[Five leaflets from the Boulder, CO-based lawyer William Penn Collins, Socialist Party activist and candidate] by Collins, William Penn - 1910

Denver, CO: Socialist Party; W.P. Collins, 1910. Handbill. Five leaflets, varying sizes but all around 8.5x12 inches. The group includes: "Socialism the Issue," from his run for Attorney General (1908), with several substantial tears, date and location of his address written in pen; another more ornate leaflet with the same title announcing a lecture during his campaign for Supreme Court Judge (1910), very good; two leaflets advertising talks on socialism (apparently between campaigns), different text but same portrait; one with two closed tears. Lastly, there is a mimeographed letter to fellow socialists in other counties, stating that he is taking a break from his law practice "to go out for the party and the cause I love," sacrificing significant income to do so. He asks, in return, that anyone inviting him to travel to a city to speak about socialism be willing to put in the work to advertise his talk. "Some comrades turn in orders for meetings and then fail to advertise. That results in cold unadulterated theft - stealing my time and sometimes my money... If you cannot sacrifice your time do not order any date." The campaign-related leaflets can be dated with certainty; the others may be from the same period or later in the 1910s. Collins, born in Mukwonago, Wisconsin, moved to Boulder in 1898 after finishing law school. He practiced there until moving his office to Denver in the 1920s. He was a traveling orator on behalf of the Colorado Socialist Party, speaking on such topics as Christianity and Socialism, the position of women and children under Socialism, the need for peaceful revolution, and related themes.