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UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA GRADUATE COLLEGE “RED-DEVIL RADICALS”: THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF AMERICANISM IN CHICAGO, 1870-1919 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE FACULTY in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY By MEGAN MCGREGOR Norman, Oklahoma 2014 “RED DEVIL RADICALS”: THE BIRTH AND GROWTH OF AMERICANISM IN CHICAGO, 1870-1919 A DISSERTATION APPROVED FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY BY ______________________________ Dr. Ben Keppel, Chair ______________________________ Dr. Gary Anderson ______________________________ Dr. David Chappell ______________________________ Dr. Melissa Stockdale ______________________________ Dr. James Zeigler © Copyright by MEGAN MCGREGOR 2014 All Rights Reserved. Acknowledgements The journey to complete this dissertation has been long and arduous, yet highly rewarding. To accomplish this task alone would have been impossible, and I would be remiss not to acknowledge those who helped me along the way. First of all, I would like to thank my committee chair, Dr. Ben Keppel, for his guidance, wisdom, and support during this project. I am incredibly grateful for your dedication and commitment. I would also like to thank the members of my committee, Dr. David Chappell, Dr. Melissa Stockdale, Dr. Gary Anderson, and Dr. James Zeigler for their knowledge, insight, and advice. Thank you for both challenging and enriching my graduate experience. My family has been a constant support throughout my academic career. Thank you to my parents, John and Brenda. Though you were unsure about this path for me in the beginning, you stood by me every step of the way, and your words of encouragement mean more than you know. I love you both. Finally, thank you to my husband Kyle for being incredibly understanding during the last several years. You have been my source of confidence and strength, and I would not have been able to complete this journey without you. I love you very much. iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………………….………………iv Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………………….vii Chapter 1: Introduction…………………………………………………………………….………….1 I. The Origins of Ideology in the Origins of Words…………………………….…5 II. American Nationalism, 1776-1865………………………………………………10 III. A Nation Confronts Industrialism, 1865-1900……………………………..22 IV. Americanism Becomes Official, 1900-1920………………………………….31 Chapter 2: Chicago as an Ideological Center of Industrialism……………………….36 I. Chicago Emerges………………………………………………………………………….38 II. New Industry Brings New People………………………………………………...51 III. Toward Class Consciousness………………………………………………………55 IV. The Ravages of Fire…………………………………………………………………….72 Chapter 3: Chicagoans Face a New Threat, 1871-1877………………………………...83 I. The Shadow of the Paris Commune……………………………………………….86 II. Paris as Seen From Chicago………………………………………………………….95 III. The Shadow of Economic Crisis………………………………………...……....102 IV. The Shadow of the Great Strike…………………………………...…………….114 Chapter 4: Ideology Precipitates Bloodshed, 1880-1889…………………..……….131 I. Trouble at the Reaper Works…………………………………………..………….136 II. Anarchy Reigns………………………………………………………………...……….148 III. Reactions to Haymarket in Chicago and Beyond…………………...……163 IV. True Americans…………………………………..……………………………………174 v Table of Contents, cont. Chapter 5: Un-Americanism Becomes Institutionalized, 1890-1919…………..181 I. Trouble in a Model Community…………………………………………………...183 II. Teaching “Americanism” to the Teachers…………………...……………....201 III. Americanism Goes to War………………………………………...………………212 Chapter 6: Conclusion…………………………………………………………..………………….238 Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………...………….256 vi Abstract In the midst of the struggle to reunite and reconstruct the nation following the Civil War, citizens of the United States also began to renegotiate what it meant to truly be an American. As the nation attempted to recover from this destructive and deadly war, some Americans found new sources of fear. While appeals to race hatred outlived the war, many people on both sides of the conflict looked with apprehension at the waves of immigrants coming to work in the industrializing nation. The leaders prominent in this historical account were searching for a unity that would paper over rather than resolve differences over slavery and the fundamental questions of human rights, which now flowed from its demise. These Americans ventured to define that which could now be rendered politically “unthinkable” as simultaneously “Un- American.” Beginning in the 1870s, this term takes on a new meaning and significance that will last well into the twentieth century, as un-American is inextricably linked to the terms radical, socialist, or communist. The ways in which some Americans chose to react to events such as the Paris Commune in 1871, railroad strikes and general strikes in 1877, and the Haymarket affair in 1886, was used to create a new nationalism in the United States. “Americanism” was conceived in opposition to the Paris Commune and was consistently developed and applied to fight against organized labor and various political ideologies from 1871 to 1919. By the end of the First World War, “Americanism” had become institutionalized through national and legislation. This study examines that process of ideological invention and vii institutionalization at exceptionally close range by looking at its origins and trajectory in the heartland city of American industrialism, Chicago. From this local knowledge we gain the keys to a larger story: how an enduring and politically reactionary form of nationalism known still as “Americanism” came to be. viii Chapter 1 Introduction: Imagined Communities In his classic study of nationalism, Benedict Anderson defines the nation as an “imagined political community,” particularly conceived as its inhabitants sharing a deep comradeship that makes fraternity and loyalty possible.1 In writing about the events that deepen this sense of solidarity among people of specific geographic spaces, Anderson argues that the convergence of capitalism and print technology created the possibility of a new form of imagined community, setting the stage for the modern nation.2 These new states contained genuine nationalist enthusiasm, but also underwent a “systematic…instilling of nationalist ideology” through such forms as the mass media and the educational system.3 Once imagined and created, what, then, creates a sense of patriotism or attachment to the nation of their imaginations? According to Anderson, in the 19th centuries, when experiencing the new nation was no longer possible, a new consciousness arose, eliciting imagined bonds of fraternity among inhabitants of nations.4 This dissertation explores one particular expression of this political emotion, a variety of American nationalism known as “Americanism.” Americanism can be broadly defined as loyalty to certain conceptions of 1 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1991), 6-7. 2 Ibid., 46. 3 Ibid., 163. 4 Ibid., 203. 1 democracy and capitalism that are imagined by their advocates to be the only constructions of reality suitable for organizing any society, not just their own. Although the rituals of American political cultural pay routinized homage to the value of intellectual and religious liberty, historian Michael Kammen finds much intolerance for political ideas that are “outside the mainstream,” even if they are held by a professedly and manifestly “loyal opposition.”5 This study examines the origins of “Americanism” in the late 19th century, and how its proponents capitalized on the fear caused by foreign communist regimes, American labor uprisings, and supposed “radical” movements in the United States to forge this, at times, violent nationalism that itself disregarded American liberty and freedom of speech. This form of nationalism is well-known to Americans, especially those who lived through the Cold War, not to mention the years since the September 11, 2001 attacks initiated a “war on terror.” Though the idea may have been clearly understood by the mid-20th century, this dissertation moves the history of Americanism back much further than the Second Red Scare, which most conspicuously starred Senator Joseph McCarthy, and even further back than the so-called First Red Scare that followed World War I. By examining the rise of labor movement and its ensuing conflicts in the later years of the American chapter of the industrial revolution, we find Americanism to be a much older concept with a distinct and influential group of advocates. 5 Michael Kammen, Mystic Chords of Memory: The Transformation of Tradition in American Culture (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1991), 5; 14. 2 In the midst of struggle to reunite and reconstruct the nation following the Civil War, citizens of the United States also began to renegotiate what it meant to truly be an American. As historian Peter Parish argues, Americans became bound together by a shared belief in common ideals;6 however, in the late nineteenth century, these ideals were questioned, at times, by immigrants whose ideas seemed as foreign as their passports, also by native born Americans (such as Eugene Debs and Jane Addams), who saw a new and exceptionally brutal industrial system threatening not only the material and physical well being of workers, but their power as citizens of a democratic republic dedicated to the sovereignty of the people. As the nation attempted to recover from a destructive and deadly war, some Americans led a movement