File contains fourteen draft typed manuscripts columns and handwritten letters, written by Brigadier-General Hugh B. Hester, a noted critic of American foreign policy, written in 1972 and 1973, submitted to numerous newspapers with copies (as well as a couple of personal handwritten letters) sent to Kenneth Leslie. The topics of the letters include the ongoing "disastrous mistake" of the Vietnam War, the "most ballyhooed" nuclear agreements between Nixon and Brezhnev, the 1972 Presidential Election (declaring that Americans "could not psychologically bring themselves to vote for McGovern because his election would have proven true all those crimes committed by Washington [against the Vietnamese people]" and the developing Watergate scandal.

File contains correspondence sent to the Charlotte Observer, the New York Times, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Senator Michael Mansfield (D-MT), The Nation Magazine, the Asheville Citizen, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Greenville News, and Meyer Robert Field.

The letter written to Leslie, dated July 4, 1973, expresses regret at not yet discussing Hester's recent trip to China, as well as demanding that Nixon should "be dismissed and tried" for his actions regarding the escalating Watergate scandal. The file also includes a draft manuscript of a letter "to the Editor" of Leslie's "New Man Magazine", dated November 27, 1972, responding to newspaper magnate John S. Knight proclamation that the "two-party system will continue to be strong and stable" being incorrect following McGovern's defeat, suggesting that "there were no 1972 presidential elections in any meaningful sense".

File contains Kenneth Leslie's letter book from the early years of The Protestant Digest, and the Textbook Commission to Eliminate Anti-Semitic Statements in American Textbooks, dated 1938 to 1943. File contains full correspondence as well as snippets from Kenneth Leslie's letters, Protestant Digest documentation, favourable testimonials about The Protestant Digest, as well as Leslie's efforts to attract scholars to join the editorial board of The Protestant Digest.

The letter book is divided into the following sections:
- Textbook Commission: with a "general invitation to join the Textbook Commission to Eliminate Anti-Semitic Statements in American Textbooks as well as Leslie's letters to Richard E. Gutstadt, Samuel Radbill, Joseph Barth, E. George Payne, Chas. Feltman, Sol Tekulsky, Brigadier-General Chaplain William R. Arnold, St. Anthony Guild Press, the Confraternity of the Precious Blood, E.E. Wheeler, Louis Broido, and Abraham A. Neuman;

- Released Time: responding to critiques from the Editor of Commonweal, the editor of the Friends of the Public Schools of America, Harriet V. Postman, Simon Certner, Mrs. Yorke Allen, Mark Starr, and James King;

- Anti-Semitism: letters and support to Isaac Rosengarten, Marion B. Sulzberger, Joseph Gorelik, Dr Albert W. Palmer, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Hon. Fiorello LaGuardia, Senator James E. Mead, Margaret Lee Southard, Philip Slomovitz, Rabbi Jerome Unger, and Mrs. Louis L. Browne;

- Social Action and Negro: letters to the editor of the New York Post, John T. McManus, the Women's National Radio Committee, Dr Benjamin E. Mays, Donald West, Hon. Sumner Welles, Patrick Malin, Dr A. Clayton Powell Jr., Donald Young, Robert Searle, Bridget Clark, Mrs Franklin D. [Eleanor] Roosevelt, Sylvia Loomis, Annette Smith Lawrence, Mrs. Julius O. Adler, Harold Rosswell, Philip Murray, Chaim Weizmann, Meyer Weisgal, Samuel McCrea Cavert, Dr Adolf Meyer, Eugene R. Shippen, Attorney General Francis Biddle, and the text of a "statement for the special Negro issue of New Masses, October 1, 1942";

- The Protestant Digest, later The Protestant: with subheadings for Documents, Beginnings -- Motif -- Aim -- Purpose, Epigrams (to Nora Bateson, John L. Lewis, Edward T. Friendly, American League for Peace and Democracy, John Temple Graves II, Walter Winchell, Paul Vincent Carroll, Carl W. Shaver, Dr J.H. Rushbrook, Rev. J.T. Widner, Bishop Ralph A. Ward, Sara Graham Mullhall, Maurice Rosenblatt, Mrs. A. Goshawk, Hon. Henry A. Wallace, Cyrus S. Eaton, and Mrs. Leonard K. Elmhirst;

- Comments on The Protestant Digest, later The Protestant, Favorable: with comments from Eleanor Roosevelt, The Christian Register, Zions Herald, Social Action Digest, Reinhold Niebuhr, Dr. W.K. Wilson, Mrs. Andrew Gardner, Presbyterian Tribune, Joseph Fort Newton, Upton Sinclair, Edward Holton James, George N. Falconer, Edward T. Friendly, Nora Bateson, O.R. Thome, Miss Ada L. Snell, A.W. Heinle, Clifford J. Laube, I.C. Thorgaard, Ellis Huntington Dana, Hamish Hamilton, H.A. Crossley, Clarence E. Wilson, Carl W. Shaver, Walter C. Leck, Rabbi Joseph S. Shubow, P.L. Howe, Kay Smith, Robert C. Harder, M. Milton Talkin, Arthur Settel, Robert H. Ellis Jr., I.M. Sholkin, Fred Eastman, Florence L. Cox, Rev. Robert H. Eads, Stephen S. Wise, Angie Wynn, John Granberry, Samuel L. Hamilton, Leon Wolf Levy, W. Edgar Gregory, Guy Henson, R. Lloyd Pobst, Don MacDiarmid, D. Arthur Bowman, Harry C. Steinmetz, Lester L. Greenbaum, the New York Post, R.O. Johnson, Maria Halberstadt, Pierre vanPaasen, Louis Adamic, Sam G. Johnson, Laird T. Hites, Frank Mlakar, C. Oumansky, George R. Bryant, Robert Ulich, Mrs. A.B. Cross, Rev. Hurley Begun, Horace T. Houf, Frank D. Graham, Ivy Litvinoff, Rev. Alfred V. Bliss, Peter Kamitchis, Rev. Edward Morris, Gerald M. Meyer, William Bouck, R.. Dundon, Edwin McNeil Poteat, Stanley High, Ione Riggs, Bishop James Cannon Jr., Olive Anderson, Robert Whitaker Edward H. Redman, John A. Lee, John A. MacKay, Walter M. Kraus, Theodore D. Jervey, Neason Jones, Sidney A. Goodman, Mrs. A. Allyn, Marion Neville, Albert F. Gilmore, Richard J. Davis, and Ralph W. Wescott;

- Invitations to join the Board of Editorial Advisors, epigrams: with letters to Albert Einstein, Sherwood Eddy, Bishop Edward L. Parsons, George Bernard Shaw, Rt. Rev. Malcolm E. Peabody, Charles Evans Hughes, Rt. Rev. Benjamin, Ralph Barton Perry, and Bishop G. Bromley Oxnam;

- The Protestant Digest Associates, epigrams: with letters to Martha Gelhorn [sic], Vilhjalmur Stefansson, Helen Lynd, William Jay Schieffelin, Rev. Edward Morris, Ida Pellar, Judge Benjamin Shaleck, and Cyrus Eaton.

File contains three off-printed pamphlets published by the house of Kenneth Leslie's 1940's periodical The Protestant.

The first pamphlet, ten pages long, is written by Harold L. Ickes, entitled "Protestantism answers hate", was the text of an address delivered by Ickes, Secretary of the Interior, to the 'Protestantism answers hate dinner forum' at the Hotel Roosevelt on Tuesday, February 25, 1941. It did not appear in The Protestant.

The second pamphlet, six pages long in a triptych format, is written by Gerald Richardson, associate editor of The Protestant, entitled "Who is anti-Catholic? A letter which clarifies the position of a true liberal democratic Roman Catholic". The letter previously appeared in the March 1945 issue of The Protestant.

Th third pamphlet, eight pages long, was written by Abraham Pomerantz (and contains an introduction by Kenneth Leslie) entitled "Dissent becomes disloyalty". The article previously appeared in the December 1947 issue of The Protestant.

File contains final drafts of three press releases prepared by Kenneth Leslie's press services at The Protestant. The press releases, undated, were released in 1943 and 1944.

The first release is a single-page handwritten note entitled 'Immediate break with Spain is urged : editor of The Protestant calls also for a Western Front', dated March 24, 1943, and bound for the New York Times.

The second release, typed, undated but shortly after The Protestant was denounced by the "American Jewish Committee [as following] the Communist 'party line'", was written by B.Z. Goldberg, entitled "A mysterious cure for anti-Semitism".

The third release, typed, undated but likely from the summer of 1944, was written by Elbert Aidline-Trommer, entitled "Hitler defeated in Chicago", and discusses Charles J. Anderson Jr.'s failed 1944 "run for Congress in the sixth district as a Republican on a Nazi platform".

Fonds contains material created and accumulated by René de Villiers during his time as an editor and politician. The fonds contains records on associations and clubs, press and media, historical publications, urban problems, Marquard family papers, manuscripts, correspondence, biographical materials, speeches & editorials, politics, publications, photographs, and miscellaneous materials.

The fonds includes ca. 123 photographs, almost all black and white, 7 posters, 2 audio reels, 2 maps, and 1 painting.