Charles Solomon Photographs

The collection documents Solomon's work as a Socialist candidate and orator as well as a judge. Portraits of Charles Solomon are amply represented (13) and are supplemented by two pen and ink cartoons, as well as by a portrait in his campaign literature. Highlights of the collection are four photographs from 1932, showing Solomon, the Socialist candidate, standing on a soapbox, speaking to office workers in the Wall Street area. In addition, six photographs document Solomon's swearing-in ceremony--performed by New York City Mayor Fiorello La Guardia--as a judge for the city's Magistrate's Court. Solomon is surrounded by family and supporters, including International Ladies Garment Workers Union president David Dubinsky. Various photographs show Solomon in the courtroom, sometimes posed formally with other judges, sometimes in action with courtroom participants. Two blow-ups (11x14) picture Solomon at the bench in an intense interaction with courtroom participants crowded around the bench. An early group portrait (undated) poses Solomon with socialist luminaries August Claessens, Louis Waldman, Sam Orr and S.A. De Witt. Another posed portrait shows Solomon with Algernon Lee, B. Charney Vladeck, John Dewey, Norman Thomas and Rabbi Stephen Wise. Other group portraits or two-shots include Solomon speaking at Meyer London's funeral, posed with the International Ladies Garment Workers Union's All-Star baseball team, Solomon's fellow Socialist Party/Social Democratic Federation/American Labor Party member Louis Goldberg, Harry Avrutin, Abraham Cahan, and New York City African-American politician Myles Paige. Finally, the collection also includes the official certificate of appointment to the office of city magistrate signed by Mayor La Guardia.