2003 37c Patriotic Flags: Presidential Campaign Badge

U.S. #3777
37¢ Campaign Badge
Patriotic Flags Set
Issue Date: April 3, 2003
City: New York, NY
Quantity: 60,000,000
Printed By: Ashton Potter (USA) Ltd
Printing Method: Lithographed
Perforations: Serpentine Die Cut 10 x 9.75
Color: Multicolored

This stamp was issued on April 3, 2003, in New York City as one of five designs in the Old Glory set, part of the Postal Service's second prestige booklet, following the 2000 Submarines booklet as only the second issue of its kind. The Old Glory booklet ran twenty six pages and explored how the American flag motif has appeared throughout everyday American life over the years, from business and political materials to songbooks, postcards, playing cards, and folk art, with this particular stamp representing the political campaign category within that broader theme.

The stamp reproduces an 1888 presidential campaign badge bearing a small portrait of Benjamin Harrison, created for his successful run against incumbent president Grover Cleveland that year. That race centered heavily on the issue of tariffs, with Harrison siding with industrialists and factory workers who favored keeping rates high, while Cleveland pushed for reductions. Campaign badges and buttons like this one were a common form of political memorabilia during the late nineteenth century, often combining a candidate's portrait with patriotic flag imagery to appeal to voters' sense of national pride alongside party loyalty.

This design was one of several images selected for the booklet by designer Richard Sheaff, chosen specifically to showcase the surprising range of contexts in which the flag and its related imagery have appeared throughout American history. Issued alongside four companion stamps depicting a woven silk bookmark, a folding fan, a folk art bicycle scene, and a carved wooden figure of Lady Liberty, this stamp offers a compact look at how patriotic symbolism shaped American political campaigning well over a century ago.