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  • McCulloch of Ohio: For the Republic by Mark Bernstein
  • Jerry M. Lewis
McCulloch of Ohio: For the Republic. By Mark Bernstein ( New Bremen, Ohio: Equipment Corporation, 2014. 302 pp. Cloth $22.50, isbn 978-0692-20436-8.)

This volume is a narrative biography of William Moore McCulloch, a longtime member of the United States House of Representatives from the Fourth District of Ohio. McCulloch was born in 1901 on a farm in Holmes [End Page 97] County, Ohio. The farm had limited amenities and even lacked electricity. Hard work, including milking cows and husking corn by hand, governed his youthful farming life.

McCulloch was the first member of his family to go to college when he enrolled in 1920 in the College of Wooster, Ohio, near his home. He majored in political science as a preparation for law school. He later attended the Ohio State University Law School in Columbus, Ohio, graduating in 1925.

He began to practice law in Florida, but after a few years returned to Piqua, Ohio, located in the southwest part of the state, which remained his base for the rest of his life. In 1933 he was elected as a Republican to the Ohio House of Representatives from Miami County. In 1936 he was elected minority leader and in 1939 Speaker of the Ohio House. During World War II, he served two years in a civil affairs unit providing administration for parts of France and Germany.

In November 1947, he was elected to Congress from the Fourth District of Ohio, eventually serving thirteen consecutive terms. Bernstein offers numerous examples to demonstrate the McCulloch campaign style. “Years later, he told a junior member of his law firm, ‘Always run scared’” (54). This meant reaching out to voters by attending county fairs and having conversations with constituents ranging from farmers to retailers in his district.

McCulloch was very conservative as was the Fourth District. A lifelong Republican, he was so frugal with costs that he often returned some of his unused congressional office expense money to the government. He supported just one of President Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” programs and that was health care for the elderly. A poll showed that 77 percent of the respondents in the District wanted to reduce both the federal income tax as well as federal spending.

Why should we be interested in McCulloch? Because of his leadership with regard to civil rights legislation. The intriguing issue is how a conservative congressman from a conservative district came to play such an important role in establishing one of the major civil rights legislation of the twentieth century: the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Some of the major provisions of the act included voting rights, public accommodations, desegregation of public education, extending the life of the Civil Rights Commission, and the creation of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

In chapters 13 and 14 of this biography, the author explores how McCulloch worked both privately and publicly to make sure the proposed bill would not be watered down through political compromise. In these [End Page 98] chapters we see McCulloch interacting with such political actors as Robert Kennedy, Emanuel Celler, John Lindsey, Everett Dirksen, and, of course, presidents Kennedy and Johnson. The bill that became the Civil Right Act was, according to the New York Times writer, Adam Clymer, “McCulloch’s Bill” (119). McCulloch was also important in getting the act passed in Senate as well the conference’s joint bill.

Many prominent people recognized McCulloch’s contribution to civil rights. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, on learning of McCulloch’s planned retirement, wrote: “You made a personal commitment to President Kennedy in October, 1963. … There were so many opportunities to sabotage the bill … but never took them. On the contrary, you brought everyone along with you” (240).

Do we have the answer to the question of why McCulloch took the leadership that led to the passage of major civil rights legislation? Bernstein provides a clue when he quotes McCulloch, saying, “Black power is voting power. The cry of a nonvoter in a representative government is silent cry. Let the black voices be heard” (221). Bernstein suggests that he supported the legislation because McCulloch...

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