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Romney Associates
The records of Romney Associates concern the activities of the Lansing-based office set up in 1967 to explore the viability of a George Romney candidacy for the Republican nomination for President of the United States. The great bulk of the records fall in the period of February 1967 to February 1968. There are of course materials that come on either side of this date, especially before, roughly since 1964.
The records divide into six series, and consist primarily of correspondence and memoranda of Romney and the Romney Associates staff, background for speeches, position papers, strategic analyses, trip files, clippings, and campaign miscellanea. The six series are: State Files, Correspondence, Administrative Files, Topical Files, Clippings, and Miscellaneous and Campaign Paraphernalia. In addition to its value for the study of this phase of George Romney's career, the Romney Associates record group is an excellent source for the study of Republican Party politics in the 1960s, and for an understanding of the issues confronting the nation: Vietnam, racial and civil strife, and Lyndon Johnson's Great Society program.
Much documentation on the Romney campaign will also be found in the files of campaign aides, Walter DeVries and Richard VanDusen, also housed at the library. The researcher should consult the separate inventories to these collections for additional information.
State Files
Arranged alphabetically by state, this series includes two types of files: campaign and general. Although this is a distinction made by the Romney staff, similar materials appear in both categories. In sum, though, the campaign file contains more analyses and background research on the various states, while the general files consist mainly of citizen correspondence on the issues of the day and politics. The bulk of both sets of files is correspondence, and the responses to incoming letters are signed by Romney and RA staff members. The fact that some of the letters are signed by Leonard Hall and other members of the Romney-for-President staff indicate that perhaps some of the Washington files were folded into the Lansing office files after the collapse of the Romney candidacy. The great part of these files are, however, from Romney Associates. In addition to files for the individual states, there are also files for the U.S. territories and for U.S. servicemen serving abroad.