Crawford, F. Marion: An American Politician (1884). Reformer John Harrington’s excursion into politics of the late eighties under Marquis of Queensberry rules.
DeForest, John William: Honest John Vane (1875). A weak congressman seduced into corruption by a satanic lobbyist and a money-hungry wife during Reconstruction.
——: Playing the Mischief (1876). Attractive Josie Murray gets a fraudulent relief bill passed by a corrupt Congress amidst unsavory Washingtonians.
Dos Passos, John: Adventures of a Young Man (1938). Glenn Spotswood’s development into Communist organizer and his death for Trotskyism in the Spanish Civil War.
——: Number One (1943). Huey Long-like Chuck Crawford carries on as Tyler Spotswood goes to jail for him in atonement for his collusion in a corrupt career.
——: The Grand Design (1949). Panoramic novel of New Deal and wartime Washington. Conflicts of personalities, ideals, and politics—national and international.
Ellison, Ralph: The Invisible Man (1953). A young Negro’s crack-up under prejudice in North and South and disillusionment after whole-souled Communist Work.
Farrell, James T.: Yet Other Waters (1952). Novelist Bernard Carr learns that the Communists dictate to artists too, then leaves despite twinges and “the treatment.”
Ford, James L.: Hot Corn Ike (1923). Local politics with national implications in two areas of late nineteenth-century New York.
Ford, Paul Leicester: The Honorable Peter Stirling (1894). Poor Man’s Friend to Governor of New York despite vicissitudes as love and virtue triumph.