[JRFF 6.1 (2016) 94–130] ISSN (Print) 1757–2460 ISSN (Online) 1757–2479

[JRFF 6.1 (2016) 94–130] ISSN (print) 1757–2460 http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/jrff.34717 ISSN (online) 1757–2479 Crossing Gender and Colour Lines in American Fraternalism: A Study on Joseph W. Kinsley (1843–1905) Jeffrey Tyssens1 Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium Email: [email protected] Abstract At first sight, Joseph W. Kinsley could be considered as one of those uncountable ‘grandees’ of American fraternalism whose lives have all fallen into a justified oblivion. Closer scrutiny however reveals a career within different fraternal societies that went far beyond the habitual accumulation of titles and responsibilities in the mainstream orders. Kinsley endeavoured experiments with new types of fraternities wherein the normal exclusion of women and African Americans was to be transcended, first in a frontier town in Montana, later in the federal capital. If all of these orders eventually failed, their short-lived histories nevertheless shed light on those men and women, black and white, who tried to make use of the specific context of the American west to break with segregation and gender exclusiveness. They brought this new formula to other parts of the country. Whatever the limitations of his projects and of the views that he held on race and gender, Kinsley does appear as one of the lonely pioneers who tried to break with deep-rooted fraternal orthodoxies regarding these same categories. Keywords: Fraternalism, women, African Americans, desegregation. Introduction For the past 15 years, scholars of American fraternalism have recognized that the integrative role of fraternal societies, that old ‘topos’ of a specific historical and sociological literature, has been subject to considerable doubt. This was notably demonstrated by sociologist Jason Kaufman in his seminal book, For the Common Good? Indeed, societal cleavages of gender, religion, ethnicity and race seem rather to have been reinforced by 1. Jeffrey Tyssens is Professor of Contemporary History at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium, and Chairman of the Interdisciplinary Research Group Free- masonry. © Equinox Publishing Ltd 2017. Tyssens Crossing Gender and Colour Lines 95 the exclusion practices of white or predominantly white fraternal orders, which were definitely stimulating a broader process of ‘competitive voluntarism’ within the fraternal field at large.2 There are many examples of these exclusions. The best known is no doubt the way African American freemasons, although theoretically accepted in lodges of ‘Caucasians’, eventually found themselves to be ostracized by the white grand lodges and had no other option but to create their own lodges and grand lodges, thus generating Prince Hall masonry. One cannot help but be struck by the force of this refusal not only of the admittance of African Americans in mainstream lodges, but also of any recognition of the lodges and grand lodges the excluded group created: it is only recently that this rejection— clearly inspired by racism though it was often veiled by questions of regularity—has been tentatively abolished.3 Freemasons were hardly the only ones to exclude blacks or other racial minorities. The same observation can be made, for example, for the Odd Fellows, who were once the largest fraternal society of the US. There, African Americans were refused as well, again forcing them to construct a parallel order. All nineteenth-century attempts by Odd Fellows to cross that eternal ‘color line’ failed miserably.4 All of that did not stop black fraternities from prospering.5 It is even clear that they contributed considerably to the construction of the African American community6 which was not only gravitating around the churches, however important those were. If only for the financial means they provided for their communities, notably for civic struggles, the fraternities were of undeniable importance: 2. Jason Kaufman, For the Common Good? American Civic Life and the Golden Age of Fraternity (Oxford: University Press, 2002). 3. Cécile Révauger, Noirs et francs-maçons. Comment la ségrégation raciale s’est installée chez les frères américains (Paris: Dervy, 2014); Peter P. Hinks and Stephen Kantrowitz, eds., All Men Free and Brethren. Essays on the History of African American Freemasonry (Ithaca & London: Cornell University Press, 2013). 4. Ami Pflugrad-Jackisch, Brothers of a Vow. Secret Fraternal Orders and the Transformation of White Male Culture in Antebellum Virginia (Athens & London: University of Georgia Press, 2010), 47–48. 5. That does not mean they only copied the white examples: some orders, with their specific biblical frames of reference, were autonomously generated by the black community itself. See Theda Skocpol, Ariane Liazos & Marshall Ganz, What a Mighty Power We Can Be: African-American Fraternal Groups and the Struggle for Racial Equality (Princeton, NJ: University Press, 2006), 45–55. 6. Which does not imply that black community leaders were always favourably disposed towards fraternalism. Frederick Douglass (1818–95) was opposed to African Americans entering freemasonry, as he considered it a waste of time and energy. See, Stephen Kantrowitz, ‘”Intended for the Better Government of Man”: The Political History of African American Freemasonry in the Era of Emancipation’, Journal of American History 96.4 (2010): 1001. © Equinox Publishing Ltd 2017. 96 Journal for Research into Freemasonry and Fraternalism Cooper argues, ‘Fraternal orders were bastions of financial capital in black communities’.7 Apparently these black fraternal structures were perceived as sufficiently menacing for their white counterparts to launch a series of litigations between 1904 and 1929 aimed at their dissolution.8 The non-admission of women took a somewhat different form. Women were definitely not allowed into most of the fraternities as such and were consequently also excluded from their benefit systems. However, by means of the so-called auxiliaries, which were open for women with a kinship tie to a member of the fraternal order that patronized it, there nevertheless was a certain connection: there was no segregation like the one that was imposed against the secret societies of black citizens. But obviously masculine lodge life as such remained hermetically closed to female presence. Was this exclusiveness based on gender and race really ubiquitous and absolute? One could have that impression, certainly when observing the often aggressive refusal of any opening whatsoever. Furthermore, literature usually focusses on this large majority of non-integrated and non-mixed fraternities.9 It seems that reality, though, was somewhat more complex. There were fraternities who (if only timidly) went beyond these exclusions, whether by admitting women or African Americans. And even among those who normally refused to open their doors, there were exceptions to the rule. We know there have been some tendencies within freemasonry to allow men and women on an equal basis10 and even the ‘color line’ was to be abolished for some white fraternalists.11 Some black freemasons had contacts with their white counterparts and, 7. Brittney C. Cooper, ‘‘’They Are Nevertheless Our Brethren”: The Order of the Eastern Star and the Battle for Women’s leadership, 1874–1926’, Hinks and Kantrowitz, eds. All Men Free and Brethren, 117. 8. Skocpol, Liazos & Ganz, What a Mighty Power We Can Be, 135–67. 9. Even the earliest studies did not try to find integrated initiatives. See Carter G. Woodson, ‘Insurance Business Among Negroes’, Journal of Negro History 14.2 (1929): 202–26; James B. Browning, ‘The Beginnings of Insurance Enterprise among Negroes’, Journal of Negro History 22.4 (1937): 417–32. 10. John Slifko, ‘An Historical Geography of Louis Goaziou and the Early Years of L’Ordre Maçonnique Mixte et International “Le Droit Humain”’, American Federation of Human Rights: the Significance of the Industrial Monongahela Valley of Western Pennsylvania’, Journal for Research into Freemasonry and Fraternalism 4.1–2 (2013): 88– 109. 11. One of the most striking examples is definitely that of William H. Upton (1854–1906), Grand Master of the state of Washington, who openly questioned the arguments for the non-recognition of the Prince Hall lodges. See, John Arthur, William Henry Upton: Grand Master 1898–9. Memorial Address before M(ost) W(orshipful) Grand Lodge F(ree) & A(ccepted) M(asons) (Tacoma, Washington: Allen & Lamborn, 1907), 4–20; Jeffrey Croteau, ‘Prince Hall: Masonry and the Man’, The Northern Light, February 2011, 12–13; Révauger, Noirs et francs-maçons, 249–50. © Equinox Publishing Ltd 2017. Tyssens Crossing Gender and Colour Lines 97 be it on very rare occasions, notably in the early days of black masonry in the north, they participated in the same lodge meetings.12 This obviously brings us to the men in white fraternities who wanted to abolish these classical exclusions. Who were they? What could moti- vate their willingness to go against the current? In what geographical context can we see them acting against the colour or the gender line? What was their project? Opening their fraternal gatherings to black people? To women? Or, perhaps the adventurous ones amongst them, to both of them at the same time? And then, if their project actually led to something, who were the blacks and the women, or more particularly even, the black women, who entered into these new fraternities? It is precisely in this respect that the action of Joseph William Kinsley (1843–1905) becomes most interesting. Kinsley, an insurance salesman, journalist, editor and full-time fraternalist, is hardly a well-known man in the history of American fraternalism. He appears at first sight to be just one more of those innumerable ‘grand’ officers who led, at a given moment and with a given level of responsibility, one or other of the fraternal orders, that is, one of those men whose biographies only count in a purely prosopographical context. Kinsley however proved so exceptional in his ambitions for the reform of American fraternalism that a more profound study of his life is overdue. From East to West, from Commercial Insurance to Fraternal Benefit The biographical data we possess regarding Joseph W.

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