Description
First English edition of A Citizen Looks at Congress by Secretary of State Dean Acheson, inscribed to National Security Advisor Walt Rostow.
Octavo, 124pp. Black cloth, title in gilt on label affixed to spine. No additional printings mentioned. Solid text block, light toning to endpapers from publisher’s glue. In the publisher’s dust jacket, retail price on front flap, archival tissue repairs to front panel and spine, light soiling to spine, a very good example. Signature page has notable toning, small chip along bottom edge, reinforced along gutter. Signed on the front flyleaf: “To Walt Rostow for whose warm friendship + gay companionship I am forever grateful. Dean Acheson. October 1958.”
Walt Rostow (1916-2003) was an American economist, political theorist, and National Security Advisor to President Lyndon Johnson from 1966-1969. Acheson and Rostow were close friends, but differed on their outlook towards the expansion of communism. Rostow advocated for more involvement in Third World counties to rebuff Soviet influence, while Acheson was focused on Western Europe. Their disagreements were most evident in Vietnam, with Acheson and the “Wise Men” advocating for a withdrawal in 1968, but Rostow pushing forward. Dean Acheson (1893-1971) served as Secretary of State for President Harry S. Truman. Acheson’s memoir, Present at the Creation, won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 1970.
