Shamira Gelbman
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shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Shamira Gelbman
@shamiragelbman.bsky.social
3K followers 2.3K following 970 posts
Author of The Civil Rights Lobby http://tinyurl.com/32tzxran
Brooklyn in Indiana 🏙️🌽
Poli Sci Prof at Wabash College 🔔
I tweet solely in my own capacity, not on behalf of the College
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shamiragelbman.bsky.social
publish or perish 🤷‍♀️
November 11, 2025 at 2:10 AM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Also, pics I took last week of the new liberty tree and marker in Green-Wood Cemetery 😎
November 4, 2025 at 8:36 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Felt like I was killing time down genealogical rabbit holes this morning, but this find is new research project gold #LadyLobbyists
November 3, 2025 at 2:18 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Picked this article up more for its topical (i.e., interest group coalitions) than its regional focus, but it's not the first piece I've read recently that has me thinking Americanists should be reading more work by Central/Eastern Europeanists #polisky #poliscisky
October 29, 2025 at 8:57 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Great day to walk through Green-Wood cemetery
October 27, 2025 at 7:27 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Sometimes FamilySearch transcriptions are great, sometimes not so much
Occupation: Cokspit Occupation: lobbyist
October 23, 2025 at 6:57 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
It's been decades since my last time here at @brooklynmuseum.org
October 22, 2025 at 6:28 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Nice day for a walk now that the rain has moved out
October 19, 2025 at 9:02 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
TFW an organizational committee report from 1941 hits deep
For we live today in an atmosphere of crisis and with a mixed sense of frustration and urgency. And although the tenseness about us is amply justified by events at home and abroad, it carries with it grave dangers. For its basis is fear and fear may easily lead to confusion and a feeling of helplessness. And above all, there is danger in fear, because, inevitably following it, come persecution, intolerance, misplaced zeal and cruelty. There are many things to be afraid of in the world today. But they are real things, to be countered by purposeful action. If we are afraid of an enemy air force- we build planes. If we are afraid of Congressman So and So - we organize to defeat him. If we are afraid of losing our democracy - we prepare to preserve it. But vague fears, which have no relation to the facts of our crisis, serve only to intensify existing insecurities and hatreds of which we have all too many. America, we should remember, is the home of lynching. We have more national minorities than any other country. Social competition is intense and, even now, the impact of economic change is only thinly cushioned. To this we have added the effects of a twelve year depression. All these hatreds and all these insecurities are fuel for jingoistic hysteria. For eight years Fascism has warred upon the world ... And yet many people in this country still refuse to understand the nature of Fascism ...
October 17, 2025 at 12:52 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Didn't think I'd do that well 🤷‍♀️
October 13, 2025 at 5:19 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Oh, and here's one from 1938, calling December 15
"an occasion for a resounding demonstration of faith in liberty and democracy"
Bill of Rights Anniversary: Mrs. Miller expressed the belief that it is desirable for Council to participate in the anniversary of the ratification of the Bill of Rights on December 15, 1938, it being an occasion for a resounding demonstration of faith in liberty and democracy. Mrs. Brenner moved, and Mrs. Wolf seconded, that we participate.
October 12, 2025 at 8:06 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
On the porch 📚 🍺
October 11, 2025 at 10:00 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Good porch weather! 🍺 📚
October 7, 2025 at 10:44 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Lobbying by dramatic skit 👀
(from a 1936 report in the @ncjw.bsky.social records ... I'll have to go digging for the scripts next time)
"Another interesting point is that because of the representation of our women on the sub-committee of the Women's Joint Congressional Committee in Washington, Mrs. Louis Ottenberg has written a series of skits on legislation on the various subjects that she has studied so closely and they were presented last week at a Council meeting in Washington at which where present the wives of several Congressmen and Senators. Mrs. Ottenberg has been asked to repeat the skits at a meeting of the League of Women Voters at which Mrs. F.D. Roosevelt will be present ..."
October 7, 2025 at 12:53 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Station 66 🍔 🍟 🍧 #polisciroadtrip 🚗
October 4, 2025 at 3:56 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Also in Battle Creek #polisciroadtrip 🚗
Sojourner Truth gravesite
October 4, 2025 at 2:25 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
When in cereal city ...
October 4, 2025 at 12:16 AM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Battle Creek, MI 🥣 #polisciroadtrip 🚗
October 3, 2025 at 6:55 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Station 66 🍔 🍟 🍧 #polisciroadtrip 🚗
October 3, 2025 at 5:54 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Just a short #polisciroadtrip this time 🚗
October 3, 2025 at 4:54 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Not the first time I've come across an org* playing up Dec 15 as "Bill of Rights Day" to counter civil rights/liberties threats in the 1950s

Might be time for a reboot? (+maybe of interest to @thisdaypod.com?)

*in this case @ncjw.bsky.social in 1952; see also @civilrightsorg.bsky.social in 1955
December 15: Bill of Rights Day clipping. Key passage at the end: "Current threats to civil liberties make the observance of this Bill of Rights Day a 'must' for the alert citizen who knows that 'Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.' December is studded with milestones of Freedom. What better month for [National] Council [of Jewish Women] Sections to 'Speak up' and give Freedom the exercise it needs!"
September 29, 2025 at 1:03 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Farmers market + homecoming 🐮 🏈
September 27, 2025 at 6:05 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
The chapter titles write themselves (... but will the chapters? 😬)
Clip from archived 1952 document in National Council of Jewish Women DC Office records: "Women are not a special interest group ... Women voters today are as much interested in international understanding and aid to underdeveloped countries as they are in new school construction and equal pay for women. They feel as much concerned with mutual security as with social security, with civil rights as with equal rights"
September 24, 2025 at 7:17 PM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Back home with some nice adds to the magnet collection #polisciroadtrip 🚗
September 22, 2025 at 12:20 AM
shamiragelbman.bsky.social
Squeezing in one more state #polisciroadtrip 🚗
September 20, 2025 at 7:08 PM