THE HONEST POLITICIAN AFFAIR—1902 [The Historical Mysteries] by Clarence Budington Kelland

He grew up in the Party, he had been a Party man all his life—but could any Party be right all the time?

Two mysterious murders! One of Kelland's strongest, wisest women! One of his most innocent, beset heroes! An inside look at American politics in its brawling infancy at the turn of the 1900s! In the mind of Clarence Budington Kelland, this was his most important novel.

This is the story of a man who believed in doing the right thing, and did. And his charisma could compel the public to back him. But he couldn't help seeing the political advantage in doing the right thing. It make him keep wondering: Did he keep making the honest choice for the right reasons ... or the wrong ones?

She was the woman who loved him more than life itself. She encouraged every choice he made. She was sure she knew why he kept making the right choice. But it was only when they shot him the first time that she finally knew the truth.

A passionate romance, a murder mystery and a brilliant novel of politics by a Washington insider, who would have been his party's vice-presidential candidate had Eisenhower not won the nomination.

"The education and enlightenment of a politician … Thomas Gladwin Cuyler, a night school law graduate, from the Fourth Ward of Tecumseh, is first blooded when he is a candidate for precinct committeeman in the horse and buggy days; the ten years of his career surround him with the knowledge of the venality and corruption in politics and determine his stand. He is technically aided by newspaperman Jim Cotton and ethically influenced by his wife, Lydia, who is determined that her powerful connections shall not color his own views. He outfaces a feared gang; he refuses to be a catspaw for the Party, he defies his law firm in proceeding against purveyors of tainted food; his belief that a man is not guilty of murder turns the police department upside down; as public prosecutor he uncovers fraud. When strikes hinder his early days as mayor, his dramatic refusal to permit guns to be used, secures him his place in the hearts and minds of the citizenry. The Kelland touch makes it easy reading." —Kirkus Reviews

"Kelland has chosen politics in the days of Teddy Roosevelt as the arena for his night school lawyer hero, a young man who makes the most of every conflict and disaster, working up a reformer's zeal coupled with the political shrewdness needed to win elections in a nation finding its way into the 20th century. Kelland keeps the lessons clear and the story line straight and fast." —The San Rafael Daily-Independent