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THE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY OF FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER Item Type text; Dissertation-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Maginnis, Paul M., 1932- Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 28/09/2021 10:39:54 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/288293 This dissertation has been microfilmed exactly as received 69-8524 MAGINNIS, Paul M., 1932- THE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY OF FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER. University of Arizona, Ph.D., 1969 Education, history University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan ^COPYRIGHTED BY PAUL M. MAGINNIS 1969 111 THE SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY OF FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER by Paul M. Maglnnis A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 19 6 9 THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE I hereby recommend that this dissertation prepared under my direction by Paul M Maginnis entitled The Social Philosophy of Frederick Jackson Turner be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy September 6, 1968 Dissertation Director Date John Alexander Carroll After inspection of the final copy of the dissertation, the following members of the Final Examination Committee concur in its approval and recommend its acceptance:" _ C\rtny-£) 0^ /o /~ ^ /9b CjfttkuA JfK\ i f 4 /fa f This approval and acceptance is contingent on the candidate's adequate performance and defense of this dissertation at the final oral examination. The inclusion of this sheet bound into the library copy of the dissertation is evidence of satisfactory performance at the final examination. STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited 1n the University Library to be made available to bor­ rowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source 1s made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript 1n whole or in part may be granted by the copyright holder. SIGNED: DEDICATED TO R. Jack Wilson and Beth Maginnls 1 v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation 1s possible only through the support, help, and generosity of several people. Undoubtedly I have done least 1n simply writing 1t. Several members of the Department of History at The University of Arizona have aided me in difficult, if not unusual circum­ stances, by their understanding and tolerance. Professor John Alexander Carroll has entertained fresh Ideas and been sympathetic to his students pursuing them. For me, Dr. Carroll's breadth of mind has been particu­ larly rewarding. Professor James A. Beatson, the Director of Graduate Studies at Arizona, has always had an opened door for me, and Dr. Beatson, like Dr. Carroll, has encouraged vigorous thought and expression. This-sort of freedom—1n contrast to some enclosed thought range—has made The University of Arizona a wonderful experience for me. The department, with the chairman Russell C. Ewing, has given me several scholarships and fellowships to aid my study. One of my delightful experiences has been 1n the courses of Professor James Donohoe, a professor of unique vitality. Professor Harwood Hlnton has been a personal advisor and friend when needed. I owe special thanks to Professor Ray Allen Billington of the Huntington Library and Art Gallery. He is a model for the controller of any collection. As controller, Professor Billington's concern is first for a broader range of Ideas and evaluation of those and other ideas, and secondarily is his concern for his own particular area of v v1 historical concern. Surely, this 1s the first gage of freedom; 1t is conspiciously meaningful. With almost perfect balance between efficiency and understanding Miss Isabel Frye and the staff of the Huntington Library have made this student deeply appreciative of their contribution. R. Jack Wilson has given me more than I have discovered myself in the time I have studied under him. Since he has an individual ability to bring minds to vigorous intellectual fruition without Interjecting himself, his discovery through students 1s, paradoxically, Increased. Among other things, this means that errors in this study are solely mine. Wilson 1s a great teacher. He has made what could have been a chore Into a shared, individual experience. I wish also to thank Mrs. Charles L. Burleigh for her kindness and generosity, in good times and bad. She has been steadfastly loyal to a person whose ideas are often alien to her own and to a person whose "cultural temperament" has not infrequently been distressing to her. Professor Richard Smyer has read the text of this study and helped me immeasurably in grammar and some of the general language. A belated and deep thanks to a long time friend, Mrs. Byrd Howell Granger. Mrs. Granger has read and corrected the final draft of this paper. The hospi­ tality of Gary and Sharon Gray and Tom and Dona Senning while I was researching in California was deeply appreciated. Surely the greatest burden of this graduate student and doctoral candidate has been on my wife Beth. She has been patient and enduring. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT vlii 1. INTRODUCTION . 1 2. THE DEVELOPMENT OF A FRONTIER RATIONALE: BACKPORCH ESCAPADE . 26 3. SECTIONS AND VOTES: THE PROBLEMS OF SPECIFICS 68 4. PAUPERS AND PRESSURES: THE GENERALITIES OF SOCIETY 107 5. THE INDIVIDUAL AND THE WORLD: TURNER AND WORLD SOCIETY. ... 146 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 191 Collections of Letters, Lectures, and Manuscripts 191 Edited Compilations of Turner's Essays and Manuscripts . 191 Turner's Works: Manuscripts 191 Turner's Works: Other Than Manuscripts. 193 Other Primary Works 197 Secondary Works on Turner and the Hypothesis 198 General Secondary Works 203 vil ABSTRACT This essay 1s an attempt to come to an understanding of Frederick Jackson Turner's social philosophy by a study of his private and public expression. Turner, a perceptive though only mildly critical man, held the center stage in the historical discipline for forty years. Both disciples and critics maintained that Turner had caused a "revolution" in American historiography. But what actually was Turner's revelance to the social problems of his day remained a question, a question which could only be answered by viewing the whole-man—both private and public sides. Chapter 1 of this study reviews some of the more important works on the Turnerian hypothesis and on Turner. Chapter 2 examines part of Turner's background which contributed to his adult mind and his Insights. The writer of this dissertation attempts to reconcile widely disparate strains of Turner's thought through the use of a metaphor—the tent-on- the-porch. These strains were Turner's idea of a functional value for the frontier, his relating the American political and economic system to the frontier, and his endeavor to carry "ideals" of the past into the present and into the future. These strains of thought, of course, per­ meate the entire essay. In Chapter 2 this writer maintains that Turner's mental development through conditioning in American political ways, at the hands of his father, was as important as the Portage-frontier milieu. And 1n any case, the frontier milieu and the American political system became inseparable in Turner's mind. Turner's principal intellectual viii 1x mentor at the University of Wisconsin, William F. Allen, only rein­ forced Turner's attitude toward economic free enterprise and the political guarantees of that economic system. A sample of Allen's thinking is given. Chapter 3 offers that Turner developed the sectional rationale around 1899 to buttress the waning frontier rationale. The sectional thesis came when Turner's country was undergoing dynamic change in internal and external affairs. It was the thesis which Turner clung to the rest of his life, failing to give him the intellectual and social unity which he craved. Through the sectional thesis Turner attempted to sustain "individualism," by individuals identifying with their section. It was a heavily hedged individualism, and failed. Ironically, some of Turner's strongest and loudest cries for nationalism came when he advo­ cated sectionalism. Turner closely aligned national unity with the political party function, making many of his inferences of social affairs from voting patterns. His difficulty was 1n making sound Inferences by considering some social pressures and then merely counting numbers. A meaningful correlation between pressures and numbers was difficult. Turner realized it. In Chapter 4, the writer postulates that Turner was essentially a conservative when grappling with real social problems. His liberalism was merely a veneer for which the cover was history, the frontier, and a belief in the good working out by accident. This was true in Turner's attitude toward the Populists, the trusts, labor class, and to a certain extent race. In the last chapter of the text this writer attempts to X show how and why Turner extended his rationale to the world. The extension came first from an Intellectual-emotional Involvement In World War I. From that involvement Turner's mind changed substantively. Though Turner endeavored to regress after this substantive change, he simply became disillusioned but not what the former Turner had been. CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION "Turner's discovery of the American frontier as a force encouraging democracy m*y exhibit some Imaginative persistence of this association between desirable political Institutions and a forest." Henry Nash Smith "..
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