Strange Bedfellows: Nativism, Know-Nothings, African-Americans & School Desegregation in Antebellum Massachusetts (APUS Presentation)

1. STRANGE BEDFELLOWS:
Nativism, Know-Nothings, African-
Americans & School Desegregation
in Antebellum Massachusetts
Written & Presented by Stan Prager,
M.A. Public History

2. THE SEEDS OF DISCONTENT
Rapidly changing economic conditions fueled a bewildering
set of dislocations. The value of labor for the working class
fell. The population of the foreign born increased
exponentially, their numbers pregnant with an unfamiliar
culture & a religious faith despised by most Americans. Urban
life was beset with poverty and crime. Traditional social &
political institutions were incapable of redressing or even
containing a growing discontent. These factors & others
translated into a rage directed at the elite & their failed
institutions, spawning a populist revolt that manifested itself in
racism, hatred, xenophobia, exclusion & a determination to
overthrow the old order & start afresh. [Sound familiar?] That
was Massachusetts in the early 1850s . . .
African-Americans—chafing at life at the margins in
a state that nevertheless offered the best overall
quality of life in the nation—sought equality of
education for their children in fully integrated
schools. Utilizing boycotts, non-violent tactics and
an alliance with elite whites who objected to
inferior “separate but equal” schools, a movement
formed driven by a charismatic yet unassuming
leader that demanded desegregation. That too
was Massachusetts in the early 1850s . . .

3. MASSACHUSETTS IN THE EARLY 1850s
Once dominated by agriculture, by the 1850s Massachusetts had become
“The nation’s most densely populated, urbanized & industrialized state.”
Industry boomed, workers toiled in often abysmal conditions from dawn
to dusk for low wages with an increasingly poorer quality of life. The myth
of free market capitalism that held that any worker could sell his labor to
the highest bidder was dashed on the rocks of the reality that all the
employers were low-bidders & conditions were often terrible, with children
working 70-hour weeks. The majority entrenched business-friendly Whig
Party ignored workers’ demands that coalesced around a call for a “Ten
Hour Law” that would limit the workday, instead catering to the wealthy
elite who owned the mills and factories. Whig support for the
Compromise of 1850—which included the hated Fugitive Slave Act—
further damaged the Whigs in antislavery Massachusetts, while laissez-
faire Jacksonian Democrats had nothing to offer. Pro-temperance,
nativist & anti-slavery Free Soil elements clawed at the margins agitating
for change, mounting a surprise upset coup of the legislature that sent
antislavery champion Charles Sumner to the US Senate but achieved little
else, fostering an even greater frustration & popular rage against
government. The symbol of that rage became the legions of Irish
immigrants who flooded the state & a resurgent nativism dominated the
political narrative.

4. ORIGINS OF NATIVISM
Nativism is not an aberration in
America. It is a part of our national
DNA. Thus, it rears its ugly head
again & again. Only a decade after
the Constitution was ratified, Alien &
Sedition laws passed, championed
by America’s most famous foreign-
born resident, Alexander Hamilton
(born in the West Indies), who called
for the mass of aliens to leave the
country. In 1841, John Pintard, N.Y.
philanthropist & popularizer of Santa
Claus, condemned the Irish as a
source of evil. In 1903, Woodrow
Wilson wrote of Europe disburdening
itself of its more sordid and hapless
elements from Italy, Hungary &
Poland. And more recently,
candidate Donald Trump exclaimed
in 2015 that Mexico was sending
racists & criminals here.

5. NATIVISM FLUCTUATES WITH FOREIGN-BORN
POPULATION & IMMIGRATION TRENDS
Spikes in nativism coincide with rise
of percentage of the foreign-born
population & immigration trends.
From 1841 to 1850 immigration
exploded to 1.7 million total
immigrants & at least 781,000 were
Irish fleeing the potato famine 1845-
49. Nearly 10% of the population
was foreign-born in 1850, provoking
a nativist reaction. In the last two
decades, similar percentages have
triggered a similar response. History
does not repeat itself, but it does
rhyme, as Mark Twain is said to have
observed!

6. IRISH IMMIGRATION EXPLODES
Irish immigration was not new to America & their culture & Catholic religion was always suspect. But the Irish
Potato Famine sent hundreds of thousands to America with great suddenness. Ireland lost one-third of its
population to death by starvation & emigration. As a convenient port city with a booming industrial base, Boston
was an attractive magnet for the starving Irish emigrants seeking opportunity. By 1850, the Irish were the largest
ethnic group in Boston, mostly poor & unskilled laborers. Although there were plenty of jobs & no American
workers were displaced by them—in fact it served for upward mobility for the native born since the Irish like most
new immigrants were willing to do the jobs despised by Americans—the newly arrived population was a perceived
threat & a convenient target for the rage and frustration already triggered by massive socio-economic changes.

7. NATIVIST RESPONSE WAS KNOW-NOTHING PARTY
The Know-Nothings, officially known as
the American Party, was a national
movement that grew out of earlier Native
American Party. “Sam” was Uncle Sam’s
nephew & became a symbol of the
Know-Nothings. Their “Dark Lantern”
style of politics with secret local lodges
spawned the “Know-Nothing” tag but
served as a powerful organizational tool
that brought together a variety of people
with a multiplicity of complaints who
were frustrated with a lack of political
voice. Meanwhile, a growing mass of
Irish refugees became a potent symbol
of threats to traditional lifeways. The
Know-Nothings capitalized on this to
secretly construct a huge following &
manifest a surprising political landslide.

8. KNOW-NOTHINGS SWEEP MASSACHUSETTS . . .
Frustration with the inability of the Whigs
or Jacksonian Democrats to address
mounting social & economic dislocations
brought on by industrialism & other
factors led to a populist revolt that
hitched itself to the Know-Nothing nativist
wagon. In the 1854 elections,
the American Party, which made gains
across America, swept Massachusetts,
electing a governor & gaining control of
all but three of the 400 seats in the
Massachusetts legislature. Only 35
members had any previous legislative
experience!

9. AFRICAN AMERICANS HAD BEST QUALITY OF
LIFE IN MASSACHUSETTS IN ANTEBELLUM ERA . . .
Meanwhile, there was another minority
group in Massachusetts not subject to
attack by nativists. African Americans
had better lifeways in Massachusetts
than anywhere else in America in the
1850s, north or south. It was a
destination for runaway slaves, who
were welcomed to the various thriving
black communities across the state.
This is a post Civil War photograph of
Thomas Thomas (1817-1894), a
prominent black abolitionist and later
restaurant owner in Springfield, Mass.

10. . . . BUT RACISM STILL REIGNED SUPREME
Racism led to an early
“separate but equal” doctrine
that kept blacks separated in
most theaters, public trans-
portation & in sub-standard
black schools, like the Abiel
Smith School in Boston..
Segregated schools faded
over time across the rest of
the state, but stubbornly
remained the status quo in
Boston.

11. ENTER WILLIAM COOPER NELL
William Cooper Nell (1816-1874) was an acolyte
of famous abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison.
Nell, abolitionist, integrationist, and tireless
crusader for equal rights, lobbied and led
boycotts in an effort to desegregate Boston
schools, the last place in Massachusetts where
blacks were prohibited from attending schools
alongside whites. As a boy, Nell was denied the
same academic award earned by fellow white
students, and thereafter dedicated his life to
equality in education in every other sphere of
civic life.

12. NON-VIOLENT PROTESTS, BOYCOTTS &
AGITATION CONTINUED FOR A DECADE
Nell, all but forgotten by history, led a movement for
desegregation that pioneered methods adopted by
later activists, including boycotts & petitions. When
a respected black headmaster was appointed to the
still segregated Smith School, peaceful but
persistent protesters interfered with opening day
registration to expand the boycott, until police
scattered them. When Nell gathered with these
participants that evening at the African American
Belknap Street Church next door, opponents
outside threw stones, breaking church windows.
Nell, who consistently advocated for strict
nonviolence—and whose methods and mien in
some senses prefigured by a century those of
Martin Luther King—told the crowd that the stones
will be kept “as trophies of the prowess of those
who resort to such methods of appeal.” The boycott
continued.

13. NATIVIST LEGISLATURE PROHIBITS SCHOOL
SEGREGATION
Many schools in Massachusetts had been integrated over time, but Boston remained the holdout. Using
every legal peaceful means, Nell and his allies continued to put pressure to bear on all sectors, including
black families who did not object to separate schools. He even urged a “taxpayer” boycott that led
prominent blacks to move out of Boston to the suburbs. It took over a decade of persistence, but
integration came to Boston when the legislature—controlled by the Know-Nothings—outlawed segregation
in the state in 1855. How did Nell achieve this result with nativists in control?

14. IN MASSACHUSETTS MANY KNOW-NOTHINGS
WERE ALSO ANTISLAVERY FREE SOILERS
Free Soiler Henry Wilson (1812-1875)
was a prominent anti-slavery power
broker who helped propel the Know-
Nothing party to its electoral sweep. He
was rewarded by the Know-Nothing
legislature with a Senate seat in 1855.
Nell had many antislavery allies in the
Free Soil party, & many Know-Nothings
in Massachusetts were also Free Soilers,
either because they were using the
nativist party to advance their own
agenda—or because they really were
both anti-Irish & sympathetic to blacks!

15. KNOW-NOTHINGS PASSED PROGRESSIVE
LEGISLATION TAINTED WITH ANTI-IRISH SENTIMENT
A landmark law favoring black education represented just a fraction of a host of progressive
legislation passed by the Know-Nothing legislature, including laws that provided an overall
boost to public school expenditure, made vaccination compulsory, funded libraries, took
tentative steps to regulate child labor, & strikingly improved women’s rights in property,
marriage and divorce. Anti-Irish prejudice ever loomed in the background. The small,
Protestant black minority posed little threat, & one legislator bemoaned long walks to school
for blacks while local public schools were so convenient to the “dirty Irish.”

16. POPULISM CAN BE PROGRESSIVE & REACTIONARY
What can historians make of the fact that what at first glance looks
like a nativist, reactionary political entity turned into one of the
most progressive legislative forces in American history? It could
well be that populist revolts take on many faces but at root most
are simply & essentially populist revolts, striking out against the
status quo. This is underscored by the incongruity of so many
votes for Robert Kennedy drifting after his assassination to George
Wallace in 1968, and of the estimated 12% of Bernie Sanders
supporters who voted for Donald Trump in 2016. Historian Ronald
P. Formisano argues that a mosaic of forces can serve as engine
to revolts against the status quo, and that it certainly did in this
case, noting: “that Know-Nothingism was populist and progressive
and reactionary. It was not progressive because it was populist, or
reactionary because it was populist. Rather, all three of these
currents came together, making it a classic case of the
combination of progressive and reactionary elements in a populist
movement.” The reality is that disaffected voters calling for change
cannot always articulate what form that change should take, only
that the status quo is unacceptable.

17. EPILOGUE
Preparing for the 1856 presidential race, the national Know-
Nothings met in convention & declared a position essentially
agnostic on slavery, seeking to unite the country behind nativism.
But Massachusetts Know-Nothings, however, met in Springfield in
Aug. 6-7, 1855 & championed nativism while declaring a free soil &
antislavery position that came to be called the “Springfield
Platform.” This wounded the national party, which nevertheless
nominated former President Millard Fillmore, who went down to
defeat in 1856. Antislavery votes hemorrhaged from the Know-
Nothings & went in great numbers to the brand new Republican
Party. Republicans elected their first President, Abraham Lincoln,
in 1860, & a great Civil War ensued that resulted in the abolition of
slavery in the United States. The rights of blacks, however,
suffered after the war, in the north as well as the south. African
Americans had to fight a long fight to desegregate Boston schools
once again, more than a century after William Cooper Nell & his
movement integrated schools the first time. Anti-Irish & anti-
Catholic prejudice lingered long after the Civil War, as well, and
while the Irish have now long been assimilated into American life, as
recently as 1960 the Catholic religion of the Democratic nominee
for President, John F. Kennedy, remained a significant liability in a
very close election.

18. KNOW-NOTHINGS.COM WEBSITE LAUNCH
Strange Bedfellows: Nativism, Know-Nothings, African-Americans &
School Desegregation in Antebellum Massachusetts
Stan Prager is working on a book length project about William Cooper Nell, the Know-Nothings &
Massachusetts school desegregation. Stan has created a website to host this presentation & future
related materials at www.know-nothings.com

19. About the Author
 Stan Prager has spent a lifetime studying history and much of his
professional life in the technology arena. Stan has a M.A. in Public
History from APUS, with an emphasis on digitization. Stan’s current
focus is on the marriage of history and technology. Stan has an
online profile at www.stanprager.com
 Stan digitized & transcribed the letters of Private George W. Gould,
an ordinary Massachusetts soldier killed at the Battle of Cold Harbor
in 1864, and launched a website to showcase this project, Stan
presented this material as Resurrecting Lost Voices: The George W.
Gould Story, D.I.Y. Digital Archiving, at History Camp Pioneer Valley
2016. More info at www.resurrectinglostvoices.com
 Stan is owner and president of GoGeeks Computer Rescue, a
computer services and manufacturing company in East Longmeadow,
MA. More info at www.gogeeks.com
 Stan serves as technology consultant and appears weekly on a “Tech
Tips” segment on Western Mass News television
 Stan, an avid reader & book collector, authors a book blog of reviews
& essays at www.regarp.com
 Stan can be reached via email at stan@stanprager.com
 Stan is working on a book length project about William Cooper Nell,
the Know-Nothings & Massachusetts school desegregation. For more
info visit: www.know-nothings.com