Jewish resistance to the Final Solution. In Chapter I, I present resistance historiography as it has developed since the end of the war. In Chapter II, I delineate my own argument on Jewish behavior during the Final Solution, limiting my definition of resistance and the applicability of my thesis to behavior in the extermination camp, or closed, environment. In Chapters III, IV, and V, I present a detailed narrative of the Treblinka, Sobibór, and Birkenau revolts using secondary sources and selected survivor testimony. Finally, in Chapter VI, I isolate select parts of the previous narratives and apply my argument to demonstrate its validity as an explanation for Jewish behavior.