Whenever one pundit frets about a loss of civility in the public
dialogue, another cherry-picks some violent quotation from a long-ago
political fight and says, "See? It was worse in 1840!"

So it was with particular interest that I dove into a copy of Volume 1, Issue 1 of Vital Speeches of the Day, dated Oct. 8, 1934.

Seventy-five years ago today, in this then-weekly (now monthly)
collection of U.S. speeches, what were "the leading moulders of public
opinion" talking about, and in what tones?

Read my surprising answer, on the Huffington Post's national politics page.