At the end of August 1787, after three long months of debate and deliberation, the Constitutional Convention had neared the end of its work. They were poised at that time to write into the Constitution that the President of the United States would be elected by the legislature, but at the last minute they referred the matter to the Committee on Unfinished Parts to resolve. It was that committee, guided by future president James Madison, that drafted a compromise Electors plan, answering the concerns of the small states and slave states who wanted to keep the advantages they held in the legislature but also, theoretically at least, avoiding the corruption likely in a system where the legislative branch chooses the chief executive. Of course, it didn’t take long for political actors – including some of the founders themselves – to find ways to exploit the system of Electors for their own ends. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Carolyn Renee Dupont, professor in history at Eastern Kentucky University and author of Distorting Democracy: The Forgotten History of the Electoral College--And Why It Matters Today.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Three Little Drummers from the George Washington Show,” by The United States Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps,” performed by the United States Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps on April 11, 2011; the audio is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication and is available via Wikimedia Commons. The episode artwork is “Signing of the United States Constitution with George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Alexander Hamilton (left to right in the foreground),” painting by Howard Chandler Christy; image is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons.

Additional Sources:

• “Constitutional Convention and Ratification, 1787–1789,” Office of the Historian, Foreign Service Institute, United States Department of State.
• “Electoral College History,” The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
• “Article II Executive Branch,” National Constitution Center.
• “12th Amendment: Election of President and Vice President,” National Constitution Center.
• “10 reasons why America’s first constitution failed,” by NCC Staff, National Constitution Center, November 17, 2022.
• “Why Was the Electoral College Created?” by Dave Roos, History.com, Originally posted July 15, 2019, and updated October 7, 2024.
• “How the Electoral College Became Winner-Take-All,” by Devin Mccarthy, Fair Vote, August 21, 2012.
• “Letter from James Madison to George Hay explaining views on Electoral College,” August 23, 1823.
• “Federalist No. 68,” Federalist Papers: Primary Documents in American History, Library of Congress.

In the 1870s, 120 Chinese boys came to New England as part of the Chinese Educational Mission. The boys studied at prep schools and colleges, and while they continued their lessons in Chinese language and culture, they also learned about the culture of their adopted homeland, including the local sports, like baseball. By the mid-1870s, some of the Chinese students had formed a semi-pro baseball team called the Celestials that competed on the regional circuit. With growing anti-Chinese sentiment in the US, though, the Chinese government recalled the students. On their trip home, the Celestials had one last chance to play as a team, when an Oakland, California, team, challenged them to a game. This week I’m joined by Dr. Ben Railton, Professor of American Studies at Fitchburg State University and host of The Celestials’ Last Game: Baseball, Bigotry, and the Battle for America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” composed by Albert Von Tilzer, and recorded by Edward Meeker in September 1908; the recording is in the public domain and is available via Wikimedia Commons. The episode image is “The baseball players of the Chinese Education Mission,” from 1878, via the Thomas La Fargue Papers, MASC, Washington State University Libraries; the image is in the public domain.

Additional Sources:

• “The Burlingame-Seward Treaty, 1868,” Office of the Historian, United States of America Department of State.
• “Considering History: Baseball, Chinese Americans, and the Worst and Best of America,” by Ben Railton, The Saturday Evening Post, May 11, 2020.
• “Yung Wing, the Chinese Educational Mission, and Transnational Connecticut,” by Ben Railton, Connecticut History, May 1, 2022.
• “Yung Wing’s Dream: The Chinese Educational Mission, 1872-1881,” by Barbara Austen, Connecticut History, October 26, 2021.
• “My Life in China and America,” by Yung Wing, via Project Gutenberg
• CEM Connections.
• “Chinese Educational Mission at MIT,” from an 2017 exhibit at MIT's Maihaugen Gallery.
• “Journeys 旅途: Boys of the Chinese Educational Mission,” Connecticut Museum of Culture and History.
• “Historical Context /历史背景/歷史背景: The Chinese Educational Mission (1872-1881),” Phillips Andover Academy.
• “Chinese Educational Mission, 1870s-1880s,” Phillips Exeter Academy.
• “The Workingmen’s Party & The Denis Kearney Agitation: Historical Essay,” by Chris Carlsson, FoundSF, 1995.
• “140 years ago, San Francisco was set ablaze during the city's deadliest race riots,” by Katie Dowd, SF Gate, July 23, 2017.
• “Chinese Exclusion Act (1882),” The U.S. National Archives and Records Administration
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Shortly after he was born in 1971, Ryan White was diagnosed with severe hemophilia. Ryan was able to reduce his hospitalizations from the disease through the use of in-home injections of Factor VIII concentrate, something he and other people with hemophilia saw as a lifeline. The downside of this lifeline was that it pooled blood and plasma from thousands of donors, increasing the user’s risk of exposure to diseases like HIV. In 1984, Ryan was diagnosed with AIDS. His fight to be allowed to attend school and live as normal a life as possible made him a household name and helped humanize the HIV/AIDS epidemic for many Americans, culminating in the passage of the Ryan White CARE Act months after Ryan’s death in 1990. Joining me in this episode is Dr. Paul Renfro, Associate Professor of History at Florida State University and author of The Life and Death of Ryan White: AIDS and Inequality in America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode audio is a clip from “Episode 259: Alyssa Milano,” Two Broads Talking Politics, July 23, 2019, used with permission of the original podcast. The mid-episode music is “The Beat of Nature” by folk_acoustic; the audio is free for use under the Pixabay Content License. The episode image is a photo of Ryan White taken at a fundraising event in the spring of 1989 in INdianapolis, Indiana; it is available via Wikimedia Commons and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

Additional sources:

• “Who Was Ryan White?” The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, Health Resources & Services Administration.
• “Remembering Ryan White, the teen who fought against the stigma of AIDS,” by Dr. Howard Markel, PBS Health, April 8, 2016.
• “Ryan White, Teen Who Contracted AIDS, Shifted Narrative Around the Disease,” By Paul Renfro, Teen Vogue, December 6, 2021.
• “Elton John credits Ryan White’s family with saving his life,” by Associated Press, PBS, April 3, 2022.
• “S.2240 - Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Act of 1990,” 101st Congress (1989-1990), Congress.gov.
• “Celebrating 30 Years of the Ryan White CARE Act,” HIV.gov, August 18, 2020.
• “U.S. Statistics,” HIV.gov.