Know Nothing

The Know Nothing was an American political movement nativist of the medium of the 19th siècle.
Organized with the favor of the rejection of the important Irish immigration of the end of the year 1840 by the middle-classes Anglo-Saxon Protestant women, this current was first of all structured by a secret society before forming a true party in 1854, the American Party.
Ce last, installed in a political space released by the dissolution of the powerful party Whig, did not count however major political personality and did not survive the Bipolarisation of the American political scene, most of its troops ending finally up being absorptive by the Republican party before the American Civil War.

Origin of the name

The movement nativist being first of all structured in the shape of a secret society, the members of the latter answered invariably " I do not know rien" (" I Know Nothing ") when they were questioned on the existence of this political movement.

Political ideas

The movement nativist was based on the opposition of the middle-class and the Protestant middle-classes to the massive immigration of catholic Europeans (mainly originating in Ireland and southernmost Germany), the catholic community judged being subjected to its clergy and being perceived, consequently, like the Trojan horse of a contrary pontifical policy to the liberal and democratic ideals of the United States. In addition to this nationalist xenophobia , the movement also represented a form of integrism protesting favorable to the Prohibition of the alcohol sale.

The American Party , incarnation of the movement as from 1854, had as a political platform:

a strict limitation of immigration aiming particularly the catholic immigrants;
the limitation of the access to the stations with responsibility in order to reserve the latter with only American " natifs" ;
introduction of a 21 years deadline minimum before the granting of the American citizenship to an immigrant;
the limitation of the access to the posts of teachers in the public schools in order to reserve them to the only Protestants;
introduction of daily readings of the Protestant Bible in the public schools;
a restriction of the alcohol sale.

At the time of the elections of 1856 and 1860, Know-Nothing were joined by old Whigs around the topic of the safeguarding of the Union. Beaten by the democratic candidate then by that of the Republican , they however failed to form a third way able to avoid the American Civil War.

History

New York and Philadelphia: cradles of the nativism (1844)

If the movement nativist appeared as of the municipal elections of New York in 1836, it is in 1844 that it made irruption on the political scene. This year there, indeed, was formed a first political party, the American Republican Party (renamed Native American Party after its national convention of July 1845), which took share with the elections in New York and Philadelphia. In this last city, where the communities Protestant woman and catholic were opposed on the question of the reading of the Protestant version of the Bible in the public schools, the countryside nativist caused two bloody episodes of riots (3 May 8th and 6 July 7th, 1844).
In December of the same year, a fraternity nativist, the Order of the Plain Americans , was founded in New-York.
The party nativist was blown however quickly because of its weak political influence and displacement of the attention of the nationalists on the Mexican question.

Shade with the light: " Know Nothing" with the American Party (1849-1854)

The movement reappeared a few years later, in 1849, when the New Yorkean Charles B. Allen founded lOrdre Spangled Banner ( Order off the Star Spangled Banner ), a secret society whose members (obligatorily major, believers and Protestants) were to lend an oath of absolute obedience to the instructions of the Order. Questioned by the journalists on the existence of this company, the members of the Order claimed of nothing to know, from where their nickname of Know Nothing invented by the publicity agent Horace Greeley.
Opposed to the Democratic party - then dominating which accommodated many Irish among its members, Know-Nothing benefitted from the political recombining caused by the question of slavery and the dismantling of the great party Whig, weakened by the dissensions and whose many members will join the nativistes.
Ils played a considerable part at the time of the elections of spring and autumn 1854, gaining many successes in Pennsylvania and New England, and in particular in the Massachusetts, where Know-Nothing Henry Gardner was elected governor. In Philadelphia, Whig Robert Conrad took party for Know-Nothing and gained one crushing victory while promising to repress the crime, to close the saloons Sunday and to prohibit the access of the immigrants to employment publics.
À Washington D.C, where the nativists made speak about them in March by throwing in the Potomac the block of granite offered by the pope Pie IX for the construction of the Washington Monument, the candidate Know-Nothing John T. Towers was elected in spite of a coalition new of Democrats, Whigs and Freesoilers joined together against him and entitled " Anti-Know-Nothing Party". A Know-Nothing deputy of Massachusetts, Nathaniel Prentice Banks, was even elected with the presidency of the Chambre of the representatives.
Forts of these electoral successes, Know-Nothing formed a political party, the American Party' , to which joined old Whigs, prohibitionnists, Democrats, and even of the " natifs" Southerners of catholic confession. The new party passed in a few months from approximately fifty thousand to nearly a million members.

A fast decline (1855-1859)

In spite of its electoral victories of 1854 and the spectacular growth of its troops, the American Party declined very quickly because of the emergence of the Republican party and the volatility of members much less disciplined than the members of the Order founded in 1849. Thus, as of the following year (1855), Know-Nothing gained victories only in Ohio, where they profited from the reinforcement of the German immigrants Lutherans and Scottish presbytériens hostile with the catholics, and with Chicago, where Levi Boone was elected mayor before following a discriminatory policy and prohibitionnist who was particularly prejudicial to the German immigrants and who caused, on April 21st, 1855, a riot adverse Protestant and immigrant natives catholic, the " Lager Beer Riot ".
Dans the states of the South, like the Alabama, Know-Nothing were overcome by the Democrats, the latter being perceived like a better rampart against the northerner abolitionism. With Louisville (Kentucky), the competition between Know-Nothing and Démocrates involved, at the time of the " Bloody Monday " of August 6th, the death of a score of people as well as many destruction. Similar episodes took place with Baltimore (1856), Washington (1857) and with the New-Orleans (1858), where the elections were marked by street battles between gangs adverses.
The decline of the American Party was fast in North, where Know-Nothing were divided on the question of slavery, free trade partisans having consequently joined the Republicans (in particular following the business Dred Scott). It is consequently a weakened party which supported the unhappy candidature of the former president whig Millard Fillmore at the time of the election of 1856. The slave wing of the party still survived a few years the local scales in the states of the South before being there eclipsed by the Democratic party before the election of 1860.
During this last program, the Constitutional Union Parties in vain gathered old Whigs and Know-Nothing around the topic (already approached at the time of the countryside of 1856) of the safeguarding of the Union vis-a-vis the threats of division carried by the confrontation between the northerner Republicans and the Democrats Southerners.

Heritage

If the name of the American Party were re-used by certain political trainings at the end of the 19th century (and in particular 1887), the term of Know Nothing , synonymous with blind nativism, became an insult at the beginning of the XXe century. At the beginning of XXIe century, the term was re-used at the time of the debates on the reform of the American policies of immigration.

This ignored page of the history of the United States was recently redécouverte by the general public with the favor of the film Gangs off New York (Martin Scorsese, 2002), which takes as a starting point the life of William Poole known as " Bill Boucher" , leader of the gang of the active Bowery Servant boys in the New Yorkean district of Five Points and local historical figure of the nativism.

Source

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