Institutions of Integration: the Incorporation of Frontiers in Modern Democracies, 1864-1912
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INSTITUTIONS OF INTEGRATION: THE INCORPORATION OF FRONTIERS IN MODERN DEMOCRACIES, 1864-1912 Soren I. Fanning A Dissertation Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY December 2010 Committee: Tiffany Trimmer, Advisor Irina Stakhanova Graduate Faculty Representative Rebecca Mancuso Edmund Danziger Stephen Ortiz ii ABSTRACT Tiffany Trimmer, Advisor The purpose of this study was to compare the cultural and political incorporation of the western frontiers of Canada and the United States in the late nineteenth century. The work examined the process of territorial integration (the transplantation of cultural and national identity from the state core into the peripheral frontier) in two geographically similar yet politically divergent democracies in the late nineteenth century. To accomplish this, the perspectives of both state authorities and frontier residents were explored through the use of personal memoirs, newspaper articles and editorials, formal reports from state agents, as well as official governmental records and legislative debates. Documents reveal that while law enforcement institutions were frequently chosen by the government to accomplish the task of cultural colonization, in every case the de facto objectives of these institutions transformed from enforcing the will of the national core to advocating for the needs of frontier residents. Since national identity in the late nineteenth century was based almost exclusively on a single ethnic identity, that of Anglo-Saxon Protestants, national governments could not afford to alienate these settlers politically. Therefore, the government consciously catered to the desires of its white Protestant settlers, even when conforming to popular dictates meant overriding the advice and judgment of law enforcement institutions. In the power relationship between the core and frontier, frontier residents occupied a greater position of power and agency. The historical differences between the United States and Canada, however, along with divergent geographic constraints, led the two countries to create two starkly different methods of accomplishing the same task. iii This work is dedicated to my father, who inspired me to follow in his footsteps. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This work could not have been completed without the contribution and assistance of many individuals. My dissertation committee, headed by Dr. Tiffany Trimmer, and assisted by Dr. Rebecca Mancuso, Dr. Edmund Danziger, Dr. Stephen Ortiz, and Dr. Irina Stakhanova, provided invaluable guidance and advice during the entire writing process. The outstanding staff at the Jerome Library at Bowling Green State University was tireless in tracking down vital sources of information. Similarly, the staffs of the National Archives and Records Administration in Washington, DC, and the National Archives of Canada in Ottawa were of immeasurable assistance in locating many of the documents the composed critical sections of this work. Finally, no acknowledgment would be complete without thanking Ms. Tina Thomas and Ms. Dee Dee Wentland of the BGSU history department, without whose advice, hard work, and superhuman patience I would not have graduated. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER ONE: THE FRONTIER PHENOMENON ......................................................... 1 The Importance of Identity ........................................................................................ 7 Nature of the Frontier................................................................................................. 13 The Footprint of History….. ...................................................................................... 19 Comparisons and Cases ….. ...................................................................................... 26 CHAPTER TWO: HISTORIOGRAPHY OF THE FRONTIER........................................... 35 An Overview of Frontier Historiography .................................................................. 36 A Cultural Catalyst: The Frontier in American History ............................................ 46 The Faces of Janus: The Frontier in Canadian History ….. ....................................... 56 The Omnipresent Force: The Frontier in Alaskan History ….. ................................. 61 CHAPTER THREE: THE ORGANIC FRONTIER OF MONTANA, 1867-1912 ............... 65 Origins of American Settlement Policy ..................................................................... 69 Settlement of the Montana Territory .......................................................................... 74 Economic Influences on Territorial Governance ....................................................... 82 Weakness of Gubernatorial Power............................................................................. 87 Settler Autonomy and Indian Affairs ......................................................................... 96 Whiteness Matters ...................................................................................................... 101 A Hybrid Society ....................................................................................................... 108 CHAPTER FOUR: THE PLANNED FRONTIER OF CANADA, 1867-1912 .................... 113 First Efforts at Unification ......................................................................................... 118 Origin of the Mounted Police .................................................................................... 124 vi Relations with the First Nations ................................................................................. 129 Becoming a Western Institution................................................................................. 134 Cultural Makeup of the Canadian Prairies ................................................................. 141 The Mounted Police as a Cultural Conduit ................................................................ 148 Nation Building through Negotiation ........................................................................ 156 CHAPTER FIVE: THE SUDDEN FRONTIER OF ALASKA, 1867-1912 ......................... 160 A Region Apart .......................................................................................................... 162 The Beginnings of American Rule ............................................................................ 166 The Rise of Informal Institutions ............................................................................... 172 Native Alaskans and Cultural Assimilation ............................................................... 182 The Lessons of Alaska ............................................................................................... 193 CHAPTER SIX: INCORPORATION AND ACCOMODATION ....................................... 197 Differing Policies in Differing Settings ..................................................................... 199 A Fluid Core/Frontier Relationship ........................................................................... 205 Vox Populi….. ........................................................................................................... 210 BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................. 214 1 CHAPTER ONE: THE FRONTIER PHENOMENON Territorial expansion, in the popular imagination, is a process associated primarily with military conquest. Expansion is, after all, ultimately a zero-sum proposition, as states expand their borders by seizing land claimed by another. North America is no exception, home to two states that rank among history‟s most successful expansionist nations. Throughout the nineteenth century, Canada and the United States undertook a wave of territorial expansion both rapid and truly continental in scope, bringing both staggering natural wealth and a host of diverse populations into their borders. It took only 65 years through diplomatic and military means for the United States to lay claim to what is today the contiguous boundaries of the country, in addition to the massive territory of Alaska. Canada was even more industrious; the Ottawa government amassed the world‟s second largest territorial borders in roughly the same amount of time.1 North America in the late nineteenth century offers historians the opportunity to study three similar frontiers at varying degrees of incorporation into their nations. In 1889, Montana was formally admitted to the Union after a quarter century of political apprenticeship as a dependent territory of the United States. Admission brought not only full political representation in Congress, but more importantly, the right of Montanans to finally choose their own governor, who up until this point had been appointed by lawmakers thousands of miles to the east. Formal incorporation into the nation, far from being a symbolic designation, represented the political and 1 Canada remains the world‟s second largest country in terms of sheer size, second only to the Russian Federation. Demographic Yearbook – Table 3: Population by sex, rate of population increase, surface area and density. United Nations Statistics Division, 2007. 2 economic maturation of the frontier, elevating the region to a level of equality with the older, more established states of the Union.2 Just over the border in Canada, the regions of what would become the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta had been opened