THE
CONCORD REVIEW
I am simply one who loves the past and is diligent in investigating it.
K’ung-fu-tzu (551-479 BC) The Analects
Child Labor Cases
Deniz Dutz
St. Albans School, Washington, DC
Universities of the People
Heather Harrington
Ellis School, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Johann Bernoulli
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Deerfield Academy, Deerfield, Massachusetts
Segregated Swimming
William S. Zaubler
Montclair-Kimberley Academy, Montclair, New Jersey
Eugenics in North Carolina
Raleigh Charter High School, Raleigh, North Carolina
Mission to Mao
Elliott Thornton
Hotchkiss School, Lakeville, Connecticut
1937 Supreme Court
Gann Academy, Waltham, Massachusetts
Michelle Li
Abraham Cheloff
Right of Revolution
Jianing Wang
Hunter College High School, Manhattan Island, New York
Millennialism
Negro Leagues
Mehitabel Glenhaber
Commonwealth School, Boston, Massachusetts
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Hall High School, West Hartford, Connecticut
Newburgh Conspiracy
Ramaz School, Manhattan Island, New York
Gabriel Roth
A Quarterly Review of Essays by Students of History
Volume 25, Number Three
$20.00
Spring 2015
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Volume Twenty-Five, Number Three
1
Deniz Dutz
Child Labor Cases
19
Heather Harrington
Universities of the People
35
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Johann Bernoulli
63
William S. Zaubler
Segregated Swimming
101
Michelle Li
Eugenics in North Carolina
123
Elliott Thornton
Mission to Mao
139
Abraham Cheloff
1937 Supreme Court
161
Jianing Wang
Right of Revolution
175
Mehitabel Glenhaber
Millennialism
197
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Negro Leagues
235
Gabriel Roth
Newburgh Conspiracy
254
Notes on Contributors
Spring 2015
Editor and Publisher, Will Fitzhugh
Managing Editor, Samantha S. Wesner
e-mail: [email protected], [email protected]
website:
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The Spring 2015 issue of The Concord Review
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Judging The Supreme Court: An Interpretation
of The Child Labor Cases
Deniz Dutz
T
he main entrance to the Supreme Court Building
boldly bears the words: “Equal Justice Under Law.”2 In essence,
these words express the role of the Supreme Court. The Supreme
Court webpage declares that, “as the final arbiter of the law, the
Court…functions as guardian and interpreter of the Constitution.”
The word “interpreter” in this dictum raises a few eyebrows. In
1918, the Supreme Court decided in Hammer v. Dagenhart that the
regulation of child labor lay beyond the powers of Congress. In
1941, 23 years later, the Supreme Court overturned the decision
and ruled, in United States v. Darby Lumber Co., that Congress had
the power to regulate child labor and other employment conditions. In this ruling, the precedent set by Hammer v. Dagenhart was
overturned. The doctrine of precedence, known in jurisprudence
as “the doctrine of stare decisis,” has been a foundational structure
of the U.S. common law legal system. As an “interpreter” of the
Constitution, the Supreme Court defined the Constitution in
a radically different way in each case. Yet neither the powers of
Congress nor those of the Supreme Court were altered in the years
between the two decisions. It is conceivable, in the second child
Deniz Dutz is a Senior at St. Albans School in Washington, DC, where
he wrote this paper for Benjamin W. Labaree’s United States History
course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
2
Deniz Dutz
labor case, that the Supreme Court might have refused to follow
the previous authority because it was of the view that, though relevant, the initial decision was no longer sustainable due to prevailing public attitudes.3 This paper argues that the Supreme Court’s
final decision of banning child labor was not shaped by prevailing
public views, but rather by the imposed pressure of checks on the
Supreme Court by the executive and legislative branches.
When the Founding Fathers drafted the United States Constitution in 1787, and ratified it in 1788, the main topic of concern
was the extent of power of the executive branch, and to a lesser
degree, the legislative branch. The judicial branch was perceived
as the least contentious and least powerful of the three branches.
This viewpoint is made evident in the brevity and relatively vague
language of Article III of the Constitution, which enumerates the
powers of the judicial branch.4 Based on a narrow interpretation
of power limited to physical enforcement, the judicial branch
is quite weak. As Andrew Jackson correctly pointed out in the
famous case of Worcester v. Georgia, the Supreme Court “has made
[its] decision; now let [it] enforce it!”5 However, what makes the
Supreme Court so powerful is that it exerts judicial review over the
other two branches. In the famous court case Marbury v. Madison
in 1803, Chief Justice John Marshall established that the Supreme
Court has the power to limit and determine how the Constitution applies to both the executive and legislative branches. This
judicial oversight includes the power to overturn any legislative or
executive decision. In effect, it determines the power of the other
branches. As a result of its power to set boundaries, the judicial
branch has emerged as more influential than the authors of the
Constitution may have envisioned.
Over a century after Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court
issued a ruling in what became another major landmark Supreme
Court case. In 1905, Joseph Lochner, who owned Lochner’s Home
Bakery in New York, was fined $50 for violating New York’s Bakeshop Act. The Bakeshop Act stated that “no employee shall be…
permitted to work in a…bakery or confectionary establishment
[for] more than sixty hours in any one week.”6 Lochner challenged
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3
the constitutionality of the act, and the case eventually reached
the Supreme Court. In a 5–4 decision, the Supreme Court held
that the act was unconstitutional as it interfered “with the right
of contract between the employer and employees.”7 Justice Peckham, who wrote the opinion of the court, further claimed that
“the general right to make a contract in relation to [a] business is
part of the liberty of the individual protected by the Fourteenth
Amendment.”8 The Fourteenth Amendment, which states that
“no state shall…deprive any person of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law,” served as the main argument used by
the Supreme Court to uphold the concept of liberty of contract,
which applied to citizens, and by extension, to corporations. More
specifically, the Supreme Court used the Due Process and Equal
Protection clauses as applied through the Fourteenth Amendment
as constitutional justification for liberty of contract.
The Lochner v. New York decision established the Lochner
Era, a period in American history beginning in the late 19th century which lasted until the mid-1930s. Despite its origins reaching
back to the late 19th century, the era decidedly influenced court
cases post Lochner v. New York. As historian Mary L. Dudziak commented, during “the ‘Lochner era,’…the Court played a judicially
activist but politically conservative role…The Court also carefully
scrutinized state labor regulations, invalidating those that interfered with the rights of workers and employers to freely bargain
over labor conditions.”10 In essence, the Supreme Court favored
a laissez-faire-oriented economy, with minimal oversight by the
government. In his book addressing constitutional law, historian
and attorney Steven Emanuel claims that “between 1899 and 1937
[the Lochner era], 159 Supreme Court decisions (not counting
civil rights cases) held state statutes unconstitutional under the
Due Process and Equal Protection clauses.”11 During the Lochner
era the Supreme Court overturned the law banning child labor
in the court case Hammer v. Dagenhart in 1918. However, before
delving into this court case, it is important to view this era through
the lens of the general public and of the legislative branch, both
of which shared a contrasting viewpoint compared to that of the
judicial branch.
4
Deniz Dutz
The beginning of the 20th century marked the beginning
of the progressive era, a period in which economic and social
reforms transformed American society.12 These changes included
efforts to regulate working hours, the sale of alcohol, child labor
and natural resources. The progressive movement lasted until the
1920s, and the rallying cry of the progressives was a desire for a
less corrupt and more activist government. During this period,
the public strongly favored progressivism. In the presidential
election of 1904, Theodore Roosevelt, who ran as a defender of
progressivism, received 56.4 percent of the popular vote, or 7.6
million votes. His opponent Alton Parker, who ran as a conservative
democrat, received 37.6 percent of the popular vote, or 5 million
votes.13 Already in the early 1900s, public sentiment increasingly
inclined toward progressive ideals. In the presidential election
of 1912, the four top presidential candidates, who accounted for
98.4 percent of the popular vote, all promoted progressivism.14 By
this time, the public debate no longer concerned pitting conservatism against progressivism, but rather focused on the specific
type of progressivism that should prevail in society. These statistics
regarding the popular vote illustrate how public opinion favored
social and economic changes in the early 20th century. This public
sentiment also translated to the executive and legislative branches
which increasingly favored progressivism.
The progressive political sphere during the Progressive
Era allowed for reform-promoting legislation both in local governments and in the central government. For example, Congress
passed the Pure Food and Drug Act in 1906, which resulted in
stricter supervision of the production of foods and drugs. Another
major issue that both the general public and Congress strove to
address was child labor. In 1910, 2 million children (18.4 percent
of all children) were working minors.15 As public sentiment increasingly opposed child labor, “state laws [were] toughened: all
but two states…banned children under 14 from the factories.”16
However, state legislation only accomplished so much. Due to
competition between states, those states that allowed child labor
offered enterprises an economic advantage over those that banned
child labor. This often led states to change their child labor laws,
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5
and rendered it hard if not impossible for child labor to be properly banned. In 1916, Congress enacted the Keating-Owen Act.
The act “banned the sale of products from any factory, shop, or
cannery that employed children under the age of 14, [or] from
any mine that employed children under the age of 16.”17 The act
had the support of the public, of Congress, and even of President
Woodrow Wilson, who had lobbied extensively for its passage.
The jubilation over passing this act was short-lived. Nine
months after its passage, the Supreme Court struck down the
Keating-Owen Act in Hammer v. Dagenhart. In the 5–4 decision, the
Supreme Court held that Congress, under the Commerce Clause,
had no power to regulate labor conditions. However, this case was
not influenced by the constitutionality of the legislation, but rather
by the interpretation each justice derived from the Commerce
Clause, which was ultimately based on the political and legal views
of the justices. The Commerce Clause of the Constitution “gives
Congress the power ‘to regulate commerce with foreign nations,
and among the several states, and with Indian tribes.’”18 The vague
phrasing of this clause allowed for different interpretations among
the justices. When Justice Day delivered the opinion of the court,
he wrote that the act “not only transcends the authority delegated
to Congress over commerce, but also exerts a power as to a purely
local matter to which the federal authority does not extend.”19 In
contrast, Justice Holmes, who delivered the dissent, claimed that
the act “is clearly within the Congress’ constitutional power.”20
According to Holmes, “when [states] seek to send their products
across the state line, they are no longer within their rights…such
commerce belongs…to Congress to regulate.”21
Given that the Constitution allows for two different interpretations of the Commerce Clause, it fell upon each justice to
decide which interpretation he prefered. It was in this context
that the ban on child labor was revoked. In Hammer v. Dagenhart,
the majority of the justices shared a “widespread belief that labor
contracts were individual matters that ought not to be interfered
with by the government.”22 By comparing the personal beliefs of
each justice based on how they voted, there is little doubt that the
6
Deniz Dutz
decision came down to the personal and political views of nine
men, and not to the text of the Constitution. According to the Oyez
Project, Justices White, Day, Van Devanter, Pitney and McReynolds,
all of whom voted for banning the child labor legislation, had
conservative beliefs that heavily supported a laissez-faire system.
In contrast, Justices McKenna, Holmes, Brandeis and Clarke,
who voted for upholding the legislation, all shared more liberal
and progressive-leaning views.23 The laissez-faire belief trumped
the more liberal political and social views. The laissez-faire view
was further upheld as subsequent laws attempting to ban child
labor in the following years were similarly held unconstitutional:
“[Again and] again…textile manufactures…challenged the law,…
again the High Court [Supreme Court] struck down the law.” 24
Finally, in 1938, Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards
Act. The act essentially banned child labor, and “prescribe[d]
standards for the basic minimum wage and overtime pay.”25 It also
introduced a maximum-hour workweek. In 1940, Darby, a lumber
manufacturer, challenged the constitutionality of the act as he
was paying employees below the prescribed minimum wage and
forced employees to work past the prescribed maximum weekly
hours.26 Darby claimed that regulation of manufacturing, including the child labor laws, did not fall within the commerce powers
of Congress. In 1941, the Supreme Court addressed the issue in
United States v. Darby Lumber Co. The syllabus of the decision, which
gives a summary of the opinion, stated that “while manufacture is
not of itself interstate commerce, the shipment of manufactured
goods interstate is such commerce, and the prohibition of such
shipment by Congress is a regulation of interstate commerce.”27
In an 8–0 ruling in 1941, the Supreme Court upheld the Fair
Labor Standards Act.
Justice Stone, who wrote the opinion of the Court, argued
that Congress could regulate manufacturing by referencing past
Supreme Court cases, such as Gibbons v. Ogden, which set up this
precedent. However, when addressing the precedent set forth
by Hammer v. Dagenhart, namely that Congress cannot regulate
manufacturing, Justice Stone dismissed the case, asserting that
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7
“the reasoning and conclusion of the Court’s opinion there cannot be reconciled with the conclusion which we have reached.”28
The fact that the Supreme Court overturned Hammer v. Dagenhart
as a decision based on a different viewpoint recognizes how the
personal and political beliefs of each justice affected the outcome.
The 8–0 vote for regulating manufacturing, compared to the 5–4
vote in Hammer v. Dagenhart against regulating manufacturing
demonstrates that between the two decisions, either the beliefs
of the justices underwent a profound alteration or that some
interference caused the justices to alter their views.
In terms of its context, the Fair Labor Standards Act was
very similar to previous laws that had been struck down by the
Supreme Court. Most notably, the ban on child labor has many
parallels with the Keating-Owen Act of 1916, which, as discussed,
had been struck down. Furthermore, the regulations on maximum
work hours and the setting of the minimum wage that are found
in the Fair Labor Standards Act resemble legislation that had also
previously been struck down by the Supreme Court. For example,
in “Adkins v. Children’s Hospital in 1923, the Court…voided…[a] law
that set minimum wages for women.”29 As mentioned previously,
the Supreme Court was biased toward upholding a laissez-faire system from the late 19th century to the mid-1930s in the Lochner
era. And finally, “during the 1930s, the Court’s action on social
legislation was even more devastating…[as it] invalidated both
State and Federal labor laws.”30 Although Congress underwent
several reforms between the Hammer v. Dagenhart and United States
v. Darby Lumber Co. court cases, the laws that Congress passed or
attempted to pass between 1918 and 1941 were similar enough to
discount a change in Congress to justify the shift that the Supreme
Court underwent.
Despite the vast changes that swept America between 1918
and 1941, public and legislative branch ideologies or sentiments
towards child labor remained similar to the sentiments of 1918.
Granted, the Great Depression in the United States (1929–1939)
made the public aware of the need of increased governmental
influence and increased public support systems. As writer John
8
Deniz Dutz
Green stated, when coupled with the New Deal Era (1933–1940),
both led to “a transformation between the federal government
and American citizens. Before…Americans did not expect the
government to help them in times of economic distress. After the
New Deal, the question was no longer if the government should
intervene, but how it should intervene.”31
Notwithstanding the general transformation in public attitude, the ideologies or sentiments of the public and Congress remained constant with regard to child labor. Despite all the changes
brought to America, the public, in the same fashion as during
1918, continued consistently to oppose the practice of child labor.
Furthermore, despite the expansion of the role of Congress, the
issue of repealing child labor laws had been on Congress’ agenda
since the 1910s. Given this constancy between the 1910s and the
1940s in the views of both the public and Congress towards child
labor, they could not have contributed to influencing the Supreme
Court’s reversal of decision. What did contribute to the Supreme
Court’s decision, however, was the executive branch, and through
the actions of the executive branch, the Supreme Court itself.
When the United States Constitution was created, the framers implanted a system of checks and balances of power among
the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. The motivation
was to protect the rights of Americans by preventing any single
branch from becoming overly powerful.32 As previously noted,
the Supreme Court and the judicial branch, through a series of
precedents beginning with the precedent of judicial review, had
gained more power than the framers of the Constitution had
envisioned. In addition, the Supreme Court also had virtually no
checks on it. Theoretically, the legislative branch has the power
to remove judges through impeachment, to approve appointments of judges, and to alter the size of the Supreme Court. In
addition, the executive branch has the power to appoint Supreme
Court judges. However, the failed attempt to impeach Associate
Justice Samuel Chase in 1804, based on his political views, set the
precedent that a justice cannot be impeached for having his or
her own political views influence his or her decisions. Following
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9
the failed impeachment of Justice Chase, Supreme Court Justices
were not only appointed for life, but also faced no danger of being
impeached on the basis of their personal views.
Although there are clear benefits to this system of judicial
security, it also fosters a disconnect between prevailing public opinions and the largely constant beliefs of Supreme Court Justices.
When the personal beliefs of the justices were the main driving
force in the child labor decisions, this system of judicial independence was especially dangerous due to a lack of checks from the
executive and legislative branches. The Lochner Era was an era
in which both the executive and legislative branches did little to
curb the power of the Supreme Court, which in turn allowed the
persistence of a laissez-faire ideology that failed to adjust to prevailing public sentiments. In essence, the Supreme Court, for much
of the Lochner Era, lagged behind evolving social views due to
an adherence to precedents and a lack of checks and balances.
It is precisely this system of checks of balances that changed in
1937, allowing for the reversal of the child labor decision in United
States v. Darby Lumber Co. and for a Supreme Court that was more
responsive to prevailing public ideologies.
In 1937, President Roosevelt, frustrated and determined
“to overcome the obstacle of Supreme Court opposition” which
had invalidated much of the New Deal legislation, struck back
at the justices, or as he called them, the “nine old men” of the
Bench.33,34 FDR proposed a legislative initiative to add more justices
to the Supreme Court, known as the Judicial Procedures Reform
Bill of 1937 or more commonly as the “court-packing plan.” As
the historian Leuchtenburg points out, “Roosevelt recommended
that when a federal judge who had served at least ten years waited
more than six months after his seventieth birthday to resign or
retire, the President might add a new judge to the bench…[and
could] appoint as many but no more than six new justices to the
Supreme Court.”35 According to FDR, the purpose of this plan
was to “vitalize the courts.”36
In his book, Leuchtenburg follows this overview of the
court-packing plan by adding that “opponents [to Roosevelt’s]
10
Deniz Dutz
plan had no difficulty in proving that Court inefficiency was a
bogus issue and showing that what the President really wanted was
a more responsive Court…[especially given that] the President’s
most consistent supporter had been the eighty-year-old justice
Brandeis.”37 However, historians such as Leuchtenburg agree
that “Roosevelt was too clever” to actually believe his proposed
legislation would pass. Rather, in a brilliant move, Roosevelt was
asserting to the Supreme Court the potential of more checks
and balances on their actions. Although this act would fall short,
Congress, along with the President, did have the ability to curb
the power of the Supreme Court and of the judicial branch. This
move by Roosevelt had a profound impact on the Supreme Court.
Beginning with the 1937 case of West Coast Hotel Co. v.
Parrish, the Supreme Court began routinely to overturn decisions
that were based on the laissez-faire system. And finally, in 1941, the
Supreme Court overturned the 1918 Hammer v. Dagenhart case,
and ruled that a ban on child labor fell under the jurisdiction of
Congress. Charles Hughes, who was the Chief Justice during the
court-packing plan, declared in his autobiographical notes that
“[t]he President’s proposal had not the slightest effect on our
decision.”38 However, given the weak rationale for other possibilities, it seems clear that the threat of imposing more checks and
balances on the Supreme Court through the court-packing plan
effectively reduced the disconnect between prevailing attitudes
and the Supreme Court. It was only through the actions of the
executive and legislative branches that the Supreme Court rejected the laissez-faire system and reversed, in 1941, its child labor
decision of 1918.
This paper began with an analysis of the evolution of
the judicial branch. As established, the judicial branch’s powers
quickly overstepped what the framers of the Constitution appeared to have had in mind. The obvious reason for this excess
of power lay in the vague definition of the judicial branch in
the Constitution, allowing for an expansion of power through a
series of precedents starting with Marbury v. Madison and judicial
review. However, another underlying rationale can help explain
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11
the Supreme Court’s expansion of power. This hypothesis rests
on the importance of a system of checks and balances among all
three branches of government. Although judicial review established a check by the Supreme Court on the power of both the
executive and legislative branches, there was an apparent lack of
checks on the judicial branch throughout the Lochner era. This
paper, through the lens of two child labor court cases, shows that
prevailing public and legislative branch attitudes failed to check
the power of the Supreme Court. It was only through executive
and legislative action via the court-packing plan threat that the
Supreme Court felt the pressures of executive checks and balances. The court-packing plan presented a check to the Supreme
Court which caused it to become more responsive to prevailing
views. Checks and balances only work when each side feels pressure from the other side. In 1918, the Supreme Court operated
under minimal checks when it ruled that Congress’ regulation of
child labor was unconstitutional in Hammer v. Dagenhart. By 1941,
the court-packing plan, despite its unfeasibility and unpopularity,
had imposed the threat of a system of checks and balances on the
Supreme Court, resulting in its ruling that Congress could regulate
child labor in United States v. Darby.
The interaction between the judicial and legislative
branches has led to a very special relationship between them.
The Supreme Court’s actions before and after the court-packing
plan reveal that when both branches are aligned in interests, the
legislative branch can wield vast powers, with the opposite being
true when each branch diverges in interests. Following the courtpacking plan, Congress’ powers expanded significantly as the
Supreme Court upheld subsequent legislation. Never before had
the judicial branch aligned so strongly with the legislative branch.
For example, in 1942, the Supreme Court ruled in Wickard v.
Filburn that Congress’ imposition of a penalty for growing wheat
“not intended…for commerce but wholly for consumption on the
farm [is] within the commerce power of Congress.”39 After the
court-packing plan, the Supreme Court increasingly became more
politically sensitive. Today, the Supreme Court is no longer seen
as nine justices, but rather as four conservative and four liberal
12
Deniz Dutz
justices, with Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy more likely to
swing between sides. Paradoxically, the curbing of the autonomy
of the Supreme Court through the threatened imposition of more
checks, rather than restraining its activism, may have resulted
over time in an increase in both its activism and its politicization.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
This paper was submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements of the St Albans School U.S. History course. The
author thanks Blaney Harper, Esq., and Benjamin W. Labaree
for helpful discussions prior to the completion of this paper.
2
U.S. Supreme Court, “The Court and Constitutional
Interpretation” (accessed April 20, 2014), http://www.
supremecourt.gov/about/constitutional.aspx.
3
Michael Gerhardt, The Power of Precedent (New York:
Oxford University Press, 2008).
4
U.S. Constitution, art. III.
5
Tim Garrison, “Worcester v. Georgia (1832),” New
Georgia Encyclopedia, (found August 27, 2013), http://
www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/government-politics/
worcester-v-georgia-1832.
6
New York (State) Legislature Assembly, Documents of
the Assembly of the State of New York, One Hundred and
Twentieth Session (Albany: Wynkoop Hallenbeck Crawford
Co., 1897) 18:897.
7
Alex McBride, “Supreme Court History: Lochner v. New
York (1905),” PBS, December, 2006, http://www.pbs.org/wnet/
supremecourt/capitalism/landmark_lochner.html.
8
“Syllabus of Lochner v. New York—198 U.S. 45” (New
York: U.S. Supreme Court, 1905) as provided by Justia caselaw,
“Lochner v. New York—198 U.S. 45,” Justia US Supreme Court,
(accessed April 21, 2014), http://supreme.justia.com/cases/
federal/us/198/45/case.html.
9
U.S. Constitution, amend. XIV.
10
Mary Dudziak, “The Politics of ‘the Least Dangerous
Branch’: The Court, the Constitution and Constitutional
Politics Since 1945” (2003), in A Companion to Post-1945 America
ed. Jean-Christophe Agnew and Roy Rosenzweig (Lynchburg:
Blackwell Press, 2003) p. 386.
11
Steven Emanuel, Emanuel Law Outlines: Constitutional Law
24th ed. (New York: Aspen Publishers, 2006) p. 149.
12
S. Mintz & S. McNeil, “Overview of the Progressive
Era.” Digital History (accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.
digitalhistory.uh.edu/era.cfm?eraid=11.
13
David Leip, “1904 Presidential General Election Results,”
Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections (accessed April 21, 2014),
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1904.
14
David Leip, “1912 Presidential General Election Results,”
Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections (accessed April 21, 2014),
http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1912.
1
13
14
Deniz Dutz
Bill Kauffman, “Essays in Political Economy: The Child
Labor Amendment Debate of the 1920s,” Ludwig von Mises
Institute no. 16 (November 1992) p. 3 (accessed April 21, 2014),
https://mises.org/etexts/childlabor.pdf.
16
Ibid., p. 9.
17
Edward Keating and Robert Latham, “Transcript
of Keating-Owen Child Labor Act of 1916 (1916),” Our
Documents (accessed April 21, 2014), http://ourdocuments.
gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=59&page=transcipt.
18
U.S. Constitution, art. I, § 3.
19
William Day, Opinion of Hammer v. Dagenhart—247
U.S. 251 (U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1918) as provided by
Cornell University Law School, “Hammer v. Dagenhart,” Legal
Information Institute (accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.
law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/247/251.
20
Oliver Holmes, Dissent of Hammer v. Dagenhart—247
U.S. 251 (U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1918) as provided by
Cornell University Law School, “Hammer v. Dagenhart,” Legal
Information Institute (accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.
law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/247/251.
21
Ibid.
22
“Hammer v. Dagenhart—Significance,” Law Library—
American Law and Legal Information (accessed April 21,
2014), http://law.jrank.org/pages/25324/Hammer-vDagenhart-Significance.html.
23
“HAMMER v. DAGENHART,” The Oyez Project at IIT
Chicago-Kent College of Law (accessed April 21, 2014), http://
www.oyez.org/cases/1901-1939/1917/1917_704.
24
Kauffman, p. 8.
25
U.S. Department of Labor, “The Fair Labor Standards
Act (FLSA)” (accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.dol.gov/
compliance/laws/comp-flsa.htm.
26
“United States v. Darby,” CaseBriefs (accessed April 21,
2014), http://www.casebriefs.com/blog/law/constitutionallaw/constitutional-law-keyed-to-sullivan/the-commerce-power/
united-states-v-darby-2/.
27
Syllabus of United States v. Darby—312 U.S. 100 (U.S.:
U.S. Supreme Court, 1941) as provided by Cornell University
Law School, United States v. Darby, Legal Information Institute
(accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.law.cornell.edu/
supremecourt/text/312/100.
28
Harlan Stone, Opinion of United States v. Darby—312
U.S. 100 (U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1941) as provided by
15
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Cornell University Law School, “United States v. Darby,” Legal
Information Institute (accessed April 21, 2014), http://www.
law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/312/100.
29
U.S. Department of Labor, Jonathan Grossman, Fair
Labor Standards Act of1938: Maximum Struggle for a Minimum
Wage (June, 1978), http://www.dol.gov/dol/aboutdol/history/
flsal938.htm (accessed April 21, 2014).
30
Ibid.
31
John Green, “The New Deal: Crash Course U.S. History
#34” (Thought Bubble Cate, 2013), YouTube.com, 10:15–10:34,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bMq9Ek6jnA.
32
“Issues—Checks and Balances,” National Constitution
Center—Constitutioncenter.org, http://constitutioncenter.
org/constitution/issues/checks-and-balances (accessed April
21, 2014).
33
U.S. Department of Labor, Fair Labor Standards Act of
1938: Maximum Struggle for a Minimum Wage.
34
H.E. Homan, “He Just Ain’t Fast Enough,” Brooklyn Citizen
(February 9, 1937), as shown in http://newdeal.feri.org/
court/024.htm.
35
William Leuchtenburg, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New
Deal 1932–1940 (New York: Harper & Row Publishers 1963)
p. 233.
36
Ibid. p. 233.
37
Ibid., p. 233.
38
David J. Danelski and Joseph S. Tulchin, eds, The
Autobiographical Notes of Charles Evans Hughes, Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1976, p. 312, Cited in footnote
in William Ross, The Chief Justiceship of Charles Evans Hughes
(1930–1941) (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press,
2007) p. 125.
39
Syllabus of Wickard v. Filburn—317 U.S. 111 (U.S.: U.S.
Supreme Court, 1942) as provided by Cornell University Law
School, “Wickard v. Filburn,” Legal Information Institute, http:/
www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/317/111 (accessed
April 21, 2014).
15
16
Deniz Dutz
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Day, William. Opinion of Hammer v. Dagenhart—247
US. 251 U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1918. As provided by
Cornell University Law School. “Hammer v. Dagenhart,”
Legal Information Institute, http://www.law.cornell.edu/
supremecourt/text/247/251. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Danielski, David J., and Joseph S. Tulchin, eds. The
Autobiographical Notes of Charles Evans Hughes. Cambridge,
Harvard University Press, 1973. Cited in William Ross, The
Chief Justiceship of Charles Evans Hughes (1930–1941) Columbia:
University of South Carolina Press, 2007.
Holmes, Oliver. Dissent of Hammer v. Dagenhart—247
U.S. 251 U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1918. As provided by
Cornell University Law School. “Hammer v. Dagenhart,”
Legal Information Institute, http://www.law.cornell.edu/
supremecourt/text/247/251. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Homan, H. E. “He Just Ain’t Fast Enough.” Brooklyn Citizen
February 9, 1937, http://newdeal.feri.org/court/024.htm.
Keating, Edward, & Robert Latham. “Transcript of KeatingOwen Child Labor Act of 1916 (1916).” Our Documents, http://
ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=59&page=transcri
pt. Accessed April 21, 2014.
New York (State) Legislature Assembly. Documents of the
Assembly of the State of New York, One Hundred and Twentieth Session
33 vols., Albany: Wynkoop Hallenbeck Crawford Co., 1897,
18:897.
Stone, Harlan. Opinion of United States v. Darby—312
US 100 U.S.: U.S. Supreme Court, 1941. As provided by
Cornell University Law School, “United States v. Darby,”
Legal Information Institute, http://www.law.cornell.edu/
supremecourt/text/312/100. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Syllabus of Lochner v. New York—198 U.S. 45 New York: U.S.
Supreme Court, 1905. As provided by Justia caselaw. “Lochner
v. New York—198 U.S. 45,” Justia US Supreme Court, http://
supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/198/45/case.html.
Accessed April 21, 2014.
Syllabus of United States v. Darby—312 U.S. 100 U.S.: U.S.
Supreme Court, 1941, as provided by Cornell University Law
School. United States v. Darby. Legal Information Institute,
THE CONCORD REVIEW
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/312/100/.
Accessed April 21, 2014.
Secondary Sources
Dudziak, Mary, “The Politics of ‘the Least Dangerous
Branch’: The Court, the Constitution and Constitutional
Politics Since 1945.” In A Companion to Post-1945 America edited
by Jean-Christophe Agnew and Roy Rosenzweig. Lynchburg:
Blackwell Press, 2003.
Emanuel, Steven. Emanuel Law Outlines: Constitutional Law
24th edition. New York, Aspen Publishers, 2006.
Garrison, Tim. “Worcester v. Georgia (1832),” New Georgia
Encyclopedia. August 27, 2013. http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.
org/articles/government-politics/worcester-v-georgia-1832.
Gerhardt, Michael. The Power of Precedent. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2008.
Green, John. “The New Deal: Crash Course U.S. History
#34.” Thought Bubble Cafe, 2013, YouTube.com. 10:15–10:34,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bMq9Ek6jnA.
“Hammer v. Dagenhart—Significance,” Law Library—
American Law and Legal Information. http://law.jrank.org/
pages/25324/Hammer-v-DagenhartSignificance.html. Accessed
April 21, 2014.
“HAMMER v. DAGENHART,” The Oyez Project at
IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, http://www.oyez.org/
cases/1901-1939/1917/1917_704. Accessed April 21, 2014.
“Issues—Checks and Balances,” National Constitution
Center—Constitutioncenter.org, http://constitutioncenter.
org/constitution/issues/checks-and-balances. Accessed April
21, 2014.
Kauffman, Bill. “Essays in Political Economy: The Child
Labor Amendment Debate of the 1920s.” Ludwig von Mises
Institute no. 16 (November 1992): 3–9, https://mises.org/
etexts/childlabor.pdf. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Leip, David. “1904 Presidential General Election Results,”
Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. http://uselectionatlas.org/
RESULTS/national.php?year=1904. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Leip, David. “1912 Presidential General Election Results,”
Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections. http://uselectionatlas.org/
RESULTS/national.php?year=1912. Accessed April 21, 2014.
17
18
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Leuchtenburg, William. Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal
1932–1940. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1963.
Mandelbaum, Robert. “Alton Brooks Parker.” New York
Courts, http://www.nycourts.gov/history/legal-history-newyork/luminaries-court-appeals/parker-alton.html. Accessed
April 22, 2014.
McBride, Alex. “Supreme Court History: Lochner v. New York
(1905).” PBS, December 2006, http://www.pbs.org/wnet/
supremecourt/capitalism/landmark_lochner.html.
Mintz, S., & S. McNeil. “Overview of the Progressive
Era.” Digital History, http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/era.
cfm?eraid=11. Accessed April 21, 2014.
“SCHELTER POULTRY CORP. v. UNITED STATES,” The Oyez
Project at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, http://www.oyez.
org/cases/1901-1939/1934/1934_854. Accessed April 22, 2014.
U.S. Department of Labor. The Fair Labor Standards Act
(FLSA). http://www.dol.gov/compliance/laws/comp-flsa.htm.
Accessed April 21, 2014.
U.S. Department of Labor; Grossman, Jonathan. “Fair Labor
Standards Act of 1938: Maximum Struggle for a Minimum
Wage.” June 1978. http://www.dol.gov/dol/aboutdol/history/
flsa1938.htm. Accessed April 21, 2014.
“United States v. Darby.” CaseBriefs, http://www.casebriefs.
com/blog/law/constitutional-law/constitutional-law-keyedto-sullivan/the-commerce-power/united-states-v-darby-2/.
Accessed April 21, 2014.
“United States v. Darby Lumber Co.—Case Brief Summary.”
Lawnix Free Case Briefs RSS, http://www.lawnix.com/cases/usdarby.html. Accessed April 22, 2014.
U.S. Supreme Court. “The Court and Constitutional
Interpretation.” http://www.supremecourt.gov/about/
constitutional.aspx. Accessed April 20, 2014.
Zainaldin, Jamil S. “Progressive Era,” New
Georgia Encyclopedia. January 10, 2014. http://www.
georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/
progressive-era. Accessed April 22, 2014.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Universities of the People: The Impact of the
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
in the Great Depression
Heather Harrington
I
n his “Gospel of Wealth,” Andrew Carnegie said, “the
best means of benefiting the community is to place within its
reach the ladders upon which the aspiring can rise.”1 Carnegie
knew how important such ladders were. When he was a young
man, Carnegie had access to a ladder for the mind in the form
of Colonel Anderson’s library for “working boys.” In his autobiography, Carnegie said that this early exposure to books opened
his mind and gave him the tools he would need to succeed.2 He
was convinced that the way for him to have the greatest impact on
“boys and girls who have good within them and ability and ambition to develop it” was to put books in their hands.3 It was with this
goal in mind that he funded public libraries. In the Depression
years, the public turned to his libraries—not just for escape, but
also as a means of active self-improvement, thus substantiating
Carnegie’s social philosophy.
One city where this occurred was Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The hometown of Carnegie was an industrial center, home to
many workers and immigrants, and was hard hit by the Depression.
Heather Harrington is a Senior at the Ellis School in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania, where she wrote this paper for Mr. Malmstrom’s Survey
of American History Course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
20
Heather Harrington
In Pittsburgh, like in many cities across the country, the public
libraries became an important support to the community. In part
this was the result of concentrated efforts by the Carnegie Library
of Pittsburgh to become the “University of the People”4 through
internal services and community outreach. It was also the result of
the initiative of the citizens of Pittsburgh, who sought to use their
libraries to expand their minds and opportunities. The public
libraries of Pittsburgh had a significant impact on communities
and individuals in the Great Depression, fulfilling Carnegie’s vision of helping people to help themselves.
When the stock market crashed at the end of 1929, the
Carnegie Libraries of Pittsburgh felt the effect immediately. Unemployed workers with unexpected free time flocked to the reading
rooms. In 1929, 2,855,283 books were borrowed for home reading.5 In 1932, the lowest point of the economy and the highest for
library use, that number was 4,270,052.6 The libraries’ resources
in time, staff, and money were overwhelmed by the numbers of
people requiring their service. It was the assessment of Victor
Showers, assistant director of the Reference Department, that
this expansion in the use of Pittsburgh’s public libraries could
not be accounted for by the growth of the community, which was
minimal.7 All agreed that the state of the economy was the force
driving people to books. Many were curious if these unemployed
readers, many of whom had never made use of the libraries before,
were reading with a purpose, or for escape from reality. In his
1932 report, the director, Ralph Munn, noted that between 1929
and 1932, the percentage of total books lent that was comprised
of technical books increased slightly, while that of poetry, drama,
and history decreased.8 Despite this, he felt that the shift was far
too slight to indicate that readers were turning to books of a practical or vocational nature.9 However, this was a trend also noted by
the Reader’s Counselor, who reported the self-improvement and
vocational aspects of many requests as early as 1931, and by the
Reference Department which saw a disproportional increase in use
of its services. As the Depression lengthened, circulation statistics,
use of reference services, and use of adult education programs run
THE CONCORD REVIEW
21
by the libraries, made it increasingly clear that readers were, in
fact, using the libraries for serious reading and self-improvement.
Nowhere is this clearer than in the Pittsburgh circulation
numbers. Between 1929 and 1938, the borrowing of technical
books increased by 220 percent while that of arts, biography, history, economics, etc. all increased by around 100 percent, and the
increase in the borrowing of fiction was the lowest, increasing by
only 24 percent.9 Additionally, while the total trend of circulation
during the Great Depression mirrored that of unemployment,
the circulation of adult nonfiction continued to increase even as
that of total books began to go down. The popularity of books
pertaining to useful arts was explained by Showers to be the result
of a “desire to become more efficient in present positions or to
prepare for other kinds of work.”10 The dramatic increase in the
borrowing of technical books in particular shows that the public’s
need to self-educate outweighed a desire for fictional distraction.
Other evidence that economic conditions were “impelling
people…to utilize this new leisure toward securing information
and inculcating habits and traits of mental processes to equip
individuals for a new changing political, economic, and social
world”11 was the increased use of the reference services. The only
quantifiable measure of this was the number of requests made of
the reference department staff that required a librarian to do a
fact check. Unlike circulation, this number increased every year
of the Depression, and went up by 75 percent over the decade
from 1929 to 1939.12 As much of the reference department was
composed of technical books, this implies that more people were
making inquiries of a technical nature. It certainly means that
readers were looking for information of a more serious variety
than was offered by the lending services.
Unfortunately, funds were not able to rise to match the
dramatic rise in use. Increased circulation meant increased wear
on books, which meant that thousands of dollars of the libraries’
budgets had to be allocated for the repair and replacement of
books just to maintain the current collection. Additionally, the
reports of the Committee on Buildings for the Carnegie Library
22
Heather Harrington
of Pittsburgh show that factors like acid rain and constant use
meant that building expenses were a recurring cost. The increased
use of lending and reference services warranted longer opening
hours and more librarians. The over-taxation of the resources of
Pittsburgh’s libraries was felt at the central branch, branch libraries, and school libraries run by the Carnegie Library system, as
well as in the staffing of deposit stations and in the transportation
of books. These same conditions that gave rise to abnormally
high use of the libraries also financially limited their ability to
serve the people. Contrary to the belief of many, Carnegie did
not leave large sums of money to run the libraries. In fact, he
often only covered the expense of building the facility under the
condition that the community would sustain it. This was part of
his overall philosophy of helping people help themselves.13 He
expected those who benefited from the libraries ultimately to be
financially responsible for them and to take ownership of their
self-betterment. While this policy allowed him to build many more
libraries than would have otherwise been possible, it also meant
that Carnegie Libraries across the nation were, and are, dependent
upon public funds. During the Depression, those funds were in
short supply. In his book, Our Starving Libraries, Duffus argued
that “the public, in its role of taxpayer, did not respond to the
emergency. It did not see the library as it has really been during
the hard times—a relief agency almost as essential as those which
provided food, shelter, medical care, and clothing.”14 While he
was absolutely correct on the latter point, the public’s extensive
use of the libraries indicates that, at least in Pittsburgh, the public did see and value the library’s services during the Depression.
There simply was not enough money to go around. As a result of
the economic depression, the total funds allocated to the libraries by the city were cut several times between 1930 and 1938. So
while “the Library reached the highest point in its usefulness to
the community during 1932, when unemployment brought to
it thousands of Pittsburghers who had never used its services,”15
budget cuts forced the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh to make
tough decisions about how to best serve the public.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
23
When budget cuts began, the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh tried first to absorb them without reducing the book fund.
Many at the libraries would have agreed with Duffus that “a Library exists for no other purpose than to bring together the right
book and the right reader. The rest is incidental.”16 In addition
to serving the public demand for recreational reading and books
pertaining to self-improvement and vocational training, the public
libraries were also invaluable resources to students, the business
community, and the scientific and industrial powers of the city.
Each year the libraries purchased copies of hundreds of “journals,
transactions, year books and other source materials, the lack of
which would leave permanent gaps in the book collection.”17 In
order to preserve the integrity of the book collection, cuts were
first taken out of the only other large, adjustable fund, salaries.
This step was taken grudgingly because librarians’ salaries had
always been notoriously low considering the professional training
required.18 Despite these cuts and the sharp rise in the use of the
underfunded, understaffed libraries, morale was surprisingly high.
Library staff in Pittsburgh were repeatedly reported to “show a
genuine desire to serve those who needed their aid and genuine
satisfaction in helping to ease the burdens which so many readers manifestly carried.”19 However, it soon became evident that
it would be utterly impossible to absorb the budget cuts entirely
through salaries, and the administration had to reassess its priorities on the book fund.
The most influential figure in the library administration
was the director Ralph Munn, who had become director of the
Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh in 1928, just a year before the start
of the Great Depression. Munn would later become president of
the American Library Association (ALA) and would design the
library systems for New Zealand and Australia.20 Like Andrew
Carnegie, Munn “took a philosophical view of libraries as educational centers,”21 and his policies reflected this view. Munn said
that the library should be the “University of the People.”22 Under
his guidance during the Great Depression, the library took many
steps toward this goal, firstly through selectivity in book purchases,
24
Heather Harrington
secondly through the increased specialization of departments and
staff, thirdly through adult education services such as the Reader’s
Counselor, and finally through community outreach.
When funds did not rise to meet the increased use of the
libraries in 1931, and then dropped in 1932 and again in 1933,
cuts had to be made from the book fund. Most of these cuts were
made to the purchase of adult fiction which was deemed to be
of less educational value than other sorts of books. Thus, Munn
and others crafted a “revised book selection policy that sharply
defined and limited the purchase of ‘light, recreational fiction’ and
effectively eliminated the acquisition of books that he categorized
as ‘shopping bag fiction.’”23 While these cuts were lamentable to
many readers, they allowed the Library to provide greater service
to the community as an educational institution. The 1933 Annual
Report stated that “The Technology and Reference Departments,
particularly, were spared at the expense of the other services.”24
By limiting fiction in favor of more serious books, the Library
encouraged patrons to shift to more scholarly reading, a trend
that was already present from the start of the Depression. In Since
Yesterday, Showers voiced the opinion of many at the Library when
he said “The Carnegie Library regrets its inability to meet the
desires of those who come for recreational reading of the lighter
type but since it is primarily an agency for popular education,
it must give preferences to books for more serious reading and
study.”25 By investing in the purchase of books for serious reading, the Library insured its usefulness to those who desired to use
it for self-improvement, and encouraged such reading for those
who had originally come to the Library seeking only distraction.
The increased interest in serious reading was also aided
by another major policy of Pittsburgh’s libraries—increased specialization. Traditionally, libraries had been organized into two
departments—one for lending and one for reference. However, this
inconvenienced many who came to the libraries during the Depression looking for serious reading on a certain subject. If they were
looking for a reference book, they would go to the reference section
and make a request of those staff who were very experienced and
THE CONCORD REVIEW
25
knowledgeable about those books. However, if this person wanted
a book on the same subject that could be checked out, they had to
go to the lending desk. Lending department staff had to handle
a constant deluge of requests on such a variety of subjects that it
was impossible for any personalized advice to be given. The librarians were thus thwarted in their mission to bring the right book
together with the right reader, and the studies of those using the
library’s services were hindered. In order for the Carnegie Library
to become more of a “University of the People,”26 many felt that
it would have to shift to a subject-oriented specialization of books
and staff to mirror the educational model of the universities. It was
the opinion of Ralph Munn and others that all the books dealing
with one subject, whether lending or reference, should be in one
place and staffed by a select group of librarians knowledgeable
about the subject. This would allow patrons to self-educate in an
environment conducive to easy acquisition of the best books on
the subject matter of interest. In the 1933 Annual Report, Munn
said “the librarian dealing with the restricted field should know
that field as well as the college professor, and he should know its
literature much better than does the average professor.”27 Due
to the tightening budget and the limitations of the facilities, it
was not until later in the Depression that these changes began to
be implemented. The year 1938 marked the opening of the Art
Department and the Music Department, both of which housed a
merger of reference and lending.28 The Pennsylvania Department
was also updated to fit this new model. All other attempts to physically break the collection up into departments were prevented by
the physical limitations of the Central Branch building, which was
designed for the old model. Therefore, “during 1939 [the Reference Department] staff members were assigned certain fields
of knowledge in which they attempt[ed] to become especially
proficient.”29 By achieving higher specialization within the staff,
the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh overcame physical limitations
and was able to better facilitate popular education.
While such specialization would certainly have been of
service to many readers in the early years of the Depression, it
26
Heather Harrington
was not yet available, and many who came to the Carnegie Library
of Pittsburgh for serious reading did not know how to go about
it and were in need of guidance. In 1930, the Library received a
grant of $21,000 from the Buhl Foundation for a “3 year experiment in reader’s advisory service.”30 Many libraries in the country
had started such programs, but Munn said that the “experimental
feature of our program is the use of an experienced educator who
can be presented to readers as a former college professor.”31 The
Reader’s Counselor who was hired was Charles W. Mason of the
University of Buffalo, and of the Buffalo Museum of Science, where
he had done research in museum education in collaboration with
the Carnegie Corporation.32 As the Reader’s Counselor, Mason designed individualized reading courses for those who desired guided
reading. Many sought this service as means of self-improvement.
In his first report in 1931, Mason said that “probably 95 percent
of the courses utilize books of nonfiction and I would estimate
that between one-third and one-half are vocational in nature, but
the self-improvement aspect predominates.”33 This continued to
be true in the following years. The reasons that people sought
the Reader’s Counselor’s services were varied. Some were high
school and college graduates trying to learn something new, some
feared that college would not be possible and “read during their
enforced free time to make up as much as possible this work they
[were] forced to miss.”34 Some were using it to round out a partial
schedule of college work, or wanted to become better at their job
so they could get advanced positions and better pay.35 Over the
three years of the grant, more than 750 individualized reading
courses were designed. Additionally, it was discovered that many
came seeking similar courses that required little assistance along
the way. Therefore, 15 standard reading courses were developed
and printed for general use by the public. Both types of courses
were very important services that were utilized by hundreds of
people in the Pittsburgh area.
In his role as Reader’s Counselor, Mason did a lot of community outreach to bring his services to the attention of the educationally underprivileged. There were often ads for the Reader’s
THE CONCORD REVIEW
27
Counselor and the courses in the papers, and he visited clubs for
women,36 Jews,37 and other groups. In total, approximately 100
talks were given and about a dozen discussion groups reaching
over 200 people were started with Federal Emergency Education
program funds.38 This reflected the outreach of the Library as a
whole. In 1931, the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh was a founding
member of the Pittsburgh Council on Adult Education.39 “The
activities of the Council led to a preliminary survey…which was
made for an extensive state-wide study in adult education under
the State Department of Public Instruction at Harrisburg on Civil
Works Administration funds.”40 In addition to its general work of
Adult Education, service to immigrants was especially important
to the Libraries. The Carnegie Libraries of Pittsburgh had developed foreign-and-English-language book services in 1921 and
continued to help spread literacy and knowledge of the English
language during the Depression.41 In A Century of Service, it is said
that librarians were “concerned for the welfare of the immigrant as
well as that of American culture. Like the social workers, too, the
librarians [were] in contact with the realities of immigrant life.”42
This was certainly true for the librarians of Pittsburgh. Though
poorly documented, the Annual Reports mention collaboration
with settlement houses and social workers, as was the case in many
cities around the country. All of this work helped the library be a
better “University of the People,”43 helping people help themselves.
Much of the work done by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh during the Great Depression was done in conjunction with
the efforts of national organizations or paralleled work being done
elsewhere in the country. Libraries across the country faced similar demands from their communities, and the American Library
Association coordinated efforts by library administrators, helped
librarians share their stories, and helped libraries get government
funds.44 The Works Progress Administration (WPA) recognized the
value of library services to public education, and federal money
was given to Adult Education and other emergency education
programs in libraries. In total, $134,506,510 of WPA and WPA
sponsors’ funds were invested in libraries.45 Some of these funds
28
Heather Harrington
went to building new libraries in communities that did not have
them, and other funds were used to repair existing libraries. In
total 151 libraries were built by WPA workers.46 Libraries also
employed workers sent to them by the government, largely in
jobs such as bookkeeping and book repair that had often been
neglected because of pressures on the time of the librarians. “In
the 3-month period ending June 30, 1942, WPA workers operated
about 1,700 libraries and gave assistance to nearly 3,400 libraries.”47
Some of these workers were employed by the Carnegie Library of
Pittsburgh.48 The WPA also sponsored bookmobiles and pack-horse
librarians to reach rural populations.49 Such methods were used
extensively by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) that sought,
not only to bring power, but also greater education to those in the
underserviced regions.50 Mary Utopia Rothrock was hired by the
TVA to supply library service to company towns and she sought to
make books available even to the most remote places.51 “By the late
1930s, TVA was circulating an estimated 13,000 books a month,
many of them being read by people who had not been used to
using libraries, or books for that matter.”52 The use of libraries as
centers for public education, and thus for self-improvement, was
a national phenomenon.
Duffus said that “Every social worker knows that it is not
enough to give food, clothing, and shelter—it is necessary also to
give hope to the hopeless and the wish to live to the desperate.”53
During the Great Depression, the public libraries across the nation did this through education. A significant example of this
occurred in Pittsburgh where Andrew Carnegie had built his first
library. Not only did the people of the community turn to their
libraries seeking self-improvement, be it cultural or vocational,
but Pittsburgh’s libraries actively sought to help these patrons succeed. This was achieved through curation of the book collection
towards serious reading, increased specialization of books and
staff, targeted Adult Education programs, community outreach,
and collaboration with other organizations on a local and national
level. In his autobiography, Carnegie said “if one boy in each of
my library districts, by having access to one of these libraries, is
THE CONCORD REVIEW
29
half as much benefited as I was by having access to Colonel Anderson’s four hundred well-worn volumes, I shall consider they
have not been established in vain.”54 By becoming a “University
of the People”55 and providing relief to people suffering in the
Great Depression with the tools for self-improvement, the public
libraries of Pittsburgh fulfilled Carnegie’s vision.
30
Heather Harrington
Notes
Andrew Carnegie, “Gospel of Wealth,” North American
Review (June 1889), http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/
rbannis1/AIH19th/Carnegie.html.
2
Andrew Carnegie, Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie ed.
John Charles Van Dyke (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company,
1920) p. 17.
3
Ibid., p. 17.
4
Annual Report 1933, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 7.
5
Annual Report 1932, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 2.
6
Ibid., p. 2.
7
Victor C. Showers, “Since Yesterday: At the Carnegie
Library,” Carnegie Magazine (March 1940) p. 1.
8
Annual Report 1932, p. 3.
9
Annual Report 1938, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 4.
10
Ibid., p. 2.
11
Annual Report 1933, pp. 15–16.
12
Annual Report 1939, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 3.
13
Chester Potter, “Wanted Books as Boy, so Carnegie Spent
65 Millions on 2,930 Libraries,” Pittsburgh Press (December 4,
1945).
14
Robert Luther Duffus, Our Starving Libraries; Studies in
Ten American Communities during the Depression Years (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1933) p. 2.
15
Annual Report 1932, p. 2.
16
Duffus, p. 9.
17
Ralph Munn, “The Depression Years,” in Carnegie Library
of Pittsburgh: History (Pittsburgh: Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh,
1970), http://www.carnegielibrary.org/research/pittsburgh/
carnegie/mrac2g.html (accessed July 27, 2014).
18
Charles H. Compton, “Public Library Salaries: In Cities of
More than 200,000 Population Salaries in Effect January, 1933,”
Bulletin of the American Library Association 27, no. 6 (1933),
p. 245, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25687924 (accessed
September 19, 2014).
19
Duffus, p. 10.
20
Rovert J. Gangewere, Place of Culture: Andrew Carnegie’s
museums and library in Pittsburgh (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011) p. 114.
21
Ibid., p. 119.
22
Annual Report 1933, p. 7.
1
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Keith Doms, “Munn, Ralph,” in World Encyclopedia of
Library and Information Services ed. Robert Wedgeworth (n.p.:
American Library Association, 1993) p. 595.
24
Annual Report 1933, p. 5.
25
Showers, p. 2.
26
Annual Report 1933, p. 7.
27
Ibid., p. 10.
28
Annual Report 1938, pp. 7–8.
29
Annual Report 1939, p. 6.
30
Annual Report 1930, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 7.
31
Ibid., pp. 7–8.
32
Grace F. Ramsey, Educational Work in Museums of the
United States: Development, Methods and Trends (New York: H.W.
Wilson Company, 1938) p. 241, http://archive.org/strearn/
educationalworki00ramsrich/educationalworki00ramsrich_
djvu.txt (accessed July 27, 2014).
33
Annual Report 1931, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 8.
34
Annual Report 1932, p. 13.
35
Ibid, pp. 13–14.
36
“‘Changing Temper of Our Times’ Is Theme of Year’s
Program for North Side Group,” Pittsburgh Press (August 22,
1937) p. 31, http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=wEwbAA
AAIBAJ&sjid=2EsEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5786%2C3539027 (accessed
April 21, 2014).
37
“Organization Activities,” Jewish Criterion (Pittsburgh,
PA), (January 19, 1934), http://pjn.library.cmu.edu/books/
CALLl/CRI_1934_083_011_01191934/vol0/part0/copy0/ocr/
txt/0032.txt, (accessed April 21, 2014).
38
Annual Report 1933, p. 22.
39
Ibid., p. 33.
40
Ibid., p. 33.
41
Gangewere, p. 119.
42
Hardy R. Franklin, “Service to the Urban Rank and
File,” in A Century of Service: Librarianship in the United States and
Canada ed. Sidney L. Jackson, Eleanor B. Herling, and E. J.
Josey (Chicago: American Library Association, 1976) p. 123.
43
Annual Report 1933, p. 7.
44
“Library Projects under Public Works, Civil Works,
and Relief Administrations,” Bulletin of the American Library
Association 27, no. 12 (December 1, 1933), p. 539, http://www.
jstor.org/stable/25688024 (accessed July 23, 2014).
23
31
32
Heather Harrington
Federal Works Agency, Final Report on the WPA Program
1946, http://lcweb2.loc.gov/service/gdc/scd0001/2008/20080
212001fi/20080212001fi.pdf (accessed July 27, 2014) p. 122.
46
Ibid., p. 131.
47
Ibid., p. 62.
48
Annual Report 1936, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, p. 7.
49
Angela Jordan, “Libraries During the Great Depression,”
American Library Association Archives Blog, Entry posted
October 24, 2012, http://archives.library.illinois.edu/ala
(accessed July 23, 2014).
50
Seavey A. Charles, “American Public Libraries in the
Great Depression,” DesertSailordotInfo, http://www.desertsailor.
info/libs/Depression/Index.php (accessed July 27, 2014).
51
Ibid.
52
Ibid.
53
Duffus, p. 7.
54
Carnegie, Autobiography, p. 45.
55
Annual Report 1933, p. 7.
45
Bibliography
Annual Report, 1930, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1931, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1932, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1933, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1936, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1938, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Annual Report, 1939, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh
Carnegie, Andrew. “Gospel of Wealth.” North American
Review June 1889, pp. 653–765. http://www.swarthmore.edu/
SocSci/rbarinis1/AIH19th/Carnegie.html. Accessed October
11, 2014.
Carnegie, Andrew. Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie.
Edited by John Charles Van Dyke. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1920.
Charles, Seavey A. “American Public Libraries in the Great
Depression.” Desert Sailor dot Info. http://www.desertsailor.info/
libs/Depression/Index.php. Accessed July 27, 2014.
Compton, Charles H. “Public Library Salaries: In Cities of
More than 200,000 Population Salaries in Effect January, 1933.”
Bulletin of the American Library Association 27, no. 6 (1933):
THE CONCORD REVIEW
244–247. http://www.jstor.org/stable/25687924. Accessed
September 19, 2014.
Doms, Keith. “Munn, Ralph.” In World Encyclopedia of Library
and Information Services. Edited by Robert Wedgeworth. 595–
596, n.p.: American Library Association, 1993.
Duffus, Robert Luther. Our Starving Libraries; Studies in
Ten American Communities during the Depression Years. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1933.
Federal Works Agency, Final Report on the WPA Program,
Doc. (1946), http://lcweb2.loc.gov/service/gdc/scd0001/2008
/20080212001fi/20080212001fi.pdf (accessed July 27, 2014)
Franklin, Hardy R. “Service to the Urban Rank and File.” In
A Century of Service: Librarianship in the United States and Canada.
Edited by Sidney L. Jackson, Eleanor B. Herling, and E. J. Josey,
p. 1–19. Chicago, IL: American Library Association, 1976.
Gangewere, Rovert J. Place of Culture: Andrew Carnegie’s
museums and library in Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:
University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011.
Jewish Criterion. “Organization Activities.” Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania: January 19, 1934. http://pjn.library.cmu.edu/
books/CALL1/CRI_1934_083_011_01191934/vol0/part0/
copy0/ocr/txt/0032.txt. Accessed April 21, 2014.
Jordan, Angela. “Libraries During the Great Depression.”
American Library Association Archives. Blog entry posted October
24, 2012. http://archives.library.illinois.edu/ala. Accessed July
23, 2014.
“Library Projects under Public Works, Civil Works, and
Relief Administrations.” Bulletin of the American Library
Association 27, no. 12 (December 1, 1933): 539–546. http://
www.jstor.org/stable/25688024. Accessed July 23, 2014.
Munn, Ralph. “The Depression Years.” in Carnegie Library of
Pittsburgh: History, 1895–1969. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Library of
Pittsburgh, 1970. http://www.carnegielibrary.org/research/
pittsburgh/carnegie/mrac2g.html. Accessed July 27, 2014.
Pittsburgh Press. ‘“Changing Temper of Our Times’ Is Theme
of Year’s Program for North Side Group.” August 22, 1937,
p. 31. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=wEwbAAAAIBA
J&sjid=2EsEAAAAIBAJ&pg=5786%2C3539027. Accessed April
21, 2014.
Potter, Chester. “Wanted Books as Boy, so Carnegie Spent 65
Millions on 2930 Libraries.” Pittsburgh Press. December 4, 1945.
Ramsey, Grace F. Educational Work in Museums of the
United States: Development, Methods and Trends. New York: H.
33
34
Heather Harrington
W. Wilson Company, 1938. http://archive.org/stream/
educationalworki00ramsrich/educationalworki00ramsrich_
djvu. txt. Accessed July 27, 2014.
Showers, Victor C. “Since Yesterday: At the Carnegie
Library.” Carnegie Magazine. March 1940.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Johann Bernoulli: Calculus’s Éminence Grise
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
The main duty of the historian of mathematics, as well as
his fondest privilege, is to explain the humanity of mathematics, to
illustrate its beauty, greatness, and dignity, and to describe how the
incessant efforts and accumulated genius of many generations have
built up that magnificent moment, the object of our most legitimate
pride as men, and of our wonder, humility, and thankfulness as individuals. — George Sarton (1884–1956)1
Introduction
Mathematics stems from the Greek word manthanein,
or “to learn.”2 It is divided into pure mathematics, advancing
knowledge for learning’s sake, and applied mathematics, developing techniques for practical application. An advanced form
of mathematics is calculus, which deals with the infinite and can
either be differential, determining rate of change, or integral,
calculating area.3 Harking back to ancient Greece, thinkers like
Archimedes proposed fundamental calculus problems such as the
method of exhaustion in calculating a circle’s area by circumscribing and inscribing regular polygons while increasing their size and
number of sides.4 The greatest strides towards modern calculus,
however, occurred in 17th-century Europe, and Johann Bernoulli5
(1667–1748) was its éminence grise.
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon is a Senior at Deerfield Academy in Deerfield,
Massachusetts, where she wrote this paper for Pamela Bonanno’s AP
Calculus AB course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
36
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Calculus’s discovery could be attributed to either Leibniz
or Newton. Leibniz published his essay in 1684 in the Acta Eruditorum, the first German scientific journal, while Newton revealed
his tripartite work in 1687, titled Nova Methodus pro Maximis et Minimis, itemque Tangentibus, quae nec fractas nec irrationales quantitates
moratur, et singular pro illis calculi genus (New method for maxima
and minima, and for tangents, that is not hindered by fractional
or irrational quantities, and a singular kind of calculus for the
above mentioned) and Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica
(Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy) respectively.6
Despite Leibniz’s and Newton’s pioneering research, their discoveries were abstruse to the layperson. Johann Bernoulli was the
first of only a few contemporary mathematicians who deciphered
and simplified Leibniz’s esoteric calculus, then disseminated it
across the continent.7 Yet Johann’s success in spreading calculus
was not merely due to his genius but rather to a confluence of
factors: cultural, social, political, and economic.
His successes, while grounded in an unparalleled intelligence and inquisitiveness, were mainly spurred on by rivalry—
with his contemporaries, students, and family members. First, a
familial feud with his prodigious older brother Jacob initiated
his passion for math, after which he spitefully posed the catenary
problem and brachistochrone challenge, founded the calculus of
variations, solved the isoperimetric problem, augmented other
mathematicians’ discoveries, and applied mathematics to practical
problems. Then, he staunchly supported Gottfried Wilhelm von
Leibniz’s calculus theories over Isaac Newton’s revelations, swaying an ambivalent public at the expense of his nemesis. Johann’s
antagonism reached its apex in his controversy with Marquis Guillaume de l’Hôpital, where l’Hôpital assumed credit for Johann’s
work. Finally, his struggle to reunite mathematics with religion
perfectly contextualized and immortalized his rivalry-spurred
achievements in history.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
37
Johann-Jacob Brotherly Rivalry
In the 16th and 17th centuries, Catholic governments
across Europe embarked on religious reigns of terror against
their Protestant citizens, forcing the oppressed to either convert
or flee.8 In Antwerp, Belgium, the Calvinist Bernoulli family led
by Jacques Bernoulli chose to leave for Frankfurt, Germany in
1583 and then to Basel, Switzerland in 1622.9 By Johann’s birth
on July 27, 1667, the Bernoullis had become successful drug and
spice merchants.10 Johann’s father, Nicolas, as Basel’s magistrate,
secured his family’s religious, political and economic prosperity
and, above all, Johann’s education. Nicolas, as Johann retrospectively described, “spared no trouble or expense to give [him] a
proper education in both morals and religion,”11 enrolling him in
a grammar school in Neuchatel to study French and commerce.12
The Bernoullis’ oppression in the 1500s forced the family into new
occupations that assured Johann’s literacy, impeccable curiosity,
and unrivaled creativity generations later.
When Johann turned 15, he tried his hand at the family
trade but did not inherit his ancestor’s abilities and fared poorly.13
Despite pressure from his father to succeed in the family business,
Johann pursued his penchant for mathematics, becoming the second in his family to do so.14 Inspired by his older brother Jacob who
studied physics and mathematics despite their father’s objections,
Johann earned a Master of Arts in medicine at the University of
Basel, Switzerland, where Jacob was the mathematics department
chair.15 After the Acta Eruditorum published Leibniz’s papers, both
Johann and Jacob spent an increasing amount of time studying
calculus’s cornerstone together.16 Jacob, recognizing his younger
brother’s brilliance, offered to teach him, and both analyzed
Leibniz’s work, even proposing the term “calculus integralis,”
showing their unprecedented understanding of his discoveries.17
They understood Leibniz’s reservations about his revolutionary
theories, and Johann described his deliberately obfuscated work
as “an enigma rather than an explanation; but it was enough for
us to get to the bottom of the secret.”18 After two years, Johann
had become Jacob’s equal, not only making Johann egotistical
38
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
and disparaging, but also evoking Jacob’s bitterness and jealousy.19
A shared brotherly passion soon gave way to “rivalry, suspicion,
and misunderstanding,” with Johann cantankerously berating his
brother in their letters to one another. “It is you who wish to defy
the world,” Johann wrote in 1691, accusing Jacob of being late to
the game in mathematical discoveries, “Do you think me blind?
If I had the Acta I would show you the place. Would it be possible
that I could have by heart for all these years this series…if you
had just now invented it?”20
But Jacob’s guiding hand had already done its work when
Johann successfully and spitefully solved his brother Jacob’s catenary challenge. Prior to Johann’s discovery, Galileo and Robert
Hooke had attempted to solve the catenary problem, a question
central to physics and geometry. Because calculus had yet to be
introduced, Galileo wrongly assumed in Two New Sciences that a
freely hanging chain would visually “closely [approximate] the
parabola,” and failed to derive its algebraic function.21 Joachim
Jungius later disproved his theory and published the antithesis
posthumously in 1669.22 Hooke, on the other hand, announced
his discovery of “a true mathematical and mechanical form of all
manner of Arches for Building” in the Description of Helioscopes
(1675). He used the catenary, which he described as “hangs a flexible cable so, inverted, stand the touching pieces of an arch,” to
create “true mathematical and mechanical form” in constructing
arches during the reconstruction of St. Paul’s Cathedral.23 In the
May 1690 Acta Eruditorum Jacob proposed a problem: “to find the
curve assumed by a loose string hung freely from two fixed points.”
Several prominent mathematicians replied, three of whom were
published in the June 1691 Acta Eruditorum: Dutch mathematician
Christiaan Huygens, Leibniz, and Johann.
Johann used calculus to derive its Cartesian equation
of
, where a is a constant that depends on mass
per unit length of the string and suspension tension.24 Although
Johann had solved it in a night, Jacob failed to do so in a year.25
Johann’s use of calculus to solve the catenary transformed architecture forever.26 If one column in a structure were lost, a catenary
THE CONCORD REVIEW
39
arch, when used in tandem with horizontal cables, could transfer
weight to the rest of the structure and support it instead of collapsing.27 Furthermore, catenaries occur in nature. Soap bubbles
suspended between two parallel circular loops form mirror images
of catenaries, while jump ropes and suspension bridges naturally
follow its inverted form.28 Feeling smug after his triumph, Johann
mocked Jacob’s chagrin in a letter to French mathematician Pierre
Rémond de Montmort: “The efforts of my brother were without
success; for my part, I was more fortunate, for I found the skill (I
say it without boasting, why should I conceal the truth?) to solve
it in full.”29 And so, ignited by his brother’s zeal, Johann would
assiduously study mathematics for the rest of his life, and thus,
as mathematician David Eugene Smith said, “the world was saved
the loss of a genius.”30 Consequently, Johann immersed himself
in Leibniz’s work, striving to outdo his brother in every aspect of
the craft.
Besides interpreting and applying others’ discoveries,
Johann also made some of his own, laying the groundwork
for calculus of variations. This competitiveness grew out of his
brotherly feud. While differential and integral calculus sought to
determine functions’ extrema, calculus of variations addressed
stationary values of functionals, or definite bound integrals. In
June 1696, Johann proposed the brachistochrone challenge in
the Acta Eruditorum—the trigger for this new branch of calculus.
The brachistochrone, named by Galileo in 1638, combines two
Greek words: “brachistos” or “short,” and “chronikos” or “time,”
meaning “the curve along which a particle will fall from one given
point to another in the shortest time.” His exact question was: if
two fixed points A and B and a mobile point M were in a frictionless vertical plane, what would M’s path be as it passed from A to
B in the shortest time under gravity’s influence?31 While Johann
himself had already found the solution, he relished in challenging other mathematicians, in particular the acutissimisqui into
orbe florent mathematicis, or “the shrewdest mathematicians of all
the world,” for to him “there [was] scarcely anything which more
greatly [excited] noble and ingenious spirits to labors which lead
to the increase of knowledge than to propose difficult and at the
40
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
same time useful problems through the solution of which, by no
other means, they [might] attain fame and build for themselves
eternal monuments among posterity.”32
Johann’s solution to the brachistochrone elegantly applied physics—velocity of a falling body, Snell’s law of optics, and
Fermat’s optical principle of least time—to mathematics. The
velocity of the falling body is defined as v=2gh where v is velocity,
g is gravitational acceleration, and h is the distance the object has
fallen.33 Snell’s law states that n1 sin i = n2 sin r, where i is the angle
of incidence (angle between incident and normal rays), r is the
angle of refraction (angle between refracted and normal rays), and
n’s are the respective refraction indices (speed of light in vacuum
divided by speed of light in medium). Finally, Fermat’s principle
describes that a ray of light minimizes traversing time as it travels
between two points; as a light ray travels through a medium of
decreasing density, its speed would increase and its path would
bend. Synthesizing these three physics theorems, Johann defined
the brachistochrone curve as a slight, downward-sloping one.34
By entwining physics with mathematics, Johann declared:
“In this way I have solved at one stroke two important problems—
an optical and a mechanical one—and have achieved more than
I demanded from others: I have shown that the two problems,
taken from entirely separate fields of mathematics, have the same
character.”35 His pride in his extraordinary feat also intensified
his rivalry with Newton, whom he directly challenged, snidely
commenting, “so few have appeared to solve our extraordinary
problem, even among those who boast that through…their golden
theorems, which they imagine known to no one, have been published by others long before.”36 Newton worked from 4 p.m. to 4
a.m. the day he received the problem and solved it in 12 hours.37
Upon receipt of Newton’s unsigned solution, Johann, both mortified and impressed, declared, “I recognize the lion by its paw.”38
Although Johann intuitively solved the problem in an
interdisciplinary fashion, his older brother Jacob did so with a
more cumbersome method while simultaneously posing another
problem in return, sparking a heated debate that gave birth to the
THE CONCORD REVIEW
41
calculus of variations.39 This was the isoperimetric problem, “in
which a curve had to be determined that would give a maximum
or minimum area when each of its y-coordinates was a given function of the corresponding y-coordinate of another curve.”40 Jacob,
both resentful of his brother’s natural intellect and smug that
Johann had failed, began calling Johann a subordinate who could
only “repeat what he has learned from his teacher,” infuriating
Johann, who was deeply humiliated by his failure.41 Consequently,
the Bernoulli brothers grew increasingly alienated. By 1718, this
intense rivalry had spurred Johann to read mathematician Brook
Taylor’s work Methodus incrementorum directa et inversa and form an
elegant solution that would be the basis of the calculus of variations.42 Nevertheless, as their brotherly conflict grew increasingly
public, with each party ruthlessly nitpicking each other’s work both
in private letters and mathematics journals, the French Academy
of Sciences in Paris elected both brothers as members on condition that they temper their fury.43 Eventually, Johann used his
brother’s knowledge to study exponential curves and both their
differentiated and integrated forms.44 Johann also grew adept at
discovering new curves and their application properties, such as
the isochrone curve, or tautochrone, that measured the time taken
for an object to slide to its lowest point via gravity and could be
applied to clock construction.45
Although Johann had established a solid foundation for
the calculus of variations, mathematicians following him continued to improve on it. These stakeholders include Johann’s former
student Leonhard Euler, whose book Methodus inveniendi lineas
curvas maximi minimive proprietate gaudentes, sive solution problematis
isoperimetrici latissimo sensu accepti (A method for discovering curved
lines that enjoy a maximum or minimum property, or the solution
of the isoperimetric problem taken in its widest sense) marked
the official birth of the calculus of variations in 1744.46 Finally,
Joseph-Louis Lagrange built on Euler’s discoveries and applied
them to geometry and mechanics.47 Again, Johann’s competitive
nature with his peers and family encouraged him to make better
and grander discoveries.
42
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Yet Johann did not merely apply his own mathematical
knowledge to real-life scenarios; he inspired his students to do
the same. Pierre Varignon had listened to Johann’s lectures and
learned about his applications of calculus. In 1687, he published
Projet d’une nouvelle méchanique, which applied Johann’s interpretation of Leibniz’s differential calculus to forces and mechanics.
In 1702, he also applied differential calculus to spring-driven
clocks. By “adapting Leibniz’s calculus to the inertial mechanics
of Newton’s Principia” Varignon successfully interwove both fields,
showing the power of calculus to transcend mathematics.48
While vying with other mathematicians on side problems,
Johann successfully applied mathematics to other fields such as
physics and astronomy. In 1690, prior to graduating from the
University of Basel, Johann, guided by Italian mathematician
Giovanni Alfonso Borelli, wrote his dissertation “On the Mechanics of Effervescence and Fermentation and on the Mechanics of
the Movement of the Muscles,” interweaving mathematics and
medicine.49 Other scientific discoveries included laws of optics
such as reflection and refraction, naval navigational methods,
planetary orbit inclinations, and the inchoate principle of energy
conservation.50 In particular, Johann advocated Leibniz’s theory
of energy conservation. While Cartesians backed the conservation
of momentum, where colliding forces are equal and in opposite
directions, Leibniz believed in a broader truth. He supported
the concept of “living force” or present-day kinetic energy, the
energy an object in motion possesses, and is today credited with
the emergence of energetics.51
With diligence and motivation, Johann became one of
the first mathematicians to understand and interpret Leibniz’s
calculus.52 Immediately after graduation, Johann left Basel for
Geneva to work as an engineer and private math tutor.53 In 1691,
Johann traveled to Paris, where he corresponded with Leibniz and
expanded on his theorems.54 The same year, he began lecturing
on differential calculus.55 Because Jacob prevented Johann from
becoming a professor at his alma mater, Johann accepted the chair
of mathematics at the University of Groningen, Netherlands, where
THE CONCORD REVIEW
43
he honed his medical expertise on the side after rejecting several
offers from Wolfenbüttel Ritter-Akademie and Martin Luther
University of Halle-Wittenberg and repeated propositions from
Utrecht University and Leiden University.56 While there, besides
giving lectures in mathematics, he also taught physics.57 After only
six years in Groningen, Johann returned to the University of Basel
as a result of a series of familial crises. Johann, now married, first
returned to Basel to care for his father-in-law after an incapacitating illness but while there Johann coincidentally received news of
his brother Jacob’s opportune death. Immediately the university
asked Johann to succeed Jacob as the chair of mathematics.58 At
his new father-in-law’s insistence that Johann and his wife remain
in Basel, Johann stayed in the city for the rest of his life, serving
at the institution until his death in 1748.59 In his new position,
Johann’s overflowing passion would inspire his awestruck students.
His students included his three sons—Nicolaus II, Daniel, and
Johann II—Pierre Louis Maupertuis, Gabriel Cramer, and most
notably Euler who attended the University of Basel from 1720 to
1726, starting at the age of 14.60 Euler was prodigious, with immense
capacity for mental computation and assiduous investigation that
Johann highly esteemed.61 Johann ignited Euler’s passion for math
by giving him challenging books to study, including Descartes,
Newton, and Galileo, offering private tutoring every weekend,
and encouraging him to compete with Johann’s own sons. Under Johann’s tutelage, Euler refined mathematical presentation,
advanced trigonometry, and investigated celestial mechanics.62
Johann’s attention not only convinced Euler to switch his major
to mathematics but also forged a lifelong relationship between
these two fathers of modern calculus.63
Role in Newton-Leibniz Debate
After Newton and Leibniz introduced calculus in the late
17th century, controversy soon erupted over who truly discovered
it first. Due to strong international rivalries, any breakthrough in
mathematics credited to its discoverer was a great source of pride
for the nation.64 Because calculus’s discovery was a mathematical
watershed, England’s Newton and Germany’s Leibniz bitterly quar-
44
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
reled over their discoveries’ precedence. While Leibniz published
his initial discoveries in Novo Methodus in 1684, Newton had already
discovered calculus by 1655 but did not publish a geometrical proof
until 1687 and a complete fluxional half a decade after Leibniz
did in 1704.65 Nevertheless, both sides had compelling arguments
for their precedence, Leibniz in print and Newton in thought.
Although modern historians believe both Newton and Leibniz
conceived of calculus independently and almost simultaneously,
Johann vehemently—even fanatically—advocated for Leibniz.66
Often referred to as “Leibniz’s Bulldog,” Johann acrimoniously
criticized Newton’s work and fanatically demonstrated Leibniz’s
superiority by Leibniz’s work to solve problems that Newton failed
to.67 For example, Johann promoted Leibniz’s differential notation as opposed to Newton’s fluxion representation that depicted
variables as a continuous confluence of points, lines, and planes.68
Even more compellingly, while Newton derived a formula for
ballistic curves as R = av where R was resistance, a a constant, and
v velocity, Johann used Leibniz’s discoveries to produce a more
complete and general equation of R = avn, again proving Leibniz’s
superiority.69 Because Johann had corresponded with almost every
eminent scholar alive, sending more than 2,500 letters to 110 intellectuals, he had amassed extensive influence and his beneficiary
Leibniz thus became more popular than Newton.70
Besides staunchly supporting Leibniz, Johann also fleshed
out his predecessor’s theories, showing an incredibly intuitive
understanding of calculus, especially integral calculus. His first
lecture, for example, discusses integration as the inverse of differentiation. Because dx is the differential of x, Johann infers:
adx is the differential of ax ± a constant
axdx is the differential of ½axx ± a constant
axxdx is the differential of 1/3ax3 ± a constant
Consequently, he deduces that axvdx is the differential of
,
one of the most important laws of integral calculus today. His
second lecture shows equal brilliance in dividing a plane into
infinite parts and adding the areas of individual parts to find the
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45
total area, be it through parallel vertical segments, radial diagonal
sections, or an amalgam of both.71
Johann was so adamant in his support of Leibniz over
Newton that he continually expanded upon his idol’s work at
the expense of creating his own. Although Johann made largely
astute calculations, he also backed some false theories. These
included Descartes’ vortex theory that described spiral motion of
planets and the sun as opposed to Newton’s theory of gravitation
that proved elliptical orbits of planets around a stationary sun.72
Johann’s support of a fallacious concept delayed acceptance of
the correct one.73
L’Hôpital’s Controversy
During his travels to Paris in 1691, Johann met Marquis
Guillaume Francois Antoine de l’Hôpital, who requested private
tutoring in calculus because information traveled slowly during
the Nine Years’ War (1688–1697).74 L’Hôpital, a member of Nicolas Malebranche’s circle at the Congregation of the Oratory, was
closely acquainted with the leading French mathematicians and
scientists—Giovanni Domenico Cassini, Varignon—who were
all intrigued by Johann’s knowledge.75 For the next six months,
Johann gave four lectures a week to Malebranche’s circle at the
Congregation of the Oratory in Paris. After l’Hôpital moved to
Ouques and Johann back to Basel, both frequently corresponded,
with l’Hôpital asking questions and Johann answering them.76 Paying Johann half a professor’s salary, l’Hôpital finally established a
contract in 1694, obliging Johann to “communicate to [l’Hôpital
his] discoveries, at the same time…not to disclose any of them
to others.”77 Described by modern-day mathematician Clifford
Truesdell as “an established savant; young enough for the ambition of learning and perhaps for learning itself, but old enough
for assurance and ease in a worldly society,” l’Hôpital’s wealth and
status certainly impressed the young Johann, who quickly acceded.78
Consequently, every one of l’Hôpital’s claimed discoveries was
founded in Johann’s work, leading to modern speculation that
l’Hôpital would be unknown if not for Johann.79
46
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
After accumulating Johann’s findings, l’Hôpital published
the first calculus textbook in 1696—a 200-page tome entitled Analyse
des infiniment petits, pour intelligence des lignes courbes (Analysis of the
infinitely small to understand curves).80 Divided into ten sections,
it discussed variable quantities, tangency, minima and maxima, and
higher order derivatives, but its most famous eponymous discovery
remains L’Hôpital’s Rule, which uses geometry to calculate the
limits of quotients when both numerator and denominator have
limits of 0.81 L’Hôpital proposed that numerator and denominator
should be separately differentiated, and then the limits of both
taken again, repeating the process until a defined result is achieved.
L’Hôpital’s Rule is incredibly powerful, allowing mathematicians
to find limits of unfactorizable indeterminate forms—includ1 , and . Historian Charles Seife encapsulated
ing,
this critical breakthrough: “Zero was no longer an enemy to be
avoided; it was an enigma to be studied.”82 Mathematicians could
now calculate the value of indeterminate expressions, revolutionizing both physics and engineering.83 Yet Johann’s revolutionary
discoveries did not earn him credit. Although l’Hôpital prefaced
his book with general thanks—“I am obliged to the gentlemen
Bernoulli for their many bright ideas; particularly to the younger
Mr. Bernoulli who is now a professor in Groningen”—he did not
specifically attribute any theorem to Johann.84 Furthermore, in his
communications with Leibniz and Christiaan Huygens, l’Hôpital
described his groundbreaking progress in calculus and insinuated
that his ideas were original.85 Bound by contract, Johann had no
room for protest. Instead, he effused praise on its clarity and organization, which l’Hôpital responded to by requesting another
collaboration.86 After l’Hôpital’s death in 1704, however, Johann,
now bereft of l’Hôpital’s compensation, claimed credit for all
his own major discoveries, asserting that they stemmed from his
course entitled Differential and Integral Calculus.
Yet, his reputation for being cantankerous, competitive,
conceited and covetous weakened his claims.87 For example, after
his son Daniel published Hydrodynamica in 1738, Johann spitefully
plagiarized his work and published Hydraulica, then changed his
publication date to 1732.88 Both father and son bitterly wrangled
THE CONCORD REVIEW
47
over the Newton-Leibniz controversy over their precedence in
calculus’s discovery, for Johann supported Leibniz while the
physicist Daniel backed Newton even though, to his father,
“adhering to Newton’s ideas was about the worst of all possible
heresies.”89 When Daniel later beat Johann to a prize from the
French Academy of Science in 1734, the grudge-bearing Johann
disowned him.90 Modern mathematician Eric Temple Bell wittily
characterizes public opinion of the Bernoullis, especially Johann:
“The Bernoullis took their mathematics in deadly earnest. Some of
their letters about mathematics bristle with strong language that
is usually reserved for horse thieves.”91 Consequently, l’Hôpital’s
theories were not attributed to Johann until 1922, when his nephew
Nicolaus’s copy of his course was found to be “virtually identical”
to l’Hôpital’s book.92 In 1742, although Johann published Part II
of that course, he did not print Part I, which had already been
rendered in l’Hôpital’s book.93 Although Johann lost credit for
work during his lifetime, this dispute fueled an undying passion
for discoveries he could proudly call his own.
Disagreements Over Religion
Perhaps Johann’s religious aberrations made his mathematical discoveries most interesting. When teaching at Groningen,
he often discussed math in relation to natural phenomena, which
some students, who accused him of contravening the Calvinist
faith as a Cartesian, (supporter of French mathematician René
Descartes), and Spinozist, (follower of Dutch philosopher Baruch
de Spinoza), felt was objectionable.94 Believing in pantheism, or
the unity of God and the universe, Johann argued that in denying divine resurrection, he implied the constant renewal of flesh.
Instead, his students and critics dismissed him as “a corrupter of
youth.”95 Because many abhorred Johann’s beliefs, “seek[ing] to
make [him] an abomination to the world, and to expose [him]
to the vengeance of both the powers that be and the common
people,” Johann grew fiercely defensive of his religion.96 Later, he
sought to mend relations by entangling math with divinity, implying that math and God were one, anyone who opposed one defied
the other, and that God was the world’s greatest mathematician.
48
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
As he examined the infinitely small, Johann was enraptured by
the incredible, and both his imagination and philosophy widened,
leading to his conclusion that “the omnipotence of God in the
smallest of things is inexhaustible and infinite.” In his experimentation with the infinitesimal quantities, Johann constructed an
infinite geometric sequence 1/2, 1/4, 1/8…, dividing a finite line
segment into corresponding parts and postulating that since the
sequence had infinite terms, the segment too had infinite parts
with infinitely small quantities.97 Furthermore, Johann was mesmerized by exponential equations especially after Dutch scholar
Bernard Nieuwentijt claimed that Leibniz’s methods could not
handle them. Johann published his work in 1697, proving the
adamant Nieuwentijt wrong.98
Furthermore, he infused math with spirituality, associating
the concept of the infinitely large with “the truly terrible number
at which reason is silent and that appears to approach eternity,
disappears into it and is nothing in comparison with eternity,
which absorbs and devours all things, as if it were only one year,
one month, one day, one single hour, one single minute, and
this moment that is now past.” Yet it was not merely one branch
of math that was divine but all of it. The “universal eloquence of
mathematics…penetrate[d] the essence of nature.”99 Johann’s
philosophical treatment of a scientific craft truly distinguishes his
work from other 17th-century peers.
Conclusion
By his death on January 1, 1748 in his hometown of Basel,
Johann, as a fellow of the French Academy of Sciences, the Royal
Society in London, the St. Petersburg Academy in Russia, and the
Institute of Bologna, was reputed to be the number one mathematician in Europe.100 Johann, through his talented disciples, left
behind a lasting legacy that would shape the course of calculus.
In 1700, when Michel Rolle criticized calculus as ungrounded,
Varignon compellingly refuted his arguments in front of the
Academy of Sciences, showing Johann’s profound impact on his
students.101 The Mathematics Genealogy Project reflects that Johann may have had only one doctoral student in Euler, but had
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49
inspired 32,926 doctoral descendants worldwide, excluding his
sons and grandsons and their legacies, showing that his brilliance
has touched passionate mathematics students far and wide.102 His
disgraced student l’Hôpital described Johann, “Archimedes of his
times,” best in a 1695 letter: “I am very sure that there is scarcely
a geometer in the world who can be compared to you.”103
Johann was an incredibly gifted mathematician who laid
a solid foundation for future mathematics discoveries, yet behind
every stage of his life, career, and intellectual development lay ruthless aggression. Although Jacob introduced Johann to his lifelong
passion, Johann unabashedly derided his brother’s knowledge
and initiated a bitter rivalry in pursuit of loftier mathematical
achievements. Due to his zealous support of Leibniz and bellicose
contempt for Newton in the Newton-Leibniz dispute, Johann
continually refined Leibniz’s principles, elevating them to a new
level. Johann’s pugnacity reached its zenith in the l’Hôpital plagiarism controversy, where his unresolved grudge compelled him to
publish more than l’Hôpital could. Finally, dissenters of Johann’s
pantheism only fortified his religious stance. Although rightfully
intelligent, Johann’s successes as the éminence grise of calculus were
most emboldened by his truculent response to adversity.
50
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Notes:
Carl C. Gaither and Alma E. Cavazos-Gaither, Gaither’s
Dictionary of Scientific Quotations (New York: Springer, 2012).
2
Douglas Harper, “Mathematic (n.),” Online Etymology
Dictionary n.d., http://www.etymonline.com/index.
php?term=mathematic.
3
Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Calculus,” 2014, http:/ /www.
britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/89161/calculus.
4
University of British Columbia, “The Method of
Exhaustion,” 2003, http://www.math.ubc.ca/~cass/courses/
m446-03/exhaustion.pdf, 4.
5
Johann and Jacob Bernoulli will be referred to by their
first names Johann and Jacob respectively to be distinguished
from other members of the Bernoulli family.
6
Dung (Yom) Bui and Mohamed Allali, “The Bernoulli
Family: Their Massive Contributions to Mathematics
and Hostility toward Each Other,” E-Research: A Journal of
Undergraduate Work 2, no. 2 (n.d.).
7
Ibid.
8
Dale W. Lick, “The Remarkable Bernoulli Family,” The
Mathematics Teacher 62, no. 5 (May 1969) p. 401.
9
Cheryl W. Smith, “The Life of Johann Bernoulli,” History
of Mathematics, Department of Mathematical & Statistical Sciences
(University of Colorado Denver, n.d.), http://www-math.
ucdenver.edu/~wcherowi/courses/m4010/s08/csbernoulli.
pdf, p. 3; Lick, p. 401; Bui and Allali.
10
Claudia von Collani, “Biography of Johann Bernoulli,”
Encyclopedia Stochastikon (n.d.) p. 1.
11
Smith, p. 3.
12
Ibid., p. 4.
13
Edmund F. Robertson and John J. O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography,” School of Mathematics and Statistics,
University of St. Andrews (September 1998), http://www-history.
mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Biographies/Bernoulli_Johann.
html.
14
Bui and Allali.
15
Smith, p. 3; AccessScience, “Bernoulli, Jacques (Jakob)
1654–1705 and Jean (Johann) (1667–1748),” AccessScience from
McGraw-Hill Education (n.d.), http://www.accessscience.com/
content/bernoulli-jacques-jakob-1654-1705-and-jean-johann/
m0090065; Lick, p. 403; Bui and Allali; von Collani, p. 1.
1
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Howard Eves, “The Bernoulli Family,” The Mathematics
Teacher 59, no. 3 (March 1966) p. 276.
17
Smith, p. 4.
18
J. A. van Maanen, “Johann Bernoulli, Man of Contrasts”
(Lecture presented at the Johann Bernoulli Lecture 1992–
1993, Groningen, Netherlands, February 16, 1993) p. 242.
19
Bui and Allali.
20
C. Truesdell, “The New Bernoulli Edition,” Isis 49, no. 1
(March 1958).
21
Michael Raugh, “The Catenary and Hyperbolic
Functions,” MikeRaugh.org (September 27, 2009), www.
mikeraugh.org/MathMisc/HangingChain.pdf, p. 1; R. Nowlan,
“Johann Bernoulli,” A Chronicle of Mathematical People (n.d.),
http://www.robertnowlan.com/pdfs/Bernoulli,%20Johann.
pdf, p. 4.
22
E.H. Lockwood, “Chapter 13: The Tractrix and
Catenary,” in A Book of Curves (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press, 1961).
23
Lisa Jardine, “Monuments and Microscopes: Scientific
Thinking on a Grand Scale in the Early Royal Society,” Notes
and Records of the Royal Society of London 55, no. 2 (May 2001)
pp. 289–308.
24
Bui and Allali.
25
Smith, p. 5.
26
Karl-Eugen Kurrer, The History of the Theory of Structures:
From Arch Analysis to Computational Mechanics (Hoboken, New
Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2012) pp. 61–62.
27
Astaneh-Asl Abolhassan, et al., “Use of Catenary Cables
to Prevent Progressive Collapse of Buildings” (Department of
Civil and Environmental Engineering, College of Engineering,
University of California at Berkeley, 2002) p. 4.
28
Buckard Polster and Marty Ross, “Melbourne’s Catenary
Chaos,” The Age (October 10, 2011), http://www.qedcat.com/
archive/103.html; Nowlan, p. 5.
29
Nowlan, pp. 4–5.
30
David Eugene Smith, History of Mathematics vol. 1 (New
York: Dover Publications, 1958) p. 429.
31
Bui and Allali.
32
E. A. Fellmann and J. O. Fleckenstein, “Bernoulli,
Johann (Jean) I,” 2008, http://www.encyclopedia.com/
doc/1G2-2830900407.html; Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography”.
33
Smith, p. 11.
16
51
52
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Herman Erlichson, “Johann Bernoulli’s Brachistochrone
Solution Using Fermat’s Principle of Least Time,” European
Journal of Physics 20 (1999) pp. 301–302.
35
Erlichson, p. 303.
36
Smith, pp. 10–11.
37
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
38
Bui and Allali.
39
Smith, pp. 13–14.
40
Nowlan, p. 3.
41
Smith, pp. 14–15.
42
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
43
van Maanen, p. 243.
44
Fellmann and Fleckenstein.
45
Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Johann Bernoulli,”
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2014, http://www.britannica.com/
EBchecked/topic/62606/Johann-Bernoulli.
46
Ewin Kreyszig, “On the Calculus of Variations and Its
Major Influences on the Mathematics of the First Half of Our
Century, Part I,” The American Mathematical Monthly 101, no. 7
(September 1994) p. 675.
47
Ibid., p. 676. 48 Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography.”
49
Johann Bernoulli, “On the Mechanics of Effervescence
and Fermentation and on the Mechanics of the Movement of
the Muscles” (University of Basel, 1690); Smith, p. 9.
50
Eves, p. 277; Smith, p. 16.
51
Fellmann and Fleckenstein.
52
R. Moberg, ‘The Bernoulli Brothers,” Linne on Line, 2008,
http://www.linnaeus.uu.se/online/math/1_5_1.html.
53
von Collani, p. 2.
54
Neil Schlager and Josh Lauer, eds., “Johann Bernoulli,”
Science and Its Times 3 (2001), http://icgalegroup.com/ic/bic1/
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55
Lick, p. 401; Nowlan, p. 4.
56
Bui and Allali; The Galileo Project, “Bernoulli, Johann,”
(n.d.), http://galileo.rice.edu/Catalog/NewFiles/bernouli_
34
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joh.html; Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli
Biography.”
57
Lick, p. 404.
58
von Collani, p. 2; Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography.”
59
von Collani, p. 1.
60
Nowlan, p. 2; Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography.”
61
AccessScience, “Euler, Leonhard (1707–1783),”
AccessScience from McGraw-Hill Education (n.d.), http://www.
accessscience.com/content/euler-leonhard/m0090334.
62
Ibid.
63
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
64
Lick, p. 404.
65
Edmund F. Robertson and John J. O’Connor,
“Chronology for 1675 to 1700,” School of Mathematics and
Statistics, University of St. Andrews (August 2001), http://wwwhistory.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Chronology/1675_1700.
html.
66
O’Connor and Robertson, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
67
Smith, p. 4.
68
Fellmann and Fleckenstein.
69
Smith, p. 16.
70
Bui and Allali; Nowlan, p. 2; Smith, p. 17.
71
Noah R. Bryan, “The First Attempt at a Table of
Integrals,” The American Mathematical Monthly 29, no. 10
December 1922) pp. 393–394.
72
Moberg.
73
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
74
Bui and Allali.
75
Lick, p. 404.
76
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
77
Edmund F. Robertson and John J. O’Connor, “Guillaume
Francois Antoine Marquis de L’Hôpital,” n.d., http://
www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Biographies/
De_L’Hopital.html.
78
Truesdell.
79
Ibid.; Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli
Biography.”
80
Truesdell.
81
Judy Broadwin, “The Immortal L’Hôpital” (College
Board Advanced Placement Program, 2008) p. 3.
53
54
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
Charles Seife, Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea
(London: Penguin Group. 2000) p. 125.
83
Klaus Weltner et al., Mathematics for Physicists and
Engineers: Fundamentals and Interactive Study Guide (New York:
Springer, 2009) p. 125.
84
Smith, p. 6; Truesdell, p. 59.
85
von Collani, p. 2.
86
Broadwin.
87
Truesdell.
88
Robertson and O’Connor, “Guillaume Francois Antoine
Marquis de L’Hôpital.”
89
van Maanen, p. 244.
90
Nowlan, p. 2.
91
Eric Temple Bell, Men of Mathematics: The Lives and
Achievements of the Great Mathematicians from Zeno to Poincare
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1965.
92
Robertson and O’Connor, “Guillaume Francois Antoine
Marquis de L’Hôpital.”
93
Truesdell.
94
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography”;
Gerard Sierksma and Wybe Sierksma, “The Great Leap to
the Infinitely Small. Johann Bernoulli: Mathematician and
Philosopher,” Annals of Science 56 (1999) p. 436.
95
Sierksma and Sierksma, p. 436.
96
Robertson and O’Connor, “Johann Bernoulli Biography.”
97
Horvath Miklo, “On the Attempts Made by Leibniz to
Justify His Calculus,” Studia Leibnitiana 18, no. 1 (1986) pp. 64–
65.
98
Tucker McElroy, A to Z of Mathematicians (New York:
Infobase Publishing, 2009) p. 32.
99
Sierksma and Sierksma, pp. 436–439.
100
Smith, p. 16.
101
Truesdell.
102
Darel Hardy, et al., “Historical Sketch: Johann
Bernoulli,” Hardy Calculus (2006), http://hardycalculus.com/
calcindex/IE_bernoullijohann.htm.
103
Edmund F. Robertson and John J. O’Connor, “Pierre
Varignon,” School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of St.
Andrews (July 2007), http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/
history/HistTopics/The_rise_of_calculus.html; von Collani,
p. 3.
82
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Gray, Shirley B., and Stewart Venit, “The Brachistochrone,”
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Hahn, Alexander J., “Two Historical Applications of
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1998): 93–103
Hardy, Darel, Fred Richman, Carol Walker, and Robert
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Hurst, J. Willis, and W. Bruce Fye, “Profiles in Cardiology,”
Clinical Cardiology 24, no. 9 (2001): 634–635
Jardine, Lisa, “Monuments and Microscopes: Scientific
Thinking on a Grand Scale in the Early Royal Society,” Notes
and Records of the Royal Society of London 55, no. 2 (May
2001): 289–308
Klyve, Dominic, Lee Stemkoski, and Erik Tou, “Euler’s
Correspondence with Johann (I) Bernoulli,” The Euler
Archive, n.d., http://eulerarchive.maa.org/correspondence/
correspondents/JBernoulli.html
Krantz, Steven G., A Handbook of Real Variables. With
Applications to Differential Equations and Fourier Analysis
Boston, Massachusetts: Birkhauser Boston Inc., 2004
Kreyszig, Ewin, “On the Calculus of Variations and Its
Major Influences on the Mathematics of the First Half of Our
Century. Part I,” The American Mathematical Monthly 101, no.
7 (September 1994): 674–678
Kurrer, Karl-Eugen, The History of the Theory of Structures:
From Arch Analysis to Computational Mechanics Hoboken,
New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2012
Lick, Dale W., “The Remarkable Bernoulli Family,” The
Mathematics Teacher 62, no. 5 (May 1969): 401–409
Lockwood, E.H., “Chapter 13: The Tractrix and Catenary,”
in A Book of Curves Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1961
Mastin, Luke, “18th Century Mathematics—Bernoulli
Brothers,” The Story of Mathematics 2010, http://www.
storyofmathematics.com/18th_bernoulli.html
McElroy, Tucker, A to Z of Mathematicians New York:
Infobase Publishing, 2009
Miklo, Horvath, “On the Attempts Made by Leibniz to
Justify His Calculus,” Studia Leibnitiana 18, no. 1 (1986): 60–74
Moberg, R., “The Bernoulli Brothers,” Linne on Line 2008,
http://www.linnaeus.uu.se/online/math/1_5_1.html
Nowlan, R., “Johann Bernoulli,” Chronicle of Mathematical
People n.d., http://www.robertnowlan.com/pdfs/
Bernoulli,%20Johann.pdf.
Oliver, Peter J., “The Calculus Variations,” 1148–1168,
Minneapolis, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, n.d.
Phillips, J.P., “Brachistochrone, Tautochrone, Cycloid—
Apple of Discord,” The Mathematics Teacher 60, no. 5 (May
1967): 506–508
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Polster, Buckard, and Marty Ross, “Melbourne’s Catenary
Chaos,” The Age, October 10, 2011, http://www.qedcat.com/
archive/103.html
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MikeRaugh.org, September 27, 2009, www.mikeraugh.org/
MathMisc/HangingChain.pdf.
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School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of St. Andrews
January 1997, http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/
history/Curves/Catenary.html
Robertson, Edmund F., and John J. O’Connor, “Chronology
for 1675 to 1700,” School of Mathematics and Statistics,
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st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Chronology/1675_1700.html
Robertson, Edmund F., and John J. O’Connor, “Guillaume
François Antoine Marquis de L’Hôpital,” n.d., http://
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De_L’Hopital.html
Robertson, Edmund F., and John J. O’Connor, “Johann
Bernoulli Biography,” School of Mathematics and Statistics,
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by Johann Bernoulli,” School of Mathematics and Statistics,
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mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Quotations/Bernoulli_Johann.
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Function Concept,” School of Mathematics and Statistics,
59
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THE CONCORD REVIEW
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61
62
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon
“General Slim” in
Quartered Safe Out Here [Burma]
George Macdonald Fraser
London: Harville, 1993, pp. 52-53
...But the biggest boost to morale was the burly
man who came to talk to the assembled battalion by the lake
shore—I’m not sure when, but it was unforgettable. Slim was like
that: the only man I’ve ever seen who had a force that came out
of him, a strength of personality that I have puzzled over since,
for there was no apparent reason for it, unless it was the time and
place and my own state of mind. Yet others felt it too, and they
were not impressionable men.
His appearance was plain enough: large, heavily
built, grim-faced with that hard mouth and bulldog chin; the rakish
Gurkha hat was at odds with the slung carbine and untidy trouser
bottoms; he might have been a yard foreman who had become
managing director, or a prosperous farmer who’d boxed in his
youth. Nor was he an orator. There have been four brilliant speakers in my time: Churchill, Hitler, Martin Luther King and Scargill;
Slim was not in their street. His delivery was blunt, matter-of-fact,
without gestures or mannerisms, only a lack of them.
He knew how to make an entrance—or rather, he
probably didn’t, and it came naturally. Frank Sinatra had the same
technique, but in his case it may well be studied: no fanfare, no
announcement, simply walking onstage while the orchestra are
still settling down, and starting to sing. Slim emerged from under the trees by the lake shore, there was no nonsense of “gather
round” or jumping on boxes; he just stood with his thumb hooked
in his carbine sling and talked about how we had caught Jap offbalance and were going to annihilate him in the open; there was
no exhortation or ringing clichés, no jokes or self-conscious use
of barrack-room slang—when he called the Japs “bastards” it was
casual and without heat. He was telling us informally what would
be, in the reflective way of intimate conversation. And we believed
every word of it—and it all came true...
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Don’t Dive in My Pool: Normalizing Segregated
Swimming in Montclair, New Jersey
William S. Zaubler
The manner, method, and extent of a people’s recreation
is of vast importance to their welfare1
—W.E.B. DuBois
Introduction
T
he Civil Rights Movement, best known as a struggle for
racial equality in employment, housing, voting, and education,
also included a decades-long fight to desegregate places of leisure
and recreation. The landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited
discrimination in “any place of public accommodation.”2 The
struggle for equal access to places of public accommodation was
about more than desegregating hotels and lunch counters: AfricanAmericans were also fighting for the right to go to movie theaters,
bowling alleys, dance halls, amusement parks, and beaches and
swimming pools. The effort to desegregate swimming pools, in both
northern and southern states, throughout the first seven decades
of the 20th century was especially complex, because pools raised
a unique set of issues related to hygiene and public health, dress,
and intimate contact between men and women.
Montclair, New Jersey, a suburban community just a few
miles from Newark and 12 miles from New York City, is a historiWilliam S. Zaubler is a Senior at Montclair Kimberley Academy in
Montclair, New Jersey, where he wrote this paper for Mr. Andrew Prince’s
Modern U.S. History Honors course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
64
William S. Zaubler
cally integrated town that is known as an “open-minded” suburb.3
Yet Montclair, like many northern cities, had segregated swimming
pools: swimming in Montclair was, for most of the 20th century,
a tale of two cities, one white, one African-American, co-existing
and completely separate. But, at the very moment that Montclair
was desegregating its public schools by implementing a “magnet
system,” the town chose not to build a centrally located public
pool where both whites and African-Americans would swim together. Instead, the town built neighborhood swimming pools,
thus perpetuating the swimming segregation that had existed in
Montclair since 1927, when the first pool was built for the “colored”
people of the town. In so doing, the town both “reflected” and
“solidified” the social norms surrounding swimming.4 Montclair
may be lauded as a racially integrated and tolerant town, but by
building neighborhood pools, the town normalized the custom of
segregated swimming and created an infrastructure that has had
a lingering impact on recreational swimming in Montclair.
Historical Context of Segregated Swimming
As early as the 1890s, African-American scholars recognized
the importance of public recreational and leisure space to the
African-American community. W.E.B. Du Bois, writing in 1897,
acknowledged that while access to public recreational space was
not “one of the more pressing of the Negro problems,”5 AfricanAmericans, nonetheless, had a “perfectly natural and legitimate
demand for amusement.”6 Du Bois argued that the “express or tacit
exclusion” of African-Americans from public recreational space was
detrimental to African-Americans’ character and development.7
In 1928, Forrester B. Washington, the Director of the Atlanta
School of Social Work and a future member of Franklin Delano
Roosevelt’s “Black Cabinet,” examined African-American access
to recreational facilities in the context of the Great Migration of
African-Americans from rural, southern communities to urban
centers in the north following World War I. According to Washington, African-Americans migrated for economic opportunity and
for a “better life,” which included enjoying leisure activities. Like
Du Bois, Washington believed that access to recreational space
THE CONCORD REVIEW
65
was critical to African-Americans’ “status as a race.”8 Washington
studied 57 southern and northern cities, including Montclair,
New Jersey. He found that in the 17 southern cities in his study,
there was “no mixing of the races” in recreational spaces such as
playgrounds, parks, recreation centers, bathing beaches or swimming pools.9 In the 40 northern cities, by contrast, there was some
integration of playgrounds and parks, but with respect to beaches
and swimming pools, only three pools had “no segregation,” and
not one of those pools was located in Montclair.10
Swimming pools were a unique recreational space because
at pools, unlike parks and playgrounds, issues of hygiene, class,
and gender coalesced to create an environment where segregation
was especially pronounced: desegregating swimming pools was, in
some ways, “more sensitive than [desegregating] schools.”11 In his
seminal study of segregation in municipal pools in the northern
United States, Jeff Wiltse, a history professor at the University of
Montana, uncovered a profound shift that occurred in swimming
pools: while there was essentially no racial segregation at public
swimming pools in the late 19th century and early 20th century,
by the middle of the 20th century, there was almost no racial
integration at these same pools. This transformation occurred
throughout the northern United States, in cities such as St. Louis,
Chicago, New York and Philadelphia, and in smaller towns such
as Brookline, Massachusetts. Many factors contributed to the segregation of municipal swimming pools, including white people’s
concern about African-Americans’ cleanliness and health as more
African-Americans moved to northern communities during the
post-World War I Great Migration of African Americans from
the South to northern communities.12 Most importantly, municipal pools shifted from being public baths intended to promote
cleanliness among the poor, where there was class and gender,
but not racial, segregation, into sport and exercise facilities, or
“leisure resorts,” where “practically everyone in the community
except black Americans swam together.”13 As men and women,
and families with children, began to swim together, the thought
of African-American men swimming in the same pool as scantily
dressed white women was too much for most white northerners:
66
William S. Zaubler
By racially segregating these uniquely sociable public spaces, northern communities limited the opportunities blacks and whites had
to meet and form relationships that might lead to physical intimacy
or marriage…white males determined that they did not want black
men interacting with their wives, mothers, daughters, and sisters.14
In short, white discomfort with contact between African-American
men and white women resulted in previously integrated pools
becoming segregated.
The Roots of Segregated Swimming in Montclair
In Montclair, unlike other northern communities, swimming pools did not shift from places of racial integration to places of
racial segregation, because swimming pools were never integrated
there, even though Montclair had been a racially integrated town
since the late 19th century. The first African-Americans moved to
Montclair in 1865 from Loudon County, Virginia, primarily to work
as domestic servants. African-Americans found household employment in Montclair because the town was a wealthy community that
could support these jobs, and because whites in Montclair were
“kindly disposed to the slaves and freedmen of the Civil War period.”15 Between 1870 and 1930, the population of African-Americans
in Montclair grew steadily, from 1.3 percent of the population in
1870 to 15.2 percent of the population in 1930 (by 1930, 6,384
African-Americans lived in Montclair, out of a total population of
42,017; Montclair’s African-American population represented 3
percent of New Jersey’s total African-American population and 11
percent of Essex County’s African-American population).16 During this time, the population of African-Americans in Montclair
increased much more rapidly than the white population: in the
1890s and 1900s, when the total population of Montclair increased
by 30 percent, the African-American population increased by
84.9 percent; between 1920 and 1930, when the total population
of Montclair increased by 31.4 percent, the African-American
population increased by 84.1 percent.17 Although the town did not
officially segregate African-Americans through residential zoning
restrictions, by 1930, 90 percent of the African-American population lived in the south end of Montclair, an area that came to be
THE CONCORD REVIEW
67
known as the Fourth Ward.18 African-American concentration in
the south end of Montclair was a result of many factors, but among
them was the social engineering envisioned in the 1909 report of
landscape architect and city planner John Nolen, which became
the blueprint for the town’s subsequent Master Plans.19 The Nolen
Report proposed providing better housing for the working poor on
the “outskirts of town where cheaper land” was available, which
contributed to the segregation of African-Americans in the south
end of Montclair. Interestingly, the Nolen Report recommended
building public baths in Montclair to serve the working poor; had
those baths been built, and had Montclair followed the path of
other towns, such as Brookline, Massachusetts, those baths might
have been transformed into Montclair’s first municipal pools.21
While the majority of Montclair’s African-American community worked as household employees in the first decades of
the 20th century, and many lived at or below the poverty line,22
there was an emerging African-American middle-class. In a
study of Montclair’s racial politics from 1920 to 1940, Patricia
Hampson Eget, a historian at Rutgers University, found that the
African-American community “refused to allow their occupation
to define their identity.”23 According to Eget, African-American
professionals and entrepreneurs moved to Montclair because “the
upwardly mobile black community could financially support black
establishments.”24 Among these were physicians such as Dr. John
Kenny, the personal physician of Booker T. Washington and the
founder of the National Medical Association (the national professional association for African-American physicians), who moved to
Montclair in 1922, and Dr. George E. Bell, who became president
of the New Jersey State Medical Society (the state branch of the
National Medical Association).25 In addition to physicians, at least
one Afridan-American lawyer and five ministers lived in Montclair
in the 1920s, and African-Americans established many businesses,
including newsstands, barbershops and hair salons, grocery stores,
auto repair shops, and a laundry.26 African-American business
owners formed a local association to promote African-American
entrepreneurs and encourage the African-American community
to patronize African-American-owned shops and businesses.27
68
William S. Zaubler
Given the large number of African-Americans in Montclair,
and the upward mobility of the community, important AfricanAmerican civic and religious institutions emerged. The Washington
Street Branch of the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA)
and the African-American Young Women’s Christian Association
(YWCA) played a central role in the African-American community. According to Elizabeth Shephard, the former local history
archivist at the Montclair Public Library, who, from 2000 to 2002,
undertook a grant-funded Montclair African American Oral History
Project, the Washington Street Branch of the YMCA and YWCA were
the “social hubs of the African-American community.”28 These organizations provided African-Americans places to socialize, which
they could not do at the white Park Street YMCA (or other clubs)
that explicitly excluded African-Americans.29
The Washington Street Branch of the YMCA (often referred to as the “colored” branch or the “Negro” branch) was first
discussed at a YMCA Board of Directors meeting in April 1903.30
In 1905, the YMCA Board of Directors officially authorized “the
organizing of a Colored Branch in the Town of Montclair,” although
the YMCA did not approve building “a Colored Branch building”
until 1924.31 In 1927, the Washington Street Branch opened. This
facility included a gymnasium, pool, locker room, and showers
and was “one of the few complete buildings for colored youth in
the state.”32 This was the only pool in Montclair in which AfricanAmericans could swim.33 White residents of Montclair, by contrast,
could swim at the Park Street YMCA and at several private clubs.34
While swimming might not have been the most important
activity at the Washington Street Branch, it nonetheless played a
role in the community. The Washington Street Branch (along with
the Park Street facility) offered a free “learn to swim” program each
summer. A 1931 Montclair Times article reported: “the Montclair
Y.M.C.A. is offering free swimming lessons for boys and girls over
ten years of age…This plan will also include lessons for colored
boys and girls of the same age, conducted in the Washington Street
branch of the Association.”35 A picture accompanying the article
showed a line of white girls entering the Park Street facility and
THE CONCORD REVIEW
69
a line of African-American boys entering the Washington Street
Branch. Seven hundred African-American soldiers also learned
to swim at the Washington Street Branch before being deployed
in World War II.36
In an interview for the Montclair African American Oral History Project, John Price recalled, “we had swimming teams. I was
a lifeguard…We used to go swimming, except Thursday night.
Thursday nights were open for the girls.”37 Elvoid Christmas
described the Washington Street YMCA as “his home away from
home, family.”38 For Everett Christmas (Elvoid’s brother), whose
career including working at numerous YMCAs in New Jersey and
who was named to the National YMCA Black Achievers Hall of
Fame, the Washington Street Branch was “the focal point for
the black community…it had the only pool where blacks could
swim…although we didn’t have some things, we did have the Y.”39
Sandra Lang, a former Fourth Ward Councilwoman and former
Chairperson of the Montclair Civil Rights Commission, and the
founder of Montclair’s Conversations on Race program, learned
to swim at the Washington Street Branch.40 While the Washington
Street Branch of the YMCA was a private facility, its role in the
African-American community was quasi-public, as it provided the
only place where African-American men or women could swim
in Montclair.
Although African-Americans who belonged to the Washington Street Branch had access to its swimming pool and recreational
facilities, African-Americans who did not belong to the YMCA had
very limited access to recreational space, and no access to swimming pools, in the 1920s and 1930s. The New Jersey Conference
of Social Work, in its 1932 Survey of Negro Life, which studied the
“leisure time interests” of Montclair’s African-American community,
noted: “despite the existence of three agencies in Montclair—the
Y.W.C.A, Y.M.C.A., and the Junior League Community House, all of
which do special work in the field of recreation and leisure among
Negroes, our investigation points to the fact that these programs
do not reach a large percent of the Negro population.”41 Most leisure spaces were highly segregated, such as movie theaters, where
70
William S. Zaubler
African-Americans were required to sit in “special sections of the
theater.”42 In terms of athletics, the Survey reported:
The only athletic exhibitions of any importance that are promoted by
and for Negros of Montclair are the basketball games given during the
season at the Y.M.C.A. and Y.W.C.A. These are largely attended and
play a large part in the recreational life during the winter season…43
The Survey noted that “Negro” athletes participated in the townwide track meet held every July 4th. The Survey made no mention
of swimming as a recreational activity in the African-American
community.44
By the mid-1930s, the town began to address the need for
public recreational space, but did not propose building a municipal pool. The Montclair Town Planning Board, as part of its 1933
Master Plan, adopted A Plan for Park and Recreation Facilities, based
in part on the 1909 Nolen Report. The Planning Board recognized
the necessity of parks and playgrounds in a “progressive community.”45 The Planning Board specifically addressed the need
to build playgrounds and playing fields in areas of the town that
were “inadequately served by such facilities.”46 Notably, the Planning Board proposed building neighborhood parks, playgrounds
and playing fields rather than establishing a central playground
or complex of playing fields.47 The Master Plan did not address
building a municipal swimming pool, although many cities and
towns were undertaking such projects in the early 1930s. In Pittsburgh, for example, the city opened an enormous municipal
swimming pool complex in 1931,48 and by 1936 New York City
had opened 11 Works Project Administration (WPA) swimming
pools throughout the city.49
In 1947, the year that Jackie Robinson integrated Major
League Baseball, citizens of Montclair participated in a Civil Rights
Audit that examined, among other things, African-American participation in recreational programs in Montclair. The Civil Rights
Audit, the brainchild of Montclair resident Leo Nejelski, was
conducted by the Montclair Forum and the Montclair Chapter of
the American Veterans Committee. Like the 1932 Survey of Negro
Life, the 1947 Civil Rights Audit noted the high concentration of
THE CONCORD REVIEW
71
African-Americans in the south end of Montclair.50 The Audit’s
Recreation Committee analyzed African-Americans’ access to three
types of recreational opportunities: those provided by the town
through the Public Recreation Department and the Park Department; those provided by private philanthropic organizations; and
those provided by privately owned recreational facilities that were
open to the public.51
According to the 1947 Civil Rights Audit, Montclair’s
Public Recreation Department organized a variety of activities,
including summer playground programs, which were “organized
and carried on in entire disregard of race, color, or creed, based
entirely on the need and subsequent response of those who care
to participate.”52 However, the Audit also noted that most of the
programs offered by the Recreation Department took place within
neighborhood playgrounds, which resulted in de facto segregated
recreational activities. Or, in the words of the Civil Rights Audit,
because of “population and area segregation” there was “natural
group separation.”53 The Audit described segregation at the YMCA
as “present[ing] a mixed status,” resulting in “some inequalities
with regard to both leadership and facilities,” and stated that segregation at the YMCA “emphasize[s] restrictive barriers among
boys and girls at impressionable ages, making it more difficult
for them to adjust to democratic living.”54 Simply put, by 1947
the town was on notice that recreational activities in Montclair
were largely segregated, either because of express policies, such
as those at the YMCA, or because housing patterns resulted in de
facto segregation when recreational activities were organized in
neighborhood parks and playgrounds.
Although the 1947 Civil Rights Audit recognized the harm
caused by the segregated YMCA, and thus segregated swimming,
it did not propose building a municipal swimming pool in the
town. This is notable because by 1947 many cities and towns
throughout the United States had such swimming pools, which
served the entire community, although not always without some
racial tensions. In nearby Elizabeth, New Jersey, for example, the
town had one municipal pool that was open to both whites and
72
William S. Zaubler
African-Americans.55 In Orange, New Jersey, African-American
women protested the establishment of a segregated swimming
pool as early as 1930.56 African-American activists, moreover, were
beginning to challenge segregated swimming pools through nonviolent direct action. In fact, such protests were taking place in
communities very close to Montclair. In 1945, African-American
girls in Summit, New Jersey protested the Summit YMCA’s refusal
to allow them to take swimming lessons at the pool; in 1946, the
Paterson, New Jersey chapter of the American Youth for Democracy (AYD) picketed the Paterson municipal pool after a cashier
refused entry to African-Americans, based on the fictitious claim
that the pool was a private club; and, in 1947, activists from the
Congress of Racial Equity (CORE) challenged segregated swimming at the Palisades Park Pool in Palisades, New Jersey.57
In 1954, the year the Supreme Court declared segregated
schools unconstitutional in Brown v. Board of Education, the Montclair Neighborhood Center, a community services organization
based in the south end of Montclair (which was founded in 1926
by the Montclair Junior League, an organization composed of
white women), commissioned the Center for Human Relations
Studies at New York University to undertake an exploratory study
examining “human relations” in Montclair. The focus of the study
was the extent to which “this is a community which is restrictive in
freedom of opportunity to persons of certain shades of color.”58 The
resulting study, Exploring Montclair, published in 1956, referenced
the 1947 Civil Rights Audit, and noted that many of the problems
identified a decade earlier remained significant in Montclair.59 The
study found that a lack of “leisure time programs and facilities”
for African-Americans continued to pose a significant problem
in Montclair; residents of the Fourth Ward, the predominantly
African-American south end of Montclair, had identified leisure
time programs and facilities as the fifth most pressing problem
in the community.60
The Exploring Montclair study, unlike previous reports,
specifically identified the need for more swimming facilities in
general, and for desegregated swimming facilities in particular. It
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73
quoted one young person who was interviewed: “not all of us are
welcome to enjoy the [facilities] that do exist.”61 According to the
study, one of the “immediate needs” in the community was that
“existing recreational facilities should be open, on an unrestricted
basis, to all residents of Montclair.”62 The study recognized the
distinction between “paper policies and climates,” noting that it
was important for there to be “a real welcome” and “open door”
for all Montclair residents.63 Although the study went further than
previous reports with respect to identifying the need for desegregated swimming in Montclair, and recognized that Montclair did
not even have enough pools to meet the needs of all of the town’s
residents, it still fell short of recommending that the town build a
desegregated municipal pool.64 In 1956, swimming in Montclair
remained possible only at the segregated YMCAs or at private clubs,
with the nearest public swimming pool at the Branch Brook Park
in Newark, which was about six miles away.65
Three years after the Exploring Montclair study, in 1959, the
YMCA began the reorganization and merger of the Park Street
facility and the African-American Washington Street Branch.
According to a YMCA document prepared for the YMCA’s 1991
Centennial Celebration:
In November 1959, the Committee of Management of the Washington
Street Branch, voted to integrate the Washington Street Branch in all
phases of activity and programming. It voted for integration of staff
on all levels…as well as participation on the Board and committees
of the Montclair YMCA. It also voted to have all women’s and girl’s
swim classes held at the Park Street facility until adequate space was
provided at Washington St….66
After several years of planning, the merger became official on
January 28, 1964. According to the YMCA, the transition went
smoothly,67 although an article in The Montclair Times in 1969
noted that not all of the African-American leadership at the YMCA
was “delighted at the opportunity to merge,” largely because of a
concern that the merger would ultimately result in the closing of
the Washington Street branch.68
Although African-Americans could now swim at the
Park Street building, African-Americans continued to use the
74
William S. Zaubler
Washington Street Branch, and “the Washington Street Branch
YMCA…continued to be patronized and thought [of] as [an]
African American organization for several years after [its] integration.”69 Lydia Davis Barrett, whose family was active in the effort
to desegregate the Montclair public schools, recounted a story
of her experience swimming at the Park Street facility in the late
1960s and encountering “polite” discrimination. As a young girl,
Ms. Davis Barrett and a friend decided to go to the Park Street
YMCA to swim. When the girls arrived at the YMCA, the front
desk receptionist asked them if they were in the right place. They
replied that they wanted to swim at the Park Street pool, and were
allowed to do so. Ms. Davis Barrett recalled that the policies at the
two pools were very different: at the Washington Street Branch,
swimmers had to dip their feet in disinfectant before entering
the pool, but at the Park Street facility, this was not required.
Ironically, Ms. Davis Barrett developed a fungus infection on her
feet from swimming at the Park Street pool.70 Ms. Lang recalled
encountering so much discrimination at the Park Street facility
after the merger, noting “they didn’t want us to come in there,”
that to this day she refuses to go there.71
At about the same time that the YMCA merged its facilities, the town, for the first time, began to address the need for
a municipal swimming pool open to all Montclair residents. In
September 1961, The Montclair Times ran an editorial, “How About
a Municipal Swimming Pool or Pools for Montclair?” The editorial read in part:
Another summer has passed—and it was a real scorcher—and once
again residents from this area…are already turning their thoughts
to providing means of “cooling off” next summer at home in community swimming pools.
The success of Livingston’s two municipally operated pools and a
similar pool in Ridgewood has led residents of a number of communities, including Millburn and Cedar Grove, to develop plans for
similar recreational facilities. Isn’t it high time, therefore, that the
Montclair Town Commission gave serious consideration to building
a municipal pool or pools to fill a real need in our community?...
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75
If these towns can provide such a worthwhile recreation facility, for
its residents, why can’t Montclair?72
Perhaps the answer to why Montclair had yet to build a municipal
pool, and would not for another seven years, and would then build
neighborhood pools rather than a single community-wide pool
like the one in Millburn, comes from H.E. Seibert’s Letter to the
Editor that appeared one week after the editorial:
You have asked why Montclair does not have a town swimming pool
(although it is probably the town of this area which is best able to
afford one.) [sic]
Was this a rhetorical question or are you actually so naive as to wonder
what reason may stop us from building such a recreational delight?
Although it is rarely discussed publicly, Montclair has more racial
prejudice than many Southern towns and the thought of Negroes
enjoying a swim in the same water with whites is anathema to many
of our citizens.
If you are truly anxious to get a pool for our community this issue
must be brought into the open and the antiquated segregationist
element of the town must be faced down by forcing them to declare
themselves openly instead of at dinner parties and bridge gatherings.
I am sure you know Montclair well enough to know from my address
that I am not one of our Negro citizens. It would, of course, be “unthinkable” that a Negro, however intelligent, should buy a house in
this end of town.73
By 1964, the year that the YMCA merger was fully implemented,
and three years after the editorial urging the town to build a municipal swimming pool, the state of race relations in Montclair was
front and center in the minds of many, if not most, people in the
community. That year, in response to the 1963 Freedom March on
Washington and the Montclair Town Commission’s 1963 public
policy statement opposing discrimination based on race, creed
or color, several community organizations in Montclair, including
the YWCA, the Fair Housing Committee, the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Montclair
Civil Rights Commission (which had been established in 1949 in
response to the 1947 Civil Rights Audit), B’nai B’rith Women, the
Intercultural Association and the United Church Women, created
76
William S. Zaubler
a working group to update Montclair’s 1947 Civil Rights Audit.
The group examined “the extent to which all Montclair citizens
actually participate freely in the life of the town,” and produced a
report, the 1964 Community Audit.74 This Audit generally followed
the topic areas covered in the 1947 Audit, with a section devoted
to recreation. Like the 1947 Civil Rights Audit, the 1964 Community
Audit assessed the Public Recreation Department, private agencies
receiving money from the Community Chest, and privately owned
facilities open to the public.
The 1964 Community Audit reported a generally favorable
picture of integration in recreational activities. Programs organized
through the town’s Recreation Department, for example, were
“open to all without regard to race, color or creed, whether on a
geographical basis…or an interest basis.”75 Still, “low income and
culturally deprived groups” lacked access to leisure time activities.76
With respect to swimming, the 1964 Audit specifically noted that
the town had no public swimming facilities, and that many of the
swimming pools were segregated: “many of the activities, such
as swimming, are facilitated through private clubs, groups and
centers, which exclude a significant number of young people.”77
The custom and tradition of segregated swimming in Montclair
was made plain; how the town would respond remained an open
question.
Normalizing Segregated Swimming in Montclair
Despite the clear description of the segregated status
of swimming in Montclair, the town did not open its municipal
pools for another four years. In March 1968, a seven-member
community panel, the Montclair Community Pool Association,
was created to study whether and where to build a town pool.78
The community panel, initially headed by William K. DuVal, the
Chairman of the Montclair Council for Community Action and a
candidate for Town Commission, wanted a single pool “situated
in as centrally located a site as possible.”79 In fact, according to
The Montclair Times, the Community Pool Association specifically
“ruled out the possibility of more than a single pool.”80 Mr. DuVal
told The Montclair Times he was spearheading the effort to build a
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77
municipal pool because of “[his] concern about the social situation
in Montclair.”81 He wanted the pool located behind George Innes
Annex of the Montclair High School. While Montclair’s Town
Planner acknowledged that that area was centrally located, and
near where there was already a concentration of public facilities,
he stressed that a pool needed to be located in an “isolated” spot
due to traffic and parking.82
Although the Community Pool Association clearly favored
building one centrally-located pool, in April 1968 the Montclair
Town Commission decided to set up three temporary, tank-type,
portable swimming pools in Montclair: one in Nishuane Park
in the predominantly African-American south end of town; one
in Essex Park, located geographically roughly in the middle of
Montclair and near other public facilities such as the town’s ice
skating rink; and one in an undetermined location in Upper Montclair, the predominantly white, northern section of Montclair.83
Thus, at the very moment that Montclair was moving away from
neighborhood public schools toward a magnet school program
in order to comply with court-ordered desegregation,84 and at the
very moment the town elected its first African-American mayor,85
the town devised a plan to build neighborhood swimming pools.86
The town argued that the neighborhood pools ensured that “all
Montclair children will be within a 1 ¼ mile radius of at least one
pool,”87 despite the fact that the 1947 Civil Rights Audit made clear
that recreational activities that took place within neighborhood
playgrounds resulted in de facto segregation and that the 1964
Community Audit explicitly noted that swimming in Montclair was
highly segregated.
The reaction to the town’s decision was varied. A May second editorial in The Montclair Times praised the decision to set up
the portable pools, but did not address whether there should be
neighborhood pools or one centrally located facility.88 The Community Pool Association, on the other hand, was, as reported in
The Montclair Times, clear in its opposition:
78
William S. Zaubler
The Negro community feels that this 3-pool system is a stalling tactic,
generated to buy peace at a minimum price. Three segregated pools
will simply not do the job required for the people of Montclair.
Placing the pools in Nishuane Park and Essex Park and in an undetermined location in Upper Montclair will be guaranteeing total
disregard for even token integration.89
James R. Brock, a co-chairman of the Community Pool Association
told The Montclair Times that the town’s plan, “would be detrimental
to community race relations and would, in effect, constitute segregated recreational planning similar to the segregated educational
facilities offered by the town to residents in recent years.”90 The
Community Pool Association, moreover, noted that it had “received
support from most of the candidates for Town Commission for its
plans to press for the establishment of a single municipal swimming pool.”91 Thus, at least publicly, candidates for public office
supported building one municipal pool, a plan that clearly had
the support of Montclair’s African-American community.
Notably, the African-American community considered the
town’s decision to build neighborhood pools “a slap in the face to
the Negroes living in the area…we are fighting to get one swimming pool.”92 Marjorie Baskerville, an African-American member
of the Recreation Advisory Committee, described the town’s
decision to build three pools as “hasty” and “questionable,” and
said she was “ashamed” to be a member of the advisory group.93
Dr. Archie Young, an African-American member of the Board of
Education, summed up the sentiment of the African-American
community: “[we] oppose neighborhood facilities as fostering
racial isolation…but this is a lost issue. We have lost the opportunity to provide integrated facilities.”94 Wally Choice, a prominent
community activist who founded Montclair Grass Roots in 1968,
described the decision to build neighborhood pools as “separating
the population,” and noted that other local communities successfully built centralized pools that dealt with integration.95 In the
summer of 1968, just one year after explosive race riots in nearby
Newark revealed deep tensions between the African-American
and white communities, in part due to poor recreational facilities
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79
and programs, segregated swimming in Montclair was becoming
normalized.96
Lonnie Brandon, who was born and raised in Montclair,
worked for Montclair’s Department of Parks, Recreation and
Cultural Affairs for more than 31 years, serving as its director for
the last 12, until his retirement in 2004. He was the first AfricanAmerican department head in Montclair. Brandon said that a single
pool “would have become a galvanizing factor” for integration,
and would have had the “same kind of effect that busing had” on
school integration. According to Brandon, it is impossible to “second guess” what motivated the town council when it established
the three neighborhood pools in 1968, and he does not believe
that maintaining segregated pools was an overt aim. That said,
Brandon stated that the town council was probably motivated by
a belief that it “needed to maintain the social structure in town”
and not “create a situation they believed would become volatile.”97
Ms. Lang, the former Fourth Ward Council Woman and former
Chairperson of the Montclair Civil Rights Commission, echoed this
belief, stating the town council would not, under any circumstance,
have agreed to build only one centrally located pool, despite the
clear preference of the African-American community.98 In other
words, by building neighborhood pools the town was reflecting
and solidifying the existing social norms for swimming.
While the three pools were not de jure segregated, and
residents could choose to swim at any of the town’s municipal
pools, many African-Americans did not feel welcome at all of
the pools, particularly the one located in Mountainside Park
in Upper Montclair. Dr. Anthony Spain, who was a teenager in
the 1970s, swam in the pool in Nishuane Park both because it
was close to his home and because he did not feel comfortable
at the essentially all-white Mountainside pool. Like Lydia Davis
Barrett, who encountered “polite” discrimination at the Park
Street YMCA in the late 1960s, Dr. Spain felt “dissuaded” from
swimming at the Mountainside pool.99 Dolores “Bobbi” Reilly, the
first African-American elected to Montclair’s town council (and
the first official representative of the Fourth Ward), and the first
80
William S. Zaubler
Vice President of the Montclair chapter of the NAACP, recalled
that to the African-American community, the Mountainside pool
had a “country club” atmosphere, welcoming to white Montclair
residents but not African-Americans.100 Thus, although there was
not legal separation in the town’s municipal pools, the reality was
that African-Americans did not feel comfortable swimming in the
white pools: the custom of segregated swimming that had existed
in Montclair since 1927 was now being perpetuated and becoming
normalized in the town pools.
Following the initial decision to build the three neighborhood pools, much of the discussion about them turned to practicalities. The Upper Montclair community was deeply divided
about the location of the pool in its area.101 Residents of the south
end were dissatisfied with the dimensions of the Nishuane pool
and also pressed for an additional pool in Glenfield Park.102 After
the summer of 1968, most of the press coverage about the pools
in The Montclair Times was rather mundane: opening dates, swim
meets between the town pools, and problems of vandalism.103 One
article in The Montclair Times noted the growth of private pools,104
a phenomenon Jeff Wiltse documents. According to Wiltse, many
factors contributed to the growth of backyard swimming pools,
but one of the most significant was that it “enabled owners to
control their social environment.”105 For several subsequent summers, Montclair had four portable pools (one had been erected
in Glenfield Park in August 1968). Discussion about building one
centrally located facility essentially ceased106 and, as if by default,
by 1974 Montclair had converted three of the portable pools
into permanent, in-ground pools, one in Nishuane Park, one in
Essex Park and one in Mountainside Park.107 The portable pool
in Glenfield Park was vandalized and subsequently removed.108
According to Montclair resident and local historian Frank
Gerard Godlewski, in the aftermath of the 1967 Newark riots,
Montclair became even more segregated, in part because many
white residents felt that Newark began south of Bloomfield Avenue
in Montclair, and in part because many African-Americans and
whites in Montclair were just as happy to live parallel but segregated
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81
lives.109 This analysis is supported by Robert W. Lake, a professor at
Rutgers University, who described Montclair in the 1960s and early
1970s as “socially divided,” where African-Americans and whites
had “mutually exclusive social networks” and “a sense of mutual
coexistence…rather than social acceptance.”110 The neighborhood
swimming pools certainly provided the infrastructure for parallel
swimming and mutual coexistence. Otherwise put, the establishment of swimming pools in historically segregated neighborhoods
both perpetuated past segregation and guided future segregated
behavior. Unlike in the schools, where the town was moving away
from neighborhood schools, by establishing neighborhood pools
that perpetuated the racially segregated swimming that had existed in Montclair since the Washington Street Branch opened
its doors in 1927, the town normalized the custom of segregated
swimming. The people of Montclair were not swimming together
in one municipal pool, but were continuing to swim apart in segregated neighborhoods.
There was one last effort to build a truly integrated, centrally
located pool in Montclair, and the story of that pool may be the
most telling in the history of segregated swimming in Montclair.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the YWCA (which by then was
no longer the African-American YWCA, though it was still commonly thought of as such),111 undertook a fundraising campaign
to remodel its facility at 159 Glenridge Avenue and build a new
gymnasium and “covered” pool that would be open to all Montclair residents.112 In a grant application to The Kresge Foundation, the YWCA noted, “research has indicated a great need and
desire for additional swimming facilities.”113 In the application,
the YWCA described itself “as one of the few places in the community where integration has happened without artificiality.”114
The YWCA had a successful fundraising campaign,115 and by 1974
the gymnasium and pool project were under way.116 The pool,
despite some preliminary excavation, was never completed. The
circumstances surrounding the YWCA’s decision to abandon the
swimming pool were not officially recorded, but the rumor from
people with knowledge of the YWCA is that the pool was not built
because some of the contributors to the fundraising campaign
82
William S. Zaubler
withdrew their contributions because they did not support building an integrated pool.117 What is indisputable is that the pool
was never built.
That swimming in Montclair would remain de facto segregated while other areas of civic life were becoming integrated is
not surprising. As Jeff Wiltse explains, swimming pools were notoriously difficult places to integrate “because swimming brought
males and females into ‘physical’ and ‘intimate’ contact.”118 Thus,
when towns and cities built neighborhood pools, those pools
remained largely segregated based on neighborhood demographics. In Baltimore, Maryland, for example, which operated seven
municipal pools, the pools located in the white sections of the
city “attract[ed] only white swimmers,” while the pools located in
the predominantly African-American neighborhoods were overwhelmingly frequented by African-Americans.119 Kevin Mumford, a
Professor of History and African American studies at the University
of Iowa, in his study of racial politics in post-World War II Newark,
notes that in New Jersey the “potential for extraordinary intimacy
between the races”120 so threatened white residents that “whites
in New Jersey employed various methods to maintain de facto
segregation in the waters”121 even after the New Jersey Supreme
Court ruled that public swimming pools and beaches could not
be segregated. Montclair’s “method” to maintain the custom of
segregated swimming that had existed in the town since 1927 was
to build neighborhood pools, knowing full well from numerous
town audits that neighborhood based recreation in Montclair
resulted in de facto segregation.
The segregation resulting from Montclair’s neighborhood
pools was more subtle than the overt discrimination that existed
in other towns in New Jersey and elsewhere and, therefore, harder
to identify and remedy.122 To be sure, many of Montclair’s AfricanAmerican leaders criticized the decision to build neighborhood
pools as nothing more than a veiled plan to maintain segregated
swimming, and pressed the town to build one centrally located
pool that would necessarily be integrated. Neither African-American residents, nor the local chapter of the NAACP, however,
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83
sued to force the town to build one centrally located pool, and
likely had no grounds to do so, because the neighborhood pools
did not violate federal or state accommodation laws. Montclair’s
African-American residents were not legally barred from any of
the town pools, unlike African-Americans who were denied entry
to the Paterson municipal pool in 1946, the Palisades Park pool
in 1947, or the Plainfield, New Jersey municipal pools in 1967.123
Nor, for that matter, were African-Americans in Montclair forced
to swim at their neighborhood pool, in contrast to their forced
attendance at their neighborhood public school. Notably, the
Montclair African-American community also did not stage protests
or boycotts, such as those that occurred in Plainfield in 1967 and
1968 in response to overt segregation of the town pools there.124
The lack of protests in Montclair, from either African-American
or white residents, may be partially attributed to the fact that the
neighborhood pools were not overtly segregated, but another
possible explanation is that, despite the criticism from many in
the African-American community, the neighborhood based pools
enabled residents of Montclair to maintain the “mutual coexistence” and “mutually exclusive social networks” that characterized
Montclair in the late 1960s and 1970s.125
Despite the longstanding African-American community
in Montclair, a meaningful group of African-American civic leaders and elites, and the recent election of an African-American
mayor, Montclair remained socially divided in the late 1960s and
early 1970s. When the town decided to build municipal pools,
Montclair did what many towns in New Jersey and elsewhere did:
kept swimming as separate as possible. Montclair achieved this—
quietly perpetuating the custom of segregated swimming that had
existed for over 40 years—by building neighborhood pools that
while technically open to all residents would correspond with the
lines that divided neighborhoods according to race. In so doing,
Montclair was both perpetuating and normalizing the segregated
swimming that had existed since 1927 and guiding future behavior.
84
William S. Zaubler
Conclusion
Lise Funderburg, writing in The New York Times in 1999
about Montclair’s magnet schools, noted that Montclair had many
of the requisites of a truly integrated community: the town had
maintained a mixed racial balance since at least 1980 (30 percent
African-American and 65 percent white) and residents identified
their community as diverse.126 That said, data from the 1980s, 1990s
and early 2000s showed that geographic segregation continued
in Montclair, with a disproportionate “racial concentration” of
African-Americans in the Fourth Ward.127 Funderburg described
Montclair as suffering from “integration anxiety,” noting that
“once you get past the Kumbaya hype, self-congratulatory civic
boosterism and media accolades…diversity is still a concept very
much under construction here.”128 With respect to swimming in
Montclair’s municipal pools, this is undoubtedly so. Swimming
pools have been, in towns and cities throughout the United States,
notoriously difficult places to integrate. What would have happened
had the town followed the Montclair Community Pool Association’s 1968 recommendation to build one centrally located pool
is impossible to know: whether there would have been a smooth
transition to integrated swimming or whether there would have
been racial tensions or violence is speculative at best. What is
clear, however, is that the decision to build three neighborhood
pools, while not an overt act of discrimination, reflected and
solidified social norms by perpetuating parallel coexistence and
discouraging integration, and normalized the custom of segregated
swimming that had existed in Montclair since 1927. That decision
continues to impact Montclair’s municipal pools, which remain
neighborhood-based, and as such are not a place where all the
citizens of Montclair, one of the nation’s most racially integrated
and tolerant towns, usually come together to swim.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Notes
W.E.B. Du Bois, “The Problem of Amusement,” reprinted
in W.E.B. Du Bois on Sociology and the Black Community by W. E.
B Du Bois, Dan S. Green, and Edwin D. Driver (Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press, 1978) p. 226.
2
“Civil Rights Division Home Page,” The United States
Department of Justice, http://www.justice.gov.
3
Michael A. Fletcher, “Interracial Marriages Eroding
Barriers,” The Washington Post (Washington, DC), (December
28, 1998), http://www.washingtonpost.com.
4
Paula Span, “Deep Divisions,” Columbia Law School
Magazine (Fall 2013).
5
Du Bois, p. 226.
6
Ibid., p. 231.
7
Ibid., p. 228.
8
Forrester B. Washington, “Recreational Facilities for
the Negro,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social
Science 140 (November 1928) p. 272, http://www.jstor.org.
9
Ibid., p. 274.
10
Ibid., p. 274.
11
Jeff Wiltse, Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming
Pools in America (Chapel Hill, North Carolina: University of
North Carolina, 2007) pp. 154–156.
12
Ibid., p. 123.
13
Ibid., pp. 2, 13–15, 65–66.
14
Ibid., pp. 133–134.
15
Interracial Committee of the New Jersey Conference of
Social Work, Survey of Negro Life in New Jersey: Community Report
No. II, Montclair (Trenton, New Jersey: New Jersey Conference
of Social Work, 1932) p. 2.
16
Ibid., pp. 2–3.
17
Ibid., p. 3.
18
Ibid., p. 4.
19
“Unified Land Use and Circulation Element—
Introduction,” Montclair Township, http://www.
montclairnjusa.org.
20
John Nolen, Montclair: The Preservation of Its Natural
Beauty and Its Improvement as a Residence Town (Montclair, New
Jersey: n.p., 1909) p. 73, http://babel.hathitrust.org.
21
Ibid., p. 36; see Wiltse, pp. 133–134.
22
Interracial Committee of the New Jersey Conference of
Social Work, pp. 6, 9–10.
1
85
86
William S. Zaubler
Patricia Hampson Eget, “Challenging Containment:
African Americans and Racial Politics in Montclair, New Jersey,
1920–1940,” New Jersey History 126, no. 1 (2011) p. 6, http://
reaper64.scc-net.rutgers.edu.
24
Ibid., p. 9.
25
Ibid., p. 9.
26
Elizabeth Shepard, “An Evolution of a Community: A
Montclair African American History Project,” (unpublished
manuscript, 2007) pp. 13–14, 29–30.
27
Eget, p. 10.
28
Shepard, p. 37.
29
Ibid., p. 37.
30
Thomas Boyton, Washington Street Branch (Montclair, New
Jersey: Montclair YMCA, 1991) p. 1991.
31
Ibid., p. 16.
32
Ibid., pp. 16–17.
33
Jonathan Mellon, The Washington Street YMCA (Montclair,
New Jersey: Montclair Township. 2004) p. 3.
34
Edwin B. Goodell, Montclair: The Evolution of a Suburban
Town (Montclair, New Jersey: Edward Madison Company, 1934)
pp. 234–255; S. C. G. Watkins, Reminiscences of Montclair (New
York, New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1929) pp. 96–104.
35
“Y Offers Free Swimming Lessons,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (June 10, 1931) p. 4.
36
Everett T. Christmas, Sr., The Washington Street YMCA:
Montclair, New Jersey 1904–1964 (n.p.: n.p., 2008).
37
Shepard, pp. 38–39.
38
Elvoid Christmas, interview by the author, Montclair
Kimberley Academy, Montclair, New Jersey, February 12, 2014
39
Alicia Zadrozny, “YMCA Holds Many Fond Memories for
One Washington Street Youth,” The Montclair Times (Montclair,
New Jersey), (September 4, 2003) pp. 1, 5.
40
Sandra Lang, interview by the author, Montclair, New
Jersey, February 17, 2014.
41
Interracial Committee of the New Jersey Conference of
Social Work, p. 23.
42
Ibid., p. 25.
43
Ibid., p. 25.
44
Ibid., p. 25.
45
Harold M. Lewis, Master Plan of the Town of Montclair New
Jersey: Part VII, A Plan for Park and Recreation Facilities (Montclair,
New Jersey: Montclair Planning Board, 1933) p. 5.
46
Ibid., p. 17.
23
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Ibid., p. 17.
Wiltse, p. 125.
49
Marta Gutman, “Race, Place, and Play: Robert Moses and
the WPA Swimming Pools in New York City,” Journal of the Society
of Architectural Historians 61, no. 4 (December 2008), http://
www.jstor.org.
50
Montclair Forum, Montclair Civil Rights Audit (Montclair,
New Jersey: Montclair Forum and Montclair Chapter of the
American Veterans Committee, 1947).
51
Ibid.
52
Ibid.
53
Ibid.
54
Ibid.
55
See Wiltse, pp. 135–139.
56
Paul E. Baker, Negro-White Adjustment: An Investigation and
Analysis of Methods in the Interracial Movement in the United States
(New York: Association Press, 1934) pp. 140–145.
57
Victoria W. Wolcott, Race, Riots, and Roller Coasters: The
Struggle over Segregated Recreation in America (Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania, 2012) pp. 60–64, 72–73.
58
Rhetta M. Arter, “Exploring Montclair,” in Human
Relations Monograph 6 (New York, New York: New York
University Center for Human Relations Studies, 1956) p. v.
59
Ibid., p. vi.
60
Ibid., p. 12.
61
Ibid., p. 16.
62
Ibid., p. 21.
63
Ibid., p. 21.
64
Ibid., p. 21.
65
The League of Women Voters of Montclair, Know Your
Town: Montclair 3rd ed. (Montclair, New Jersey: League of
Women Voters of Montclair, 1958) p. 40.
66
Boyton, pp. 18–19.
67
Ibid., pp. 18–19.
68
“Policies, Practices of ‘Y’ Criticized,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (January 30, 1969) p. 1.
69
Shepard, p. 45.
70
Lydia Davis Barrett, telephone interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey, November 24, 2013.
71
Lang, interview by the author.
72
“How About a Municipal Swimming Pool or Pools for
Montclair?,” The Montclair Times (Montclair, New Jersey),
(September 14, 1961) p. 42.
47
48
87
88
William S. Zaubler
H.E. Siebert, letter to the editor, The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (September 21, 1961) p. 14.
74
The 1964 Community Audit (Montclair, New Jersey: n.p.,
1964).
75
Ibid.
76
“Low Income Group Lacks Leisure Time Activities,” The
Montclair Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (July 16, 1964) p. 1.
77
The 1964 Community Audit.
78
“Swimming Pool Meeting Planned,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (March 14, 1968) p. 1.
79
“Swimming Pool Study Planned,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, NJ), (March 28, 1968) p. 1.
80
Ibid., p. 1.
81
Ibid., p. 1.
82
Ibid., p. 1.
83
“3 Portable Pools Set for Town,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (April 25, 1968) p. 1.
84
Jane Caroline Manners, “Selling Integration: A History
of the Magnet School System in Montclair, New Jersey”
(Honors Thesis, Harvard University, 1997).
85
“M.G. Carter Chosen First Negro Mayor,” The Montclair
Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (May 23, 1968) p. 1.
86
The contrast between the town’s decisions to build
neighborhood pools at essentially the same moment that
Montclair moved away from neighborhood schools and toward
a magnet school system merits a brief digression. There were
noteworthy distinctions between the state of swimming and
the state of education in Montclair in the late 1960s and early
1970s. First, pools were particularly difficult places to integrate
because pools brought men and woman into physical contact
and created the potential for sexual intimacy. Second, unlike
the public schools, where students were required to attend
their neighborhood school, residents of Montclair were free
to choose to swim in any of the town’s municipal pools. Third,
unlike the public schools, where there were demonstrable
differences between the schools that were in the AfricanAmerican and white neighborhoods, there were no meaningful
differences between the quality of the swimming pool facilities
in the town. See Wiltse, pp. 154–156; and Manners.
87
“Swimming Pools Are Advanced,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (May 16, 1968) p. 1.
88
“A Step in the Right Direction,” editorial, The Montclair
Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (May 2, 1968) p. 14.
73
THE CONCORD REVIEW
“Three Pools Are Opposed,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (May 2, 1968) p. 10.
90
Ibid., p. 10.
91
“Pool Views Outlined,” The Montclair Times (Montclair,
New Jersey), (May 9, 1968) p. 1.
92
“Nishuane Swim Pool Criticized,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (July 18, 1968) p. 1.
93
Ibid., p. 1.
94
Ibid., p. 1.
95
Wally Choice, telephone interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey, February 18, 2014.
96
U.S. Riot Commission, Report of the National Advisory
Commission on Civil Disorders later printing ed. (New York, New
York: Bantam Books, 1968) pp. 6–8, 56–74.
97
Lonnie Brandon, telephone interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey February 19, 2014.
98
Lang, interview by the author.
99
Anthony Spain, telephone interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey, February 10, 2014.
100
Dolores Reilly, telephone interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey, February 9, 2014.
101
“Town Board Votes Pool Site Change,” The Montclair
Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (June 28, 1968) p. 1.
102
“Nishuane Swim Pool Criticized,” p. 1.
103
See, for example, “4 Swimming Pools Open on June 28,”
The Montclair Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (May 1, 1969) p. 1;
“Mountainside-Nishuane Meet on Pool Program,” The Montclair
Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (August 7, 1969) p. 3; “Vandals
Strike at Glenfield Pool,” The Montclair Times (Montclair, NJ),
(August 26, 1971) p. 1.
104
“Nicer Homes, More Pools,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, New Jersey), (July 16, 1970) p. 8.
105
Wiltse, p. 201.
106
In 1978, the Recreation Department proposed building
an indoor-outdoor Olympic sized swimming pool. Lonnie
Brandon advocated consolidating the three pools and building
one large pool complex in a central location, noting that from
a budget standpoint this would save money over time. In the
Town of Montclair’s 1978 Master Plan, the town recommended
“the formation of a citizen committee…to study this proposal
further.” This pool was never built. Boorman and Dorram Inc.,
Consultants, Master Plan (Montclair, NJ: n.p., 1978); Lonnie
89
89
90
William S. Zaubler
Brandon, telephone interview by the author, Montclair, New
Jersey, February 19, 2014.
107
Pat Brechka, “Township Pools,” e-mail message to author,
February 4, 2014.
108
Choice, telephone interview by the author.
109
Frank Gerard Godlewski, e-mail interview by the author,
Montclair, New Jersey, February 11, 2014.
110
Robert W. Lake, The New Suburbanites: Race and Housing
in the Suburbs (New Brunswick, New Jersey: Center for Urban
Policy Research, Rutgers University, 1981) p. 90.
111
Shepard, p. 45.
112
Elizabeth B. Seaver, letter to the editor, The Montclair
Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (May 23, 1968) p. 12.
113
Lula Garrett to William H. Baldwin, “Re: Grant
Application by Montclair-North Essex Y.W.C.A,” n.d., Montclair
Public Library, Montclair, New Jersey
114
Ibid.
115
See “YWCA Fund at $333,000,” The Montclair Times
(Montclair, NJ), (June 26, 1966) p. 1; “Goal Set by YWCA for
Drive,” The Montclair Times (Montclair, New Jersey), (April 22,
1966) p. 1.
116
Joyce Mins to Board of Directors and Board of Trustees,
memorandum, “Report for the June 4, 1974 Board of Directors
Meeting,” June 26, 1964, Montclair Public Library, Montclair,
New Jersey.
117
Confidential source, interview by the author, 2013.
118
Wiltse, p. 156.
119
Ibid., p. 157.
120
Kevin Mumford, Newark: A History of Race, Rights and Riots
in America (New York, New York: New York University Press,
2007) p. 45.
121
Ibid., p. 46.
122
Manners, pp. 7–8.
123
Wolcott, p. 213.
124
Ibid., p. 213.
125
Lake, p. 90.
126
Lise Funderburg, “Integration Anxiety,” The New York
Times Magazine (November 7, 1999), http://www.nytimes.com.
127
The Montclair Community Audit (Montclair, New Jersey:
n.p., 1980); AJ Faas and Richard P. MacDonald, “Race, Rent
and Housing in Montclair,” College of Humanities and Social
Sciences—Montclair State University, last modified May 23,
2005, http://chss.montclair.edu.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
128
Funderburg.
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THE CONCORD REVIEW
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American Caesar, Douglas MacArthur 1880-1964
Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1978, pp. 297-304
Other approaches to Port Moresby having failed, the Japanese
now attempted the incredible, an offensive over the Owen Stanleys. At
first the small rear guard of the digger militiamen, who remained in the
range until August 8, assumed that the enemy soldiers climbing towards
them were merely patrolling. To their astonishment, massed infantrymen,
manhandling mortars, machine-guns, and fieldpieces, crept slowly up
the slimy, zigzagging, hundred-mile Kokoda Trail. In four weeks Major
General Tomitaro Horii’s fourteen thousand men had crossed the raging
Kumusi River at Wairopi and struggled through thirteen-thousand-foot
Kokoda Pass. Five jungle-trained battalions leapfrogged one another
into Isurava village, fifty-five miles from their starting point, and pushed
down the precipitous southern slopes toward Imita Ridge and Ioribaiwa,
twenty miles from the bluffs around Port Moresby. How many men succumbed in this heroic endeavor will never be known. Many perished
in the Kumusi, and others disappeared in quicksand or plunged into
gorges. In places the winding trail, a foot wide at most, simply disappeared. It took an hour to cut through a few yards of vegetation. The
first man in a file would hack away with a machete until he collapsed
of exhaustion; then the second man would pick up the machete and
continue, and so on. In that climate the life expectancy of the men who
lost consciousness and were left behind was often measured in minutes.
MacArthur had sent two of his best brigadiers, Pat Casey and
Harold George, to survey the Papuan terrain. They returned to Brisbane
shaken. Until now they had assumed that Bataan and Samar were covered
with the densest jungle in the world, but New Guinea was unbelievable.
They told the General that they didn’t see how human beings could live
there, let alone fight there. From the air, whence they had first seen it,
Papua’s most striking feature had been the razorback mountain range,
stretching down the peninsula like the dorsal vertebrae of some prehistoric monster, its peaks obscured by dark clouds swollen with rain. It
wasn’t until they had landed and ventured into the rain forest on steep,
slippery, root-tangled trails that the full horror of life there had struck
them. Blades of grass seven feet high that could lay a man’s hand open
as quickly as a scalpel. The jungle was studded with mangrove swamps
and thick clumps of bamboo and palms. Often the trail was covered with
waist-deep slop. The air reeked with vile odors—the stench of rotting
undergrowth and of stink lilies. Little light penetrated the thick matted
screens of liana vines overhead, but when the rain stopped and the sun
appeared, vast suffocating waves of steam rose from the dank marshes.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Eugenics in North Carolina
Michelle Li
Carrie Buck was born in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 1906.
She was a foster child; her mother Emma was committed to the
Virginia Colony for the Epileptic and Feebleminded.1 At age 17,
Carrie was identified as possessing the traits of feeblemindedness
and sexual promiscuity and ordered to be forcibly sterilized.2 The
evidence for the claims of sexual promiscuity stemmed from the
fact that Carrie had an illegitimate child. Carrie did have a child
at age 17, but her pregnancy was a result of rape, allegedly by
the nephew of her foster parents.3 Despite this, Carrie Buck was
eventually forcibly sterilized by the state of Virginia, an act that
was sanctioned by the United States Supreme Court in Buck v. Bell
(1927).4 At the trial, several witnesses testified to Carrie’s “defects”
and those of her mother as well.5 A study of Carrie’s infant child
Vivian concluded that she was “definitely not normal.”6 And in the
opinion delivered by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, the Supreme
Court asserted that, “It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve
for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly
unfit from continuing their kind…three generations of imbeciles
are enough.”7 Despite the fact that the “definitely-not-normal” Vivian would grow to be an honor roll student, despite the fact that
Michelle Li is a Senior at Raleigh Charter High School in Raleigh,
North Carolina, where she wrote this paper for Shayne Klein’s Advanced
Placement U.S. History course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
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Michelle Li
Carrie’s own defense attorney conspired with the lawyer for the
Commonwealth of Virginia to uphold Virginia’s sterilization law
in court, despite the fact that Carrie’s sterilization was based on
false diagnosis of feeblemindedness and Carrie’s child was not a
result of sexual promiscuity but of rape, the Supreme Court ruled
Virginia’s sterilization law constitutional.8 The decision in Buck
v. Bell provided the legal basis for the rising eugenics movement
in America which would eventually be considered a legitimate
science. However, the policy of eugenics arose out of flawed science and racial bias. The movement then continued under the
pretense of improving the welfare and morality of humankind.
After the impact that eugenic policy had in the Holocaust came
to light, the eugenics movement faded in America. However, in
states such as North Carolina, the eugenics program grew after
World War II due to a framing of old ideas to fit a new cultural
context. The survival and even growth of the eugenics movement
after World War II was due to a retooling of eugenic rhetoric to fit
the post World War II world of increased welfare and civil rights.
In 1865, an unknown Czech monk, Gregor Mendel, published a paper observing patterns of inheritance in pea plants. At
the same time that Mendel and Darwin were beginning to probe
genetics and heredity, a man named Francis Galton was extending their concepts into a different realm.9 Galton reasoned that
characteristics such as talent and intelligence could be calculated,
managed, and bred. They were inherited.10 Galton’s policies eventually grew into “positive eugenics”; recommending or even legally
mandating biologically beneficial marriages.11 However, within
a few years, Galton’s ideas had been transformed into “negative
eugenics,” a much more coercive ideology of discouraging the
reproduction by those deemed “unfit.”12 In her 1891 pamphlet,
The Rapid Multiplication of the Unfit, prominent women’s suffrage
leader Victoria Woodhull declared, “The best minds of today have
accepted the fact that if superior people are desired, they must
be bred; and if imbeciles, criminals, paupers and [the] otherwise
unfit are undesirable citizens, they must not be bred.”13 A year
later, in 1892, Galton himself admitted in the preface of the second edition of Hereditary Genius, that “the…problem of the future
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betterment of the human race is confessedly, at the present time,
hardly advanced beyond the state of academic interest.”14 Though
the theories were false, these “academic interests” eventually
made their way into legislation in 30 states and would permeate
American culture and thought.15
Eugenicists lent legitimacy to their movement by shrouding racial bias in scientific inquiry and statistical data. In order to
establish a scientific basis for eugenics, a standard for determining
inferiority needed to be developed. Using developed “intelligence
tests” in order to determine “mental ability,” eugenicists tested and
collected data on various races. One such test was the Stanford-Binet
test (1916), which offered questions of increasing difficulty that
included a large pop culture component. The creators of this test
viewed the results as merely indicators of whether or not students
needed extra attention or alternate teaching methods. However,
eugenicists used these tests to identify the feebleminded.16
Question: “Becky Sharp appears in…” Possible answers: Vanity Fair,
Romola, The Christmas Carol, Henry IV. Correct response: Vanity Fair.
Question: “The Pierce Arrow car is made in…” Possible answers: Buffalo, Detroit, Toledo, Flint. Correct Response: Buffalo.
Question: “‘Hasn’t scratched yet’ is used in advertising a…” Possible
answers: drink, revolver, flour, cleanser. Correct response: cleanser.17
Southern Italian immigrants would not have known who the latest
Broadway stars were or where a car was made. Often, recent Jewish
immigrants were only literate in Yiddish. And African Americans
had been denied literacy by a discriminatory educational system
for decades. Thus predictably, using these tests as a benchmark,
the Journal of Delinquency reported that 40 percent of immigrants
tested as feebleminded and 60 percent of Jewish immigrants
tested as mentally unfit. The Archives of Psychology reported that
Blacks scored 60 percent lower than their white counterparts,
but as the percentage of white blood increased in their ancestry,
so did the test scores. More sophisticated tests, such as the Yerkes
Bridge Point Scale for Intelligence (1919), began to be created.
Results from these tests showed that feeblemindedness among
cherished groups such as those of Dutch, German, English, and
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Michelle Li
Swedish descent was minuscule—all under half of 1 percent. The
work done utilizing the Yerkes test was furthered by Princeton psychologist Carl Brigham, who in his 1922 book A Study of American
Intelligence wrote,
We still find tremendous differences between the non-English speaking Nordic group and the Alpine and Mediterranean groups…the
decline in intelligence is due to two factors: the change in races
migrating to this country, and to the additional factor of lower and
lower representatives of each race…The conclusion is that our test
results indicate a genuine intellectual superiority of the Nordic group
over the Alpine and Mediterranean groups.18
Due to his work on intelligence tests, Carl Brigham would later
be chosen by the College Board to head a committee to create a
qualifying college exam, known as the Scholastic Aptitude Test,
or SAT. His work, A Study of American Intelligence, had become a
scientific standard. Clearly, these tests were vectors of racial bias
and social exclusion.19 However, legislators, educators, and social
workers believed eugenic notions were hard science, and they
enacted laws and procedures to implement eugenics goals. By
“legitimizing” eugenics and the hereditary and racially-based attributes of intelligence, the eugenics movement became accepted
and propagated, with the help of some very powerful people.20
Charles Davenport, a Harvard zoologist, became the face
and leader of the eugenics movement and remained dominant in
the field for many decades. Davenport sought to create a superior
race, and in order to gain the financial support to accelerate this
goal, turned to the Carnegie Institute.21 The Carnegie Institute
was at the forefront of scientific discovery and academic thought,
and Davenport offered to them a resonating argument:
We have in this country the grave problem of the negro, a race whose
mental development is, on the average, far below the average of the
Caucasian. Is there a prospect that we may through the education of
the individual produce an improved race so that we may hope at last
that the negro mind shall be as teachable, as elastic, as original, as
fruitful as the Caucasian’s? Or must future generations, indefinitely,
start from the same low plane and yield the same meager results? We
do not know; we have no data. Prevailing ‘opinion’ says we must face
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the latter alternative…I propose to give the rest of my life unreservedly to this work.22
The Carnegie Trustees said yes to Davenport, and helped established the Eugenics Record Office (1910) as well as the Cold
Spring Harbor Laboratory. John D. Rockefeller Jr. also maintained
correspondence with Davenport discussing eugenics, and gave to
the movement a portion of his considerable financial assets. The
support of the elites, both financially and through lending legitimacy and credibility made possible the propagation of eugenics
policies throughout America.23
Eugenics was taught in the education system as well. In 1911,
the prestigious firm Henry Holt & Co. published a textbook titled
Heredity in Relation to Eugenics. Authored by Charles Davenport,
this textbook advocated strongly for mass sterilization and incarceration of the unfit, tying the quality of “unfit” to immigrants. If
Southern European immigrants were allowed to enter the United
States at their current rate, Davenport’s textbook reasoned that
America would “rapidly become darker in pigmentation, smaller
in stature…more given to crimes of larceny, kidnapping, assault,
murder, rape, and sex-immorality.”24 Davenport also asserted that
The horde of Jews that are now coming…with their intense individualism and ideals of gain at the cost of any interest, represent the opposite
extreme from the Early English and the more recent Scandinavian
immigration with their ideals of community life in the open country,
advancement by the sweat of the brow, and the uprearing of families
in the fear of God and love of country.25
Davenport’s textbook was a small sample of the extent to which
eugenics was entrenched within higher education. The universities
that possessed a stand-alone eugenics curriculum included Harvard
University, Princeton University, Yale University, the University of
Chicago, Northwestern University, and Stanford University.26 High
schools also adopted eugenic textbooks and integrated eugenics
into their courses.27 By methodically integrating eugenic texts into
curricula at prestigious universities across the nation, eugenicists
provided academic legitimacy for the growing movement and in
turn indoctrinated students with the racially-charged policies and
flawed science of eugenics.
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Michelle Li
While eugenics was a school of thought that in part grew
out of racial or ethnic bias, advocates of eugenics saw themselves
as improving the morality of the American population. Eugenicists
sought to ensure that those deemed unfit and immoral would be
prohibited from passing down their degenerate traits to offspring.
One study that lent validity to the claim of heredity as a cause for
social traits was that of the Jukes. In 1874, Elisha Harris, a physician
and secretary of the Prison Association, presented work indicating
the recurrence of family names in prisons.28 This work attracted
the attention of Richard Dugdale, a member of the Executive
Committee of the New York prison. Dugdale was familiar with
the Malthusian belief in the inevitability of overpopulation and
adhered to the view that genes were the basis for criminal potential. While at a prison interviewing inmates, Dugdale discovered
that six were related.29 Following this discovery, Dugdale started
tracing the family lineages of those who were incarcerated in New
York.30 He discovered that 709 people were related by either blood
or marriage to five sisters.31 Bestowing the name “Jukes” upon
these sisters and their posterity, Dugdale found Jukes in brothels,
prisons, and alehouses throughout New York.32 The overwhelming
number of Jukes in such places prompted Dugdale to suggest that
a combination of hereditary factors and environment were the
cause of the Jukes’ criminal behavior. The hereditary aspects of
his findings received immediate attention and were widely pointed
to by eugenicists as evidence of the benefits forced sterilizations
would provide to the common welfare. Many eugenicists and social workers also pointed to sexual promiscuity as a root cause of
deficiency and criminal potential. This assertion was supported
by The Kallikak Study, (1912) written by Henry Goddard, a leading
eugenicist. Martin Kallikak was a Quaker from New Jersey who,
against his family’s religious beliefs, fought in the Revolutionary
War. While serving in the Continental Army, Kallikak had a short
relationship with a country girl, who in some accounts is referred
to as a “tavern wench.”33 According to Goddard’s study, Kallikak’s
first union with the promiscuous “tavern wench” produced a lineage of criminals, degenerates, and paupers. In contrast, Kallikak’s
second, legitimate, marriage produced a line of doctors, politi-
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cians, professors, and upstanding citizens.34 The Kallikak Study was
written for a lay audience and proved to be immensely popular.35
“Family studies” such as that of the Jukes and Kallikaks convinced
social workers, eugenicists and mental testers that individual
characteristics such as sexual promiscuity or race explained the
type of criminal activity or feeblemindedness present in familial
lines rather than environmental factors such as poverty.36 Thus the
policy of eugenics was propagated and implemented with legislation coercing sterilization under the belief that these laws would
put an end to the hereditary recurrences of degenerate traits and
improve the general morality and welfare of the human race.
The eugenics policies that spread in America were not confined to this country. In the 1920s and 1930s, government eugenic
programs were established in Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Japan, and
Sweden. Negative eugenics appeared in Germany at the end of
19th century and would continue to permeate the country with
horrific effects.37 Charles Davenport and the Carnegie Institute
became a beacon in the eugenic world for German researchers.
The bonds between American and German eugenicists dissipated
at the outbreak of World War I. However, under Adolf Hitler’s
command, a German-American eugenic partnership reemerged.38
American eugenicists viewed National Socialism as having the
potential for creating racial procedures and eugenic legislation
that would never be implemented in America. Rockefeller Foundation money began to flow into Germany, playing a central role
in establishing major eugenic research institutes in Germany.39
In 1924, Eugenical News and the Journal of the American Medical Association published reports on the work of Ernst Rudin, who was
the leading force in German Eugenics and an architect of Hitler’s
systematic medical repression.40 When Hitler gained control of
Germany’s government (1933), legislation implementing forced
sterilization for the unfit was passed quickly. Coedited by Rudin,
this mass compulsory sterilization law reflected heavy American
influence within the legislation.41 Eugenic News commented that
“to one versed in the history of eugenic sterilization in America,
the text of the German statute reads almost like the American
model sterilization law.”42 Detailed analyses of California steriliza-
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Michelle Li
tion measures also heavily influenced the German law.43 American
eugenicists viewed the growing German eugenics movement with
admiration. As American eugenicist Clarence G. Campbell stated
at a reception during the 1935 International Population Congress
in Berlin, “To that great leader, Adolf Hitler!”44 It is important to
note that Hitler did not develop his racist and anti-Semitic beliefs
from America. However, eugenics did provide a way for Hitler to
legitimize his racial beliefs by allowing him to enshroud them in
the scientific façade of eugenics.45
As is well known, the most devastating occurrence of
eugenic rhetoric and ideals appeared in Auschwitz. Crucial to
the experimentation that occurred at Auschwitz was Dr. Otmar
Freiherr von Verschuer. An “eugenic warrior” chiefly focused on
racial hygiene and the study of twins, Verschuer quickly gained
the trust of the Nazi government and became a star in America
as well. Both Eugenical News and the Journal of the American Medical
Association followed his writings and career, and when Eugenical
News reported on Frankfurt’s new Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene, the headline simply read “Verschuer’s
Institute.”46 As any scientist would, Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer
had an assistant. The name of his assistant was Josef Mengele.47
Like his mentor, Josef Mengele considered himself a race
warrior, and, in an autobiographical account, stated that his motivation in becoming a doctor was to create a superior race.48 Perhaps
most infamous among Mengele’s horrible experiments were those
using twins. The twin camp at Auschwitz was established Barrack
14 in Camp F. There, atrocities were committed. Twin girls were
forced to have sex with twin boys to see if twin children would
result.49 Twin brothers, Guido and Nino, were one day taken away
from their rooms by Mengele. A few days later, they were brought
back as a crude imitation of Siamese twins, with wrists and backs
sewn together and interconnected veins. That night their mother
injected them with a fatal dose of morphine to end their suffering.50 Why was Mengele so fixated on twins? Eugenicists craved
twins to help achieve their biological goal as they were the perfect
control group for experimentation; they were Nature’s clones.
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They were also valued as a vehicle to enhance the superior race,
because if desirable individuals had multiple births, the growth
of the superior race would grow. A decade before Galton coined
the term eugenics, he published a scientific essay entitled “The
History of Twins as a Criterion of the Relative Powers of Nature
and Nurture.”51 American eugenic publications constantly dotted
their pages with the latest twin theory and research. Eugenicist R.A.
Fisher opened up one of his lectures to the Second International
Congress of Eugenics with the phrase: “The subject of the genesis of human twins…has a special importance for eugenicists.”52
Mengele’s horrible experiments were eventually stopped. Not
by reason or remorse, but by Allied forces. Mengele fled.53 Once
the atrocities committed at Auschwitz and other concentration
camps came to light, eugenics fell from popular support. American
eugenicists did not condone the methods used by Mengele and
Verschuer which likely had little real effect on the extremity of
the Holocaust.54 However, there is no denying that the school of
eugenic thought influenced and related to horrific crimes against
humanity that were committed during World War II.
The revelation of Nazi atrocities cast an extremely negative
light upon eugenics, and in the years following World War II the
days of the eugenics movement seemed to be numbered. In addition, the science of the hereditarian argument that eugenics rested
upon was being increasingly challenged by new advances in the
study of genes. In 1942, the Supreme Court set a new precedent
by striking down an Oklahoma law that allowed sterilizations of
three-time felons.55 Yet despite these odds, the eugenics movement
did not totally wither and die away. On the contrary, while in most
states state-ordered sterilizations ceased by the 1940s, in North
Carolina there was a huge increase in the number of sterilizations
performed post-World War II.56 Proponents of eugenics helped
resuscitate the fading movement by retooling old ideas into a new
rhetoric that fit the post-World War II welfare state. As Frederick
Osborn, an administrator, military leader, and eugenics leader who
played a large role in turning the post-WWII eugenics movement
away from race and class consciousness, stated, “eugenic goals are
most likely to be attained under a name other than eugenics.”57, 58
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Michelle Li
In 1967, Elaine Riddick became pregnant at the age of 13
due to rape. When a social worker became aware of her condition,
her case was recommended to the North Carolina Eugenics Board.
The Board reported that “because of Elaine’s inability to control
herself, and her promiscuity—there are community reports of her
‘running around’ and out late at night unchaperoned—the physician has advised sterilization.” Riddick’s illiterate grandmother
signed an “X” on a consent form, and hours after Riddick gave
birth to her son, she was sterilized.59 She was not informed that
she was being sterilized during the operation. Riddick’s later marriage fell apart and she is still affected by the sterilization, stating
“I felt like I was nothing. It’s like, the people that did this; they
took my spirit away from me.”60 Elaine Riddick was one of the
more than 7,600 people who were sterilized in North Carolina
over the course of 40 years.61 In 1933, The North Carolina General
Assembly passed a sterilization law that also created the North
Carolina Board of Eugenics.62 Initially, the rate of sterilizations
remained relatively low. However the rate increased in the 1940s
and reached its peak between 1950 and 1952 with 704 sterilizations.63 The number of sterilizations performed between 1950
and 1952 was a roughly 300 percent increase from the number of
sterilizations performed in 1935.64 As seen in North Carolina, the
eugenics movement was far from gone after World War II. Just as
before, eugenicists embraced eugenics as improving the morality
of the human race for the greater good. Post-World War II rhetoric
surrounding eugenics derived from the idea of the welfare state
and new welfare programs. The language surrounding eugenics
now was structured to address the culture of welfare and rights
that had been created post-World War II.
In North Carolina, eugenics had a very direct link with
welfare. North Carolina was the only state in the nation that gave
social workers the authority to submit petitions for sterilization to
the Eugenics Board for review.65 The movement survived because of
negative concerns and attitudes people possessed regarding welfare
and welfare recipients. Paul Popenoe, a leading eugenicist, had
warned in the 1930s that the development and reproduction of an
inferior class was encouraged by welfare programs.66, 67 When state
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officials visited rural areas of North Carolina, they saw dilapidated
housing and poor conditions supporting large numbers of people.
To many, it seemed the number of those relying on welfare had
expanded, and this burden was thought to be the cause and effect
of the country’s problems. One significant factor that contributed
to the increase in the number of welfare recipients was the inclusion of African Americans into welfare programs. Prior to the
war, many Southern States, including North Carolina, had barred
African Americans from access to New Deal programs such as Aid
to Dependent Children.68 Generally, Southern states had smaller
government revenues for social spending due to lower tax rates and
a lower tax base. In addition, segregation denied African Americans
access to most institutions where sterilization occurred. However
with the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, African Americans
were finally granted full access to federal welfare programs. The
number of African Americans receiving welfare benefits rose, and
so did the percentage of African American sterilizations. In the
1930s, African Americans made up 23 percent of sterilizations in
North Carolina, whereas in the 1960s African Americans accounted
for 65 percent of sterilizations.69 Ironically, the work of civil rights
activists to grant African Americans equal access to programs such
as welfare that promised to improve the quality of life actually
diminished it in states such as North Carolina, resulting in sterilization for many. The inclusion of African Americans into welfare
programs brought them into closer contact with social workers
and state-supported sterilization.70 In addition, racist stereotypes
continued to play a role in the eugenics movement. The belief
in the Jezebel character, the idea that African American women
were unable to control their sexual behavior, placed the blame
for urban poverty and unrest on African American women rather
than on the structural causes of poverty and crime. Resentment
of African American single mothers and their presumed burden
on the welfare state contributed to support for their sterilization
and for the eugenics movement.71 The link between the increased
number of African American sterilizations and the increased participation of African Americans in welfare reflects the link between
welfare and sterilization in North Carolina. Advocates for eugenics
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Michelle Li
argued that eugenics was the intervention needed to prevent the
state from being overrun by welfare dependents.72 Curtis Wood,
president of the Human Betterment Association of America, stated
at a meeting of the Kentucky Gynecological Society in 1963 that
“people were the cancer cells, growing in an uncontrolled and
destructive manner.”73 Wood argued that welfare policies had
created 7.25 million dependents and that number would only
rise. Without eugenics, hardworking families would have to pay
to support welfare-dependent and “reproductively irresponsible”
families. Old eugenic ideas about racial stereotypes and ending
the lineages of the poor and seemingly unfit in order to benefit
the welfare of the hardworking and intelligent remained at the
heart of the movement. However, the eugenics movement began
to be framed as a solution for issues within welfare programs, and
as concern over these problems increased following World War II,
the number of sterilizations in North Carolina increased as well.
The eugenics movement not only fell into ill repute following World War II but was facing a tough battle scientifically
as well. Geneticists were now starting to become convinced that
feeblemindedness was not due to heredity. Thus, the eugenics
movement adapted and, in an attempt to rid the movement of
negative connotations, dropped the word “eugenic” completely.
Advocates packaged eugenics in new rhetoric, changing “eugenic”
to “selective.”74 Eugenics was also renamed under labels such as
“human genetics” and “genetic counseling.”75 In addition, in order to bolster support for the fading movement, eugenicists also
began to assert that one purpose of eugenics was to protect the
unborn child. This retooling attempted to make the rights of the
child to be born to adequate parents more central than the threat
of the feebleminded. With this argument, eugenicists embraced
the post-World War II rights culture and the scientific idea that
environment was a contributing factor to certain characteristics
within a person. Eugenicists asserted that the environment an
unfit mother provided for her child would negatively impact the
child’s future character, and thus it was the right of the unborn
child to be born to fit parents. A pamphlet published by New Jer-
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sey Sterilization League entitled If the Unborn Could Choose Their
Parents! (1950) argues:
Should we not protect the Birthright of the unborn from violation by
defective and irresponsible parents? If the unborn were given the opportunity of choosing their parents would they elect a mother whose
feeble wits indulge themselves in the careless drowning of her baby in
the bath tub, a schizophrenic father that in recurrent fits of insanity
hurls a child against a wall, or a family where already are to be seen
neglected fragments of intelligence clothed in pitiful little bodies?76
These arguments were backed by statistics from the 1920s on
feeblemindedness, heredity, and differential fertility.77 The arguments of the past had now been re-framed to reflect the post-war
rights context in which the country now lived. Eugenicists focused
on motherhood and family preservation, asserting that only “fit”
women should become mothers. 78 As stated in a pamphlet disseminated by the Human Betterment League of North Carolina,
…each day the feebleminded and mentally defective are entrusted
with the most important job and far-reaching job of all, the job of
parenthood! Selective sterilization also protects children, for no child
should be born to subnormal parents—denied a fair and healthy start
in life—or doomed from birth to a mental institution.79
The use of environmental factors such as a mother’s care to indicate future potential and proficiency of a child aimed to provide
a new scientific basis for eugenics that combined both heredity
and environment. The emphasis on the child’s rights fit with the
post World War II culture centered around rights. While the movement began to be framed as an effort to protect the welfare of the
child, old pretenses of improving the welfare of the population
and that feeblemindedness needed to be eradicated for the good
of humankind still remained at heart.
The retooling of eugenic rhetoric contributed to little
change in eugenic policies following World War II despite the
scientific foundation of eugenics being challenged. The continued
presence of eugenic legislation after World War II was in part due
to the efforts of eugenic advocates to restructure eugenic language,
but also in part due to the large lag time between academic discovery and its reflection in the policy making of the public and
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community. While it was becoming increasingly clear to scientists
that feeblemindedness was neither inherited nor caused by heredity,
it took lawmakers and journalists longer to reach this conclusion.
Eugenics still provided legitimacy to people’s fears and was backed
by the Supreme Court. For example, in New Jersey, a “Special Committee for the Study of Eugenic Legislation” published a report
in 1940 that made arguments mirroring those today that heredity
was nuanced, complicated, and unpredictable.80 Yet just two years
later a bill introduced to the New Jersey Assembly proposed the
sterilization of “…those suffering from mental deficiency, familial
mental disease, familial epilepsy, familial blindness, familial deafmutism, familial gross deformity, and familial neurological disease
who would become by the propagation of their kind a menace to
society…”81 Meanwhile, geneticists criticized pedigree studies as
inaccurate and psychologists similarly dismissed IQ tests as inaccurate measures of ability.82 However, most of this research was
published in academic journals and directed at other scientists.
Wary of the politics surrounding eugenics, many scientists did
not challenge eugenics directly with their research. For example,
Abraham Myerson, a neurologist at Tufts University, attacked the
basis of heredity for feeblemindedness, yet despite his research,
recommended that sterilization be voluntary instead of abolished.83 Eugenicists did their best to address scientific opposition
by changing the language of eugenics and using environmental
factors as well as heredity as evidence of their belief. In addition,
the lag time between scientific discovery and policy ensured that
eugenic thought and practice would continue to exist in legislation and survive.
After World War II, the major financial backers of the
eugenics movement had backed out. The Carnegie Institute, worried about the growing scientific challenge to eugenics, pulled
its support, as did the Rockefeller Foundation.84 However, elite
support from the wealthy did not completely disappear. Following
the passage of the New Deal, Clarence J. Gamble of Proctor and
Gamble gave new financial support to the movement that helped
to ensure that the acceptance of eugenics did not fade after World
War II.85 Gamble opposed Roosevelt’s New Deal and saw it is a
THE CONCORD REVIEW
115
failing solution to a problem that only sterilization could solve.86
Gamble donated considerable funds, bankrolling Birthright Inc.,
an eugenics advocacy group, which set up sterilization clinics
throughout the South, and co-wrote an article with a member of
the North Carolina State Board of Health concluding that North
Carolina needed to expand its sterilization program.87 Just as the
pre-World War II eugenics movement found wealthy and influential supporters to lend legitimacy, so did the post-War movement,
albeit with a new face and name.
The eugenics movement of America resulted in more than
60,000 sterilizations by the 1950s.88 Though the movement faded
following World War II, it was not until 1977 that North Carolina
repealed laws authorizing the existence of the Eugenics Board
of North Carolina.89 The negative impact of the movement still
persists today, and in 2013 the North Carolina General Assembly
appropriated $10 million dollars towards reparations for surviving
sterilization victims.90 The policy of eugenics arose out of flawed
science and racial bias and continued under the pretense of welfare
and improving the morality of humankind. After the impact that
eugenic policy had on the Holocaust came to light, the eugenics
movement faded in America. However, in states such as North
Carolina, the eugenics program grew after World War II, due to
a retooling of old ideas into new rhetoric that fit the post World
War II welfare state. There are still remnants of eugenics lurking
in the present today. The Annals of Eugenics became the Annals
of Human Genetics and is now a distinguished scientific publication.91 Eugenical News changed its name to Social Biology and is
now researching genuine demographic and biological trends.92 A
young man named James Watson studied at Cold Spring Harbor,
founded by Charles Davenport, and returned there to give the
first public presentation of his discovery of the Double Helix.93
Geneticists everywhere have now devoted their lives to the fight
against disease and to develop drugs. The rise of genetics has also
brought us the Human Genome Program, DNA identity databanks,
designer babies, and genetic testing on employees. The science of
genetics holds many promises. However, as eugenics has showed
us, we must be careful to ensure that nothing should be done to
116
Michelle Li
define, divide, discriminate and harm human beings ever again
based on their genetic identity. To do so would be moving back
towards the discriminatory and immoral policies of eugenics that
had permeated America for so long.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Notes
Paul Lombardo, “Social Origins of Eugenics,” Social
Origins of Eugenics (Dolan DNA Learning Center, n.d.) Web, 26
March 2014.
2
Ibid.
3
Carrie Buck Revisited, Eugenics: Three Generations–No
Imbeciles–Virginia Eugenics Buck v Bell (n.p., n.d.) Web, 26 March
2014.
4
“Buck v. Bell.” LII/Legal Information Institute (n.p., n.d.)
Web, 26 March 2014.
5
Lombardo.
6
Ibid.
7
Buck v. Bell Supreme Court, 22 Apr. 1927, Justia (n.p.,
n.d.) Web.
8
Lombardo.
9
Edwin Black, War against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s
Campaign to Create a Master Race (New York: Four Walls Eight
Windows, 2003) p. 15, print.
10
Ibid., p. 15.
11
Ibid., p. 18.
12
Ibid., p. 19.
13
Ibid., p. 22.
14
Ibid., p. 18.
15
“Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American
States,” Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American States
(n.p., n.d.) Web, 25 March 2014.
16
Randall Hensen and Desmond S. King, Sterilized by the
State: Eugenics, Race, and the Population Scare in Twentieth-century
North America (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013)
p. 51.
17
Black, p. 81.
18
Ibid., p. 82.
19
Ibid., p. 82.
20
Ibid., p. 83.
21
Ibid., p. 37.
22
Ibid., p. 38.
23
Ibid., p. 93.
24
Ibid., p. 74.
25
Ibid., p. 74.
26
Ibid., p. 75.
27
Ibid., p. 75.
1
117
118
Michelle Li
Elof Axel Carlson, The Unfit: A History of a Bad Idea (Cold
Spring Harbor, New York: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory,
2001) p. 163.
29
Hansen and King, p. 50.
30
Ibid., p. 50.
31
Ibid., p. 50.
32
Richard Dugdale, The Jukes: A Study in Crime, Pauperism,
Disease, and Heredity (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1891) (no
page given).
33
Hansen and King, p. 52.
34
J. David Smith and Michael L. Wehmeyer, “Who Was
Deborah Kallikak?” Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities 50,
no. 2 (2012) ScholarWorks at Georgia State University.
35
Hansen and King, p. 52.
36
Ibid., p. 53.
37
Black, p. 261.
38
Ibid. p. 280.
39
Stefan Kühl, The Nazi Connection: Eugenics, American
Racism, and German National Socialism (New York, New York:
Oxford University Press, 1994) print.
40
Black, p. 85.
41
Ibid., p. 299.
42
Kühl, p. 39.
43
Ibid., p. 42.
44
Ibid., p. 27.
45
Black, p. 269.
46
Ibid., p. 341.
47
Ibid., p. 344.
48
Ibid., p. 356.
49
Ibid., p. 358.
50
Ibid., p. 358.
51
Ibid., p. 348.
52
R.A. Fisher, “New Data on the Genesis of Twins,” in
Eugenics, Genetics and the Family: Volume I: Scientific papers of the
Second International Congress of Eugenics (Baltimore: Williams &
Wilkins Co., 1923) p. 195. As seen in Black, p. 351.
53
Black, p. 371.
54
Hansen and King, p. 157.
55
Johanna Schoen, Choice & Coercion: Birth Control,
Sterilization, and Abortion in Public Health and Welfare (Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina, 2005) p. 105.
56
Ibid., p. 105.
28
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Frederick Henry Osborn Papers Abstract, American
Philosophical Society, Web, found April 2014.
58
Frederick Osborn, The Future of Human Heredity; An
Introduction to Eugenics in Modern Society (New York: Weybright
and Talley, 1968) p. 104, as seen in Hansen and King, p. 163.
59
David Zucchino, “Sterilized by North Carolina, She Felt
Raped Once More,” Los Angeles Times (25 January 2012) Web.
60
“Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American
States”.
61
Ibid.
62
Ibid.
63
Ibid.
64
North Carolina, Records of Eugenical Sterilization in North
Carolina (North Carolina: Eugenics Board of North Carolina,
1935) Web, 1 Feb. 2014.
65
“Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American
States”.
66
“Paul Popenoe, Eugenics, and Marriage Counseling” The
New Yorker (n.p., n.d.) Web, 24 Apr. 2014.
67
Paul Popenoe and Ellen Morton Williams, “The
Fecundity of Families Dependent on Public Charity,” American
Journal of Sociology 40, no. 2 (1934) pp. 214–220, as seen in
Hansen and King, p. 238.
68
Hansen, p. 238.
69
Ibid., p. 243.
70
Schoen, p. 108.
71
Ibid., p. 109.
72
Hansen and King, p. 238.
73
H.C. Wood, “A Prescription for the Alleviation of Welfare
Abuses and Illegitimacy,” Journal of the Kentucky State Medical
Association 951, no. 4 (1953) pp. 319–323, as seen in Hansen
and King, p. 239.
74
Hansen and King, p. 167.
75
Black, p. 411.
76
If the Unborn Could Choose Their Parents! (New Jersey:
Birthright, Inc., 1950), as seen in Hansen and King, p. 171.
77
Hansen and King, p. 171.
78
Wendy Kline, Building a Better Race: Gender, Sexuality, and
Eugenics from the Turn of the Century to the Baby Boom (Berkeley:
University of California, 2001) print.
79
You wouldn’t expect... (Winston Salem, North Carolina:
Human Betterment League of North Carolina, 1950) Web,
North Carolina Digital Collections, February 2014.
57
119
120
Michelle Li
W. MacMillan, Report on the Special Committee for the Study of
Eugenic Sterilization (1940) Special collection, Medical Society of
New Jersey, as seen in Hansen and King, p. 165.
81
State of New Jersey, Draft Sterilization Bill, 1942, GRO
133/6, as seen in Hansen and King, p. 166.
82
Schoen, p. 104.
83
Ibid., p. 104.
84
Hansen and King, p. 172.
85
Ibid., p. 172.
86
Ibid., p. 172.
87
Ibid., p. 241.
88
“Genetics Journal Reveals Dark Past,” USA Today (n.p.,
n.d.) Web. Accessed 24 April 2014.
89
North Carolina General Assembly, Session Laws and
Resolutions Passed by the General Assembly 1977, North Carolina
Digital Collections, 24 April 2014.
90
North Carolina, The Governor’s Eugenics Compensation
Task Force, Final Report (North Carolina: The Governor’s
Eugenics Compensation Task Force, 201l) Web, North Carolina
Digital Collections, 1 February 2014.
91
Black, p. 425.
92
Ibid., p. 425.
93
Ibid., p. 426.
80
Bibliography
Black, Edwin. War against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s
Campaign to Create a Master Race. New York: Four Walls Eight
Windows, 2003.
Buck v. Bell. LII/Legal Information Institute n.p., n.d., Web,
26 March 2014.
Buck v. Bell. Supreme Court, 22 April 1927, Justia n.p., n.d.,
Web.
Carlson, Elof Axel. The Unfit: A History of a Bad Idea. Cold
Spring Harbor, New York: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory,
2001.
Carrie Buck Revisited. Eugenics: Three Generations–No
Imbeciles–Virginia Eugenics Buck v Bell Web, 26 March 2014.
Davenport, Charles Benedict. Eugenics: The Science of Human
Improvement by Better Breeding. New York: H. Holt and Co., 1910,
Web, Google Books, 1 February 2014.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
121
Dugdale, Richard. The Jukes: A Study in Crime, Pauperism,
Disease, and Heredity. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1891.
“Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American States.”
Eugenics: Compulsory Sterilization in 50 American States. n.p., n.d.,
Web, 25 March 2014.
Fisher, R.A. “New Data on the Genesis of Twins.” In Eugenics,
Genetics and the Family: Volume I: Scientific papers of the Second
International Congress of Eugenics. Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins
Co., 1923.
Frederick Henry Osborn Papers. Abstract. American
Philosophical Society, Web, April 2014.
“Genetics Journal Reveals Dark Past.” USA Today. n.p., n.d.,
Web, 24 April 2014.
Hansen, Randall, and Desmond S. King. Sterilized by the State:
Eugenics, Race, and the Population Scare in Twentieth-century North
America. Cambridge University Press, 2013.
If the Unborn Could Choose Their Parents! New Jersey:
Birthright Inc., 1950.
Kline, Wendy. Building a Better Race: Gender, Sexuality, and
Eugenics from the Turn of the Century to the Baby Boom. Berkeley:
University of California, 2001.
Kühl, Stefan. The Nazi Connection: Eugenics, American Racism,
and German National Socialism. New York, New York: Oxford
University Press, 1994.
Lombardo, Paul. “Social Origins of Eugenics.” Social Origins
of Eugenics. Dolan DNA Learning Center, n.d., Web, 26 March
2014.
MacMillan, W. Report on the Special Committee for the Study of
Eugenic Sterilization, 1940. Special collection, Medical Society of
New Jersey.
North Carolina General Assembly. Session Laws and
Resolutions Passed by the General Assembly. 1977, North Carolina
Digital Collections, 24 April 2014.
North Carolina. Records of Eugenical Sterilization in North
Carolina. North Carolina: Eugenics Board of North Carolina,
1935, Web, 1 February 2014.
North Carolina. The Governor’s Eugenics Compensation
Task Force, Final Report. North Carolina: The Governor’s
Eugenics Compensation Task Force, 2011, Web, North Carolina
Digital Collections, 1 February 2014.
Osborn, Frederick. The Future of Human Heredity; An
Introduction to Eugenics in Modern Society. New York: Weybright
and Talley, 1968, p. 104.
122
Michelle Li
“Paul Popenoe, Eugenics, and Marriage Counseling.” The
New Yorker n.p., n.d., Web, 24 April 2014.
Popenoe, Paul, and Ellen Morton Williams. “The Fecundity
of Families Dependent on Public Charity.” American Journal of
Sociology 40, no. 2, 1934, pp. 214–220.
Schoen, Johanna. Choice & Coercion: Birth Control,
Sterilization, and Abortion in Public Health and Welfare. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina, 2005, print.
Smith, J. David, and Michael L. Wehmeyer. “Who Was
Deborah Kallikak?” Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities 50,
no. 2 (2012) Scholar Works at Georgia State University. Web.
State of New Jersey. Draft Sterilization Bill, 1942. GRO
133/6.
Wood, H.C. “A Prescription for the Alleviation of Welfare
Abuses and Illegitimacy.” Journal of the Kentucky State Medical
Association 951, no. 4. 1953, pp. 319–323.
You wouldn’t expect.... Winston Salem, North Carolina:
Human Betterment League of North Carolina, 1950, Web,
North Carolina Digital Collections, 1 February 2014.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
A Lost Chance with China
Elliott Thornton
A
s World War II wound down in the summer of 1945,
the Civil War in China between the ruling Kuomintang Party and
the insurgent Communist Party was still raging. The United States
(U.S.) had done well to get the two rivals to cooperate to help
defeat the Japanese, but the future of China’s leadership and its
relationship to the U.S. remained unresolved. Notwithstanding
its formal neutrality, the U.S. had a natural inclination to support
Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang (KMT). They were, after
all, the existing government and closer to the U.S. in terms of
political and economic systems.
Mao Zedong (Mao), the leader of the Communists, understood the complexities surrounding the U.S.-China relationship.
Furthermore, he believed the Communists would prevail, and he
understood the value to China of a positive relationship with the
United States. With this goal in mind, Mao tried hard to open communication lines to the U.S. to begin to build the foundation of a
healthy and mutually beneficial relationship. The entire China desk
at the State Department understood Mao’s desires and thought,
at a minimum, that the U.S. should respond to Mao’s entreaties.
President Roosevelt and President Truman and their respective
Elliott Thornton is a Junior at the Hotchkiss School. He wrote this paper
for Hilary Mendoza at the Palm Beach Day Academy in the 2013/2014
academic year.
124
Elliott Thornton
administrations, however, were never able to see their way clear to
reciprocating. As a result, no relationship was ever built. In fact,
from the time the Communists took power officially on October
1, 1949, until President Nixon and Mao met in 1972, there was
no official relationship between the U.S. and China. The implications for both the countries and the world were profound. The
question remains: why did the U.S. not pursue a different path?
1. The Dixie Mission
The United States Army Observation Group, commonly
known as the Dixie Mission, was the United States’ first official
attempt to establish relations with the Chinese Communist Party.
The Mission was launched on July 22, 1944, and was led by John
Stewart Service from the State Department and Colonel David
B. Barrett of the U.S. Army. In order to learn the Communists’
military and political goals and to assess whether an alliance with
the Communists would be beneficial to the United States, these
Americans traveled to Yan’an in July 1944 to stay with the Communists and learn more about them. Two of the most influential
members of the Mission, John Stewart Service and John Paton
Davies, were both born to missionary parents in China, spoke
Chinese, and had a deep understanding of the current situation
in China.
One month after Service’s arrival, Mao met with him in a
meeting that lasted eight hours. Mao made it clear to Service that
he wished to avoid a civil war: “From bitter experience, we know
it will mean long years of ruin and chaos for China [and] a major
international problem.”1 Mao wanted the U.S. “to take the lead in
calling for a conference of all leading Chinese political groups,
to work on creating a democratic constitution and to work out
reforms for a reorganized, broader based central government:
half the conference seats should go to the Nationalist Party with
the other half apportioned among all the other groups.”2 Mao
urged that American aid should go to all the forces, including the
Communists, who, at that time, were fighting the Japanese: “For
America to insist that arms be given to all forces who fight Japan…
THE CONCORD REVIEW
125
is not interference…To give arms only to the [Nationalists] will
in its effect be interference…Every American soldier in China
should be a walking and talking advertisement for democracy. We
have popular support and can fight.”3 Service reported Mao’s concluding remarks, “America does not need to fear that we will not
be cooperative. We must cooperate and we must have American
help. We cannot risk crossing you—cannot risk any conflict with
you.”4 Service wrote a detailed account and portentously noted:
“These American policies will decide whether the Communists
must play a lone hand and look out for themselves, or whether
they can be assured of survival and participation in a democratic
China. The Communists want our understanding and support;
they are anxious to do nothing to alienate us or compromise
that support.”5 Service sent his detailed account immediately to
Chongqing, where it remained for two months before it was sent
to the State Department. There was no response.
2. Roosevelt’s Personal Envoy
At approximately the same time, in August 1944, President
Franklin Roosevelt dispatched a personal Presidential envoy, General Patrick J. Hurley, to represent him in China with the express
goal of facilitating a more constructive relationship between Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, the leader of the Nationalist Chinese
government, and General Joseph Stillwell. Hurley, born on Indian
Territory in Oklahoma in 1883, had practiced law in Oklahoma
as a young man and served as a colonel in the American Expeditionary Force in World War I. After the war, he entered politics
and eventually served as Herbert Hoover’s Secretary of War. In
1941, when the U.S. entered World War II, Hurley was promoted
to Brigadier General. Starting in 1942, Hurley was sent on several
assignments by President Roosevelt. Over the next two years, he
went to the Near East, Middle East, China, Iran, and Afghanistan
to meet with the local political leaders on behalf of Roosevelt.
General Joseph Warren Stilwell, a four-star General, was assigned
by the U.S. to be Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek’s chief of staff.
He was placed in charge of the Chinese 5th and 6th armies in
Burma. In 1942, they were run out, however, by Japanese troops
126
Elliott Thornton
of superior numbers, and were forced to trek back 140 miles to
India on foot.
General Stilwell never got along with Chiang Kai-shek, and
he had made his unfavorable views on Chiang Kai-shek known to
President Roosevelt. Stilwell’s political advisor, John Paton Davies,
the second secretary at the United States embassy in Chongqing,
wrote, in a letter intended for President Roosevelt, that “the Generalissimo was ‘probably the only Chinese who shares the popular
American misconception that Chiang Kai-shek is China.’” He went
on to add that “[Chiang Kai-shek’s] philosophy is the unintegrated
product of his limited intelligence, his Japanese military education, his former close contact with German military advisers, his
alliance with the usurious banker-landlord class, and his reversion
to the sterile moralisms of the Chinese classics.”6 Chiang Kai-shek
shrewdly never publicly expressed his dislike for Stilwell. Whenever he was asked what he thought of Stilwell’s performance, he
responded by saying he had full confidence and trust in him.
Because of their bad relationship, Chiang Kai-shek was
always reluctant to grant Stilwell command of large numbers of
troops, and even when he finally did, he often undermined Stilwell’s command. Patrick Hurley was initially sent to China to help
facilitate Stilwell’s appointment as Commander-in-Chief of China’s
army and to help coax Chiang Kai-shek into giving Stilwell command over more troops. The opposite, however, happened. For
Chiang Kai-shek, Hurley was the perfect mediator between the U.S.
and China. He was vain, easily manipulated, and inexperienced
in China.7 Chiang Kai-shek used Hurley to have Stilwell moved
out of China and replaced by General Albert Coady Wedemeyer.
When Stilwell left, the sitting U.S. Ambassador to China, Clarence
E. Gauss, also resigned. Chiang Kai-shek used this event to his advantage. He asked for Hurley’s appointment as ambassador, and
in a personal message to President Roosevelt, told Roosevelt that
he was confident in Hurley’s ability to deal with the Communists.
Roosevelt agreed and, in November 1944, appointed Hurley U.S.
Ambassador to China.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
127
3. Ambassador Hurley
As Ambassador, Hurley refused to accept any guidance
from his Embassy staff, although most of them spoke Chinese,
and quite a few had lived in China for significant periods of their
lives. The U.S. was focused on building a coalition between the
Communists and Nationalists, and they wanted to use Hurley as
a mediator between the two sides.
Hurley was not a good choice, however, since he favored
the Nationalists and was known to be anti-Communist. In late
1944, Hurley visited the Communists in Yan’an and spoke with
them about their terms for coalition. The Communists were not
quite sure what to make of him. When he first got off the plane
in Yan’an, he let out an Indian war whoop and saluted, which of
course meant nothing to the Chinese who were there to greet
him.8 Nonetheless, the Communists created a five-point plan
with him for coalition. The terms of this plan would allow them
relative freedom of political action while acknowledging Chiang
Kai-shek’s leadership and joint authority over their armed forces.
Since Hurley did not understand the Communists, he thought that
all they wanted was a share in government, so to him the terms
seemed very workable. He believed he had succeeded in crafting
terms sufficient for a coalition government. Accordingly, he rather
dramatically signed a document with Mao to memorialize the
terms and his triumph. What he did not understand, however, was
that the Communists viewed coalition as a small price to pay on
the road to American support and national power. They trusted
that over time their growing popularity would result in a growing
share of government, which would allow them eventually to take
control of China. Chiang Kai-shek, not surprisingly, rejected the
plan outright.
The rejection by Chiang Kai-shek did not deter Hurley.
Indeed, as a pro-Nationalist, he turned, pivoted, and reworked the
plan according to Chiang Kai-shek’s terms and sent the amended
plan that, while recognizing the Communists as a party, would
subordinate them to the Nationalists. Mao had agreed to coalition
not subordination, so Hurley’s attempts to mediate went nowhere.
128
Elliott Thornton
4. Mao and Chou’s attempt to see Roosevelt
It was against this bleak background that Mao and Chou
En-lai decided to make an attempt to see Roosevelt directly. The
Communists wanted to talk to President Roosevelt, give him their
view of the situation in China, and convince him that they, not
the Nationalists, represented the future of China. They were also
hoping that they could discuss with him their terms for coalition
and that he could relay the terms to the Nationalists. On January
9, the Mission transmitted the proposal to General Wedemeyer
in Chongqing:
[Yan’an] Government wants [to] dispatch to America an unofficial–
rpt–unofficial group to interpret and explain to American civilians
and officials interested the present situation and problems of China.
Next is strictly off record suggestion by same: Mao and Chou will be
immediately available either singly or together for exploratory conference at Washington should President Roosevelt express desire to
receive them at White House as leaders of a primary Chinese party.9
If Roosevelt were prepared to see them, they requested air travel
to Washington. In case he refused, they asked that their request
be kept private so as not to upset the Nationalists, with whom they
were still in negotiations.
The Communists were worried, however, that Hurley, in
whom they had lost all trust, would not forward their request directly to the President. They decided to address the telegram to
General Wedemeyer instead, since they thought he would be more
willing to forward it to the President. When they sent it, however,
Wedemeyer was out of the country in Burma, and since he and
Hurley had agreed to share all messages they received, Hurley
got the telegram first. As expected, he was not happy about the
telegram being addressed solely to Wedemeyer and viewed it as
an attempt to go over his head. He held up the telegram at the
United States Embassy and never forwarded it to the President.
When Hurley finally did tell the President about the Communists’ request, he advised that either meeting with or giving
the Communists military support would constitute recognition of
them as an official party and would be viewed by the Nationalists
THE CONCORD REVIEW
129
as a betrayal of their friendship with the United States. Not only
did the message reach Roosevelt on Hurley’s terms, it reached
him at a bad time. He was preparing for the Yalta Conference,
and thought that if he could, at the conference, get the Russians,
who were almost like a big brother to the Chinese Communists, to
promise to side with the Nationalists, then the Communists would
have no choice but to agree to join a coalition government more
or less on the terms offered by the Nationalists.
5. State’s Last Gasp
A few months later, in March 1945, Hurley, returned to
Washington, this time accompanied by General Wedemeyer. Having still made no progress on effecting a coalition between the
Nationalists and the Communists, Hurley and Wedemeyer made
their trip to consult as to how Washington saw the way forward.
While they were there, the members of the American Embassy in China decided that it was a good time to send the State
Department a report giving their analysis of the situation in China
and to offer their advice on policy. In Hurley’s absence, George
Atcheson, the Counselor of the Embassy, was in charge. The foreign
service officers at the Embassy felt that Hurley had not been giving
the State Department an objective and accurate description of the
events in China. At Atcheson’s suggestion, they wrote a telegram
and sent it to the State Department. All of the foreign service officers contributed to the final draft of the telegram, which went
out under Atcheson’s name, although John Service initially drafted
it and did most of the writing. They advised President Roosevelt
to reexamine the situation in China and consider the possibility
of giving support to the Communists in order to prevent a civil
war. They believed that if the U.S. altered their policy to include
support for the Communists, a policy which:
realistically accepts the facts in China, [the U.S.] could expect to
secure to the cooperation of all of China’s forces in the war, to hold
the Communists to our side rather than throw them into the arms
of Russia,…to convince the KMT of the undesirability of its apparent
present plans for eventual civil war, and to bring about some unifica-
130
Elliott Thornton
tion which, even though not immediately complete, would provide
the basis for peaceful future development toward full democracy.10
Hurley viewed the telegram as an attempt to bypass his authority
and considered it an act of disloyalty. After first seeing it at the
State Department, Hurley was quoted as saying, “I know who
drafted that telegram: Service. I’ll get that S.O.B. if it’s the last
thing I do.”11 Hurley did not have to wait long.
The State Department submitted the telegram to President
Roosevelt who discussed the telegram with Hurley in two private
talks, on March 8 and March 24. Hurley believed that the agreement
the President had attained with the Russians at the Yalta Conference would weaken the Communists and make coalition much
easier. He promised, as he had said earlier, that he could achieve
coalition by the end of April.12 Contrary to observations and recommendations contained in the telegram, Roosevelt trusted Hurley
and eventually decided to go with his advice and to continue to
support solely Chiang Kai-shek. Roosevelt’s decision went against
all of the advice of the experienced and knowledgeable foreign
service officers who had written the telegram and gave Hurley
more power than he had before. To, in effect, “get back” at the
officers who had written the telegram, he insisted that Atcheson
and all of the other officers involved in the telegram, five out of
six of whom spoke Chinese and had a combined 90 years worth
of experience in China, be moved out of China. This request was
granted and ruined the careers of these men. Upon returning to
the United States, several of these officers were convicted of being
Communist sympathizers, and both Service and Davies had what
remained of their diplomatic careers destroyed by unfounded
accusations by Senator Joseph McCarthy and his associates.13
Roosevelt’s decision to side with Hurley extinguished any
hope for a positive Communist China-United States relationship,
certainly during his Presidency. It was one of the last important
political decisions he made in his life, as just weeks later, on April
12, he died in Warm Springs, Georgia.
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131
6. The Extraordinary Signey Rittenberg
After the end of the war in August 1945, there was one
American, Sidney Rittenberg, who arrived in Yan’an not only to
live with the Chinese Communists but also to join the Chinese
Communist Party. Just months earlier, Sidney had been a member
of the American armed forces. Before the war, Sidney had been a
member of the American Communist Party, so he had historical
sympathies with the ideals of Communism. His sympathies were
strengthened after he had witnessed first hand through his work
after the war for UN Relief, that the Communists delivered the
food they were given to the people for whom it was intended.
The Nationalists, by contrast, kept the food either for the leaders or worse, sold it for profit and retained the proceeds. The
comparison in concern for the poor had a profound impact on
Sidney’s thinking.
With his background and his obvious high regard for the
Communists, combined with his unique status as a former American
GI, Sidney was welcomed by the Chinese Communists. From the
beginning, he built deep relationships of trust with the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and got to know all of them
well, including, importantly, both Mao and Chou En-lai. Because
of his extraordinary position, he was asked by the leadership on
two occasions to act as interpreter in two later attempts by them
to continue to try to forge a relationship with the Americans.14
7. The Communists Persist
The first occasion, in May of 1946, took place in Hubei
Province, which is located to the eastern side of the middle of
China. Present for the U.S. was Colonel Hodgkins, a former adjutant in Nanjing to General George C. Marshall. He was about
to leave China to retire in America. Before he left, General Li
Xiannian, a Communist general, visited him to say goodbye. He
also delivered to Hodgkins a message from Mao. Mao said that he
expected to be in power within five years, that he understood that
the U.S. supported Chiang Kai-shek, but that he still wanted them
to at least understand his goals. His goals were, as stated above,
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Elliott Thornton
to establish relations with the United States to seek financial assistance to rebuild China after the war, so that China would not be
dependent on the Soviets. Sidney Rittenberg says that Hodgkins
was fairly sympathetic to the Communists’ cause and understood
them. He promised that he would relay the message to his superiors in Washington and advocate for them.
The second talk in which Sidney participated was in July
of 1946. This talk took place in Zhangjiakou, China. This time
Margaret Cooly, a consul in the American Consulate in Beijing,
represented the United States. Present for the Communists was
General Cai Shufan, a famous one-armed general. Sidney says that
the atmosphere at this talk was much more hostile. Shufan relayed
the same message from Mao, almost word for word, to Cooly, yet
she seemed not to understand the Communists at all, was very
stubborn, and refused to change her viewpoint to understand
better the Communists’ message.15 Unfortunately, nothing ever
came of these talks, and Mao eventually gave up and made the
pragmatic strategic decision to shut off China from America until
Nixon’s famous visit in 1972.
8. Why the Failure?
To this day it remains puzzling why the U.S. and Communist
Chinese were never able to forge a relationship, notwithstanding
the desire to do so at the highest levels on the Chinese side and
the clear understanding on the part of all those on the American
side who had experience as China hands and who had direct
exposure to the Chinese Communists.
A common explanation for the failure of the Americans and
the Communist Chinese to forge a relationship revolves around
the arrival of Patrick Hurley on the scene, as it were, at exactly the
wrong moment in history. Hurley had a surfeit of self-confidence;
a deficit of humility, knowledge of, and experience in China; and
a historical antipathy to anything Communist. In addition, he had
a close relationship with President Roosevelt. All of these factors
enabled him to ignore the wise counsel of his Embassy staff and
to mold single-handedly the reaction of the President to events
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133
in China. Hurley was, of course, presenting his views at a time in
Washington when many already had a deep suspicion and wariness toward Communism. To this extent, his position naturally
resonated in many quarters, and it certainly was the easier path
politically for Roosevelt.
The second and in some sense broader reason for the
failure was not simply differences of ideology, but rather, as Sidney Rittenberg believes, an expression of the general paucity of
understanding and knowledge that the Americans had of the
Chinese. Sidney Rittenberg was an eyewitness to two of the final
attempts—perhaps the final attempts—at building a relationship.
The United States did not understand the Chinese Communists
well enough, and this ultimately doomed their relationship with
them. The U.S. also seemed fearful of Communism at the time,
as evidenced by the political rise, position, and power of Senator
Joseph McCarthy. Had the U.S. been able to look past the fact
that the Chinese Communists were Communists and had they
spent more time trying to understand them more fundamentally
as Chinese, their relationship with the Chinese Communists could
have been much different.16
9. Was it Inevitable?
There is an argument, advanced most forcefully by the
Chinese scholar Zi Zhongyun, that failure of these entreaties was
inevitable. Zi Zhongyun’s argument is that Mao never intended
for a meaningful relationship to be built but rather was, in effect,
feigning interest in one as a convenient way to diminish the interest the Americans would have in supporting the Nationalists.
In this way, Mao was tactically using the notional talks to advance
the chances that the Communists would defeat the Nationalists.
In his book, Mao’s China & The Cold War, University of Virginia
professor Chen Jian, advances a variation on this theme. He believes that Mao’s ambitions from the outset were to restore China’s
rightful place as the Middle Kingdom or, as he puts it, to restore
China’s central position in the international community.18 In this
sense Mao was concerned not just with taking power, but also in
134
Elliott Thornton
extending its momentum well beyond the initial goal achieved by
winning the civil war. This greater goal, in Mao’s mind, would be
compromised by allowing the U.S. to adopt an “imperial” position
toward a weakened China in the late 1940s. Perhaps the inevitable
initial imbalance would frustrate China’s ability ever to be what
in Mao’s mind it should be.
Sidney Rittenberg, who knew Mao personally, vigorously
disagrees with both views. He believes that Mao was always very
interested in the U.S. and that the U.S. interested him by far the
most of any country. Mao had two primary reasons for wanting
to establish good relations with the U.S. He knew that the Communists were going to win the Civil War, but he also knew that
China was a poor country and that it had been at war for 100 years,
so it would take great resources to rebuild it. The only country
that would have enough money after World War II to lend to the
Communists was the U.S. His second reason for wanting to have
a good relationship with the U.S. was that he did not want to be
solely dependent on the Soviet Union. They were both Communist
states, and although they were comrades, the Chinese Communists
disagreed with the Soviet Union on a number of issues.19
10. Conclusion
On consideration, Sidney Rittenberg’s view seems more
likely to represent the true view of Mao. First, Sidney’s personal
relationship with Mao must weigh heavily in any effort to discern
Mao’s real motivations. Second, Mao, through history, showed
himself to be both highly pragmatic and also profoundly strategic.
He had to have known that the absence of a meaningful relationship with the U.S., the world’s only economic superpower, would
mean a much less positive economic future for China. He also
had to know that economic, political, and cultural power tend to
correlate.
Much more likely, Mao correctly read the political winds,
which blew with increasing ferocity from 1949 on into the early to
mid 1950s in the U.S. He must have reasoned that he, therefore,
had to devise a national strategy that would create the appearance
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135
of strength out of an inherently weak position. What better way
to do so than to create mystery through the absence of access
and information? Such a strategy would simultaneously limit the
ability of the Chinese people to compare their circumstances unfavorably with others and also not permit outsiders to know with
any certainty what was the real situation behind the impenetrable
“great wall” surrounding China.
Finally, Mao’s willingness many years later to receive President Nixon and open China to the U.S. also suggests that he was
waiting patiently for the day when the U.S. would come round to
the view that it was in their interests to build a relationship with
Communist China. When that day came, Mao was prepared and
acted in character by pragmatically responding positively to the U.S.
entreaty and using it to strengthen China’s standing in the world.
Mao’s decision to isolate China in 1949 can be seen both
as a profoundly strategic one and perhaps his only realistic option.
Had the U.S. adopted a policy that had succeeded in bringing
about a coalition government and the Communists had gained
control of China, the U.S. would have been accused of helping the
Communists defeat the Nationalists, a charge that would have been
highly explosive given the U.S. political climate after World War II.
On the other hand, had the U.S. developed a good relationship
with the Communists, the chances of the conflicts in Korea and
Vietnam developing into full scale wars with casualties of soldiers
and civilians numbering over 1 million, would have been, if not
completely extinguished, then greatly reduced. But the game of
hindsight in history is a tricky exercise. If the Vietnam and Korean
Wars prove that the policy advocated by the China hands was the
wise one to follow, had their policy been followed—there would
not exist the proof to show they were right. Therein lies one of
the many conundrums of history.
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Elliott Thornton
Notes
Lynne Joiner, Honorable Survivor: Mao’s China, McCarthy’s
America, and the Persecution of John S. Service (Annapolis,
Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2009) p. 72.
2
Ibid., p. 72.
3
Ibid., pp. 71–72.
4
John Paton Davies, Jr., China Hand: An Autobiography
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012) p. 216.
5
Joiner, pp. 72–73.
6
Denis Twitchett and John K. Fairbank, eds., The Cambridge
History of China: Volume 13: Republican China 1912–1949, Part 2
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986) p. 535.
7
Barbara W. Tuchman, “If Mao Had Come to Washington:
An Essay in Alternatives,” Foreign Affairs 51, no. 1 (October
1972) p. 52.
8
China: A Century of Revolution, Part 1: China in Revolution
Director Sue Williams, Ambrica Productions, 1989, DVD.
9
Tuchman, p. 44.
10
Joseph W. Esherick, Lost Chance in China? The World War
II Despatches of John Service (New York: Random House, 1974)
p. 363.
11
Ibid., p. 358.
12
Tuchman, p. 57.
13
John K. Fairbank notes in his book, The United States and
China (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976) p. 352),
“The China specialists were generally transferred to other
areas, some were dismissed, some resigned. John S. Service was
cleared six times in succession by the State Department Loyalty
Board but was eventually dismissed at the request of the Loyalty
Board Review. In June 1957, as a result of a Supreme Court
order, he was reinstated.
14
Sidney Rittenberg, interview with author, May 10, 2013.
15
Ibid.
16
Ibid.
17
Zi Zhongyun, No Exit? The Origin and Evolution of U.S.
Policy toward China, 1945–1950 (Norwalk: East Bridge, 2003)
p. 16.
18
Chen Jian, Mao’s China and the Cold War (Chapel Hill: The
University of North Carolina Press, 2001) p. 47.
19
Rittenberg interview.
1
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Bibliography
China: A Century of Revolution, Part I: China in Revolution.
Directed by Sue Williams, Ambrica Productions, 1989, DVD.
Davies, Jr., John Paton. China Hand: An Autobiography.
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012.
Esherick, Joseph W. Lost Chance in China? The World War II
Despatches of John S. Service. New York: Random House, 1974.
Fairbanks, John King. The United States and China.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976.
Jian, Chen. Mao’s China and the Cold War. Chapel Hill: The
University of North Carolina Press, 2001.
Joiner, Lynne. Honorable Survivor: Mao’s China, McCarthy’s
America, and the Persecution of John S. Service. Annapolis,
Maryland: Naval Institute Press, 2009.
“Joseph W. Stilwell.” Encyclopaedia Brittanica Online.
Encyclopaedia Brittanica Inc., http://www.britannica.com/
EBchecked/topic/566373/Joseph-W-Stilwell.
Kaufman, Michael T. “John Paton Davies, Diplomat Who
Ran Afoul of McCarthy Over China, Dies at 91.” New York Times.
December 24, 1999.
The Revolutionary. Directed by Lucy Ostrander, Don Sellers,
and Irv Drasnin. Stourwater Pictures, 2013, DVD.
Rittenberg, Sidney. Interview by author, May 10, 2013.
Rittenberg, Sidney. The Man Who Stayed Behind. Durham:
Duke University Press, 2001.
Twitchett, Denis, and John K. Fairbank, eds. The Cambridge
History of China: Volume 13: Republican China 1912–1949, Part 2.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.
Tuchman, Barbara W. “If Mao Had Come to Washington:
An Essay in Alternatives.” Foreign Affairs 51, no. 1, October
1972: 44–64.
Zhongyun, Zi. No Exit? The Origin and Evolution of U.S. Policy
toward China, 1945–1950. Norwalk, Connecticut: EastBridge,
2003.
137
138
Elliott Thornton
By the time of Christ, the Roman republic, which
had been doubling in size with every generation, had
expanded to encompass the whole of the Mediterranean
theatre. It was in some respects a liberal empire, bearing
the marks of its origins. This was a new, indeed unique,
conjunction in world history: an empire which imposed
stability and so made possible freedom of trade and communications throughout a vast area, yet did not seek to
regiment ideas or inhibit their exchange and propagation.
The Roman law could be brutal and was always relentless,
but it still operated over a comparatively limited area of
human conduct. Many fields of economic and cultural
activity lay outside its scope. Moreover, even where the law
prescribed, it was not always assiduous. Roman law tended
to sleep unless infractions were brought to its attention
by the external signs of disorder: vociferous complaints,
breaches of the peace, riots. Then it warned, and if its
warnings went unheeded, acted with ferocity until silence
was reimposed; afterwards, it would sleep again. Within
Roman rule, a sensible and circumspect man, however
antinomian his views, could survive and flourish, and
even propagate them; it was one very important reason
why Rome was able to extend and perpetuate itself....
Johnson, Paul (2012-03-27)
History of Christianity (pp. 5-6).
Touchstone. Kindle Edition.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
The Myth of the Switch: Justice Owen Roberts
and the 1937 Constitutional Revolution
Abraham Cheloff
I
n June 2013, Justice Antonin Scalia dissented in United
States v. Windsor,1 arguing that the majority opinion “fool[ed]…
readers…into thinking that this is a federalism opinion,”2 when
in reality the liberals were just too scared to “utter the dreaded
words ‘substantive due process.’”3
Substantive due process? What was Scalia talking about,
and what is so “dreaded” about it? Substantive due process is an
analysis of the “due process clause” of the Fourteenth Amendment (which states that), “No State shall…deprive any person of
life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”4 But the idea
of “liberty” is vague. For most of history, liberty was understood
to mean something procedural. In order for one’s liberty to be
removed, one must be guaranteed a certain process, such as having the right to an attorney, arraignment, etc. Nevertheless, in the
late 19th and early 20th centuries the court decided to give a very
specific—and non-procedural —meaning to the term “liberty.”
This new idea, substantive due process (providing substance and
not just procedure to the word liberty) defined liberty not just as
procedural in nature, but also as pertaining to other freedoms.
Abraham Cheloff is at Brandeis. He wrote this paper while at the Gann
Academy in Waltham, Massachusetts, for Dr. Jonathan Golden’s Advanced
Placement U.S. History course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
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Abraham Cheloff
The particular freedom that the court had in mind was freedom
of contract.
According to the Legal Information Institute, this created
“a doctrine holding that the 5th and 14th Amendments require
all governmental intrusions into fundamental rights and liberties
be fair and reasonable and in furtherance of a legitimate governmental interest.”5 In other words, freedom of contract was used as
a principle that weighed government action against government
interest. For 40 years, the court would use freedom of contract
to strike down almost all economic regulations placed before it.
Substantive due process was the law of the land until 1937.
In that year, in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish, the era of the freedom of
contract seemed to come to an abrupt end. The idea of economic
liberty as grounded in the due process clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment (and with it substantive due process), was never used
again, and has not been resurrected to this day. Many lawyers,
justices, and law makers, particularly ones on the economic left,
did not lament the demise of this principle.
Antonin Scalia knows his court history, and it is thus not
surprising that Scalia launched an attack on what he perceived as
a liberal ruling by claiming that the opinion authors were reviving
substantive due process. Scalia is putting on a ghost costume to
try to scare his fellow justices, with the resurrection of the long
dead and buried principle: substantive due process.6
In order to understand how substantive due process
suddenly came to an end, as well as why, we must explore the
jurisprudence of Justice Owen Roberts. For many years, Roberts
voted to uphold freedom of contract,7 along with Justices Willis
Van Devanter, James Clark McReynolds, George Sutherland, and
Pierce Butler,8 until 1937 when he suddenly switched his vote to
argue that freedom of contract was not to be found in the Constitution, since after 1937 the Supreme Court did not use freedom
of contract to strike down another piece of legislation. But why
did Owen Roberts uphold freedom of contract for so long, only
to strike it down? That will be the subject of this paper.
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141
“The Switch in Time” (and other common myths seeking to explain the Robert’s vote switch.
Given that the Constitutional Revolution9 lined up with
FDR’s Court Packing Plan,10 many believe that Roberts changed
his vote because of his fear of being swallowed up by the Court
Packing Plan, as it would threaten some of Roberts’ power as a
justice. The notion that Roberts switched his vote has been mythological named, “Switch in Time that Saved Nine.” Let us take a
quick look at this myth in order to see how much weight it truly
holds in the Constitutional Revolution of 1937.
FDR’s claim was that in 1937, the current court was so old
that it was unable to keep up with its workload (and he claimed
because of this the court had only taken 108/80811 cases that
year.12) The public stood firmly behind FDR, as evidenced by his
reelection in 1936. Some legislators threatened to attack the court
as well, as some proposed legislation, “would have required a supermajority of the Court to invalidate legislation; others would have
deprived the Court of the power to review questions of social and
economic policy.”13 With all the attacks on the Court happening
right before the Constitutional Revolution, the conclusion many
people drew was that the two events were related. Chief Justice
Hughes, according to historian Alpheus Thomas, vigorously “denied any connection [between West Coast Hotel v. Parrish and the
Court Packing Plan], but ‘cynical and sober’ observers refused to
take him at his word.”14
It is likely, however, that Hughes was correct, and the “cynical and sober” observers were not. According to a memorandum
written by Justice Roberts himself, the Court Packing Plan could
not have affected the justices, since the vote for West Coast Hotel
Co. v. Parrish (the case that overturned freedom of contract)
was “voted on by the justices in conference”15 on December 19,
1936,16 months before the announcement of the Court Packing
Plan, which was a closely guarded secret. So why was the opinion
not announced earlier (in other words, before the Court Packing
Plan)? The reason was that during the vote, Justice Harlan Fiske
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Abraham Cheloff
Stone was out on medical leave, and the case was out until he could
cast the deciding vote in February. When Justice Stone returned:
Hughes decided that if the Court were to hand down the Parrish
opinion so soon after the president’s announcement, it would convey
a false impression that the Court was capitulating to political pressure. He therefore decided to hold the opinion for release at a more
propitious date.17
Even though Chief Justice Hughes’ intentions were good, the
plan was obviously not, and people persisted in the belief that
the court’s decisions were affected by the Court Packing Plan.18
Furthermore, was Justice Owen Roberts the type of justice
who would change his vote in fear of political pressure? Roberts
once opined that he believed justices who simply change their vote
when they please have, “an intolerance for what those who have
composed this court in the past have conscientiously and deliberately concluded.”19 It seemed not within Roberts’ constitution
for him to change a vote because of external political pressure.
The myth is therefore likely not true. In order to understand why Owen Roberts made this unexpected vote, we have to
look elsewhere. We will first explore freedom of contract era cases
in general, and then look at Robert’s previous jurisprudence to
discover what type of justice he was and what his personal values
were.
Lochner v. New York
In 1905, the landmark Supreme Court case Lochner v. New
York asked the Supreme Court to decide whether or not working
hours (particularly those in New York bakeries) could be restricted.
Justice Peckham, speaking in the official Court opinion, said:
The statute necessarily interferes with the right of contract between
the employer and employees concerning the number of hours in
which the latter may labor in the bakery of the employer. The general
right to make a contract in relation to his business is part of the liberty
of the individual protected by the Fourteenth Amendment of the
Federal Constitution. Allgeyer v. Louisiana,20 165 U.S. 578. Under that
provision, no State can deprive any person of life, liberty or property
without due process of law. The right to purchase or to sell labor is
part of the liberty protected by [the Fourteenth] amendment….21
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143
When Justice Peckham wrote, “the right to purchase or to sell
labor is part of the liberty protected by [the Fourteenth] Amendment,” he was heralding the arrival of substantive due process.
In other words, when the due process clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment says, “no state shall…deprive any person of life, liberty,
or property, without due process of law,” it meant, according to
Justice Peckham, that the right to negotiate labor contracts was
a protected “liberty.” It was therefore unconstitutional to make
laws which determine the number of hours one can work, since
this would be depriving citizens of the United States of their “due
process liberty” to purchase and sell labor as they wish.
As time moved on, the Supreme Court’s interpretation
of the Due Process Clause not only struck down laws restricting
working hours, but also laws that set minimum wages as well. In
1923, the constitutionality of a minimum wage for children and
women in the District of Columbia was questioned in Adkins v.
Children’s Hospital. By now, the Four Horsemen,22 Justices Van
Devanter, McReynolds, Sutherland, and Butler, who invariably
voted in favor of freedom of contract, just as the Lochner court
had, were all sitting on the court. This court, with what may be
called a Social Darwinist economic agenda,23 decided that the
minimum wage law in D.C. was, in fact, unconstitutional given
that, “to sustain the individual freedom of action contemplated by
the Constitution is not to strike down the common good, but to
exalt it, for surely the good of society as a whole cannot be better
served than by the preservation against arbitrary restraint of the
liberties of its constituent members.”24 Adkins simply confirmed
what Lochner had stated (a principle known as stare decisis25), preventing the era from ending for another 14 years.
So how did Justice Owen Roberts vote during the Lochner era?
In the years leading up to the infamous “Switch in Time,”
Owen Roberts was a consistent vote with the Four Horseman26
that ruled the court with a slew of 5–4 decisions. Justices Benjamin
Cardozo, Louis Brandeis, and Harlan Stone, also known as the
Three Musketeers,27 were almost always in the dissenting opinion.28
Indeed, at first glance, it would appear to many that Justice Roberts
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Abraham Cheloff
was, at least in practice, a “Fifth Horseman.” However, Roberts’
voting record defies easy analysis, making it much more difficult
to pin down what way he was going to vote, and why.
Just who was Justice Owen Roberts?
United States v. Butler (1936) is a classic example of Roberts
voting along with the Four Horsemen. The Agricultural Adjustment Act (the legislation in question in this case) empowered the
government to take money from food processors and use it to pay
farmers. In return for that government subsidy, the farmers would
decrease their crop output, and this would in turn drive up the
prices of those crops. The Court struck down this statue in the
Butler case, and it seemed to many that the court simply struck
down yet another piece of economic legislation that was interfering with freedom of contract. Further analysis, however, shows
that Roberts’ vote in this case may not be so easy to understand.
Justice Roberts, who wrote the case opinion, explained
his rationale as follows:
The act invades the reserved rights of the states. It is a statutory plan
to regulate and control agricultural production, a matter beyond the
powers delegated to the federal government. The tax, the appropriation of the funds raised, and the direction for their disbursement are
but parts of the plan. They are but means to an unconstitutional end.”29
In striking down the Agricultural Adjustment Act, Justices Roberts
did not claim that the federal government was interfering with
a person’s liberty of contract. Rather, he argued that the federal
government was interfering with the rights of the states to regulate
the economy. In other words, for Roberts this case was about state
power vs. federal power, rather than about substantive due process.
States’ Righter
So does this solve our problem? Was Roberts’ decision
to uphold the Washington minimum wage law actually a states’
rights decision? West Coast Hotel was, after all, a case involving a
state statute. Indeed, Justice Roberts had built a very impressive
resume of defending states’ rights within the Constitution. One
example of this was a case known as Nebbia v. New York (1934). In
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145
this case, the constitutionality of a law that allowed New York State
to regulate the price of milk and dairy items being bought and
sold was in question. In this case, Roberts, who wrote the ruling,
not only upheld states’ rights but also departed from freedom of
contract:
The state may control the use of property in various ways; may prohibit advertising bill boards except of a prescribed size and location,
or their use for certain kinds of advertising; [etc.]…And although
the Fourteenth Amendment extends protection to aliens as well as
citizens, a state may for adequate reasons of policy exclude aliens
altogether from the use and occupancy of land.30
Justice Roberts sided with the majority in empowering a stateappointed agency to take the powers the law had bestowed upon
the federal government.31 As early as 1934 we can see that Justice
Roberts was not a Lochner purist, since the anchor of his jurisprudence was federalism, i.e. giving states more power, rather than
substantive due process like the Horsemen.
So does “Roberts the states’ righter” solve our problem?
Perhaps the reversal that took place in 1937 was not even a reversal,
but simply some confusion about Owen Roberts’ beliefs. After all,
West Coast Hotel v. Parrish was a state statue, and Roberts’ vote was
to uphold the right of the state to create a minimum wage law.
The problem with the states’ rights explanation is that Roberts was not as consistent with his states’ rights ideology as it may
seem. Other cases involving federal legislation make this analysis
much more difficult. For example Roberts voted to uphold two
key pieces of federal legislation, the Social Security Act, and the
National Labor Relations Act.32 Few states’ righters would have
voted to uphold this sort of federal power. So, while Roberts may
have cared about states’ rights, he was not a purist when it came
down to it.
Towards a governing judicial philosophy
So did Owen Roberts actually have a governing judicial
philosophy? If so, what was it, and would it help to explain his vote
in West Coast Hotel? His opinions in a series of voting rights cases
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Abraham Cheloff
may shed some light on this question. In 1935, the Supreme Court
unanimously ruled in Grovey v. Townsend that the Texas Democratic
Party has the right to set guidelines for its own primary elections.33
Nine years later, the ruling was overturned in Smith v. Allwright.
Roberts dissented:
I have expressed my views with respect to the present policy of the
court freely to disregard and to overrule considered decisions and
the rules of law announced in them. This tendency, it seems to me,
indicates an intolerance for what those who have composed this
court in the past have conscientiously and deliberately concluded,
and involves an assumption that knowledge and wisdom reside in us
which was denied to our predecessors.34
Roberts felt that it was the job of the court to uphold the principle
of stare decisis. Roberts was angered by what he believed was his
brethren simply disregarding previous decisions, arguing that
this created an atmosphere of “intolerance” for previous justices.
Roberts seems to have been consistent in this regard. In
Minersville School District v. Gobitis (1940), the Supreme Court ruled
that school districts had the right to force students to salute to the
American flag.35 However, three years later in West Virginia State
Board of Education v. Barnette, the opinion was suddenly overturned,
and students were no longer required to salute. Frankfurter filed
a dissent, and Roberts and Stanley Reed also filed silent dissents.
In his dissent, Justice Frankfurter’s stated that:
The Constitution does not give us greater veto power when dealing
with one phase of “liberty” than with another, or when dealing with
grade school regulations than with college regulations that offend
conscience, as was the case in Hamilton v. Regents, 293 U.S. 245. In
neither situation is our function comparable to that of a legislature,
nor are we free to act as though we were a super-legislature. Judicial
self-restraint is equally necessary whenever an exercise of political or
legislative power is challenged.36
While Roberts was not the author in this opinion, it is clear that
Roberts is not uncomfortable with the idea of haphazard overturning of cases. Rather, Roberts and Frankfurter felt that there
was a need for judicial restraint when it came to cases involving
precedent.
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147
This may help us to understand why Roberts chose to uphold
various pieces of federal legislation, even if he was uncomfortable
with the legislation’s Constitutional underpinning. In siding with
the majority to uphold the Social Security Act, Roberts signed with
an opinion that stated that the court was simply upholding Steward Machine Co. v. Davis, (which in turn was upholding Pollack v.
Farmer’s Loan and Trust Co.). Similarly, in the opinion for National
Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation, supra,
the court based its decision on stare decisis, upholding a slew of
cases which included: Veazre Bank v. Fenno and Federal Trade Commission v. American Tobacco Co. So is Justice Roberts “defender of
stare decisis” the answer to our question?
The problem is that West Coast Hotel v. Parrish was itself
a direct affront to the ideal of stare decisis. If stare decisis was the
driving principle for Owen Roberts’ judicial philosophy, then we
need to be understand the seeming-exception that he made in
West Coast Hotel v. Parrish.
West Coast Hotel v. Parrish
Given the Adkins precedent one would assume that Owen
Roberts would vote to strike down the Washington minimum wage
law in West Coast Hotel v. Parrish. West Coast Hotel only asked whether
to uphold stare decisis in Adkins, which should have been easy for
Roberts. However, Justice Owen Roberts shocked the nation, and
even his fellow justices,37 when he decided to uphold the Washington minimum wage law, and argued that, “the case of Adkins
v. Children’s Hospital, supra, should be, and it is, overruled.”38 So:
How do we understand stare decisis purist Owen Roberts switching
his vote?
Justice Owen Roberts: Judicial Continuity, Consistency, and Conservatism
Understanding Owen Roberts and the way he voted as a
justice is an extremely difficult task. Many times the Justice signed
an opinion or dissent in silence, and there is very little writing
that is originally his, given that upon leaving the court, Roberts
burned every paper in his possession.
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Abraham Cheloff
That being said, a fascinating clue exists that may or may
not have originated from the Justice himself. While the authenticity of this piece of evidence may be in question, its contents are
consistent with (for reasons we will discuss below) the other works
and writings of Justice Owen Roberts.39
After Owen Roberts left the court, Justice Felix Frankfurter asked for Roberts to write a memorandum explaining his
actions in the days leading up to West Coast Hotel v. Parrish. The
memorandum begins with a recollection of a case from 1936,
Morehead v. Tipaldo. In this case, a statute in New York allowed the
state labor commission to fix wages based on the service being
offered.40 While the Chief Justice wanted the Supreme Court to
take this case, many others did not, since they believed that the
issue in this case had already been decided in Adkins. Roberts picks
up the story from there: “When my turn came to speak [in the
conference concerning whether to take the case or not] I said I
saw no reason to grant the writ unless the Court were prepared to
re-examine and overrule the Adkins case. To this remark there was
no response around the table, and the case was marked granted.”41
Roberts inferred from the silence that the other justices agreed
with him, and thus Morehead was granted a hearing.
Both sides sent in briefs, and Roberts saw: “Both…in the
brief on the merits, and in oral argument, counsel for the State
of New York took the position that it was unnecessary to overrule
the Adkins case in order to sustain the position of the State of New
York.”42 The counsel for the State of New York not only failed to
ask for Adkins to be overruled, but it claimed that there was no
need to overrule Adkins at all. Roberts decided, and his fellow Justices concurred, that they would not, “review and re-examine the
Adkins case until a case should come to the court requiring that
this should be done.”43 Put another way, the counsel in Morehead
specifically asked for Adkins to be left alone, and the court agreed
to do so. Roberts would clearly not move on his jurisprudence
unless asked to do so.
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149
While Roberts refused to overturn the Adkins precedent
in Morehead, he would soon do so in West Coast Hotel. Roberts
explained that:
In the appeal in the Parrish case the authority of Adkins was definitely
assailed and the Court was asked to reconsider and overrule it. Thus,
for the first time, I was confronted with the necessity of facing the
soundness of the Adkins case.44
In the West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish case, Elise Parrish asked the
court to reconsider the Adkins precedent.45 With the Adkins case
now open for discussion, Roberts felt that the necessary steps had
been taken such that he could vote to overturn stare decisis without
overstepping his bounds as a justice.
Ultimately, we do not know for certain why Owen Roberts
believed that Lochner Era jurisprudence was unconstitutional, and
thus should have been overturned. However, we do know that if
Roberts was going to strike down almost 50 years’ worth of law that
he was going to do it in the narrowest way possible, with the least
use of his own power. With this belief, it even makes sense that
Roberts would strike down substantive due process, given that it is
a huge constitutional leap that the court makes, since it assumes
that freedom of contract exists when there is no mention of it in
the Constitution explicitly. Ultimately, Roberts placed a great deal
of power in the attorneys who argue before the Supreme Court, as
he refused to do any more than the attorneys requested in their
briefs or arguments.
Why the Constitutional Revolution occurred has never
been fully explained. However, there is evidence that all points in
a general consensus. That consensus is: The events of the Court
Packing Plan did not align with the events of the Revolution. Ignoring the fact that many documents show that Justice Roberts never
believed in Lochner in the fullest possible way, and thus his vote
in Parrish should not have been a shock, the reason why Justice
Roberts changed his vote was due to the fact that, in the case West
Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, Elise Parrish asked the Supreme Court to
question the legitimacy of the Adkins precedent in their deliberations. The fact that the precedent was questioned, allowed Justice
150
Abraham Cheloff
Roberts to rule in favor of minimum wage legislation without feeling that he was overstepping his bounds as a justice.
The End
By 1942, the effects of the Roberts-driven Constitutional
Revolution could truly be seen. The readings of the due process
clause of the 5th and 14th amendments were reversed, which
opened the door for unprecedented federal regulation, including:
upholding a statute stating that the United States government has
the right to control what people grow in their own backyards,46
and the upholding of civil rights legislation,47 both in the name
of a broad interpretation of federal power under the Commerce
Clause, and more recently, the upholding of the Affordable Care
act under the taxation powers of Congress. The Supreme Court
since then has expanded the powers of the federal government
under several Constitutional clauses. The court has decided not
to interfere with Congressional statutes in the economic interest
of the United States.
Just as Lochner v. New York affected a whole era of cases,
the West Coast Hotel case affected far more than minimum wage
legislation. It opened the doors for the Supreme Court to loosely
interpret the Constitutional Commerce Clause, and give Congress
far more powers than it had ever had before. The basis on which
the Court’s reasoning had hinged for 32 years was struck down by
a single justice who was just waiting for the opportunity to change
his vote, given that the right lawyer would come along and argue
the correct case before the Supreme Court.
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151
Notes
United States v. Windsor ruled that the Defense of Marriage
Act was unconstitutional.
2
Quote from Scalia’s dissent, taken from: “DOMA, Prop
8, and Justice Scalia’s intemperate dissent,” http://www.
scotusblog.com/?p=l66093 (last accessed January 4, 2014).
3
Ibid.
4
United States Constitution, Amendment Fourteen,
Section One.
5
“Substantive due process,” LII / Legal Information
Institute, http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/substantive_due_
process (accessed May 28, 2014) .
6
So what is so “dreaded” about the words “substantive
due process”? In the majority opinion, Justice Anthony
Kennedy had ruled that the Defense of Marriage act was
unconstitutional as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause
of the 14th Amendment. Kennedy never mentioned substantive
due process in the opinion, and it is possible that the concept
never crossed his mind. Scalia, however, was not buying it.
The ever-contentious justice argued that Kennedy striking
down the Defense of Marriage Act had nothing to do with the
Equal Protection Clause 14th Amendment, but was a subtle
resurrection of substantive due process.
7
Freedom of contract refers to the idea that a citizen
of the United States has the right to create a contract with
any individual they want and decide any of the conditions,
including, but not limited to, hours and wage.
8
These justices were known as the Four Horsemen. This
was the name given by the press to the four conservative justices
who sat on the 1932–1937 Supreme Court.
9
The term “Constitutional Revolution” refers to the
fact that in 1937 the meaning of the Due Process and Equal
Protection clauses of the 14th Amendment were reversed.
Rather than protecting an individual’s right to contract, the
government now had the right to interfere when it saw fit.
10
FDR, fearing for his New Deal, wanted to pass legislation
that would “empower the President to nominate a new federal
judge—including a Supreme Court justice—for every sitting
judge beyond the age of seventy.” This would have added six
additional justices to the Supreme Court in 1937. Justices would
not have approved of this plan, given that it would water down
the amount of power each justice had. Perhaps this was the
1
152
Abraham Cheloff
reason that Justice Roberts switched his vote? (Noah Feldman,
Scorpions: the Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Supreme Court
Justices [New York: Twelve, 2010] p. 108).
11
This is not an unusual number of cases for the court to
hear. In the modern day, the court grants about 80 cases per
year, out of 10,000 petitions.
12
Barry Cushman, Rethinking the New Deal Court: The
Structure of a Constitutional Revolution (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1998) p. 11.
13
Ibid., p. 12.
14
Ibid., p. 12; Alpheus Thomas Mason and William Merritt
Beaney, The Supreme Court in a Free Society (Englewood Cliffs,
New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1959).
15
While it is possible for justices to change their vote after
conference, it is suspected that they did not. According to the
Roberts’ memo, the conference vote was 4–4, with Hughes,
Brandeis, Cardozo, and Roberts opposing the Four Horseman.
When Stone returned, he joined his fellow liberals, and allowed
the minimum wage law. Cushman, p. 18.
16
Ibid., p. 18; and Felix Frankfurter, Mr. Justice Roberts
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Law Review, 1955)
p. 315.
17
Ibid., p. 18.
18
Even though there is much evidence that shows that
the Court Packing Plan could not have affected the Supreme
Court’s vote in West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, the myth has still
persisted until today. One explanation for this is that journalists
wanted to align the constitutional history of the 1900s around
the New Deal, and thus published works such as The Twilight of
the Supreme Court or Court over Constitution, which perpetuated
the myth. Historians then worked off of the journalism, and
thus the myth continued. Edward G White, The Constitution and
the New Deal (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000).
19
Smith v. Allwright, supra.
20
It is interesting to note that although Allgeyer, which
limited rights by the due process clause, happened before
Lochner, the era is still known as the Lochner era, and not the
Allgeyer era. As David Bernstein explains, although Allgeyer
was important in that it questioned liberty of contract under
due process “despite Peckham’s broad dicta, Allgeyer’s actual
holding was narrow: that an individual has the right ‘to contract
outside the state.’” It therefore follows that the era is known
as “Lochner” due to the fact that Lochner, by affecting work
THE CONCORD REVIEW
153
hours, affected almost all America, unlike Allgeyer which only
confirmed a current statute. David E. Bernstein, Rehabilitating
Lochner: Defending Individual Rights against Progressive Reform
(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2011) p. 20.
21
Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1905, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
22
The Four Horsemen refer to the four conservative
justices on the 1932–1937 courts; Justice Van Devanter, Justice
McReynolds, Justice Sutherland, and Justice Butler. In 1923,
Justice Brandeis was the only member of the Three Musketeers,
a name given to the liberal members of the 1932–1937 courts,
to have been appointed.
23
The 1920s and the 1930s were the peak for social
Darwinism in the United States, with ideas that the population
as a whole can only be helped if we get rid of the weakest links.
Please see the end of the section “Justice Owen Roberts” for an
explanation of this era.
24
Adkins v. Children’s Hospital, 261 U.S. 525 Supreme Court
of the United States, 1923, Legal Information Institute: Supreme
Court Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
25
Stare decisis is the legal principle that judges are required
to respect the precedents established in prior decisions of
their court. Once a case has been voted upon it is very difficult,
and sometimes impossible to undo that decision. In 1992, for
example, five parts of the Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act
of 1982 were being challenged as unconstitutional under the
Roe v. Wade ruling. While Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was
not particularly supportive of Roe v. Wade, she did support to
uphold it given, “the fundamental constitutional questions
resolved by Roe, principles of institutional integrity, and the rule
of stare decisis” (Planned Parenthood of Southern Pennsylvania v.
Casey, 505 U.S. 833). A thorough look at the opinion of the case
shows that stare decisis is brought up eight times by O’Connor,
showing that this was a true basis for her ruling. In the case of
substantive due process, the Lochner and Allgeyer precedents
were upheld by Adkins, but Justice Owen Roberts was the hinge
vote that could change everything.
26
The press gave the name “The Four Horsemen” to the
Justices McReynolds, Van Devanter, Clark, and Butler in 1932,
before Roberts was a member of the court with an established
ideology. Therefore, even though Roberts’ jurisprudence
agreed with the Horsemen, he was not added by the press as
154
Abraham Cheloff
one of that group. Carol E. Jenson, (1992), “New Deal,” in
Kermit L. Hall, Oxford Companion to the United States Supreme
Court (Oxford University Press).
27
The Three Musketeers is the nickname given by the press
to the three liberals of the court.
28
Brian T. Goldman, The Switch In Time That Saved Nine: A
Study of Justice Owen Roberts’s Vote in West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Scholarly Commons
Repository, 2012) pp. 115, 116.
29
United States v. Butler, 297 U.S. 1 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1936, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
30
Nebbia v. New York, 291 U.S. 502 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1934, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (August 8, 2013).
31
Similar rulings occur in: Crowell v. Benson, 285 U.S. 22
Supreme Court of the United States, 1932, Legal Information
Institute: Supreme Court Collection Home Web (August 8, 2013);
Borden’s Farm Products Co., Inc. v. Ten Eyck, 297 U.S. 251 Supreme
Court of the United States, 1936, Legal Information Institute:
Supreme Court Collection Home Web (August 8, 2013).
32
Helvering v. Davis, 301 U.S. 619 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1937, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (May 13, 2014); and National Labor Relations
Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation, 301 U.S. 1 Supreme
Court of the United States, 1937, Legal Information Institute:
Supreme Court Collection Home Web (May 13, 2014).
33
Grovey v. Townsend, 295 U.S. 45 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1935, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (January 4, 2014).
34
Smith v. Allwright, 321 U.S. 649 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1944, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (May 13, 2014).
35
Minersville School District v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586 Supreme
Court of the United States, 1940, Legal Information Institute:
Supreme Court Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
36
West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S.
624 Supreme Court of the United States, 1943, Legal Information
Institute: Supreme Court Collection Home Web (May 13, 2014).
37
“Owen Roberts Memorandum (November 9, 1945),”
Owen Roberts Memorandum (November 9, 1945), http://
newdeal.feri.org/court/roberts.htm (accessed June 2, 2014).
38
Ibid.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
155
Cushman, p. 45; However, the memorandum is believed,
by some, to be a fake. This belief was first published in the
Harvard Law Review by Professor Michael Ariens. He claims that
the only known source of the memorandum is the article that
Felix Frankfurter writes regarding it, and it was only published
after the death of Justice Roberts. Nevertheless, an article was
written in the University of Pennsylvania Law Review in 1985
attesting to the authenticity of the memorandum, Richard
D. Friedman. According to the article, Professor Chambers,
a vetted historian, saw the memorandum in the Library of
Congress, but it was stolen during a theft in 1972. In addition,
when Roberts left the Supreme Court, there was disagreement
over what the letter sent to Roberts from the court should say.
Justice Frankfurter was once of Roberts’ strongest supporters,
and thus it makes sense that he was the one to receive the
memorandum. A Reaffirmation: The Authenticity of the Roberts
Memorandum, or Felix the Non-Forger (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Law Review, 1985).
40
Morehead v. New York ex rel Tipaldo, 298 U.S. 587 Supreme
Court of the United States, 1936, Legal Information Institute:
Supreme Court Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
41
Frankfurter, p. 314.
42
Ibid., p. 314.
43
Ibid., p. 315.
44
Ibid., p. 315.
45
“West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (Great American Court Cases)
Study Guide & Homework Help—Reference—eNotes.com,”
eNotes, http://www.enotes.com/west-coast-hotel-co-v-parrishreference/west-coast-hotel-v-parrish (accessed June 28, 2013).
46
Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 Supreme Court of the
United States, 1942, Legal Information Institute: Supreme Court
Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
47
Heart of Atlanta Motel Inc. v. United States, 379 U.S. 241
Supreme Court of the United States, 1964, Legal Information
Institute: Supreme Court Collection Home Web (May 12, 2013).
39
156
Abraham Cheloff
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Elizabeth
Longford
Welllington, The Years of the Sword
London: Panther 1971, pp. 74-75
Among the ‘rubbish’ lay a secret resolve to read. The voyage to India gave it a fine excuse. From Dublin Arthur brought his
small library, to which he added in England over fifty pounds’ worth
of books. Among the Oriental dictionaries, grammars and maps,
the military manuals and histories of India, were works of a more
general interest. Voltaire, Rousseau, Frederick the Great, Maréchal
de Saxe, Plutarch’s Lives and the Caesar’s Commentaria—in Latin;
for law, Blackstone’s Commentaries; for economics, Adam Smith’s
Wealth of Nations; for philosophy, Locke and Human Understanding
reappear; for theology, five volumes of Paley, gilt; and for the good
of his Anglo-Irish soul, twenty-four volumes of Swift at 2s. 10d.
At least one person had an inkling of something else which lay
among the ‘rubbish’—something rare but not yet definable. There
was a Dr. Warren (probably Richard Warren the court physician)
whom Arthur had consulted as well as Dr. Hunter before leaving
England. “I have been attending a young man,” says this Dr. Warren
to a friend, “whose conversation is the most extraordinary I have
ever listened to...if this young man lives, he must one day be Prime
Minister.” What was it in Arthur’s manner which told Dr. Warren he
had the necessary sense of direction, critical understanding, vigour,
personality and vision? Or was it in the subjects he talked about that
he revealed the mystic trade-mark? One guess is as good as another.
But if this slight young man, recently sick and battered by
the incompetence of his superiors, held forth on his prospects in
India—his chance to emulate Clive’s victories, to extend the settlement of Cornwallis without the controversy, and to achieve the
power of Warren Hastings without his suspected corruption—the
doctor may well have thought himself in the presence of either
brain fever or genius. Arthur and his trunkload of books followed
the 33rd at the end of June. Ireland was already a month away. It
had been high time to break out from the Castle, where his spirit
had been a prisoner for more than nine years. Perhaps, indeed, he
had never yet known what it was to feel truly free.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Lincoln, Davis, and the Right of Revolution
Jianing Wang
As the political situation of antebellum America brooded
with restlessness and discontent, revolution seemed inevitable. The
idea of a “right of revolution” may be judged on both moral and
legal grounds, creating a divide between the moral and universal
right to revolt as written in the Declaration of Independence
versus the legal right actually to execute a revolt.1 The right to
revolt can also be judged on grounds of state vs. federal rights,
a distinction that would become especially clear during the Civil
War. Considering the political climate of Abraham Lincoln and
Jefferson Davis’s time, the controversial nature of the “right to
revolt” during the 1850s and the Civil War is unsurprising. The
underlying issues of the 1850s—in particular, the European revolutions and the collapse of the two-party system—caused a wave
of revolutionary sentiment to sweep through the United States,
which only increased in intensity with the outbreak of the Civil
War. With the U.S. in such a fragile state, Lincoln and Davis were
faced with the difficult task of taking a solid position on the “right
of revolution” and shaping it to justify their respective causes. Both
Lincoln and Davis were influenced by the political pitfalls of the
1850s and the legacy of the Founding Fathers. Neither believed
himself to be revolting against America, but rather as preserving
Jianing Wang is a Senior at Hunter College High School on Manhattan
Island in New York, where she wrote this paper for Ms. Giovanna Assenso
Termini’s U.S. History III class in the 2013/2014 academic year.
162
Jianing Wang
the initial duty of the Founding Fathers and upholding the basis of
American democracy. As demonstrated by their powerful speeches,
each man used the ideas of the Founding Fathers in his rhetoric
to justify his view on secession and state vs. federal rights, but in
strikingly different ways. Although both Lincoln and Davis agreed
on the basic concept of the right to revolt and maintain what they
saw as the foundation of American government, each produced
fundamentally different arguments for allowing or disallowing the
states the power to do so during the war. In a broader historical
framework, Lincoln and Davis’s opposing attitudes towards revolution raise the question of what the Founding Fathers themselves
would have sought from the Civil War.
The European revolutions of 1848 brought to light the
problem of tyranny in those countries, strengthening revolutionary fervor in the United States. In one year, political upheaval
swept across Europe from France in the west to Austria and Prussia farther east. At such a fragile time in American politics, the
situation in Europe had a great effect on American ideas of freedom. After the Fugitive Slave Law was passed in 1850, antislavery
papers likened runaway slaves to Hungarian freedom-fighters.2
Similarly, organizations for urban labor and women’s rights—also
major causes of sectionalism—noticed the momentum of reform
in Europe and argued that similar change should occur in the
United States.3 The words of influential politicians like Lincoln
also reflected the global implications of European revolution. In
1850, Hungarian revolutionary leader Louis Kossuth addressed
the United States, saying, “I asked of the king, not the complete
independence of my beloved country—not even any new rights or
privileges—but simply these [things]: First: That the inalienable
rights sanctioned by a thousand years, and by the constitution of
my fatherland, should be guaranteed by a national and responsible
administration.”4 Lincoln responded two years later by issuing a
call to honor Kossuth in Springfield and drawing up resolutions
of sympathy for the Hungarian revolutionaries:
We recognize in Governor Kossuth of Hungary the most worthy and
distinguished representative of the cause of civil and religious liberty
on the continent of Europe. A cause for which he and his nation
THE CONCORD REVIEW
163
struggled until they were overwhelmed by the armed intervention
of a foreign despot, in violation of the more sacred principles of the
laws of nature and of nations—principles held dear by the friends
of freedom everywhere, and more especially by the people of these
United States.5
In the same year, Kossuth coined the phrase, “All for the people
and by the people. Nothing about the people without the people.
That is democracy, and that is the ruling tendency of the spirit
of our age.”6 Lincoln would issue his famed “of the people, for
the people, by the people” speech at Gettysburg a decade later
in 1863, demonstrating how Lincoln borrowed descriptions of
democracy from European revolutionaries. Lincoln even explicitly
agreed with Kossuth in saying that “it is the right of any people,
sufficiently numerous for national independence, to throw off, to
revolutionize, their existing form of government”7—a foreshadowing of the American conflict to come.
Yet we will see that by the time the Civil War erupted,
Lincoln had come to view revolution with a much more cautious
attitude now that it had settled upon his own country. In attacking
Davis’s approach to Southern revolt, Lincoln said to Congress on
July 4, 1861:
The sophism itself is that any State of the Union may consistently
with the national Constitution, and therefore lawfully and peacefully,
withdraw from the Union without the consent of the Union or of
any other State…With rebellion thus sugar-coated [the South] has
been drugging the public mind of their section for more than thirty
years…If they break from us, they can only do so against law.8
Such a drastic change in attitude raises the questions: What caused
this change, and how did Lincoln justify such a shift in opinion,
one that shared the same basis as Davis’s yet differed on such fundamental terms? As spectators from the outside, Americans saw
European freedom fighters struggling for democracy. Yet from
the inside, both North and South would eventually come to view
themselves as the “true” freedom fighters for American liberty.
Four years after the crisis in Europe, the Two Party System
collapsed in the United States, causing sectional conflicts not only
to rise, but also to become ideological in nature. The Two Party
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Jianing Wang
System had risen in the early 19th century as a result of opposing
agendas, which divided the U.S. into two clear factions. Economic
problems such as the Panic of 1819 directed hostility towards the
economic elite,9 polarizing the United States into two groups that
disagreed on issues about banks, inflation and commercialization. Two years later, Missouri’s admission as a slave state in 1821
alarmed the public because it threatened to tip the balance in the
Congress in favor of the slave states, prompting arguments on the
political, economic and moral consequences of slavery.10 However,
while economic and moral conflicts in the early 19th century had
strengthened the Two Party System, by the 1850s, consensus was
causing the Two Party System to grow weak. As Thomas Jefferson
explained to John Taylor in 1798, basic competition is necessary
for the survival of political parties: “In every free and deliberating
society, there must, from the nature of man, be opposite parties,
and violent dissensions and discords.”11 However, by the 1850s,
the Whigs and Democrats were taking similar stances on the issues
that had defined them. The economy was strong, diminishing the
importance of national finances, and both parties agreed (at least
temporarily) with the Compromise of 1850.12 With competition
diminished, little incentive remained for people to advocate for
one party over another. Eventually, voters began to seek out third
parties that better addressed their sectional grievances, which were
becoming more ideological. American history professor Michael
F. Holt wrote,
The core of the secessionist persuasion was aimed at the same republican values of Southerners that Republicans appealed to among
Northerners….The central issue was neither race nor restriction, but
republicanism. Where Republicans had located the anti-republican
monster in the Slave Power conspiracy, secessionists identified it with
the Republican Party, which they labeled a threat to self-government,
the rule of law, Southern liberty, and Southern equality.13
As faith in the current state of politics decreased among members
of both major parties, North and South began to view each other as
threats to republicanism—government of, by and for the people.14
Both sides felt the need to reform politics and return power to
the people. Without strong political parties to lean on, North and
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165
South resorted to identifying each other as tyrants and attacking
each other as destroyers of American liberty and equality15—vague
terms that were susceptible to politicians’ influence. As Lincoln
and Davis’s rhetoric demonstrates, subtle tweaks to a quote can
completely change its meaning. In the midst of such instability
and revolutionary fervor, it is undeniable that Lincoln and Davis’s
speeches on secession and revolution had a huge role in shaping
the peoples’ views against and justifications for revolution in the
“United States” of America.
The broad issue of disagreement between Lincoln and
Davis was that of secession. In order to tackle this issue, both men
turned to the Founding Fathers for help in 1861 as they began
to take on the burdens of a new government, but found very different answers. Davis made it clear that the Confederacy was not
a radical but a conservative means of attaining Southern liberty.
The South was merely protecting the values of the Constitution
and repeating American revolutionary tradition. “It has been a
conviction of pressing necessity,” Davis said in his Farewell Address
to the Senate on January 21, 1861, “it has been a belief that we
are to be deprived in the Union of the rights which our fathers
bequeathed to us.”16 In his inaugural address in Montgomery
a month later, Davis once again drew upon the values of the
Founding Fathers. This time, however, Davis spoke in front of an
audience of Southern citizens and emphasized the rights of the
common people even more: “Our present condition…illustrates
the American idea that governments rest upon the consent of the
governed, and that it is the right of the people to alter or abolish
governments whenever they become destructive of the ends for
which they were established.”17 By saying this, Davis stressed to his
people that the South was simply defending the rights of freedom
and autonomy that the Founding Fathers had built the nation
upon—ironic in hindsight, considering that they were fighting
in large part for the freedom to own slaves. To further illustrate
his point, Davis quoted the Preamble to the Constitution, arguing
that its values had been “perverted from the purposes for which it
was ordained.”18 In bringing up the Constitution, Davis essentially
told his people that the South must fight to preserve the basic
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Jianing Wang
values of the Constitution itself, and save Southern freedoms. The
attitude of Confederate enlisters demonstrated the effect Davis’s
interpretation had on his people. The Confederates believed
they were fighting for liberty. A South Carolina recruit wrote that
the Founding Fathers “severed the bonds of oppression once…
now [we] for the second time throw off the yoke and be freemen
still.”19 Similarly, a farmer who enlisted in the 26th Tennessee
insisted that “any man in the South would rather die battling for
civil and political liberty, than submit to the base usurpations of
a northern tyrant.”20 It is clear that Davis’s message spread to his
people—just as the previous revolutionary generation had fought
a war with tyrannical England for the basic rights of freedom and
liberty that they were promised, the Confederates were claiming
the same mission. Like the Hungarian revolutionaries of the
previous decade, they said they were true fighters for freedom.
Although Lincoln cited the same passages of the Constitution and Declaration of Independence as Davis, his speeches
demonstrated a fundamentally different interpretation. Nearly a
century ago, the Founding Fathers had fought for their liberty.
Like Davis, Lincoln believed that he was fighting in the footsteps
of the Founding Fathers. The similarities ended there. A month
after Davis’s inauguration, Lincoln stated in his first inaugural
address: “I hold that in contemplation of universal law and of the
Constitution the Union of these States is perpetual….Continue to
execute all the express provisions of our National Constitution,
and the Union will endure forever.”21 Lincoln held that in order
for the Nation to endure, the North must follow the values of the
Constitution, unlike the Southern rebels. Three months later, in
his Special Session message to Congress, Lincoln described the
war as a people’s contest: “On the side of the Union it is a struggle
for maintaining in the world that form and substance of government whose leading object is to elevate the condition of men.”22
Unlike Davis, who said that the Confederacy should fight against
Northern tyranny, Lincoln said that the Union was actually fighting
to preserve the basis of American government. A young Union
enlister from Philadelphia reflected Lincoln’s views: “This contest
is not the North against South….It is government against anarchy,
THE CONCORD REVIEW
167
law against disorder.”23 If the North allowed disunity to destroy the
nation, their generation would fail to preserve American ideals of
republican liberty—ironic, as Davis and the Confederate troops
believed that they were preserving republican liberty as well.
A more radical concept behind American revolutionary
tradition was that the forefathers themselves, Jefferson and Madison in particular, saw secession as necessary protection. Looking
back on his views in the 1860s and with the intent of addressing
both Northern and Southern audiences, Davis stated in his book,
The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (1881), that “the
‘people’ who organized the first confederation, the people who
dissolved it, the people who ordained and established the Constitution which succeeded it…were the people of the respective
States, each acting separately and with absolute independence of
the others,”24 and cited Jefferson’s Kentucky Resolutions of 1789
and Madison’s Virginia Resolutions of 1789.25 According to Davis,
even the Founding Fathers considered the United States to be a
coalition of sovereign, free, and independent States—not one
state or one union. Solid proof laid in the Kentucky and Virginia
Resolutions—the first examples of nullification.26 Even after the
Constitution had passed, the forefathers had allowed state power
to defy federal power. Davis considered his Confederacy to be following that very tradition. However, Lincoln invalidated Davis’s
defense of secession, arguing that secession was absolutely not the
intent of the forefathers. In Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address, given
shortly after the South seceded, he stated, “Perpetuity is implied, if
not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments.
It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination.”27 Whereas Davis
claimed that the Founding Fathers were advocates for secession
themselves, Lincoln claimed that no government would support
its own split. According to Lincoln, secession was “the essence of
anarchy,”28 since it defied the rule of law itself—another reason
to fight against Southern Revolt.
It becomes clear that the overarching issue behind Lincoln
and Davis’s argument over war and secession was the issue of states’
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Jianing Wang
rights versus federal rights. Above all, Davis cited Constitutional
tradition to argue that states were distinct units rather than one
union. He emphasized that the Constitution reserved all powers
not given to Congress to the states, granting them the right to
revolt against such a nation “perverted from the purposes for
which it was ordained.” In The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (1881), a work widely received by a Southern audience,
Davis outlined the connections between the Founding Fathers
and the South. He began by stating that “the object of this work
has been from historical data to show that the Southern States
had rightfully the power to withdraw from a Union into which
they had, as sovereign communities, voluntarily entered; that the
denial of that right was a violation of the letter and spirit of the
compact between the states.”29 By describing the Confederate
states as “sovereign communities,” Davis called upon the 10th
Amendment (the powers not delegated to the United States by
the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved
to the states respectively, or to the people30) to justify Southern
revolt. He continued: “The war waged by the Federal Government
against the seceding States was in disregard of the limitations of the
Constitution, and destructive of the principles of the Declaration
of Independence.”31 By claiming that the war had been “waged
by the Federal Government against the seceding States,” Davis essentially told his people that the war was not a Civil War, but a war
of Northern aggression against states’ rights. The North was the
side set upon destroying American autonomy. The Confederacy,
as a coalition of separate and sovereign states, was only rising up
to defend these rights under the 10th Amendment.
On the other hand, Lincoln cited higher law to argue that
states were simply a creation of the union. In his Special Session
Speech to the Republican-controlled 37th Congress in 1861, Lincoln refuted Davis’s argument for state rights: “Our States have
neither more nor less power than that reserved to them in the
Union by the Constitution, no one of them ever having been a
State out of the Union.”32 In such a dire situation, it was Lincoln’s
duty to justify the Union cause. He certainly did hold a greater
degree of power amidst a Republican Congress, though, and thus
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169
attacked inconsistencies in the Confederate argument rather
freely. Lincoln demonstrated this power by drawing a stark contrast
between the constitutional right of modifying government and
the revolutionary right of overthrowing it—a distinction that the
Confederacy evidently did not understand. He thus implied that
Davis’ approach to secession was inherently flawed—revolution,
as a principle, was acceptable if and only if the revolutionaries
have been deprived of explicit constitutional rights, and liberty is
guaranteed by insurrection. This clear distinction between moral
right vs. actual implementation was largely defined by Lincoln’s
change in attitude from the 1840s to 1850s—when the political
climate shifted from foreign revolution, which he had supported,
to revolution against his own government, which he declared
illegal. When it came to foreign revolution, Lincoln defended
revolt as a catalyst towards attaining national independence and
democracy. In his speech to Congress on the Mexican War, Lincoln
likened the Mexican revolutionary cause to the American Revolution, stating that “a majority of any portion of such people may
revolutionize, putting down a minority…who may oppose their
movement. Such minority, was precisely the case, of the Tories of
our own revolution.”33 When it came to his own country in the
1850s, however, Lincoln had become more wary of the “right to
revolt,” especially following Senator Stephen Douglas’s attacks on
Lincoln for being “revolutionary and destructive of the existence
of this government.”34 As a result, Lincoln cited the Declaration of
Independence to defend his opposition to slavery, but did not cite
the section that included the “right of revolution”35—demonstrating that Lincoln equated his position with the Founding Fathers’
not on grounds of revolution, but on grounds of basic freedom
and equality. By 1861, Lincoln had developed a solid position on
revolution, as expressed in a message to Congress: “The right of
revolution, is never a legal right…At most, it is but a moral right,
when exercised for a morally justifiable cause. When exercised
without such a cause revolution is no right, but simply a wicked
exercise of physical power.”36 By arguing thus, Lincoln essentially
overturned Davis’s argument that states, as sovereign entities, had
every right to rise up against their government. Rather, Lincoln
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Jianing Wang
said, the Southern cause was invalid. Confederate secession was
not the product of losing explicit constitutional rights, nor was an
improved U.S. guaranteed by Southern insurrection.
In part, history can be seen as a debate over how to interpret
the past. In the same way, the Civil War can be seen as an argument
over what the Founding Fathers would have wanted the nation
to become, since both North and South believed that they were
fighting in the American revolutionary tradition. It is safe to say
that time is enough of an influence that it prevents the future from
perfectly adhering to opinions of the past, so a more appropriate
question would be which side the major figures of the previous
century would have leaned towards. It is hard to offer a definitive
answer to this for the simple reason that the forefathers themselves
were split, and history tends to repeat itself. Even at the time of
the Founding Fathers there existed a clash between federalist and
antifederalist philosophy, a fact best demonstrated by the lengthy
dispute between Hamilton and Jefferson. During the Civil War,
Lincoln adhered more to federalist philosophy with his support
of the power of federal government, and Davis to antifederalist
philosophy with his opinion that the federal government should
be subordinate to the states. With such a split, it is difficult to consider the Founding Fathers as only one entity with one opinion on
the Civil War. However, it can be said that Lincoln and Davis’s war
was a means of finally solving this dispute between federalism and
anti-federalism that the Founding Fathers had left to fester for so
long. The Civil War settled the debate once and for all.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
171
Notes
Thomas J. Pressly, “Bullets and Ballots: Lincoln and the
‘Right of Revolution,’” The American Historical Review 67, no. 3
(April 1962) p. 647.
2
“United States and the 1848 Revolutions,” Ohio
University, http://www.ohio.edu/chastain/rz/usa.htm
(accessed December 14, 2013).
3
Ibid.
4
Henry M. De Puy, Kossuth and His Generals (Buffalo, New
York: Phinney & Co., 1852) pp. 317–318.
5
Patrick J. Garrity, “The Hungarian Resolution,”
Recovering the American Idea, last modified
January 20, 2014, http://www.claremont.org/index.
php?act=crbbasicpgdet&bpId=100#.U6L-5PldVfg (accessed
June 19, 2014).
6
“Kossuth’s Speech before the Legislature of Ohio. By
Express for the New York Daily Times,” The New York Times (New
York, New York) (February 12, 1852).
7
Pressly, p. 651.
8
Paul Halsall, “Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865): Special
Session Message, July 4, 1861,” Modern History Sourcebook,
last modified July 1998, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/
mod/1861lincoln-special.asp (accessed May 7, 2014).
9
Michael F. Holt, The Political Crisis of the 1850s (New York,
USA: Wiley, 1978) p. 17.
10
Ibid., p. 19.
11
Ibid., p. 12.
12
Ibid., p. 98.
13
Ibid., p. 240.
14
Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman, Edward J. Blum, and John
Gjerde, eds., Major Problems in American History, Volume 1
(Stamford, Connecticut: Cengage Learning, 2010) p. 404.
15
Ibid., p. 405.
16
Jefferson Davis, “Farewell Address to the Senate” (speech,
Washington D.C., January 21, 1861), Rice University: The
Papers of Jefferson Davis, http://jeffersondavis.rice.edu/
Content.aspx?id=87.
17
Emory M. Thomas, “Jefferson Davis and the American
Revolutionary Tradition,” Journal of the Illinois State Historical
Society 70, no. 1 (February 1977) p. 6.
18
Jefferson Davis, “Inaugural Address of the President
of the Provisional Government” (speech, Montgomery, AL,
1
172
Jianing Wang
February 18, 1861) Yale Law School: The Avalon Project,
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_csainau.asp
19
James M. McPherson, For Cause and Comrades: Why Men
Fought in the Civil War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997)
p. 21.
20
Ibid., p. 20.
21
Abraham Lincoln, “First Inaugural Address of Abraham
Lincoln” (speech, Washington, D.C., March 4, 1861), Yale Law
School: The Avalon Project, http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_
century/lincoln1.asp.
22
Halsall.
23
McPherson, p. 18.
24
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate
Government (1881) (n.p., 1881) 1:1, http://www.gutenberg.org/
files/19831/19831-h/19831-h.htm, p. 115 (accessed December
8, 2013).
25
Ibid., pp. 134–135.
26
“Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions,” Princeton
University, https://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/
wiki100k/docs/Kentucky_and_Virginia_Resolutions.html.
(accessed December 14, 2013).
27
Lincoln, “First Inaugural Address of Abraham Lincoln”
28
McPherson, p. 18.
29
Davis, 1:1.
30
U.S. Const, amend. X.
31
Davis, 1:1.
32
Lincoln, “Special Session Message, July 4, 1861”
33
Abraham Lincoln, “The War With Mexico” (speech,
Washington, D.C., January 12, 1848) Animated Atlas: Mexican
War, http://www.animatedatlas.com/mexwar/lincoln2.html.
34
Pressly, p. 654.
35
Ibid., p. 655.
36
Paul E. Johnson, ed., Liberty, Equality, and Power: A History
of the American People 5th ed. (Stamford, Connecticut: Cengage
Learning, n.d.) p. 447.
Bibliography
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Constitutionalism.” The Review of Politics 50, no. 2, (Spring
1988), pp. 169–197.
Davis, Jefferson. The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government
(1881). Vol. 1, n.p., 1881. http://www.gutenberg.org/
THE CONCORD REVIEW
173
files/19831/19831-h/19831-h.htm. Accessed December 8,
2013.
De Puy, Henry M. Kossuth and His Generals. Buffalo, New
York: Phinney & Co., 1852.
Garrity, Patrick J. “The Hungarian Resolution.” Recovering
the American Idea. Last modified January 20, 2014. http://
www.claremont.org/index.php?act=crbbasicpgdet&bpId=100#.
U6L-5PldVfg. Accessed June 19, 2014.
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Session Message, July 4, 1861.” Modern History Sourcebook,
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mod/1861lincoln-special.asp. Accessed May 7, 2014.
Hoffman, Elizabeth Cobbs, Edward J. Blum, and John
Gjerde, eds. Major Problems in American History, Volume 1.
Stamford, Connecticut: Cengage Learning, 2010.
Holt, Michael F. The Political Crisis of the 1850s. New York,
USA: Wiley, 1978.
Johnson, Paul E., ed. Liberty, Equality, and Power: A History
of the American People. 5th ed., Stamford, Connecticut: Cengage
Learning, n.d.
“Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions.” Princeton University.
https://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/
Kentucky_and_Virginia_Resolutions.html. Accessed December
14, 2013.
McPherson, James M. For Cause and Comrades: Why Men
Fought in the Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Ohio University, “United States and the 1848 Revolutions”
Ohio University, http://www.ohio.edu/chastain/rz/usa.htm
(accessed December 14, 2013)
Pressly, Thomas J., “Bullets and Ballots: Lincoln and the
‘Right of Revolution.’” The American Historical Review 67 no. 3
April 1962: 647–662.
The Constitution of the Confederate States of America.
Doc., 1861.
The New York Times (New York, New York). “Kossuth’s Speech
before the Legislature of Ohio. By Express for the New York
Daily Times.” February 12, 1852.
Thomas, Emory M. “Jefferson Davis and the American
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U.S. Const, art. I, § 2.
U.S. Const, art. I, § 9.
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Jianing Wang
John Buchan (later Lord Tweedsmuir, Governor-General of Canada)
Oliver Cromwell
London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1934, pp. 19-20
A great man lays upon posterity the duty of understanding him.
The task is not easy even with those well-defined, four-square personalities, who belong to a recognizable type, whose purpose was single and
whose career was the product of obvious causes; for we have still in
our interpretation to recover an atmosphere which is not our own. It
is harder when the man in question falls under no accepted category,
and in each feature demands a new analysis. It is hardest of all with one
who sets classification at defiance, and seems to unite in himself every
contrary, who dominates his generation like some portent of nature, a
mystery to his contemporaries and an enigma to his successors. In such
a case his interpreter must search not only among the arcana of his age,
its hidden forces and imponderable elements, but among the profundities of the human spirit.
Oliver Cromwell has long passed beyond the mists of calumny.
He is no longer Hyde’s “brave bad man”; still less is he the hypocrite,
the vulgar usurper, the bandit of genius, of Hume and Hallam. By common consent he stands in the first rank of greatness, but there is little
agreement on the specific character of that greatness. He is admired by
the disciples of the most divergent faiths. Some see in him the apostle
of liberty, the patron of all free communions, forgetting his attempts to
found an established discipline. Constitutionalists claim him as one of the
pioneers of the parliamentary system, though he had little patience with
government by debate, and played havoc with many parliaments. He has
been hailed as a soldier-saint, in spite of notable blots on his scutcheon.
He has been called a religious genius, but on his religion it is not easy
to be dogmatic; like Bunyan’s Much-afraid, when he went through the
River none could understand what he said. Modern devotees of force
have seen in him the super-man who marches steadfastly to his goal amid
the crash of ancient fabrics, but they have forgotten his torturing hours
of indecision. He has been described as tramping with his heavy boots
relentlessly through his age, but his steps were mainly slow and hesitating, and he often stumbled...
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
The American War for Liberty Shewn to Be the
Cause of God: Millennialism, Common Sense, and
The American Revolution
Mehitabel Glenhaber
T
homas Paine’s widely-read Common Sense (1776) is frequently seen as an attempt to explain the principles that would
be laid out in the Declaration of Independence to the American
common man. However, this pamphlet did not simply explain
Locke and Montesquieu’s principles of government and Whig
philosophy to the American public. Instead, it merged the Enlightenment-based ideal of an experiment in self-government of the
revolutionary elite with Great Awakening-inspired millennialism
of the lower classes in support of the cause of American freedom
and independence. Despite the Great Awakening animosity towards the spiritually dead “old lights” of the Enlightenment, both
of these groups came together during the American Revolution
under the banner not only of American Independence, but also
of the higher cause of a great work, which Reverend Abraham
Keteltas spoke of when he preached “It is a glorious cause…It is
the cause of the oppressed against the oppressor. The cause of
pure undefiled religion against bigotry, superstition, and human
inventions. It is the cause of the reformation against popery…in
Mehitabel Glenhaber is a Senior at the Commonwealth School in Boston,
Massachusetts, where she wrote this paper for Melissa Haber’s United
States History course in the 2013/2014 academic year.
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short it is the cause of Heaven against Hell…Nay, it is the cause
for which the son of God came down from his celestial throne
and expired on the cross.”1 This vision is the combination of the
elite’s secular Utopian vision for American Liberty and a perhaps
much older religious Utopian vision of Great Awakening millennialists, and Philadelphia Presbyterians who had declared that
there could be “No king but king Jesus” a decade before the start
of the revolution.2
Even before the Great Awakening, the seeds of a millennial
vision for America had always been a part of New England society,
since many American colonists saw themselves as a chosen people
fleeing from the moral corruption of Europe to the clean slate
of America. Far before Thomas Paine described the American
continent as “an asylum for mankind,”3 William Penn encouraged immigrants fleeing religious persecution, not only from
England, but from all parts of Europe, to come settle in Pennsylvania,4 and America was seen by the colonists as a safe-haven for
the Protestants of the world.5 The founder’s account of ancestors
fleeing religious intolerance was already a developed part of the
American identity in the early 1700s, and many colonists took
pride in the idea that the moral purity of their “worthy fathers”
had forced them to seek refuge from Europe.6 America was not
just a safe-haven for Protestants, but was also seen as a promised
land for them and was often described as a “New American Israel,”
with comparisons frequently drawn between God’s covenant with
the Jews and with his sacred people in the New World. Whereas
Europe was described by Robert Cushman at Plymouth in 1621
as overrun with “Turkish slavery [and] popish tyrannie.”7 America
was described by John Winthrop as a place of virtue which would
house the Puritans’ “city on a hill”8 as a beacon of morality to the
world. As John Locke wrote in his Second Treatise on government
“in the beginning, the world was America.” The colonists also saw
America not only as a land free of government, but as a land free
of the vice of corrupt governments and religions, a clean slate for
a purer religious and moral life.
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In the 1740s, the Great Awakening introduced not only
a renewed religious fervor, but another element in the colonists’
identity as a chosen people, the hope of the imminent millennium. In addition to an emphasis on emotional or “vital” religion,
and an encouraging of the common person to take a more active
role in interpretation of the Bible for themselves, one of the main
elements of the Great Awakening was the belief in the coming
kingdom of Christ described in the Book of Revelation. This doctrine taught that preceding the apocalypse and final judgment,
Christ will return to earth and establish the kingdom of heaven
on earth for a thousand years. The reign of Christ was described
as a time of peace when the Antichrist would be defeated, all the
peoples of the world would convert to Christianity, and people
would live in peace and harmony as “the Kingdoms of this world…
become the kingdom of OUR BLESSED LORD AND SAVIOR JESUS
CHRIST.”9 Millennialism was a wildly popular doctrine during the
Great Awakening, especially in the American Colonies, taught by
many prominent preachers such as Jonathan Edwards. In New
England alone, in the summer of 1743 nearly 70 preachers signed
The Testimony And Advice of An Assembly of Pastors, supporting the
millennial doctrine.10 In keeping with the Great Awakening belief
in the active role of God in the affairs of humanity, the surge of
religious revivals inspired people to believe that mankind was on
the brink of an era in Christian history and that the millennium
was not only impending, but would come to fruition in the near
future as a result of Americans’ converting to more religious lives
and ridding themselves of sin.11 During the early 1740s, many
“Christian histories” were written, demonstrating how over the
past centuries, humanity had been freeing itself from heathenism, and worst of all, Catholicism, and was moving towards a new
age of spirituality, as evidenced by the myriad revivals.12 Personal
emotional religion and faith in Christ was seen as the driving force
behind the Millennium, and Edwards preached that the time in
history when “vital religion shall take possession of king’s palaces
and thrones; and those who are in the highest advancement shall
be the holy men” was nigh.13
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Because human faith and morality were seen as the causes
of the millennium, the rejection of European corruption and Catholicism and the vision of America as the land of God’s chosen
people were now given a new importance, as many of these millennial predictions centered around America as the seat of Christ.14
Ranging from the predictions of Englishmen like Edwards,15 to the
German millennial sect that settled Pennsylvania,16 to the Shakers’
belief that the arrival of early Shakers in America marked the start
of the third spiritual age,17 predictions for the coming kingdom
of Christ repeatedly centered on America. The vision of America
as playing a key role in the millennium expanded America’s role
as a holy land for the chosen people. In this millennial philosophy, God’s elect, believers in the revivals in America, would act
like John Winthrop’s “city on a hill,” and provide the foothold
for what Edwards called a “wonderful revival and propagation of
religion” that would inspire the rest of the world and usher it into
a more spiritual age.18 As the point from which this “very great
and wonderful, and exceedingly glorious” work would be carried
out, America was to be the seat of Christ in the coming new age.19
However, the link between self-government and millennialism did not always seem as obvious to the colonists as it would
become during the American Revolution. The idea of Democracy
had always been apparent in American Protestantism both in terms
of the religion itself and the interaction between politics and the
religion. The Protestant religion itself, especially after the Great
Awakening, focused on the rights of individuals to interpret the
Bible for themselves, rather than to rely on a clergy to tell them
what to believe, an idea very similar to the Whig philosophy of
the rights of man.20 The ideas of democracy and the rights of man
were prevalent in the church, where many of the revivals called
on the people to challenge ministers with whom they disagreed,
leading to tensions between the radical “New Lights” and more
traditional “Old Lights,” whom they viewed as elitist and spiritually
dead,21 and the common citizen was not separated from the altar
by a fence, but was encouraged to participate in decision-making in
the church community where everybody had a vote.22 In rare cases,
such as the colony of Massachusetts, this democratic philosophy
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extended to the government, which at the start of the colony was
practically a theocracy. So a democratic church translated to a
democratic state government, where all church members who could
demonstrate proof of their salvation had voting rights. However,
almost everywhere in America, this Protestant and Great Awakening philosophy of the common man influenced people’s views on
government. Consequently, the evils of Europe were often seen
as “luxury” and “corruption” related to a greedy clergy, and the
politically synonymous nobles, amassing wealth for themselves,
and was seen as one of the main factors separating America from
Europe.23 America was celebrated for its freedom in terms of religion, and for its political freedom as well.24 However, the more
political aspects of many of these creeds were not emphasized
during the Great Awakening in the 1740s, since the focus of the
revivals was on how religion, not politics, would bring about the
millennium. Although Great Awakening preachers certainly did
condemn wealth and tyranny and all forms of popish slavery, the
emphasis on the reign of Christ in a spiritual age pushed politics
out of the spotlight.25
However, the conflict between France and England in
the Seven Years War (1756-1763), which emphasized the difference between the free Protestant nations and despotic Catholic
ones, revived the millennialism of the 1740s with a new political
emphasis.26 The Seven Years War was not only a unifying event
culturally for Americans as the first pan-colonial military conflict,
but it was also a tremendous religious event. For many, the Seven
Years War was seen as a holy war to protect the purity of America
from the threat of Catholic corruption,27 and it revived millennial
hopes of the defeat of the Antichrist, which was seen as almost
synonymous with Catholicism.28 The first American victory of the
war, the capturing of Louisberg on July 1745, was reported as a
“crusade” by the New England press, a victory of almost miraculous
proportions, and was actually seen as the defeat of the Antichrist
by some Americans.29 This victory caused the American Presbyterian preacher Samuel Layden to declare “Babylon has fallen.”30
As anti-Catholic sentiments reached a high, the American presses
were filled with gruesome descriptions of “the merciless rage of
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popish power”31 and the “inhuman barbarities” and “methods of
torture and violence” that Americans would suffer “should [their]
enemy triumph over [them].”32 Not only did Americans fear that
the French would give “[their] wives to ravishment, and [their]
sons and daughters to torture”33 but they also viewed the French
as “a massive and insidious threat to [their] religious liberties.”34
They were afraid that “[they] would have the gospel taken from
[them],”35 and that their foes, described by the American preacher
John Burt as “the offspring of the scarlet whore, that mother of
harlots who is justly the abomination of the earth,” were not only
Catholic, but the Antichrist itself.36 The worst consequence of a
French victory would not be the physical tyranny that Americans
would be subjected to, but that “instead of [the gospel] being
transmitted by [Americans] to other nations…our land may be
given to the Beast,” and the millennial cause lost. This sparked
a sort of millennialism in which Americans saw it as their duty to
free the world from Catholic tyranny by their newfound political
and military might, as well as their religious superiority.37 The religious mission of millennialism now had a political counterpart.38
The Seven Years War drove a stark distinction between
Catholic tyranny and Protestant liberty into the minds of Americans, as terror of French popery and despotism was combined with
a swell of pride for the rights of British citizens. In the new world
view of Americans, it was England and America, the free Protestant nations, against the squalor, the corruption, the immorality
and slavery of Europe. Much of this separation from Europe was
based not only on the shared religion of England and America,
but also on the British constitution and the rights of British citizens. The British Constitution was seen as what separated British
monarchy from the wanton and uncontrolled tyranny of the rest
of Europe,39 a pride shared by Old Lights and New Lights alike.
Many colonists fondly remembered the Glorious Revolution, the
Protestant revolution against the Stuart King who tried to convert England to Catholicism, as an event central to the identity
of England, as a moment similar to the Seven Years War when
England could have succumbed to Catholic tyranny and did not.
The right to rebel in order to protect their religious freedoms was
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seen as the factor that saved England from a popish plot, and was
likewise a great point of British pride, perhaps as important as
the constitution. As Jonathan Mayhew, a fiery revivalist minister,
declared in a speech against another service in the memory of
Charles I, “Cromwell and his supporters were not, properly speaking, guilty of rebellion; because he whom they beheaded was not,
properly speaking, the king, but a lawless tyrant,”40 since he “would,
probably, have been very willing to unite Lambeth [the center of
London] and Rome.”41 At this point in time, England was viewed
as different from other European monarchies because it did not
have an absolute and arbitrary monarch, and this distinction was
very important to Englishmen before the revolution who did not
see all monarchy as evil. The distinction between absolute and
limited monarchy was especially emphasized because the people’s
right to religion was seen as a freedom that could only be usurped
by an absolute tyrant. The Kings of England could not subject the
people to “civil and ecclesiastical tyranny,” a phrase which was
used very frequently in the 1750s and 1760s, demonstrating how
linked these two concepts were in people’s minds.42 This legacy
of the Glorious Revolution, and pride in the British constitution
made political and religious freedom one quality, an advantage
England had over all of the less-civilized and despotic nations.
The swelling British pride over being Protestant and free
led people to consider it the Christian right, as well as the Christian duty, not to submit to such an absolute monarch. Christians
believed that they could only practice Christianity safely under
a free government, due to a constant, almost conspiracy-theorylike, fear of “an impious bargain struck up betwixt the scepter and
the surplice.”43 It seemed as if any tyrant’s first move would be to
immediately convert the nation to Catholicism.44 Any absolute
monarch was on the side of Catholicism, since any free people
would choose the truth of Protestantism, and absolute monarchy
was associated with the Spanish inquisition and French persecution of Protestants.45 Absolute monarchy also went against God’s
scripture and the teaching that “ye shall not oppress one another.
Leviticus 25, 14.17.”46 But increasingly, there was also a sense that
simply having to obey an absolute monarch and not being able
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to follow one’s own moral judgments went against the inherent
equality of all Christian men, their right to decide the meaning
of the Bible’s teachings and their duty to make their own moral
judgments that Protestantism and the Great Awakening stressed
so strongly.47
But even more radically, the doctrine of complete submission to one ruler was viewed as sacrilegious because of its resemblance to idolatry. In the same way that it would be anti-Christian
for Protestants to submit themselves to the absolute authority of
a Pope, it would be anti-Christian for Protestants to bow to the
absolute authority of a King.48 “The divine right of Kings, and the
doctrine of non-resistance” wrote Jonathan Mayhew, “[is] altogether
as fabulous and chimerical as transubstantiation.”49 To “make the
people believe that Kings had God’s authority” would be an affront to God, since “Christ’s kingdom is not of this world” and it
would be unlawful to “give unto Caesar” the tribute of complete
submission that should be reserved for God.50 Thus, it was not only
unchristian to rob others of their rights, but it was unchristian for
Protestants to allow themselves to be robbed of their rights. To
Mayhew and many others, it was viewed as sacrilege to allow any
monarch to become an absolute ruler and it was seen as their
duty to God to rebel against a monarch who attempted to become
one.51 Mayhew concluded with the ringing words that “it would
be more rational to suppose that if they did NOT resist, than that
they did, would be more likely to receive to themselves damnation.”52
This doctrine in some ways made the religious counterpart to John
Locke’s philosophy that it is acceptable for a people to overthrow a
monarch who becomes despotic, which he developed in response
to the Glorious Revolution as well. Some radicals at the time took
this doctrine to mean that all monarchy was anti-Christian, such
as zealous French author Louis-Sebastian Mercier, who wrote a
novel entitled Memoirs of the Year Two Thousand Two Hundred and
Forty52 in which a man travels to a Utopian future where there is
no Catholicism and the King’s palace has been converted into a
public library.54 The vast majority of Americans in the 1750s and
1760s, however, were proud to be citizens of England, which they
viewed as safe from the despotism of the rest of Europe.55
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However, in the 1760s, as tensions rose between England
and America, England began to lose its standing alongside America
as a free nation. At the end of the Seven Years War (1763), the
British government abruptly ended its policy of salutary neglect
towards the colonies and started taxing them to pay for the war
debts. Americans were initially shocked with this imposition, but
as British attempts to quell American protests escalated and violations of the British constitution piled up, Americans began to worry
increasingly that the British Government was becoming tyrannical.
The King was committing the same crimes of “raise[ing] arbitrary
taxes” and using troops “in order to force more arbitrary taxes
on his subjects” which were previously listed by Mayhew as the
evils of Charles I. On top of that, it seemed as though the British
constitution, which had been the source of so much pride, was
losing its meaning, as the British government denied the colonists
the rights to be free, from forced quartering of troops, to trial by
jury, and ultimately, to representation.56 It seemed as though every
action of the British government dismantled another part of the
constitution that Americans had been so proud of as the factor
that separated England from despotic, anti-Christian nations.
Conspiracy theories about Catholicism now turned to
England, and the American presses were swamped with stories
warning Americans to be on guard against a “prostituted parliament”57 filled with Catholic plots “calculated in its natural tendancy
to subvert the British Constitution…and to substitute in the room
thereof absolute despotism,” as Reverend Joseph Parry wrote in
1775.58 A conspiracy seemed so obvious that the Massachusetts
Provincial Congress declared that “it would be an affront to the
understanding of mankind to adduce proofs in support of it.”59
The movement to establish an Anglican ministry in the colonies
came under particularly harsh criticism60 in 1774 by Jonathan
Parsons, who delivered a sermon entitled “Freedom from Civil
and Ecclesiastical Tyranny” despairing that England attempted
to “forcibly take away the money and property [of the colonist]
to support a minister they cannot conscientiously attend” and
charging them with “spiritual tyranny.”61 All Anglicans, in fact,
came under almost as harsh criticism as Catholics,62 since the
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organized church of England looked all too corrupt and similar
to the organized church of Rome, and in Brunswick the Presbyterian minister Thompson and a number of his followers tracked
down Anglicans and threatened to bury them alive unless they
repented both religiously and politically.63 However, the worst of
the outrage was reserved for actual Catholics, with the Quebec
Act in 1774, which handed over the Canadian territory from the
Seven Years War to the French citizens of Canada rather than to
the Americans. Not only did it seem to Americans that England
did not recognize their hard-won land as their own, but also they
were handing it over to the despotic Catholic enemy.64 Thomas
Paine described the Quebec Act as “popery…in Canada” and denounced it as “but a part of the system of despotism” that England
meant to create.65 With England working to establish a Catholic
presence on the soil of the American continent which the colonists had fought to protect from any sort of despotic corruption
or Catholic influence, it seemed as though a conspiracy between
England and Rome was undeniable.
Throughout 1775 and 1776, tensions between England and
America continued to climb, resulting in actual armed conflict at
the battles of Lexington and Concord. Although the American
government did not officially declare its independence until late
1776, by this point, the popular American opinion had shifted
against England, which Americans now viewed on the same level
as other European nations. The New England preacher Samuel
Sherwood claimed that England “has been…infected and corrupted” and that its levels of tyranny “exceeded…France and other
Popish countries”66 The British declaration of war on America
seemed like the final turning point, especially when England
had so clearly marked their affiliations with Europe rather than
with America by hiring German mercenaries.67 England had
proven their great constitution, which separated them from the
rest of Europe, to be a sham and nothing more, and their shared
Protestantism was not far behind, since fear of a Catholic plot
to enslave America always closely followed fear of despotism.68
Now that nothing set England apart from Europe in the minds
of Americans, they finally saw the New World as the lone island
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of liberty against the entirety of the Old World. Thomas Paine’s
first publication, The Crisis, (1776) premiered with the tide ‘The
Altar of Despotism Is Erected In America and Shall We Be The
Next Victims of Its Lawless Power?”69
As Americans began to see themselves locked in a war
for freedom against all Old World nations, the millennial spirit
of the Seven Years War was reborn as a crusade against all forms
of monarchy everywhere. The fundamental opposition between
unlimited submission to a monarch and Christianity that was set
forth by Mayhew was now extended to all monarchs by Benjamin
Rush who described “a pope in religion [as a] king in power”70
and by Paine who wrote that it was “the most preposterous invention of the devil ever set forth for the promotion of idolatry.”71
Repeated objections were raised against monarchy stemming from
the scripture.72 Paine, along with many clergymen, argued that
“Monarchy is ranked in scripture as one of the sins of the Jews,”
and bemoaned that “The Heathens paid divine honours to their
deceased kings, and the Christian world hath improved on the
plan, by doing the same to their living ones.”73 In the minds of
Americans at that point, there was no possibility of a good monarch, because all monarchs were tyrants. By contrast, democratic
government was seen as the fulfillment of God’s plan, described
by the New Jersey Preacher Abraham Keteltas as “a grand fountain
under God, of every temporal blessing, and what is more important,
it is favorable to the propagation of unadulterated Christianity.”74
Drawing off of the millennial ideas of the Seven Years War, the
Americans saw themselves as champions not only of Christianity,
but also of freedom, who would “lead the world from the vale of
tears, into a paradise of God; whereas oppressive principles…have
filled the world with blood and stupor.”75
The American Revolution actually was seen as a holy war
against the forces of tyranny and Satan. Putting 1760s doctrines
of resistance to complete arbitrary power into action against all
powers more absolute than democratic government, the people
of America now saw it as their Christian duty to defend themselves
from the forces of despotism and to fight for independence against
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England. “Civil Government is an ordinance of GOD” declared
the Reverend Nathaniel Frisk in an attempt to raise troops in
Massachusetts after the battles of Lexington and Concord.76 Just
as Mayhew previously argued that a man who would not defend
his own rights against a tyrant was destined for hell, ministers now
declared that “the man who refuses to assert his right to liberty—
property—and life—is guilty of…high treason against GOD.”77
The atmosphere was filled with the belief that all men possessed
God-given rights, and that he expected men to fight for them.78
In another sermon, Reverend William Sterns urged men to take
up arms against England “lest that curse fall upon us, which fell
upon the dastardly inhabitants of Menoz,” who were condemned
by God for refusing to fight against a tyrant (Judges 5.23).79 In a
letter encouraging her son to fight in the Revolution, a Massachusetts mother Lydia Gray wrote to her son, “I am more afraid
of our sins than of the forces of our enemy,” echoing Mayhew’s
fears that non-resistance is the real sin, and not rebellion.80 However, if instead Americans chose to fight for their rights, they were
seen as being backed by all of God’s power. Not only was there a
huge increase in references to the “New American Israel” and the
American covenant between God and his chosen people,81 but in
some cases, revivalists like Samuel Sherwood actually preached
that “God Almighty, with all the powers of heaven, are on our
side.”82 For Keteltas and many others, the American Revolution
literally meant the coming of the millennium, when “tyranny and
oppression shall be banished from the earth…when universal
love and liberty, peace and righteousness shall prevail…when
Jews shall be brought into the Christian church and…Israel shall
be saved. When the celestial country and the heaven of heavens
shall resound with joy…because the kingdoms of this world are
become the kingdom of our Lord and our Christ.”83 In this way,
the American Revolution was seen as a holy war against the Antichrist of tyranny, fought for and alongside God.
However, this Great Awakening-inspired, revivalist millennialism was not the only Utopian vision in the days leading up to
the American Revolution. At the same time, there was also the Old
Light Enlightenment movement for self-government, influenced
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by the political philosophies of Locke and Montesquieu. As England’s offenses against its own constitution began to pile up, the
upper classes too believed in a British plot to reduce America to
slavery, as evidenced by John Dickinson’s slippery slope argument
in Letter From A Pennsylvania Farmer arguing that English taxation
will only lead to more infringements against American Freedom.
Similarly to the millennialists, the Enlightenment-educated elite
also had a vision of a perfect free society, in which the philosophical
principles of the rights of man, and governments deriving their
just powers from the consent of the governed, could be put into
action in a real society.84 Louis-Sebastian Mercier’s Memoirs of The
Year Two Thousand Four Hundred and Forty, published in 1740 and
reprinted in America in 1772, radiated Enlightenment philosophy, but was also as much a millennialist vision as the predictions
of Johnathan Edwards, since it describes a kingdom of freedom,
contentment and peace in the far future where all virtue is realized. In the novel, Mercier denounced the opulence of Europe,
complaining that “silver and gold” have made philosophy “degenerate.”85 And the secular anti-Catholicism of Mercier’s vision
almost reaches that of the revivalists, since he not only denounced
funeral orations as the organized church serving the state, but
also proclaimed that in the libraries of the perfect society, all the
“ordinances of bishops” would be condemned to flames along
with all books “judged either frivolous, useless or dangerous.”86
Finally, in describing his Utopian society, Mercier related a fact
that “will certainly give great pleasure to every generous mind that
loves justice and hates tyranny”: that “the king’s [palace] belongs
not to him but to the state” and “a pope now sits in the place of
the Caesars! Ignorance and superstition inhabit Athens!”87 Just as
the American Revolution gave a chance for millennialists to fulfill
their destiny of conquering Satan through the defeat of tyranny,
it gave Enlightenment-educated philosophers a chance to fulfill
their secular visions of the defeat of tyranny as well.
In the American Revolution, differences between the Old
and New Lights were cast aside and these two Utopian visions
became one, a merger which is perhaps best demonstrated in
Common Sense. Tomas Paine was educated in England, and heavily
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influenced by Enlightenment philosophy. He was encouraged to
write Common Sense by Benjamin Franklin, who he met through
a mutual friend. The tract makes use of the “plain English”
style that was common at the time (the name is in fact derived
from another term for the style), using common agricultural or
scriptural metaphors and avoiding Latin phrases to make Common Sense much more accessible to the more religious and Great
Awakening-influenced lower classes.88 The pamphlet relates the
Enlightenment principles of government, which it explained in
plain but complete terms, from Locke’s entire philosophy to such
small details of science as the “principle in nature, which no art
can overturn…that the more simple any thing is, the less liable
it is to be disordered.”89 Common Sense demystified these ideas to
the common American by removing them from the context of
exclusively intellectual publications, and presented them in plain
English rather than Latin, as open to the people’s interpretation
as the Protestant Bible. Since so much of the New Light hatred of
Old Lights had been directed at Anglicans rather than Enlightenment deists and rationalists in the past several years, the revivalists
were more willing to throw aside their differences with the elites,
and Common Sense provided the meeting ground.90
But Paine did more than simply bring the ideas of the
Enlightenment and Great Awakening together. He demonstrated
that they both ideas were inspired by the same millennial hope. At
the conclusion of Common Sense, Paine declared “The sun never
shined on a cause of greater worth, ’Tis not the affair of a city, a
county, a province, or a kingdom, but of a continent—of at least
one eighth part of the habitable globe. ’Tis not the concern of a
day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected, even to the end of time,
by the proceedings now.”91 This sense of the American mission
for Independence echoes the civil millennialism of the end of
the Seven Years War. It is the idea that America will bring about
the Millennium not only through religious superiority, but also
through freedom in government and triumph over Catholic tyranny. The mission of the American Revolution framed in Common
Sense tapped into the religious side of millennialism with the idea
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of the battle against monarchy was a crusade against “idolatry” and
that “the Almighty hath…entered his protest against monarchical
government…or the scripture is false.”92 But the civil side of the
millennial argument allowed for overlap with the political idea
that “hereditary succession…is a degradation and lessening of
ourselves [and] claimed as a matter of right, is an insult and an
imposition on posterity”—on its own, also an Enlightenment idea.93
Likewise, the idea that “Every spot of the old world is overrun with
oppression; Freedom hath been hunted round the globe,”94 taps
into the millennial idea of America as the lone beacon of morality in a corrupt and despotic world, but also carries the elites’
same disgust for not only the lack of self-government, but also
the decadence and low morals of Europe that Jefferson described
when he said that a man educated in England would only learn
“drinking, horse racing, and boxing.”95 Finally Paine argues that
“this new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of
civil and religious liberty from EVERY PART of Europe” and that
America must “receive the fugitive, and prepare in time an asylum
for mankind,” a reference to the American religious heritage of
those fleeing religious intolerance, but now applied to civil rather
than religious principles.96 All of these visions of American glory
shared in common the idea that Americans are a chosen people,
set aside from the rest of Europe to embark on a great work, be
that work the construction of a free government unlike anything
that has ever been seen before, or bringing about the millennial
kingdom of Christ.
These millennial visions allowed Americans of all theologies to set aside previous differences and become united under
the banner of the Glorious Cause of self-government and the
American nation. Enlightenment philosophy and Great Awakening Millennialism were combined not only through the vision
that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” but also through the vision
that America was set apart from the cosmos and had some great
duty to fulfill. In the Revolutionary War, Americans took up arms
as a chosen people fulfilling their destiny of bringing greatness
190
Mehitabel Glenhaber
not only to America but also to the entire earth, be that greatness
self-government or the light of true Christianity. They believed
that they were fighting “for the welfare of millions now living,
and for the happiness of millions yet unborn…the whole human
race.”97 They saw themselves ushering the world into a new age
of spirituality and freedom, the like of which the world had never
before seen. As Abraham Keteltas preached, “Eminent Divines
& Celebrated poets have given it as their opinion that America
will be a glorious land of freedom, knowledge, and religion—an
asylum for the distressed, oppressed, and persecuted virtue” and
they were “ready to fight for it and maintain it to the last drop of
[their] blood.”98 It was to this shared destiny as Americans that
Americans of all classes “mutually pledge[d] each other [their]
lives, [their] fortunes and [their] sacred honor,”99 and began the
undertaking of the “very great and wonderful, and exceedingly
glorious” work that was not only American independence, but the
destiny of the American Nation.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Notes
Abraham Keteltas, God Arising and Pleading His People’s
Cause; Or The American War in Favor of Liberty, Against The
Measures And Arms of Great Britan, Shewn to Be The Cause of God,
(Newbury: John Mycall (printer), 1777) pp. 16–17.
2
Eric Foner, Tom Paine and Revolutionary America (New
York: Oxford University Press, 2005) pp. 114–115.
3
Thomas Paine, Common Sense edited by Roland Herder
(Mineola: Dover Publications, 1997) p. 33.
4
Robert Middlekauff, The Glorious Cause: The American
Revolution, 1763–1789 (New York: Oxford University Press,
1982) p. 30.
5
Ibid., p. 9.
6
Nathan O. Hatch, “The Origins of Civil Millennialism in
America: New England Clergymen, War with France, and the
Revolution,” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, Vol.
31, No. 3 (July 1974) pp. 407–430, 18–19.
7
Robert Cushman in American Sermons: The Pilgrims to
Martin Luther King edited by Michael Warner (New York: The
Library of America, 1999) pp. 2–3.
8
John Winthrop in American Sermons: The Pilgrims to Martin
Luther King, p. 42.
9
Christopher M. Beam, Millennialism and American
Nationalism: 1740–1800, Journal of Presbyterian History (1962–
1985) Vol. 54, No. 1, PRESBYTERIANS AND THE AMERICAN
REVOLUTION: AN INTERPRETIVE ACCOUNT (1976)
pp. 182–199, 2; Daniel Putnam, The Christian History, p. 182, in
Hatch, p. 8.
10
Hatch, p. 7.
11
Ibid., p. 8.
12
Beam, p. 2.
13
Jonathan Edwards in Hatch, p. 13.
14
Beam, pp. 3–4.
15
Hatch, p. 7.
16
Middlekauff, p. 30.
17
Kate Cray, 2014, unpublished work.
18
Johnathan Edwards in Hatch, p. 7.
19
Ibid., p. 7.
20
Middlekauff, p. 46.
21
T. H. Breen, American Insurgents, American Patriots: The
Revolution of the People. (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publications. 2010) p. 33.
1
191
192
Mehitabel Glenhaber
Middlekauff, pp. 47–48.
Foner, p. 111.
24
Ibid., p. 111.
25
Hatch, p. 13.
26
After the millennium did not happen immediately after
the summer of 1743, there was a lapse in millennial beliefs
as people lost faith that the world was actually coming to an
end. Several millennialist preachers became rather pessimistic
including the rather disheartened Jonathan Edwards who
griped that “mana grows tasteless and insipid after a year or
two’s enjoyment” and then went on to Scotland to preach that
the seat of Christ would be there and in neither England nor
America, which were both too spiritually dead. His son-in-law,
Aaron Burr, was more optimistic, and became a millennialist
preacher of some note after the Seven Years War.
27
Beam, pp. 4–5.
28
Hatch, p. 12.
29
Ibid., pp. 12–13.
30
Samuel Layden in Hatch, p. 16.
31
John Burt in Hatch, p. 13.
32
Ebenezer Pemberton in Hatch, p. 13.
33
Ibid., p. 13.
34
John Mellen in Hatch, p. 13.
35
Ibid., p. 13.
36
John Burt in Hatch, p. 13.
37
In fact, some people became so invested in this millennial
vision that in a moment of particular passion, Jonathan Mayhew
proclaimed that the next step in American victory would be the
“conquest of Canada.”
38
Hatch, p. 16.
39
Breen, p. 37.
40
Jonathan Mayhew in American Sermons, p. 416.
41
Ibid., p. 418.
42
Hatch, p. 17.
43
Mayhew, p. 419.
44
Breen, p. 255.
45
Hatch, p. 13.
46
Keteltas, p. 7.
47
Breen, pp. 47–48.
48
Foner, p. 80.
49
Mayhew, p. 407.
50
Ibid., pp. 384–385.
51
Breen, p. 251.
22
23
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Mayhew, p. 407.
Which is, for some reason, translated into English as
“Memoirs of the Year Two Thousand Five Hundred.”
54
Louis-Sebastian Mercier, Memoirs of The Year 2500
translated by W. Hooper (London: Pater-Noster Row, 1772),
https://archive.org/details/memoirsofyeartwo02merc/, p. 40.
55
Beam, p. 37.
56
Mayhew, p. 412
57
Letter in the South Carolina Gazette, in Breen, p. 270.
58
Joseph Parry in Breen, pp. 260, 270.
59
Breen, p. 260.
60
Foner, p. 81.
61
Jonathan Parsons, in John Tucker, Remarks on a Discourse
of the Rev. Jonathan Parsons (Connecticut: 1774) p. 6.
62
One such unlucky Anglican was the stamp collector in
Massachusetts who was attacked by a mob of protesters. They
noted that he shared initials with Judas Iscariot, captured him,
and plotted his fate in a mock trial where he was tied up in
the other room with no lawyer for his defense, although they
claimed that he was “virtually represented.”
63
Breen, p. 48.
64
Foner, p. 72.
65
Paine in Foner, p. 72.
66
Samuel Sherwood in Hatch, pp. 23–24.
67
In fact, Jonathan Mayhew in the aforementioned speech
actually lists “rais[ing] with arbitrary taxes into Germany more
foreign troops, in order to force more arbitrary taxes on his
subjects” as one of Charles I’s offenses, nearly 20 years earlier,
in a moment of ironic foresight. Middlekauff, pp. 315–316.
68
Breen, p. 260.
69
Ibid., p. 262.
70
Benjamin Rush in Foner, pp. 113–114.
71
Paine in Foner, p. 81.
72
Foner, p. 81.
73
Paine, p. 9.
74
Keteltas, p. 13.
75
Ibid., p. 11–12.
76
Nathaniel Frisk in Breen, p. 255.
77
Breen, p. 35.
78
Ibid., p. 251.
79
William Sterns in Breen, p. 285.
80
Gray in Breen, p. 35.
81
Hatch, p. 4; and Foner, pp. 114–115.
52
53
193
194
Mehitabel Glenhaber
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
Sherwood in Hatch, p. 2.
Keteltas, p. 18.
Foner, p. 6; and Middlekauff, pp. 47–48.
Mercier, p. 4.
Ibid., pp. 5–9.
Ibid., pp. 43, 60–62.
Foner, p. 81.
Paine, p. 5.
Foner, p. 81.
Paine, p. 18.
Ibid., p. 12.
Ibid., p. 12.
Ibid., p. 33.
Jefferson, Letter to John Banister.
Paine, p. 33.
Keteltas, p. 17.
Ibid., p. 18.
Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence 1776.
Bibliography
Beam, Christopher M. “Millennialism and American
Nationalism: 1740–1800.” Journal of Presbyterian History (1962–
1985), Vol. 54, No. 1, PRESBYTERIANS AND THE AMERICAN
REVOLUTION: AN INTERPRETIVE ACCOUNT (1976),
pp. 182–199.
Breen, T. H. American Insurgents, American Patriots: The
Revolution of the People. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Publications, 2010.
Byles, Mather. “A Discourse on the Present Vileness of the
Body and Its Future Glorious Change By Christ.” In American
Sermons: The Pilgrims to Martin Luther King. Edited by Michael
Warner, New York: The Library of America, 1999, 308–324.
Cushman, Robert. “A Sermon Preached at Plimmoth in New
England December 9, 1621.” In American Sermons: The Pilgrims
to Martin Luther King. Edited by Michael Warner, New York: The
Library of America, 1999, 1–27.
Foner, Eric. Tom Paine and Revolutionary America. New York:
Oxford University Press, 2005.
Hatch, Nathan O. “New Lights and the American
Revolution, a review of The World of John Cleaveland.” Reviews in
American History, Vol. 8, No. 3 (1980): 323–328.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
195
Hatch, Nathan O. “The Origins of Civil Millennialism in
America: New England Clergymen, War with France, and the
Revolution.” The William and Mary Quarterly. Third Series, Vol.
31, No. 3 (July 1974) pp. 407–430.
Keteltas, Abraham. God Arising and Pleading His People’s
Cause; Or The American War in Favor of Liberty, Against The
Measures And Arms of Great Britan, Shewn to Be The Cause of God.
Newbury: John Mycall (printer), 1777. http://digitalcommons.
unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1030&context=etas/.
Mayhew, Jonathan. “A Discourse Concerning Unlimited
Submission and Non-Resistance to Higher Powers.” In American
Sermons: The Pilgrims to Martin Luther King. Edited by Michael
Warner, New York: The Library of America, 1999, 380–421.
Mercier, Louis-Sebastian. Memoirs of The Year 2500.
Translated by W. Hooper. London: Pater-Noster Row, 1772,
https://archive.org/details/memoirsofyeartwo02merc/.
Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: The American
Revolution, 1763–1789. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982.
Middlekauff, Robert. “Why Men Fought in the American
Revolution.” Huntington Library Quarterly. Vol. 43, No. 2 (1980):
135–148.
Paine, Thomas. Common Sense. Edited by Roland Herder.
Mineola: Dover Publications, 1997.
Tucker, John. Remarks on a Discourse of the Rev. Jonathan
Parsons (1774). Rare books room at Boston Public Library.
Winthrop, John. “A Modell of Christian Charity.” In
American Sermons: The Pilgrims to Martin Luther King. Edited
by Michael Warner, New York: The Library of America, 1999,
28–44.
196
Glenhaber
A secret CabinetMehitabel
committee was
appointed to draft the scheme, and in
March 1831 Lord John Russell rose in the House of Commons to move the first
Reform Bill. Amid shouting and scornful laughter he read out to their holders
a list of over a hundred and fifty “pocket” borough seats which it was proposed
to abolish and replace with new constituencies for the unrepresented areas of
the Metropolis, the industrial North, and the Midlands. To the Tories this was a
violation of all they stood for, an affront to their deepest political convictions, a
gross attack on the rights of property. A seat was a thing to be bought or sold like
a house or an estate, and a more uniform franchise savoured of an arithmetical
conception of politics dangerously akin to French democracy. Many Whigs, too,
who had expected a milder measure were at first dumbfounded by the breadth
of Russell’s proposals. They soon rallied to the Government when they saw the
enthusiasm of the country, for the Whigs believed that Reform would forestall
revolution. The Tories, on the other hand, feared that it was the first step on
the road to cataclysm. To them, and indeed to many Whigs, English government
meant the rule, and the duty to rule, of the landed classes in the interests of
the community. A wider franchise would mean the beginning of the end of
the old system of administration by influence and patronage. Could the King’s
Government be carried on in the absence of these twin pillars of authority? It
was not altogether a vain question. After 1832 Britain was to see many unstable
Ministries before the pattern was changed by the rise of disciplined parties with
central organisations and busy Whips.
Radical leaders were disappointed by what they conceived to be the
moderation of the Bill, but in their various ways they supported it. There was
not much in common between them. Jeremy Bentham and James Mill were
philosophical advocates of democracy and middle-class education; William
Cobbett was a vigorous, independent-minded journalist; Francis Place, the tailor
of Charing Cross, and Thomas Attwood, the banker of Birmingham, were active
political organisers. But they were all determined that the Bill should not be
whittled away by amendment and compromise. Agitation spread through the
country. There was no economic crisis to distract public attention from the one
burning issue or to shake the popular belief that an extension of the right to vote
and a redistribution of seats to accord with the Industrial Revolution would cure
all national ills. In the House of Commons the Tories fought every inch of the
way. The Government was by no means sure of its majority, and although a small
block of Irish votes controlled by O‘Connell, leader of the emancipated Catholics,
was cast for Grey, the Bill was defeated. A roar of hatred and disappointment
swept the country. Grey asked the King for a dissolution, and William IV had the
sense to realise that a refusal might mean revolution. The news caused uproar
in the Lords, where a motion was introduced asking the King to reconsider his
decision, but as the shouting rose from the benches and peers shook their fists
across the floor of the House the thunder of cannon was heard as the King left
St James’s to come in person to pronounce the dissolution.
Churchill, Winston (2011-05-01)
A History of the English-Speaking Peoples: A One-Volume Abridgement
(Kindle Locations 11217-11239). Skyhorse Publishing. Kindle Edition.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
Negro League Baseball and Integration
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
The great pitcher Walter Johnson once said: ‘There is a
catcher that any big league club would like to buy for $200,000. His
name is Gibson. He can do everything. He hits the ball a mile. And
he catches so easy he might as well be in a rocking chair…too bad
this Gibson is a colored fellow.’1
Preface
S
ol White, considered by many to be the first historian of
black baseball, once wrote in “no other profession has the color
line been drawn more rigidly than in baseball.”2 Baseball is, and
was, America’s Pastime, and the exclusion of black players from
the Major Leagues in the first half of the 20th century was representative of the discrimination African Americans faced daily
on a national level. During the Jim Crow era, the Negro Leagues
developed as an opportunity for black ballplayers to have a league
of their own. However, the Negro Leagues represented much
more than a place for African Americans to play baseball—they
were a cultural phenomenon, but also a manifestation of the
racial divisions in American society. They were a new source of
entertainment, pride, and wealth in the black community, and a
principal black institution of the time period.
Jacob Graber-Lipperman is a Senior at Hall High School in West Hartford,
Connecticut, where he wrote this paper for Mrs. Devine’s Advanced
Placement U.S. History course inthe 2013/2014 academic year.
198
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
The Negro Leagues produced a group of talented black
players whose skills rivaled those of their white Major League
counterparts, whom they often faced in exhibition matches. The
acceptance shown by their white opponents in such games and the
racial tolerance present in foreign baseball leagues contributed
to the call for integration in the Majors. In addition, the Negro
Leagues thrust the issues surrounding the integration of baseball
to the national forefront and garnered widespread coverage for
racial issues unseen in other sectors of American life. As the Major
Leagues neared integration, questions arose among Negro League
officials about the effects of introducing black players into white
baseball on the Negro Leagues. However, many agreed that the
integration of baseball was a symbolic first step towards propelling blacks into the desegregated workforce as talented and equal
individuals, and transcended the economic and social implications
that integration would have on black baseball. None of this would
have been possible without the rich history of the Negro Leagues.3
Chapter 1—The Birth of the Negro Leagues
The Negro Leagues in History
Before Robert Peterson wrote the book Only the Ball Was
White in 1970, no extensive information about the Negro Leagues
had been published since Sol White’s Official Baseball Guide. White
wrote his short volume in 1907, depicting Negro League baseball in
its early stages. Peterson’s book introduced the public to the stars
of black baseball and the history of the Negro Leagues, drawing
widespread attention to a topic with which most people were not
familiar. Subsequent works, such as John Holway’s Voices from the
Great Black Baseball Leagues, published in 1975, were largely based
on the personal experiences of former Negro Leaguers, many of
whom were still alive during the period. The oral accounts of daily
life in the Negro Leagues offered a glimpse into the segregation
and discrimination that plagued professional baseball during the
Jim Crow era.4
THE CONCORD REVIEW
199
Written in 1983, Donn Rogosin’s Invisible Men: Life in
Baseball’s Negro Leagues documented the important role of baseball in black communities, marking the transition to a new trend
of research on the Negro Leagues. Historians moved away from
focusing solely on Negro League baseball itself, and, instead, began to explore how the Negro Leagues were a reflection of both
African American culture and society. Janet Bruce’s Kansas City
Monarchs specifically analyzed the black institution created by the
highly successful ball club, one that unified Kansas City’s African
American community. More recent works, such as Negro League
Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a Black Institution, written by Neil
Lanctot, outlined the economic and social history of the Negro
Leagues. These later works chronicled both the cultural significance of the Negro Leagues as well as revealing black baseball’s
powerful role in the struggle for integration.5
Baseball and African Americans
Baseball was first played by its modern rules in the late
1840s and developed rapidly from a recreational game into a
popular team sport played in both white and black communities.6
As urbanization trends continued to populate American cities,
professional baseball teams emerged as early as 1870 to provide
industrial workers with a new source of entertainment during
their leisure time. During the 20th century, the sport continued
to grow into the national game it is today, and professional teams
were created in many of America’s major cities.7
In the late 1800s, declining social and economic conditions for Southern African Americans led to the Great Migration
of blacks to Northern states. The movement produced large urban
populations of African Americans in Northern cities, and black
baseball teams soon arose to entertain them.8 Many teams formed
throughout the early years of professional baseball, but the most
famous black club was the Cuban Giants, organized in May of
1885 by Frank P. Thompson. Thompson was a successful “hotelman,” and became a headwaiter during the summer of that year
at the Argyle Hotel in Babylon, New York. In the early days of the
200
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
team, Thompson hired his players to work as waiters at the Argyle
while they were not playing baseball. The Giants soon began to
tour the eastern United States, easily defeating most of their black
competition and besting white teams from the Pennsylvania State
League and the Eastern League in 1885.9 Sol White called the Giants the first professional black baseball team and “marvels of the
base ball world,” attributing this status to the success of the team
throughout its history and the national attention the club drew.10
While Jackie Robinson is celebrated as the first African
American to cross baseball’s color line, several blacks had actually
played alongside whites on professional baseball teams before
Robinson. John “Bud” Fowler was the first African American to
appear in white organized baseball, playing three games in 1878
for a team in Lynn, Massachusetts, a member of the International
Association. In 1884, Moses “Fleetwood” Walker played 42 games
for Toledo of the American Association, and 48 games for Stillwater,
Minnesota in the Northwest League, and was considered the first
African American to play in white Major League baseball.11 Fowler
frequently experienced racial prejudice on the field, and actually
became the first baseball player to wear shin guards in order to
protect himself from opposing base runners attempting to spike
him. Other black players became members of white baseball teams,
including Walker’s brother Welday, Charlie Grant, Pete Hill, Sol
White, Grant Johnson, Ben Taylor, and Frank Grant.12 At the time,
“Jim Crow was not rigidly in place in society as a whole” and the
presence of blacks in white baseball reflected the more tolerable
racial attitudes of the period.13
Segregated Baseball
The short-lived prominence of black players in white baseball was soon threatened by Adrian “Cap” Anson, a player for the
Chicago White Stockings, who on multiple occasions refused to
play against teams featuring black players. A popular ballplayer,
Anson’s objection to integrated baseball led the International
League gradually to stop offering contracts to black players in order
to please its own white players.14 The general racial prejudices in
America also began to transform the overall racial landscape of
THE CONCORD REVIEW
201
the nation during the period. In the 1896 Plessey v. Ferguson case,
the Supreme Court upheld a Louisiana law segregating railroad
cars. The decision gave birth to the Jim Crow laws, barring almost
all African American males from voting in the North and implementing the color barrier in all areas of American life.15
By the late 1890s, black players found it impossible to join
white teams, and professional baseball had been effectively segregated by the “gentleman’s agreement” of Major League executives.
As a result, African American baseball grew substantially around
the turn of the century, and an increasing number of black teams
formed throughout the country.16 Black teams still frequently
played against white teams, and also began to be affiliated with
their own towns and cities, as reflected by the change in team
names from titles such as the Cuban Giants and the Gorhams to
the Philadelphia Giants and Chicago Union Giants.17
Thanks to the efforts of Rube Foster and Edward W. Bolden,
black entrepreneurs also started to attain a greater influence in
black baseball, which had often been controlled by white businessmen who could afford to finance a team.18 Foster had been both
a pitcher and a manager for the Chicago Leland Giants, a black
baseball team. As the team’s manager, Foster strove to maintain an
organized and professional club, purchasing suitable equipment
and clean uniforms for his players and transporting his team to
games in Pullman train cars. Foster built his team’s strategy around
speed, base-stealing, and bunting, tactics that would characterize
the gameplay in the Negro Leagues for years to come.19
The organizational abilities of Foster and Bolden helped
spearhead the creation of the Negro Leagues in the early 1920s, a
time of high profits for black baseball teams. Foster founded the
Negro National League (NNL) composed of mid-western teams,
in 1920, while Bolden established the Eastern Colored League in
1922.20 Foster, aware of the need for an organized professional
black baseball league to push for integration in the Majors, “gave
black baseball dignity and set the standard for things to come.” The
pennant winners of each league competed in an annual Colored
World Series, inaugurated in 1924.21
202
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Despite the early successes of the Negro Leagues, economic
problems in the African American community in the mid-1920s
led to a sharp drop in attendance at games, which reached alltime lows during the Depression era. With the Negro Leagues on
the verge of collapsing, Gus Greenlee stepped in just in time to
save organized black baseball. A successful businessman involved
in the illegal, yet lucrative, numbers lottery business, Greenlee
transformed the Pittsburgh Crawfords into a professional team
during a period when baseball team owners were sustaining heavy
financial losses.22 In early 1933, Greenlee held a meeting among
black baseball executives in which he reorganized the NNL, adding
new franchises to the league, including his Crawfords. Greenlee
was soon elected league chairman, and immediately began implementing new measures to preserve the Negro Leagues. To ease
the financial stress on black clubs, Greenlee shrunk the size of
teams, reduced the salary cap, and lowered ticket prices.23 The
Negro American League (NAL) was created later in 1937, and
both Negro Leagues gradually found the stability and economic
success that helped them prosper for the next decade as segregated institutions.24, 26
Chapter 2—A Separate League
The Negro Leagues, a baseball league that compensated
for the exclusion of black ballplayers from the Major Leagues,
were a predominant Jim Crow era institution. Black baseball featured both outstanding players and high levels of competition,
but its often precarious conditions and shaky economic standings revealed that it was certainly not equal to the white leagues.
While “a team’s extensive travel [and] nearly constant schedule of
games” dictated its professional label, early black teams struggled
to remain organized and affiliated with a league. In the early 20th
century, the substantial migration of African Americans to cities
created racial ghettos and a separate economy for black institutions and businesses. But many Negro League teams still relied on
white businessmen to rent parks for their baseball games. Team
executives also developed relationships with white agents, who
THE CONCORD REVIEW
203
were needed to arrange games with white opponents and control
team schedules, in part because of societal prejudice.27
Black ballplayers experienced segregation and discrimination almost everywhere they traveled, even in Northern states.
Teams frequently struggled on the road to find adequate sleeping accommodations and restaurants that would serve them, and
many other public facilities were not available to any African
Americans at the time.28 Paul “Jake” Stephens, who played in the
Negro Leagues in the early 1920s and 1930s, recalled that his teams
would “stay in any kind of hotel. Many’s the night I’ve stayed at
hotels so cold I wore my baseball uniform in bed. You took what
came. In some towns, they let the horses out of the stables, and
we dressed in the damn stables!”29 John “Buck” O’Neil, who began
his Negro League career in the 1930s, remembered sleeping in
funeral homes with his team and being locked out of restrooms
at filling stations while traveling in the South.30
Chet Brewer, a Negro League pitcher, told a number
of stories about the harsh discrimination he faced on the road.
Once, the owner of a cheap white motel threatened members of
his team with a pistol at two o’clock in the morning before forcing the entire team to leave. Brewer also recalled enduring racist
comments from whites while walking on the street in numerous
cities and visiting a restaurant in Elkhart, Indiana, where his team
was barred from eating inside.31 However, Brewer noted that he
played one summer in Crookston, Minnesota, a location lacking
the typical racial discrimination to which many black players had
grown accustomed. To his surprise, following a service at a white
church, he was enthusiastically greeted by the minister, who told
Brewer about his admiration of black ballplayers. Later on, a local
hotel owner helped him find accommodations for the summer.
Brewer described his rare experience in a racially tolerant atmosphere as “one of the most beautiful summers I lived.”32
Most Negro League teams traveled extensively for both
official and exhibition games in buses. The buses were usually illequipped for the rigorous travel of the baseball teams, and contributed to the often rough conditions Negro Leaguers experienced
204
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
on the road.33 Some of the wealthier Negro League owners could
afford more adequate transportation for their teams. For example,
the Page Fence Giants owned a “sixty-foot long, gilt-ornamented
car,” with its own bathroom, offices, and a room that served as
quarters for sleeping, dining, and sitting. The railroad car also had
a kitchen and a cook, providing the Giants with a luxurious and
comfortable style of travel. Ironically, these accommodations still
reflected the discrimination blacks faced in various communities,
as the car’s accommodations were intended to help the team avoid
segregated facilities almost entirely during travel.34
The economic inequality in black baseball was also clearly
evidenced in the financial dealings of the Negro Leagues. Sol
White estimated that in 1906, the average annual salary for a black
baseball player was $466 compared to $500 for white Minor Leaguers and $2,000 for white Major Leaguers. White declared that the
“disparity in the salary of a major league player and a colored player
is enormous, especially when it is taken into consideration that,
were it not for color, many would be playing in the big league for
$2,000.”35 In 1934, the average monthly salary of Negro Leaguers
increased to $125 and during the 1940s, the most economically
prosperous period for the Negro Leagues, the average monthly
salary jumped to between $500 and $800. This was still a paltry
figure compared to the salaries of Major Leaguers in the 1940s,
who were paid $7,000 a month on average. Black baseball was
never as lucrative as the Major Leagues, causing team managers
to spend less money and only carry about 15 players, while white
clubs usually carried around 25 players.36
At the start of his career, Paul Stephens claimed he made
$150 a month for the Hilldales club in the early 1920s, but was
angered when his monthly salary had only increased a meager $50
a whole eight years later. Believing the team could afford to pay
him more money, he demanded to be traded, and was dealt to
the Homestead Grays in 1929.37 Stephen’s attitude toward changing teams in pursuit of more money was prevalent among many
Negro Leaguers who were unhappy with their salaries. Teams also
often folded due to insufficient funds, and new teams emerged in
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their place, further contributing to the fluid movement of players
between teams. Unlike the Major Leagues, where stricter contracts
were present preventing players from switching teams, the practice of changing teams in the Negro Leagues was a precursor to
modern baseball’s free agency policy, where players are allowed to
sign contracts with any team once their existing contract expires.38
The economic gap between the Majors and the Negro
Leagues was further illustrated in the tactics team executives
employed to appeal to as large an audience as possible. Brewer
remembered how J.L. Wilkinson, the owner of the Kansas City
Monarchs, would give his star pitcher Satchel Paige, 15 percent
“off the top of the gate receipts.” Paige, a talented pitcher and
a Negro Leaguer who received national fame unlike any other
black ballplayer, proved to be such an attraction that he drew
fans to the ballpark of every team for which he pitched.39 O’Neil
mentioned that Wilkinson would rent out Paige to other Negro
League teams that needed to earn more money. Paige would
pitch only a few innings for the teams to which he was leased,
but his services helped teams sell large numbers of tickets for the
individual games in which he was featured.40
Another notable practice in black baseball was “clowning,”
in which players added comedic elements to games in order to
entertain the crowd. After the formation of the Negro Leagues,
professional teams outlawed clowning because it portrayed many
of the black stereotypes of the time period, and more importantly,
removed the aspect of serious competition from Negro League
games. Most famously, a team called the Indianapolis Clowns was
created mainly for this attraction, and proved very successful in
drawing in crowds.41 O’Neil, who clowned while playing for teams
at the start of his baseball career, said “I wore the straw shirt. We
played shadow ball in the infield, without a ball, and pepper ball,
throwing behind your back, like that.”42 Richard “King Tut” King,
a player who made a living while clowning for various baseball
teams throughout his career, is shown wearing a striped outfit
and holding an oversized glove and bat in a photograph taken by
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Ernest Withers, an illustration of some of the antics teams would
use in order to entertain their fans.43
Even during the 1940s, the peak of financial success for
Negro League teams, black teams still rented out big league parks
from white baseball officials. J.B. Martin contended that it was “impossible for [black] clubs to operate unless they play in big league
parks.” Despite not always being available for Negro League teams,
the limited amount of games played in Major League stadiums
drew large numbers of fans, making park rentals an economically
appealing practice for both white and black executives. In 1944,
four black baseball games played at Detroit’s Briggs Stadium drew
85,000 fans, a tenth of the total amount that attended Major League
games in Briggs for the entire season. That same year, numerous other teams played in Major League stadiums as their home
park, including the New York Black Yankees, who rented Yankee
Stadium, the Chicago American Giants, who rented the Chicago
White Sox’s Comiskey Park, and the Cleveland Buckeyes, who
rented the Cleveland Indians’ League Park.44 These new venues
created a vastly different experience for black baseball fans, who
had primarily watched black baseball in smaller Minor League
parks or wooden facilities in the early days of the Negro Leagues.
White fans had also sparsely attended Negro League games in the
past, but games played in Major League stadiums generally drew
numerous white fans to black baseball games. For a doubleheader
in Yankee Stadium played on May 11, 1941, white fans comprised
about 5,000 of the 20,000 total fans in attendance.45
Another significant disparity between the Major Leagues
and the Negro Leagues was the availability of accurate statistics
for black players and teams. Statistics have always been an integral
part of baseball’s culture, a sport that “exhibits an obsession with
abstract, statistical success. Players compete not simply against
each other but against the entire history of baseball through the
archives of statistics and record.”46 However, the statistics for Negro League players prove difficult to confirm for many reasons:
team schedules were inaccurate, many of the games teams played
were not official league games, several different leagues and in-
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dependent teams existed, and many contemporary newspapers
presented contradicting statistics.47 Consequently, the Majors
were more commonly associated with detailed statistics and the
Negro Leagues with popular legends. Tales about Negro League
stars were prevalent amongst fans, for example, “Josh Gibson, it
was said, once hit a ball so high that it fell from the sky across the
country the next day—and into an outfielder’s glove. The umpire
had little choice but to call Gibson out, ‘yesterday in Pittsburgh.’”48
Although at many times inferior to the white Major Leagues
in terms of economic status, the Negro Leagues were still comprised of highly-competitive teams and filled with gifted players.
They were well-known for their gritty style of play, especially the
emphasis on speed and the “bunt-and-run,” popularized by Rube
Foster. Many believed this created a more exciting game of baseball, and “if they played like [the Negro Leaguers] in the majors,
they’d have to make the parks bigger to seat all the fans.”49
Negro League games also became a fixture of black society.
The front pages of black newspapers often featured pictures of
the black ballplayers and articles about black ballgames. Sunday
baseball developed into a staple of urban black culture, and large
black crowds would often travel to baseball games following church
services.50 An Ernest Withers photograph of a Memphis Red Sox
game shows the overflow seating at Martin’s Stadium during an
Easter Sunday game in 1940—rows of fans are visible sitting on
the field all the way around the park due to the high attendance
of the game.51 Negro League games were also a high-class affair
for African Americans, and many blacks would wear their finest
clothes to attend games. Doc Glenn, a Negro Leaguer, remembered
that it “could be 90 degrees out, and a woman would be sitting
there with her back just as straight as could be, and the men were
the same. They’d come to the ballpark in shirts and ties, shoes
shined, looking for women to woo.” The behavior of the fans illustrated that the Negro Leagues had transformed from simply
an athletic institution into a prominent site for social gatherings
where refined culture and respectability among blacks could be
observed.52
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The popularity of the Negro Leagues was displayed in no
better event than in the annual East-West Classic game. Inaugurated
during the 1933 season, the greatest black players were showcased
every year in the all-star game, usually played in Comiskey Park,
the home of the Chicago White Sox. The level of talent on display
in the Classic was so high that the games were covered nationally
in both white and black communities. African Americans from
all over the country traveled to watch the Classic, and the games
displayed an “emerging national identity of African-Americans…
Black sports fans attended by the thousands, and so did black
politicians, celebrities, and elite.” The 1941 game was played in
front of a record crowd of 50,000 fans, an enormous number
for even today’s baseball games. The demand for black baseball
demonstrated its incredible transformation into a cultural sensation: founded as a segregated institution, the Negro Leagues had
developed into a beloved part of black society, and were a remarkable accomplishment in the face of the racial obstacles barring
the participation of African Americans in the Major Leagues.53
Chapter 3—The Latin Leagues and Interracial Exhibitions
Throughout the early 1900s until the end of segregated
baseball, many African Americans chose to play baseball in one
of the many professional leagues in Latin America. In the 1930s
and 1940s, many new Latin professional teams formed, offering
African American and Hispanic players an even greater opportunity
to play year-round in the warm climate. Players eagerly jumped
to teams in Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico,
and Venezuela for both economic reasons and a chance to play
baseball in a less racially charged atmosphere.54 It is often forgotten that prior to 1947, Jackie Robinson’s first season in the big
leagues, Hispanic players did play for Major League teams. But
their presence was more heavily felt in the Negro Leagues, in
which four times as many Hispanic players were featured on the
rosters of black clubs as on those of white teams.55
In the spring of 1944, Willie Wells left the Newark Eagles
of the Negro Leagues to play for a team in Veracruz, explaining
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Not only do I get more money playing [there]…but I live like a king…
I am not faced with the racial problem…I didn’t quit Newark and
join some team in the United States. I quit and left the country…I’ve
found freedom and democracy here, something I never found in the
United States. Here, in Mexico, I am a man.56
Wells’ comments reflected the knowledge among many Negro
Leaguers that less segregation existed in Latin American countries
compared to the harsh discrimination many black ballplayers
experienced in the United States. African Americans were mostly
allowed in the same restaurants and hotels as everyone else in Latin
America. Black players also often found the general atmosphere
of the leagues highly appealing. In the baseball-crazed Hispanic
countries, black ballplayers were portrayed as both heroes and
celebrities, appearing in pictures and articles featured in national
newspapers. Latin American teams played fewer games per week
than most black clubs, leaving the players with more time for
recreational activities in the tropical atmosphere, and traveled
comfortably by train rather than by bus.57 However, racism still
existed in Latin America: blacks were stilled barred from many
high-end clubs, restaurants, and hotels in cities such as Havana,
Santo Domingo, and Mexico City. But in general, African Americans
were affected less by the racism present in Latin America, which
rarely intruded on their professional lives as did the segregation
in the United States.58
Latin American baseball was extremely competitive, and
players such as Jackie Robinson, Larry Doby, Monte Irvin, and
Orestes Miñoso (some of the first blacks to play in the Major
Leagues) perfected their skills while playing for Hispanic clubs.
Wilmer Fields, a pitcher who played in both the Negro and Latin
Leagues remembered, “Not everyone could make it down there
and you better believe if you didn’t produce you didn’t last long.”
Many players believed the intense playing conditions in Hispanic
clubs helped develop their playing abilities, another factor that
made playing in Latin America so alluring for African American
ballplayers.59
The Latin Leagues drew many Hispanic and, remarkably,
several white players away from the Major Leagues. About half
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of the 30 Latino players who made their Major League debuts
between 1935 and 1945 later left the United States to play in the
Mexican Leagues. The Mexican Leagues began recruiting and
signing white players as well, a practice that proved whites would
play alongside African Americans as long as they were paid well.
The desire to play for racially-diverse Hispanic clubs displayed
by these Major Leaguers had profound effects on white baseball,
leading Adrian Burgos to assert that “[t]he most compelling
threat to organized baseball’s Jim Crow practices came from the
Mexican League.” The sudden loss of hold Major League teams
had on some of their players coincided with a time “when white
players started to act on their desire to play integrated baseball,”
generating increased anti-racist sentiment in American baseball
and revealing some of the first cracks in the color barrier.60
But perhaps the most powerful testament to the ability of
blacks to play in the Major Leagues came in the interracial exhibition games between white and black teams, a staple of the popular
barnstorming tours of both Negro and Major League teams and
players. Before the rise of radio and television brought fans everywhere closer to professional baseball, barnstorming was incredibly
popular among the inhabitants of both urban and rural areas in
the early 19th century. Professional and semi-professional players barnstormed across America, playing for traveling exhibition
squads that competed against all types of competition in unofficial
games. Barnstorming was a lucrative business in baseball, drawing
large numbers of local fans to large and small venues alike. Many
white players used barnstorming as a means to earn a little extra
money between paychecks, but for black players, barnstorming
was almost always necessary to bolster their often meager salaries.
Not surprisingly, historian Leslie Nielsen contended that Negro
Leaguers played in more exhibition games than official league
matches.61
Black and white teams had been competing against each
other as early as 1869, when the Philadelphia Pythians defeated a
white team called the City Items.62 The legacy of interracial baseball continued with the Cuban Giants and the Cuban X Giants,
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two prominent traveling black teams that barnstormed frequently
and made a fortune dominating white semi-professional teams in
1896. Discovering the economic benefits of barnstorming and interracial baseball early on, the X Giants embarked on an extended
exhibition tour later that year to play various black and white
teams that emerged as potential competition.63 Once the Major
League baseball season ended in October, white barnstorming
teams featuring Major Leaguers often played black teams featuring Negro Leaguers. Black players faced the likes of Ty Cobb and
Babe Ruth, two renowned Major Leaguers and national icons, in
exhibition games, and played in venues from California to Cuba.64
In Philadelphia in 1920, a crowd of 10,000 witnessed the
black Atlantic City Bacharach Giants defeat a white team comprised of Ruth and several other major leaguers 9–4. Ruth spent
his Baltimore childhood in close contact with kids of every race,
and throughout his career the “Bambino” was known to respect
his opponents no matter their ethnicity. His enthusiasm for interracial play opened the door for Jay Hanna “Dizzy” Dean and Bob
Feller, the two Major League players who impacted black baseball
the most. Over the course of the 1930s and 1940s, the pair faced
off against Satchel Paige, the legendary Negro League pitcher, in
a series of high profile exhibition games that garnered national
coverage for black baseball.65
In Oxford, Nebraska in 1933, 6,800 fans witnessed the
first game between a barnstorming team featuring Dean and
black competition. Dean led a group of Major Leaguers against
several of J.L. Wilkinson’s Kansas City Monarchs. Although he
was advertised to pitch in the game, Paige did not appear, and
the Monarchs fell 4–5 despite a solid outing from Chet Brewer.
After the game, the Standard’s front page article was titled “K.C.
Monarchs bow to the inevitable,” referencing the expectation for
whites to easily defeat black competition at the time.66
In later games, Paige often headlined the all-star exhibition teams of Negro Leaguers, and successfully pitched in many
games against Dean and Feller. All three were exceptional pitching
talents, and games between their teams were highly-competitive.
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Typically manning smaller rosters, usually carrying fewer pitchers
and catchers, black teams were still able to accumulate many wins
against various white teams.67 Although the results of exhibition
games are sometimes questionable and difficult to trace, John
Holway stated in the PBS series Baseball that black teams won 266
of 432 of the interracial games he documented. In Black Writers/
Black Baseball, Jim Reisler declared comparable figures, claiming
black teams won 269 of 445 games he compiled.68 Even in an era
where segregation continued to define the Major Leagues, interracial exhibitions forced racial politics onto “the ostensibly fair
ground of athletic competition,” a level playing field where the
ability of black athletes could be clearly judged against that of
their white counterparts.69
A 1942 interracial exhibition game played at Wrigley Field,
a stadium that typically barred blacks from attending games, drew
a crowd of 30,000 fans, 20,000 of whom were African Americans.
The enormous crowd displayed the tremendous popularity of
interracial exhibitions and foreshadowed the calls for integration
that would soon emerge in the Majors. The Monarchs, featuring
future hall-of-famers Paige, Hilton Smith, Willard Brown, and
Frank Duncan, squared off against a Dean-led “all-star” team and
won 3–1. Despite the “all-star” label, Dean’s team was comprised
of less talented players than the name suggested. Nonetheless, the
Monarchs’ victory in front of a large crowd in a racially-restricted
stadium was an important and highly publicized accomplishment
for black baseball.70
Barnstorming and interracial competition met a strong
enemy in Major League Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis,
one of the staunchest opponents of integration. The Commissioner
set regulations on the number of games Major Leaguers could
play against black teams, and refused to allow Major Leaguers to
wear their team uniforms in exhibition matches or barnstorm before the World Series was over.71 Another opponent of interracial
baseball was Colonel Tillinghast L’Hommedieu “Cap” Huston,
the co-owner of the Yankees. Huston once told the New York Times
to think of the repercussions of “several teams of major leaguers
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losing farcical contests to colored teams. Either they ought to quit
playing or at least draw the color line.” Both men recognized the
bold statement of interracial exhibitions against segregation, and
their hatred towards barnstorming further confirms interracial
baseball’s contributions to integration.72
The remarkable on-field exploits of Paige, Dean, and
Feller would cement their place in baseball lore, and the close
relationship between Dean and Paige remains one of baseball’s
great stories. Similar to Ruth, Dean respected all black athletes,
especially players of Paige’s caliber and reputation. After the game
at Wrigley, Dean declared “[Satchel] Paige is the greatest pitcher
I’ve ever seen.”73 To hear a brilliant pitcher and one of America’s
most beloved athletes praise a black player in this manner was
astounding at the time, and as one of the leading proponents for
integration amongst Major League players, Dean went as far to
say the “big leaguers [who] believed that they were better than
the best Negro players…had another thought coming.”74 Author
Timothy Gay celebrated their accomplishments superbly, claiming “Paige, Dean, and Feller attracted hundreds of thousands of
enthusiastic and, in the main, accepting Americans of both races…
Their exhibitions helped puncture baseball apartheid; they went
a long way toward making the game a national pastime.”75
Chapter 4—The Black Press
One of the first attacks on baseball’s racial barrier came
from Westbrook Pegler, a white journalist who wrote for the Chicago
Tribune. In an article published in 1931, Pegler challenged the
notion that baseball could ever be considered America’s Pastime,
as it was the only major American sport that barred blacks from
playing. Pegler cited the participation of blacks in football, basketball, and track, and questioned baseball fans for not protesting
the segregation of baseball teams, especially since no official discriminatory rule existed in the Major Leagues. In 1933, Heywood
Broun and Jimmy Powers, both white New York sportswriters,
addressed a group of baseball writers at an annual dinner. Broun
told the audience that there was no reason that blacks should be
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excluded from Major League baseball, while Powers interviewed
several baseball officials from various teams about their stance on
integration before presenting their responses. The stand by these
writers opened the door for the Pittsburgh Courier and other black
newspapers to begin the “concerted drive to see that the color line
was dropped in the National Game.”76
At the time, the Courier was the most widely circulated black
newspaper in America and retained an enormous influence in
the black community. In 1933 alone, 46,000 copies of the Courier
were distributed, and that number rose to about 260,000 (nearly
100,000 more newspapers than the next-closest competitor) in
1945, the year Jackie Robinson signed with the Dodgers. The
newspaper published editorials and full-length articles targeting
figures such as Major League Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain
Landis and the managers and owners of Major League teams,
and featured interviews of both white ballplayers and executives.
The Courier expressed a highly radical position on the integration
of baseball by pushing for not only desegregation, but for the
complete equality of black players once they entered the Major
Leagues. The paper continued its assaults constantly from 1933
up until the end of the 1940s, assuming a leading role in the call
for the integration of the Majors.77
The Courier also covered the Negro League East-West Classic
and various interracial contests in order to publicize the talent of
African American players. Inaugurated in 1933, the Classic was an
excellent showcase for black ballplayers on a national stage. The
games were widely covered by both the black and white press, and
newspapers such as the Courier energetically endorsed the abilities
of the Negro League stars. Black newspapers noted the success of
Negro Leaguers against white players in exhibition games even
more, headlining victories by the Kansas City Monarchs and the
Pittsburgh Crawfords over Dizzy Dean’s team of barnstormers in
October of 1934. The Courier featured positive comments and
praise from the white players about their black opponents, hoping to spread the anti-racist views of many white Major Leaguers.78
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Black newspapers also signified a strong departure from the
content of typical white newspapers, which established baseball as
a source of joy and recreation during the Depression years. Instead
“the black press politicized and redefined the ‘national pastime’
through the critical discourse of racial oppression,” and focused
on baseball as a symbolic representation of Jim Crow policies in
America. The Courier covered other important contemporary topics as well, such as communism, lynching, and international news
in the 1930s and 1940s, and was part of a much larger anti-racist
conversation outside of baseball alone.79
Perhaps the most important sportswriter from the black
press was Wendell Smith. Smith had been a baseball player in his
youth, and experienced the effects of segregation firsthand while
traveling with his teams. Smith began to write for the Courier when
he was 23. In his very first article for the Courier in May of 1938,
Smith immediately detached himself from what he believed to be
the newspaper’s conservative views concerning the integration of
baseball. The young writer called for a boycott of Major League
games by African American fans, who Smith believed should refuse to support and uphold an institution “that places a bold ‘not
welcome’ sign over its thriving portal.” Instead, he encouraged
blacks fervently to support Negro League teams, which he claimed
did not receive enough attention from their fanbases. He recommended the boycott and various other protesting strategies as forms
of “racial self-help and self-organization,” a means for attaining
both racial pride and unity that would aid the fight to desegregate
baseball and other segregated institutions in the future.80
That December, in the midst of increased German aggression in Europe and the events of Kristallnacht, Smith wrote that the
Major Leagues played “the same game as Hitler. They discriminate,
segregate and hold down a minor race, just as he does. While Hitler
cripples the Jews, the great leaders of our national pastime refuse
to recognize our black players.” His writing was clearly polarizing,
and intended to garner the support of white Americans by painting Commissioner Landis and other Major League executives
as the common enemies of all Americans.81 Other integration
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movements during the war included the NAACP’s “Double V”
campaign, which expressed the desire for a victory against fascism abroad to be coupled with a victory against racism at home.
The war had further agitated the black public, which was furious
that black soldiers could fight for their country against the Axis
powers but were still treated unequally in America’s democracy.
World War II increased the public sentiment for civil rights, and
the integration of baseball especially was gaining increasing public
interest during the time period.82
The Courier and other black newspapers frequently featured
interviews with individuals associated with the Major Leagues.
Interviewers pressured both players and executives to express a
concrete opinion regarding integration, and their often solicited
views were publicized to further the case for integration. For example, in February of 1933, the President of the National League,
John Heydler, was quoted in the Courier claiming that “[b]eyond
the fundamental requirement that a Major League player must
have unique ability and good character and habits, I do not recall
one instance where baseball has allowed either race, creed or color
to enter in the question of the selection of its players.” Heydler
would never have offered openly racist comments, and his evasion of the race question helped expose some of the hypocrisy of
baseball’s racial policies.83
Between July 15 and September 2 of 1939, the Courier published a series of Smith interviews of eight managers and 40 players from the National League under the title “What Big Leaguers
Think of Negro Baseball Players.”84 The pieces were considered
“revolutionary” for their in-depth analysis and exposure of the big
leaguers’ opinions. Smith cornered his subjects in Major League
locker rooms as well as in team hotels and asked the players and
coaches to express their stance on integration. His reporting forced
the subjects of his interviews to choose a clear side, and Smith
“extracted, molded, and publicized” their opinions in his articles.
The project reflected the Courier’s larger strategy of aligning with
the white community’s views on controversial race topics, and
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similar to past interviews, such as the one with Heydler, many of
the subjects declined to express any of their potential prejudices.85
Of all the subjects of Smith’s interviews, only Paul “Daffy”
Dean was uncooperative. Smith wrote the following about his conversation with Dean: “He did not submit to our questions willingly
or graciously…He stared at us for a moment, ignoring our offer
to shake hands and said rather curtly, ‘Naw, I don’t wanna’ talk to
ya’!’…‘Hell,’ he asked suddenly, ‘kain’t ya see I’m busy!’” Smith
manipulated Dean’s speech for the purposes of his article and
presented it in dialect, while for players who expressed their support of integration, he polished the language of their comments.
These revisions demonstrated Smith’s brilliance as a writer as well
as one of main strategies of the black press, to present integration as a common and respectable opinion for white Americans.86
To further align its views with those of “socially conscious White
Americans,” the Courier commended the efforts of whites who
fought for the integration of baseball. The newspaper praised New
York State Senator Charles Perry for voicing his disapproval of
segregation of baseball within the state legislature in 1939, Jimmy
Powers for his pro-integration views published in his Daily News
column, and the New York Trade Union Athletic Association in
1940 for expressing its desire to integrate baseball.87
The Courier also directly attempted to promote the services of black ballplayers to Major League teams. In, 1937, Ches
Washington, a sports editor for the paper, wrote to the manager
of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Pie Traynor, declaring that the formula
for creating a winning ball club could be found in the form of
Negro Leaguers Josh Gibson, Buck Leonard, and Ray Brown of
the nearby Homestead Grays and Satchell Paige and “Cool Papa”
Bell of the Pittsburgh Crawfords. In 1938, William Benswanger,
the owner of the Pirates, told the Courier that Negro Leaguers were
talented enough to play in the Majors, leading the paper to declare
that Benswanger would conduct tryouts for the black ballplayers.
However, after some confusion involving claims also made by
the Communist Party’s newspaper, the Daily Worker, Benswanger
ended up not holding the highly-profiled tryouts. Benswanger’s
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Jacob Graber-Lipperman
tentativeness for possibly breaking the color barrier prompted
Smith to call the owner “baseball’s number one phony.”88
Smith and the Courier found more success dealing with
Branch Rickey, the President and General Manager of the Brooklyn
Dodgers. Rickey recognized the “more open racial atmosphere”
in Brooklyn, compared to what he had observed while serving as
an executive for the St. Louis Cardinals, and was eager to recruit
black talent.89 On April 17, 1945, Smith attended a press conference devoted to Rickey’s involvement with the upstart United
States League, a competitor to the existing NNL and NAL that
would allow Rickey to scout black players for the Dodgers. Following the conference, Smith privately conversed with Rickey
and asserted that Robinson was suited both mentally and physically for integrating the Majors. Smith’s confidence in Robinson
persuaded Rickey to thoroughly investigate Robinson’s potential
and eventually sign him. Robinson later expressed his gratitude
to Smith for recommending him to the Dodgers’ President in his
autobiography I Never Had It Made.90
That year, the Courier sent Smith to cover the Dodgers’
Spring Training in Florida. The writer documented the success
of Robinson throughout the camp, but also noted the discrimination he observed and the segregated stadiums Robinson played in,
often with limited colored seats. Smith thanked Branch Rickey for
taking a chance on Robinson and applauded his efforts to combat
the discrimination Robinson faced in his writing. Continuing his
dedication to the future Dodger, Smith followed Robinson into
the minor leagues, recording the homerun Robinson hit in his
first appearance with the Montreal Royals: “The ball…glistened
brilliantly in the afternoon sun as it went hurtling high and far
over the leftfield fence.”91
Throughout its history, the black press had been instrumental as both the principal outlet for protest in the black
community as well as a leading voice to unify African Americans.
Black newspapers relentlessly attacked the prominent racial issues
existing in America and promoted progressive ideas hoping to
uplift the position of African Americans in society. As the segre-
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gation of baseball developed into one of the most controversial
and highly-publicized racial issues in the 1930s and 1940s, the
black press assumed an integral role in the breaking down of the
color line in the Major Leagues. The Negro Leagues provided the
black press in many ways with factual evidence about the athletic
capabilities of black players, and the struggles of African American
athletes inspired writers to fight for integration in a predominant
American institution. Revolutionary changes in society are often
preceded by protest, and the efforts of Wendell Smith and Courier,
as well as other black newspapers, were crucial for instituting the
integration of baseball.92
Chapter 5—The Controversy of Integration
World War II was a time of economic prosperity in the black
community, as African Americans found new job opportunities in
the expanded wartime economy. With more money to spend on
recreational activities, African Americans “eager for entertainment”
flocked to Negro League ballparks to enjoy baseball games. As a
result, both the NNL and NAL enjoyed periods of good profits
and aimed to continue their success in the future. But at the same
time, the supposed war for global democracy had aroused anger
in the black community due to the still prevalent racial oppression in America, increasing resentment among African Americans
towards all forms of segregation, including segregation in professional baseball.93
The times were also changing within Major League Baseball itself. Commissioner Landis, long an opponent of integrating
the Major Leagues, died in November of 1944. He was succeeded
by Kentucky Senator Albert “Happy” Chandler, who unlike his
predecessor, maintained a more open attitude toward the possibility of integration. In an interview with Courier journalist Ric
Roberts, Chandler stated, “If [African Americans] can fight and
die in Okinawa, Guadalcanal, in the South Pacific, they can play
baseball in America…and when I give my word you can count
on it.” Contrary to the evasive approaches taken by many league
executives during the time period, Major League baseball’s new
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leadership signaled a changing atmosphere regarding the race
issue it had long avoided.94
Mounting pressure to integrate baseball also came from
the political sphere, as integration became a prominent political
issue. In New York State alone, New York City Councilman Ben
Davis pushed for the integration of baseball, a delegation urged
the three Major League teams from New York not to discriminate
based on race, and New York Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia created
the Mayor’s Committee on Baseball supporting the integration of
the Majors. Interestingly, many considered the Mayor’s actions to
be just an attempt to garner more votes from African Americans.
These conclusions supported the notion that baseball’s racial policies had grown from purely a baseball issue into a topic of national
conversation, and the area where American racial relationships
were most prominent.95
However, integration was not unanimously supported in
the black community. The Jim Crow era had produced a number of separate institutions for African Americans as a means to
provide blacks with opportunity and acceptance. The complete
integration of American society threatened the existence of black
newspapers, banks, hospitals, schools, and numerous other black
institutions, as well as the African American employees who relied
on the separate institutions for their jobs. In a segregated society,
black institutions were a source of both racial pride and success,
and African Americans were reluctant to abandon them.96 Buck
O’Neil noted that the integration of baseball and other black
institutions “was the end of so many black things…the Braddock
[Hotel], they couldn’t compete with the Waldorf, or the other
places, now Duke Ellington can go to the Waldorf to stay. So it
killed off a lot of things.”97
The integration of baseball also met opposition within the
Negro Leagues. The wartime economy had bolstered the profits of
the Negro Leagues, which emerged as a lucrative business for black
owners. J.B. Martin asserted that every NAL team was profitable
during the war, the most successful being the Kansas City Monarchs.
The franchise earned $200,000 total in the years between 1942
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221
and 1945 and almost $60,000 alone in 1946, an unprecedented
mark for Negro League teams. NNL teams such as the Newark
Eagles and Baltimore Elite Giants set new attendance records in
the war years. Many Negro League executives recognized that
integration would jeopardize the economic stability the war years
had produced for black baseball, and consequently maintained a
position against integrating the Majors.98
Thus, many Negro League owners were infuriated when
the Brooklyn Dodgers announced the signing of Jackie Robinson
in October of 1945, after an agreement between team President
and General Manager Branch Rickey and the young Negro League
star. Thomas Baird, the owner of the Monarchs, and Effa Manley,
the owner of the Newark Eagles, protested Rickey’s disregard
for Robinson’s contract with the Monarchs, his former Negro
League team.99 Following the Dodgers’ signing of pitcher John
Wright in 1946 from the Homestead Grays’ owner Cum Posey
labeled Rickey a “thief and robber.” He later wrote in a letter to
Commissioner Chandler, “We are glad to see our players get the
opportunity to play in white baseball…We are simply protesting
the way it is done.”100
Another surprising opponent of integration was the great
Satchel Paige. Paige contended his uneasiness about the racial
abuse black ballplayers might face in the Majors, stating “[writers]
keep on blowing off about getting us players in the league without
thinking about our end of it…without thinking how tough it’s
gonna be for a colored ball player to come out of the club house
and have all the white guys calling him ‘n____r.’” Yet Paige may have
been hesitant to support integration due to his affluent position
in black baseball. Paige earned more money in the Negro Leagues
than many Major League players did at the time, and was quick
to protect the leagues in which he had attained national fame.101
But for most black ballplayers, the Major Leagues still represented
the pinnacle of American baseball competition. Despite years of
segregation, the Majors remained a place where African American
players wanted to play, in hopes of earning higher salaries, playing
against some of baseball’s top competition, and receiving national
222
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
fame. Bob Griffith, a pitcher for the Black Yankees, once said “I’d
be tickled pink to get a chance [to play in the Majors]…You don’t
know how it is for us fellows, always on the outside looking in.”102
Just as the owners had predicted, as Robinson’s celebrity
rose, interest in the Negro Leagues began to wither. Negro League
owners attributed the declining attendance at games to a heightened interest in the Major Leagues by black fans. At the Dodgers
home opener in 1947, 14,000 of the 25,000 fans in attendance
were black. Black fans from all over the country traveled to watch
Robinson play against other National League teams in integrated
ballparks, including Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Chicago. Robinson’s
first appearance in Wrigley Park in Chicago drew more fans than
a NAL game being played in nearby Comiskey Park that day.103
As a product of segregation, African Americans had “generated an alternate public sphere in the ‘Negro Leagues,’” and
many were unwilling to abandon what had become a beloved
part of black culture. However, at its roots, black baseball was the
product of segregation, and the downfall of the Negro Leagues
was a significant step towards advancing the position of African
Americans in American society.104 An Ernest Withers photograph
depicting a fight between the Memphis Red Sox and the Indianapolis Clowns beautifully illustrates the Negro League’s position
within Jim Crow America. The picture shows both black players
and black umpires milling around after the brawl, with two white
security guards present who had been summoned to maintain order.105 The presence of white security guards at baseball games was
intended to prevent fights and supervise the crowd, a small scale
representation of the “white power structure” in Memphis which
permitted black baseball to exist in the city. The Negro Leagues
had always resided within the confines of the racial segregation
and discrimination in America: “The sport…was played in a segregated stadium in a segregated part of town in a segregated city,
state, nation: diamonds within diamonds.”106
In a report filed by Mayor La Guardia’s Committee on
Baseball that was published in November of 1945, the committee
THE CONCORD REVIEW
223
expressed its opinion on the Negro Leagues’ status as a Jim Crow
institution:
If the equity of Negro professional baseball clubs was never to be disturbed, [integration] could never be accomplished and the onus of
present Jim Crow practices would be placed on Negroes themselves.
Thus, a practice which arose because of an evil would become the
reason for its perpetuation.107
The Committee argued that the integration of baseball, and the
inevitable dissolution of the Negro Leagues, was a necessary step
towards weakening Jim Crow policies. The report also noted the
success of African Americans in other sports, such as track, boxing,
football, and basketball. The accomplishments of black athletes,
such as track star Jesse Owens and boxer Joe Louis, had already
won over the hearts of fans even in the white community. The
report asserted that the athletic abilities of African Americans
were clearly equal to those of whites and that the two races had
previously demonstrated they could play together, and called for
baseball to disband its exclusion of black players on the basis of
sportsmanship and morality.108
Losing hope that the Negro Leagues could co-exist with an
integrated Major League, Negro League officials Tom Wilson and
J.B. Martin met with Commissioner Chandler and several other
baseball executives to discuss a possible affiliation between black
and white baseball on January 17, 1946.109 Controversy ensued after
the meeting, with Chandler asserting the Negro League owners
favored “keeping their own boys…they expect those boys to want
to stay in their own class.” Martin denied Chandler’s allegations,
claiming his intentions were to “place the Negro Leagues in organized baseball in order that our players would have a greater
opportunity for advancement.”110 But with Robinson now a member of the Major Leagues, the black community, which began to
increasingly support the complete integration of American society,
viewed Martin’s position as harmful towards racial advancement.
Many African Americans considered affiliation another form of
segregation, with one fan commenting that “we need more Jackie
Robinsons instead of a segregated Negro League.”111 Rather than
becoming affiliated, the Negro Leagues began to serve as a type
224
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
of farm system for black talent for Major League baseball. Teams
hiring Negro Leaguers soon became a common practice, such as
the signing by the New York Giants of Willie Mays from the Birmingham Black Barons and Ray Dandridge, Dave Barnhill, and
Ray Noble from the New York Cubans. The latter three players
were traded for a combined $20,000.112
In the end, the integration of baseball proved disastrous
for the Negro Leagues, draining the wealth of talent from black
baseball and diverting the African American fan base to the Majors. Despite its negative effects, Buck O’Neil later expressed the
necessity of integration, stating, “it was a price to pay, and we payed.
[Integration] should’ve happened long ago…it shouldn’t have
been that segregated in the first place.” Integration was the end
of black baseball, but it was a significant step towards progress and
equality for all African Americans that transcended the individual
interests of the Negro League community.113
Chapter 6—The Legacy of Integration
When Jackie Robinson signed with the Dodgers, the
American Armed Forces and American schools had not yet been
desegregated, Congress had neglected to pass anti-lynching laws,
and no Civil Rights legislation had been enacted. At the time, few
could have predicted that the integration of baseball would open
the door for many of these monumental advances for African
Americans.114
But upon his entry to the Major Leagues, Jackie Robinson
emerged as both a phenomenal ballplayer and a symbol for all
African Americans. Considering the national attention Robinson
was receiving, Wendell Smith wrote that the Dodger rookie carried “the hopes, aspirations, and ambitions of thirteen million
black Americans heaped on his broad, sturdy shoulders.”115 The
Michigan Chronicle wrote that the American public would celebrate
Robinson “despite the popularity of color prejudice” due to its
“ingrained sense of true sportsmanship.” The paper continued to
write that the public’s exposure to Robinson would combat racial
prejudice, claiming
THE CONCORD REVIEW
225
The people who go to baseball games do not, in the main, go to
lectures on race relations, nor do they read pamphlets about goodwill. The millions who read box scores very likely have never heard
of George Washington Carver. But Jackie Robinson, if he makes the
grade, will be doing a missionary work with these people that Carver
could never do. He will be saying to them that his people should have
their rights, should have jobs, decent homes and education, freedom
from insult, and equality of opportunity to achieve.116
The integration of baseball brought the spotlight of racial issues
onto the nation’s pastime, where racial equality could easily be
judged by the performance of black players and where coverage
of the accomplishments of African Americans would be highly
publicized.
Robinson also toured the South with the Dodgers during
spring training in 1949. The team played several games in Florida
before entering Georgia, the “stronghold for the Ku Klux Klan”
and an area where segregation still dominated society in the
racially-charged South. Yet, Robinson’s successes in these games
reflected a slowly changing attitude among whites towards blacks
in the South. Eager to witness the talented Dodgers, featuring
Robinson and fellow black teammates Don Newcombe and Roy
Campanella, Southern communities “toppled like dominoes in
their acceptance of interracial competition.” The behavior of
Southern fans signified a decline in Jim Crow’s grip on American
society during the period, and indicated that fans everywhere
recognized the remarkable talent of black ballplayers.117
Robinson won the National League Rookie of the Year in
1947, batting .297, scoring 125 runs, stealing 29 bases, and hitting
12 home runs. His remarkable feats were achieved despite intense
racial prejudice. Robinson had to endure verbal abuse from the
fans, opposing pitchers throwing at him, and runners attempting
to spike him.118 Robinson displayed an incredible talent and mental
toughness in his initial years in the league, cementing his legacy as
one of baseball’s most revered players, and was inducted into the
Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962. His number, 42, is the only retired
number in the MLB, and every April, every MLB player wears the
number 42 on their uniforms for a day in honor of Robinson.119
226
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
The Negro Leagues, losing players to the Majors and white
minor leagues, as well as Latin American teams, struggled to survive
in the years following integration. In 1961, the famed East-West
game, played at Yankee Stadium that year, drew only 7,245 fans.
Professional black baseball soon disbanded entirely, unable to
compete with the now integrated Major Leagues. Black teams continued to barnstorm, with the Indianapolis Clowns finally folding
in the 1980s. While the heyday of the Negro Leagues during the
1940s had long passed, integration gave way to future generations
of black ballplayers in the Majors.120 Many storied Negro Leaguers received the opportunity to play in the Major Leagues, from
Robinson to Satchel Paige, Monte Irvin, Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks,
and Larry Doby, all of whom are now Hall of Famers. Older Negro Leaguers who were unable to enter the Majors, such as Rube
Foster and Josh Gibson, were still elected into the Hall of Fame
for their accomplishments in the Negro Leagues.121
Despite its tragic ending, the Negro Leagues represented
opportunity and triumph for African Americans in the segregated
setting of Jim Crow America. Blacks demonstrated incredible
resilience in the face of racial oppression to organize a separate
league in which black athletes could demonstrate their athletic
ability and form an institution that became a cornerstone of black
culture. The Negro Leagues, similar to the numerous other black
institutions engendered by segregation, were a temporary solution
to the exclusion of blacks from the professional baseball leagues.
But black baseball evolved into so much more. The Negro Leagues
produced many great athletes, some of whom received the opportunity to finally enter the Majors. They also became a significant
source of pride for blacks, a testimony to racial oppression that
segregation would not be tolerated by African Americans and that
equality could eventually be achieved. The Negro Leagues brought
blacks closer to the same playing field as whites, and allowed
interracial exhibition matches to occur. They provided the black
press with a national symbol to rally around, a sport that defined
America that could be turned into a national call for equality.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
227
The fact that integration in baseball preceded that of the
general American public signifies the amazing ability of sports
to both unify and shape society. Without the Negro Leagues, the
integration of baseball would never have arisen as an important
issue of the period, one that reflected the racial atmosphere of
America as a whole. However, the presence of black baseball embodied the segregated society of the time period. The downfall of
the Negro Leagues joined black and white players on Major League
teams and brought more and more black fans into Major League
ballparks. Once the American Pastime was no longer separated
on the basis of race, two divided communities joined together and
came closer to seeing each other as equals.
Buck O’Neil, who never played in the Majors, became
the first black coach in the MLB with the Cubs in 1962. Despite
being barred from the Majors during his playing career, O’Neil
was famous for expressing his lack of bitterness,122 instead focusing on the opportunities he found playing in the Negro Leagues:
“Born too soon? Forget it…I played with the greatest ball players
in the world, and I played against the greatest ball players in the
world. I saw this country and a lot of other countries, and I met
some wonderful people…‘I was born right on time.’”123 O’Neil’s
celebration of the Negro Leagues represents the importance of
remembering the history of both an amazing story in the world of
sports, and an institution that would change the racial landscape
of America.
228
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Notes
Walter Johnson, quoted in Kadir Nelson, We Are the Ship:
The Story of Negro League Baseball (New York: Hyperion, 2008)
back cover.
2
Sol White, Sol White’s History of Colored Base Ball, With
Other Documents on the Early Black Game, 1886–1936 (Lincoln:
University of Nebraska Press, 1995) p. 74.
3
Lawrence D. Hogan, Shades of Glory: The Negro Leagues and
the Story of African-American Baseball (Washington, D.C.: National
Geographic, 2006) pp. 339, 343.
4
Jules Tygiel, foreword to Shades of Glory: The Negro Leagues
and the Story of African-American Baseball, by Lawrence D. Hogan
(Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 2006) p. xiv.
5
Ibid., pp. xv–xvi.
6
Hogan, p. 7.
7
Neil Lanctot, Negro League Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a
Black Institution (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
2004) p. 3.
8
Ibid., p. 4.
9
Hogan, pp. 21–23.
10
White, pp. 8, 12.
11
Hogan, p. 43.
12
Kadir Nelson, p. 2.
13
Hogan, p. 44.
14
Ibid., pp. 62–63.
15
Ibid., p. 44.
16
Nelson, p. 3.
17
Hogan, p. 65.
18
Lanctot, pp. 4–5.
19
Nelson, pp. 5, 9.
20
Lanctot, pp. 4–5.
21
Nelson, pp. 9, 10.
22
Lanctot, pp. 9–10.
23
Ibid., p. 17.
24
Hogan, p. 284.
25
White, p. 74.
26
Hogan, pp. 339, 343.
27
Lanctot, p. 4.
28
Nelson, p. 24.
29
Paul Stephens, quoted in John B. Holway, Black Diamonds:
Life in the Negro Leagues from the Men Who Lived It (Westport:
Meckler Books, 1989) p. 15.
1
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Buck O’Neil, quoted in Holway, p. 99.
Chet Brewer, quoted in Holway, p. 25.
32
Ibid., pp. 28–29.
33
Nelson, p. 23.
34
Jerry Malloy, foreword to Sol White’s History of Colored Base
Ball, with Other Documents on the Early Black Game, 1886–1936,
by Sol White (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995) p.
xxxiv.
35
White, pp. 67–68.
36
Nelson, p. 34.
37
Paul Stephens, quoted in Holway, pp. 15, 96.
38
Ursula McTaggart, “Writing Baseball into History:
The Pittsburgh Courier, Integration, and Baseball in a War of
Position,” American Studies 47, no. 1 (2005) pp. 117, 118,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/40604900.
39
Chet Brewer, quoted in Holway, pp. 21–22.
40
Buck O’Neil, quoted in Holway, p. 96.
41
Nelson, p. 18.
42
Buck O’Neil, quoted in Holway, p. 96.
43
Photograph by Ernest Withers, in Antony Decaneas,
Negro League Baseball (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2004)
pp. 68–69.
44
J.B. Martin, quoted in Lanctot, pp. 149–150.
45
Ibid., pp. 169–170.
46
McTaggart, p. 124.
47
Hogan, p. 380.
48
McTaggart, p. 118.
49
Nelson, p. 17.
50
Timothy M. Gay, Satch, Dizzy & Rapid Robert: The Wild
Saga of Interracial Baseball Before Jackie Robinson (New York, New
York: Simon and Schuster, 2010) pp. 2–3.
51
Photograph by Ernest Withers, in Decaneas, pp. 30–31.
52
Doc Glenn, quoted in Gay, p. 3.
53
Hogan, pp. 284–285, 288.
54
Ibid., pp. 295–297.
55
Adrian Burgos Jr., “Left Out: Afro-Latinos, Black
Baseball, and the Revision of Baseball’s Racial History,” Social
Text 98 (2009) p. 40, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40283566.
56
Willie Wells, quoted in Ibid., p. 296.
57
Nelson, pp. 53– 55.
58
Burgos, p. 42.
59
Wilmer Fields, quoted in Hogan, pp. 297–298.
60
Burgos, pp. 42–43.
30
31
229
230
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Gay, p. 20.
Ibid., p. 30.
63
Hogan, p. 80.
64
Nelson, p. 58.
65
Gay, pp. 27–29.
66
The Standard, quoted in Gay, pp. 50–52.
67
Nelson, p. 60.
68
Gay, p. 30.
69
McTaggart, p. 119.
70
Gay, pp. 2, 4–5, 14.
71
Nelson, p. 60.
72
Huston, quoted in Gay, p. 32.
73
Gay, p. 15.
74
David K. Wiggins, “Wendell Smith, The Pittsburgh CourierJournal and the Campaign to Include Blacks in Organized
Baseball, 1933–1945,” Journal of Sports History 10, no. 2 (1983)
p. 9, http://library.la84.org/SportsLibrary/JSH/JSH1983/
JSH1002/jsh1002b.pdf.
75
Gay, p. 18.
76
Wiggins, pp. 6–7.
77
Ibid., pp. 5–6.
78
Ibid., p. 9.
79
McTaggart, p. 115.
80
Wendell Smith, quoted in Wiggins, pp. 10–11.
81
Wendell Smith, quoted in Hogan, pp. 327.
82
Bill L. Weaver, “The Black Press and the Assault on
Professional Baseball’s ‘Color Line,’ October, 1945–April,
1947,” Phylon 40, no. 4 (1979) p. 304, http://www.jstor.org/
stable/274527.
83
John Heydler, quoted in Hogan, p. 327.
84
Wiggins, p. 12.
85
McTaggart, p. 119.
86
Paul Dean, quoted in McTaggart, p. 120.
87
Wiggins, p. 9.
88
Wendell Smith, quoted in Hogan, p. 329.
89
Hogan, p. 334.
90
Wiggins, pp. 5, 26–27.
91
Weaver, pp. 310, 312.
92
Ibid., p. 303.
93
Lanctot, p. 252.
94
Albert Chandler, quoted in Hogan, p. 334.
95
Hogan, p. 337.
96
Lanctot, pp. 305, 306.
61
62
THE CONCORD REVIEW
231
John “Buck” O’Neil, interview, https://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=BA1ZQGcIGYw.
98
Lanctot, p. 293.
99
Hogan, pp. 337, 343.
100
Cum Posey, quoted in Hogan, p. 344.
101
Satchel Paige, quoted in Lanctot, p. 242.
102
Bob Griffith, quoted in Lanctot, p. 243.
103
Lanctot, p. 312.
104
McTaggart, p. 114.
105
Photograph by Ernest Withers in Decaneas, pp. 16–17.
106
Decaneas, p. 15.
107
Committee on Baseball Report, quoted in, “Committee
Report to Mayor Asks Equal Rights for Negro in Baseball,” New
York Times (1923–Current File) November 19, 1945, ProQuest
Historical Newspapers: The New York Times (107100541).
108
Ibid.
109
Lanctot, p. 285.
110
J.B. Martin, quoted in “Negro Loop Head Desires
Chandler Clarify Comment,” The Hartford Courant (1923–1987)
January 23, 1946, ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Hartford
Courant (1764–1988).
111
The Amsterdam News, quoted in Lanctot, p. 286.
112
Hogan, pp. 345, 360.
113
Buck C. Neil, interview, https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=BA1ZQGcIGYw.
114
Hogan, p. 337.
115
Wendell Smith, quoted in Hogan, p. 339.
116
The Michigan Chronicle, quoted in Bill L. Weaver, “The
Black Press and the Assault on Professional Baseball’s ‘Color
Line,’ October, 1945–April, 1947,” Phylon 40, no. 4 (1979)
p. 306, http://www.jstor.org/stable/274527.
117
Jules Tygiel, Baseball’s Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and
His Legacy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1983) pp. 266–
268.
118
Nelson, p. 74.
119
42, directed by Brian Helgeland (2013; Burbank,
California: Warner Bros., 2013) DVD.
120
Hogan, pp. 371, 375.
121
Nelson, p. 79.
122
Negro League Baseball Museum, “John Jordan ‘Buck’
O’Neil,” https://www.nlbm.com/100for100/bio.cfm.
123
Buck O’Neil, quoted in Holway, p. 104.
97
232
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
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Warner Bros., 2013, DVD.
Burgos Jr., Adrian. “Left Out: Afro-Latinos, Black Baseball,
and the Revision of Baseball’s Racial History.” Social Text 98,
(2009): 37–58, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40283566.
“Committee Report to Mayor Asks Equal Rights for Negro
in Baseball.” New York Times November 19, 1945. ProQuest
Historical Newspapers: The New York Times (107100541).
Decaneas, Antony. Negro League Baseball. New York: Harry N.
Abrams, 2004.
Gay, Timothy M. Satch, Dizzy & Rapid Robert: The Wild Sage
of Interracial Baseball Before Jackie Robinson. New York, New York:
Simon and Schuster, 2010.
Hogan, Lawrence D. Shades of Glory: The Negro Leagues and
the Story of African-American Baseball. Washington, D.C.: National
Geographic, 2006.
Holway, John B. Black Diamonds: Life in the Negro Leagues from
the Men Who Lived It. Westport: Meckler Books, 1989.
Lanctot, Neil. Negro League Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a
Black Institution. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press,
2004.
Malloy, Jerry. Foreword to Sol White’s History of Colored Base
Ball, with Other Documents on the Early Black Game, 1886–1936. By
Sol White, pp. xii–lxv, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,
1995.
McTaggart, Ursula. “Writing Baseball into History: The
Pittsburgh Courier, Integration, and Baseball in a War of
Position.” American Studies 41, no. 1 (2005): 113–132. http://
www.jstor.org/stable/40604900.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
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Negro League Baseball Museum. “John Jordan ‘Buck’
O’Neil.” https://www.nlbm.com/100for100/bio.cfm.
“Negro Loop Head Desires Chandler Clarify Comment.”
The Hartford Courant. January 23, 1946, ProQuest Historical
Newspapers: Hartford Courant (1764–1988).
Nelson, Kadir. We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League
Baseball. New York: Hyperion, 2008.
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watch?v=BAlZQGcIGYw.
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His Legacy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1983.
Tygiel, Jules. Foreword to Shades of Glory: The Negro Leagues
and the Story of African-American Baseball. By Lawrence D. Hogan,
vii–xxiii, Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 2006.
Weaver, Bill L. “The Black Press and the Assault on
Professional Baseball’s ‘Color Line,’ October, 1945–April,
1947.” Phylon 40, no. 4 (1979): 303–317. http://www.jstor.org/
stable/274527.
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Baseball, 1933–1945.” Journal of Sports History 10, no. 2 (1983):
5–29. http://library.la84.org/SportsLibrary/JSH/JSH1983/
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234
Jacob Graber-Lipperman
Perhaps nothing is more illustrative of American provincialism
four decades ago [1932] than a brief glance at the military establishment;
it requires no more. The U.S. had the sixteenth largest army in the
world, putting it behind, among others, Czechoslovakia, Turkey, Spain,
Romania, and Poland. When every $17.85-a-month private had suited
up, there were 132,069 Americans in uniform. On paper they could
have put up a stiff fight against Yugoslavia (138,934), but in reality they
would have been torn to pieces, because most of MacArthur’s men were
committed to desk work, patrolling the Mexican border, and protecting
U.S. possessions overseas. The chief of staff was left with 30,000 troops—
fewer than the force King George sent to tame his rebellious American
colonies in 1776.
Moreover, the quality of the Army was appalling [1932]. It cost
roughly a quarter of one percent of today’s [1973] military juggernaut,
and looked it. Fortune called it the “worst equipped” of the world’s armed
forces; no one disputed the judgment. In a crisis MacArthur could
have fielded 1,000 tanks, all obsolete; 1,509 aircraft, the fastest of which
could fly 234 mph; and a single mechanized regiment, which had been
organized at Fort Knox that spring, and which was led by cavalrymen on
horses which wore mustard-gas-proof boots. The United States Army, one
writer reported, “forever walks the wide land in the image of a gapingmouthed private with an ill-fitting uniform carrying an obsolete rifle at
an ungraceful angle.”
MacArthur was the only four-star general in the country—and
there were no three-star generals. As chief of staff he received $10,400
a year, a home at Fort Myer, and the exclusive use of the Army’s only
limousine. To his aide he seemed to occupy a distant pinnacle. Major
Eisenhower’s annual salary was $3,000. Because he doubled as the military’s
congressional lobbyist, he frequently went up to Capitol Hill. But his
employer never loaned him the limousine. Nor was the major given taxi
fare; in all of official Washington, there was no such thing as a petty cash
fund. Instead, as he liked to recall in later life, Eisenhower would walk
down the hall and fill out a form, in exchange for which he received two
streetcar tokens. Then he would stand outside on Pennsylvania Avenue
and wait for a Mt. Pleasant trolley car.
Manchester, William (2013-11-08).
The Glory and the Dream: A Narrative History of America, 1932-1972
(pp. 6-7). 1973, RosettaBooks. Kindle Edition.
Copyright 2015, The Concord Review, Inc., all rights reserved
The Newburgh Conspiracy: The Nation’s Fate
Determined by Personal Rivalry
Gabriel Roth
The American Colonists started the American Revolu-
tionary War in 1775 with hopes of achieving independence from
British tyranny and establishing an independent nation under a
new government that would protect the natural rights of its citizens. However, as the Revolution drew to a close and the Colonies
were on the brink of victory, one event threatened “to overturn
the liberties of our country” and “open the floodgates of civil discord, and deluge our rising empire in blood.”1 In 1783, tension
and anxiety spread among American Continental soldiers because
Congress had not agreed to their pension demands. The soldiers’
discontent gave rise to the Newburgh Conspiracy. A small faction,
called the “Young Turks,” led by General Horatio Gates, plotted
to use the power of the military to pressure Congress to acquiesce
to the demands of the army. While Gates and his bloc plotted in
the military cantonment in Newburgh, New York, the Nationalist
Congressmen in Philadelphia planned to use the threat of the
army as a pretext to enhance the power of the young national
government. The Nationalist plot, indeed the entire Conspiracy,
collapsed when Commander-in-Chief George Washington accused
Gabriel Roth is a Senior at the Ramaz School in New York City, where
he wrote this paper for Dr. Jon Jucovy’s American History course in the
2013/2014 academic year.
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Gabriel Roth
the conspirators of “sowing the seeds of discord and separation
between the civil and military powers of the continent” and acted
to end the revolt.2 Washington’s role certainly reflected his commitment to preserve civilian power, as so many historians have
argued. However, his response is impossible to disentangle from
his long-standing personal rivalry with and suspicion of General
Gates.
Throughout the Revolutionary War the Continental Army
endured many hardships. At times the conditions were almost
unbearable, particularly because the national government lacked
the ability to provide adequate provisions or manpower. The
principal grievance of the army concerned payment for their service. During the war, Congress had promised to pay the soldiers
half-pay pensions in perpetuity. However, as peace drew near and
the disbanding of the army became imminent, even the wages
owed had not yet been paid, causing doubt over the credibility of
Congress’ guarantee of pensions. The men began to worry that
their many years of service to their country might go unnoticed
and even worse, unrewarded. As a result, the army petitioned
Congress twice in late 1782, demanding justice and threatening
consequences if Congressional inaction continued.
The Nationalist members of Congress recognized that
the dissatisfied military could be manipulated to promote their
own political goal of centralizing the national government. The
Nationalists, including Alexander Hamilton, Gouvernour Morris,
and Robert Morris, contrived to use the military threat to push for
implementation of an impost plan. This would generate revenue
for the national government, allowing it to pay the army. Taxation
power was an important element of the powerful national government that the Nationalists had long envisioned. This opportunity
led to discreet correspondence between the audacious Nationalists
and the disgruntled army officers.
On February 12, 1783, Major General Alexander McDougall, an official envoy between Congress and the army, delivered
a conspiratorial message to the army. In the letter he instructed
the soldiers to refuse to disband and to threaten mutiny in order
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237
to receive the payment they sought. On March 10, 1783, an address, later dubbed the “Newburgh Address,” spread through
the encampment in Newburgh, calling upon the army to take
forceful action against Congress if their demands were not met.
Almost immediately, Commander-in-Chief George Washington
ordered a meeting to review McDougall’s report. In the midst of
the conference, Washington asked to speak to the military officers
at the meeting. He emotionally and dramatically denounced the
Newburgh Address and entreated the army to stand down and
preserve the fragile, yet essential, relationship between the civil
and military authority. Both the military threat and Nationalist
conspiracy dissolved.
It is evident that there was a conspiracy in Newburgh in
1783, but the identities of the conspirators, their motives, and
their intentions are subject to debate. Mary A. Y. Gallagher believes
that the Newburgh Conspiracy was part of a series of mutinous
attempts by the Pennsylvania Line, a group of radical and rebellious veteran Pennsylvanian soldiers, to force Congress and the
state to acknowledge the hardship they experienced in the fight
for independence. According to some historians, primarily Richard H. Kohn, General Gates led the Young Turks in a conspiracy
to overthrow the civil government and sought to establish a new
form of authority, perhaps even a military dictatorship. In Kohn’s
words, “Fed by disillusionment, frustration, and personal dreams
of glory, Gates and his young zealots lost all sense of reality and
began planning a full-fledged coup d’état.”3 He believes that, despite the potential danger that this enraged group posed to the
government, the Nationalists planned to “spark the explosion”
to forward their political goals.4 Other historians disagree with
Kohn’s interpretation of the conspiracy and suggest that the army
did not plan a coup d’état, but intended simply to apply pressure
on Congress to resolve the issue of payment. Edward C. Skeen
suggests that mutiny was the army’s response to congressional inaction. He reasons “one who threatens an extreme action attempts
to shift the responsibility by expressing the hope that the other
party will make such action unnecessary.”5 Other interpretations
of the conspiracy exist as well: Kenneth R. Bowling thinks that the
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Gabriel Roth
conspiracy served as a pretext to move the nation’s capital from
Philadelphia. While the participants and the goals of the military
conspiracy are widely debated, most historians agree that there
was a “small, shadowy” group within and beyond Congress that
attempted to use the discontent of the army to increase the power
of the federal government.6
A complex debate exists among historians regarding Washington’s role in the Newburgh Conspiracy. According to Kohn,
the Young Turks “fumed at Washington’s moderate leadership.”
Kohn sees Gates as an “overbearing and sensitive general whose
bad blood with Washington was long-standing” and suggests he
sought to overthrow the Commander in Chief.7 In contrast, historian John Richard Alden views the Newburgh Conspiracy as an
attempt, by forces under Washington’s command, to help him
stage a coup d’état.8 Nevertheless, the consensus opinion among
historians, such as Kohn, Robert Middlekauff, and John E. Ferling, is that Washington interceded in the conspiracy to prevent
a disruption of the unified military and civil authority, saving the
fledgling nation from chaos.
Due to the nearing end of the Revolutionary War, the
Continental soldiers encamped in Newburgh feared that Congress
would disband the army before they were paid.9 They also worried
that they would never receive their half-pay pensions promised by
Congress in 1780.10 The officers considered the perpetual pensions “an honorable and just recompense for several years hard
service” when their “health and fortunes” were “worn down and
exhausted.” The soldiers worried that they would return to civilian life as impoverished and displaced outcasts of society.11 As a
result, in 1782 Major General Alexander McDougall and Colonels
John Brooks and Matthias Ogden delivered a petition to Congress,
complaining that the hardships soldiers endured during the war
were “exceedingly disproportionate to those of any other citizens
of America” and that “shadows have been offered to us while substance has been gleaned by others.” They threatened Congress with
a warning: “The uneasiness of the soldiers, for want of pay, is great
and dangerous; any further experiments on their patience may
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239
have fatal effects.”12 The issue persisted and the army petitioned
Congress yet again. General Arthur St. Claire told the officers to
tell Congress “in the most express and positive terms” that unless
action was taken, Congress could expect “a convulsion of the most
dreadful nature and fatal consequences.”13 A crisis was imminent;
the stage was set for a conspiracy.
While emotions were running high in the military encampment, General Horatio Gates and the Young Turks initiated the
Newburgh Conspiracy to seek justice for the military. This tightknit
extremist faction was comprised of Gates, Christopher Richmond
Jr., William Barber, and likely, William Eustis and Timothy Pickering.14 Throughout the crisis, conspiratorial meetings were held in
Gates’ quarters at Newburgh.15 In a letter to John Armstrong Jr.,
one of his supporters, Gates acknowledged that the Newburgh
Address was “written in my quarters by you, copied by Richmond,
and circulated by Barber.”16 The Address was the actual document
that threatened Congress. Thus it seems that Gates’ clique was at
the core of the military conspiracy.
Though Gates’ cabal of conspirators was hotheaded,
dogmatic, and passionately believed in the army’s cause, they did
not intend to overthrow the civil authority. The text of the Newburgh Address demonstrates that the threat of mutiny was simply
a tactic to get Congress to acquiesce. The authors of the Address
stated that it was time to “carry your appeal from justice to the
fears of government. Change the milk-and-water style of your last
memorial” to Congress. The conspirators’ language conveys their
intention for the army to pressure Congress more aggressively than
they did in their preceding meek petition, the “last memorial.”17
The conspirators called upon the army to act against Congress
immediately, before they were disbanded, because “If the present
moment be lost, every future effort is in vain; and your threats then,
will be as empty as your entreaties now.”18 Clearly, they preferred
to resolve the conflict with Congress peacefully, advising the use
of language “that will neither dishonor you by its rudeness, nor
betray you by its fears.” Then the Address stated that if Congress
did not comply, “the army has an alternative.”19 The conspirators’
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Gabriel Roth
intended threat was that if the war continued, they would refuse to
fight, and “If peace, that nothing shall separate them (the Army)
from your (Congress’) arms (weapons) but death.”20 This stronger
rhetorical threat was made so that Congress would swiftly act to
settle the issue and avoid the mutinous “alternative.” Even Gates
affirmed in a letter to Armstrong that the Newburgh Address was
“intended to produce strong remonstrance to Congress in favor
of the object prayed for in a former one,” referring to the weak
petition that demanded payment for the soldiers.21 Armstrong,
Gates, and the rest of his faction genuinely empathized with the
noble and glorious army that was suffering from “the coldness and
severity of government.”22 The conclusion of the address clearly
expresses the outcome envisioned by the conspirators: if Congress
were to cooperate with the military “it would make you more happy
and them more respectable,” and the loyalty of the army would
“give the world another subject of wonder and applause; an army
victorious over its enemies—victorious over itself.”23
As early as 1780, Alexander Hamilton had created the political and financial program that later served as the fundamental
testament of Nationalism and Federalism.24 The Nationalist party
had emerged in Congress in response to the financial setback that
occurred during the American Revolution. By the end of the war,
under the Articles of Confederation, the national government
was very weak and could not provide the army with adequate
provisions, including food, clothing, and weapons.25 Tremendous
debt had been accumulating since 1777 due to the costly war.26
The national government owed both foreign nations and private
citizens. In early 1783 the best estimate of the government’s annual expenses was $3 million.27 The Nationalists wanted to aid
the war effort by reforming the government in a way that would
strengthen the congressional authority and enable more efficient
administration of public affairs. As Hamilton said, “the confederation in my opinion should give Congress complete sovereignty.”28
A tax plan was key to the Nationalist objective. In a letter
to the governor of Rhode Island, Jonathon Arnold described the
Nationalist aspirations, explaining that the impost was “held out by
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241
them as the only means of restoring Public Credit, of preventing
a Disunion of the States and saving the Country from immediate ruin—in short…the infallible, grand Political Catholicon, by
which every evil was to be avoided, and every advantage derived.”
In 1780 Hamilton warned, “Without certain revenues, a government can have no power; that power, which holds the purse strings
absolutely, must rule.”29 In 1781 the emerging party attempted to
give the government taxation powers. It was just one vote short of
amending the Articles of Confederation.30 The Nationalists were
forced to settle for a severely restricted 5 percent impost.31
After attempts to promote the Nationalist program failed,
the members of the faction were thrilled to receive the petitions
from the army. The army’s discontent could be useful in an effort
to implement the financial reforms they envisioned. Hamilton
formulated the Nationalist plan as such:
It was essential to our cause that vigorous efforts should be made to
restore public credit—it was necessary to combine all the motives to
this end that could operate upon different descriptions of persons
in the different states. The necessity and discontents of the army
presented themselves as a powerful engine.32
In order to pay the army and suppress the military threat, the Nationalists intended to create a permanent source of revenue that
would strengthen the government.33 Years after the conspiracy,
Pickering wrote to Armstrong that the strife within the army was
part of a larger, complex plot to use the military officers “as auxiliaries to the fiscal measures of that day.”34
While tensions increased at Newburgh, the Nationalists in
Philadelphia tried to encourage and guide the military conspiracy.
When the Nationalists told Alexander McDougall that they needed
the full support of the army, he wrote a letter to General Henry
Knox, advocating “the union of the influence of Congress with
that of the Army and the public Creditors to obtain permanent
funds for the United States” which “promise [the] most ultimate
Security to the Army.”35 On February 12, McDougall sent a conspiratorial message to Knox suggesting that the army may have
to revolt in order to achieve the pay they demanded. He advised
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them to announce that they would not disband unless they were
paid and assured commutation. Threatening to not disband, an
implication of mutiny, would push Congress into voting compensation.36 This would require an innovative funding system to be
implemented.37 Knox, however, was too cautious and patriotic to
support the Nationalist plot.38 He responded to McDougall, “I
consider the reputation of the American Army as one of the most
immaculate things on earth…we should even suffer wrongs and
injuries to the utmost verge of toleration rather than sully it in
the least degree.”39 Thus, the Nationalists, desperate and pressed
for time, turned to Gates and his Young Turks.
The Nationalists knew they would have to be much more
careful manipulating the Young Turks as opposed to Knox because
they were a dangerous faction.40 Even though the threat of a coup
could become reality at any moment, the Nationalists believed
that their goal justified the risk.41 On March 8 they sent Walter
Stewart, a former aide of Gates, to Gates and his followers. Stewart assured Gates that he and his faction had the full support of
Robert Morris, the Superintendent of Finance, and public creditors, to take mutinous action against Congress. As word spread
throughout Newburgh, it became “universally expected [that]
the Army would not disband until they had obtained justice” and
that the army had the backing of many members of Congress. The
military conspiracy was underway. A meeting with all field officers
and company representatives was called to discuss McDougall’s
report on February 8 and plan redress. Simultaneously, William
Barber released the unsigned Newburgh Address, which soon
circulated around the cantonment.42 The military posed a serious menace to the civil authority, as planned by the Nationalists.
Arthur Lee, an anti-Nationalist who became a Nationalist during
the Newburgh crisis, summarized the conspiracy in his letter of
July 21, 1783. Regarding Nationalist leader Robert Morris, Lee
wrote, “It is much suspected that he & his friends have been the
prime movers of all the disturbances in the Army for the purpose
of enforcing the 5 per Ct. (percent).”43 The Nationalists firmly
believed that the future of the nation depended on the success
of their plan to strengthen the national government. They were
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243
therefore willing to go to great, even conspiratorial, lengths to
achieve their goals.
The Newburgh Conspiracy put George Washington in
a rather complex and ambiguous situation, as he was both a
military man and an advocate of the bond between the civil and
military powers of the nation. As the Commander-in-Chief of the
Continental Army, Washington empathized with his troops and
supported the conspirators’ goal of the military remuneration.
Even if he would not openly sanction the conspiracy, the conspirators expected him to at least consent to the army’s action
against Congress. He indeed supported the army in past political
conflicts with the government. In a letter to Gates, Armstrong
implied that Washington was expected to provide the conspirators
with assistance, writing that Washington “was not to have been
consulted till some later period.”44 Hamilton also thought that
Washington would willingly back the conspiracy not only to help
the army but also for nationalistic reasons. Hamilton posited that
the value of the plot to pressure Congress was twofold: it would
deliver justice for the army and benefit the country financially. In
a letter, Hamilton phrased this dually beneficial Nationalist plan
in the following way: “Urged with moderation,” the army’s claims
could “operate on those weak minds which are influenced by their
apprehensions more than their judgments; so as to produce a
concurrence in the measures which the exogenesis of affairs demand.”45 He suggested that Washington “take the direction” of the
army’s anger and gain their trust in order “to keep a complaining
and suffering army within the bounds of moderation.”46 Hamilton
continued, “This will enable you in case of extremity to guide the
torrent, and bring order perhaps even good, out of confusion.”47
Washington expressed to Hamilton that he was constantly thinking
about “the sufferings of the complaining army, on the one hand,
and the inabilities of Congress and tardiness of the state, on the
other.”48 Devoted to his soldiers and concerned with their needs,
Washington thought “the just claims of the Army ought, and it is
to be hoped will, have their weight with every sensible legislature
in the union.”49 Thus, in the aftermath of the conspiracy, Wash-
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ington disclosed, “the object of the author (Armstrong) was just,
honorable, and friendly to the country.”50
Though he supported the goals of the conspiracy, Washington opposed the conspiracy’s rebellious methods. Washington, in
his apology letters to Armstrong, declared, “the means suggested
by him (Armstrong) were certainly liable to much misunderstanding and abuse.”51 Washington told Hamilton that he opposed the
conspiracy because he feared the outcome, calling the army “a
dangerous Engine to work with, as it might be made to cut both
ways.”52 He feared that if some of the army would seek “immediate
relief” from the states, divisions would be created, which might
“weaken, rather than strengthen the hands of those who were
disposed to support Continental measures—and might tend to
defeat the end they themselves had in view by endeavoring to
involve the army.”53 Regardless of whether or not he agreed with
the intentions of the conspiracy, Washington cautioned Hamilton that in general “The Army is a dangerous instrument to play
with.”54 He predicted that the situation would “end in blood.”55
Although a dedicated soldier, Washington would never use the
army as a political weapon.56 He could not risk creating a schism
between the civil and military powers of the young Republic that
he loved so dearly.
Despite his conflicting principles, Washington proved
to be staunch in his decision to suppress the revolt. After the
Newburgh Address circulated throughout the military camp,
Washington ordered a meeting to take place on March 15 to
discuss the conspiratorial message McDougall brought from the
Nationalists in Philadelphia. Although Washington said he would
not attend the conference, he appeared unexpectedly to confront
the officers.57 The following excerpt from Washington’s address
expresses his disgust with the conspirators, specifically the author
of the Newburgh Address
And let me conjure you, in the name of our common Country, as you
value your own sacred honor, as you respect the rights of humanity,
and as you regard the Military and National character of America, to
express your utmost horror and detestation of the Man who wishes,
under any specious pretenses, to overturn the liberties of our Country,
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245
and who wickedly attempts to open the flood Gates of Civil disorder,
and deluge our rising Empire in blood.58
Washington accused the plotters of acting out of “feelings and
passion” rather than “reason and good sense.” He deemed their
rebellious action “unmilitary” and “subversive of all order and discipline.”59 Washington’s speech was effective because he appealed
to the officers’ patriotism rather than to their professionalism.60 In
his conclusion, he famously began to read a letter. He reached for
his glasses and apologized, saying, “Gentlemen, you will permit me
to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost
blind in the service of my country.”61 The subtle, emotional display
of his sacrifice for the nation engendered a “general speechlessness
of the assembly.”62 Washington completely transformed insurrection into regret as the officers admitted their “abhorrence” and
“disdain” of the “infamous propositions” advanced in the addresses
and expressed their “indignation [at] the secret attempts of some
unknown persons to collect officers together, in a manner totally
subversive of all discipline and good order.”63 As Pickering angrily
phrased it, the officers “damned with infamy two publications
(the Newburgh Addresses) which during the four proceeding
[sic] days most of them had read with admiration, and talked of
with rapture.”64 Washington may have initially wavered between
both supporting and opposing the conspiracy, but in the end he
demonstrated disapproval of the treacherous plot.
General Gates’ leadership role in the conspiracy confirmed
Washington’s decision to act against the plot in part because the
two generals had a perennial rivalry. Throughout the Revolutionary War, a spirited power struggle existed between Gates and
Washington. Over time, Washington constantly worried that his
authority was being undermined. Gates, a crafty, cunning politician
and solider, known as the ‘Hero of Saratoga,’ was very popular in
both the army and Congress. Some hoped he would replace Washington.65 General Thomas Mifflin, one of the disgruntled officers
who openly challenged Washington’s authority, wrote to Gates that
a “mighty torrent of public clamor and public vengeance” wished
that Washington would be removed from his position. Virginia
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Congressman Richard Henry Lee, an old friend of Washington’s,
elaborated on Mifflin’s advocacy for Gates in a letter, saying that
he believed “the military knowledge and authority of Gates necessary to procure the indispensable changes in our army. I believe
he is right.” In addition, many were concerned with Washington’s
poor leadership at Brandywine, Paoli, and Germantown in 1777.66
Washington was always skeptical of Gates and took note of any
signs of his rise to power.
In 1777 Congress altered the civil-military structure in order
to give Gates power and indirectly weaken Washington’s authority.
Congress expressed great faith in Gates’ leadership and even said
that the success of the nation depended on him. As a result, on
November 27, Congress passed a resolution that made Gates the
president of the Board of War, a committee originally established
to manage the war on a day-to-day basis. This position of power
enabled Gates to make decisions without consulting Washington.
The powers of the President of the Board of War included appointing officers, proposing reforms, issuing reports, and supervising
the quartermaster and commissary departments.67 In 1778 when
the army was planning a new campaign, Gates used his power to
circumvent Washington’s authority. In one strategy for the campaign, Gates and the Board of War supported another invasion
of Canada. Washington opposed the plan for various reasons and
tried to undermine it before it was enacted. Despite Washington’s
opposition, Congress approved the plan, and it was put into effect.68 Washington viewed this campaign as part of a conspiracy to
oust him in favor of Gates.69 Although Congress’ actions did not
replace Washington in his command, they certainly infringed on
his authority, which he believed to be part of a larger scheme.70
In the winter of 1777 an alleged conspiracy, dubbed the
Conway Cabal, posed a great threat to Washington’s authority.71
Washington was especially suspicious of a conspiracy because he
had a recent military failure at Philadelphia and Gates had a great
victory at Saratoga. In November, Lord Sterling reported to Washington that Brigadier General Thomas Conway said the following
to Gates: “Heaven has been determined to save your Country; or
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247
a weak General (Washington) and bad Councellors [sic] would
have ruin[e]d it.” In another slanderous remark, Major General
Johann de Kals said that Washington was “the weakest general”
he had ever served under and said that if Washington ever “does
anything sensational he will owe it more to his fool luck or to his
adversary’s mistakes than to his own ability.” Conway showered
Gates with praise, such as “What a pity there is but one Gates.”
Washington was informed that Conway and Mifflin were “holding
up General G[ate]s to the people” as a great leader and “making
them believe that you [Washington] have done nothing [and that]
Philadelphia was given up by your Mismanagement.”72 Whether or
not there truly existed a plot to remove Washington from power
is irrelevant. The significance of this defamatory gossip lies in the
fact that it caused Washington to believe there was a faction that
desired “Gates…to be exalted, on the ruin of my reputation and
influence.”73
The suspicion and apprehension that Washington developed as a result of the Conway Cabal influenced his course of
action during the Newburgh Conspiracy. Washington considered
both conspiracies a direct threat to his authority. Whether he
had evidence or not, Washington suspected that the Newburgh
Conspiracy was an attempt by Gates to use the discontent within
the army to recover his own reputation and take the army from
Washington. After all, one of the main reasons the Young Turks
gravitated towards Gates was because he was an arrogant leader
who despised Washington’s moderate leadership.74 The Newburgh
Address expressed the conspirators’ opposition to Washington,
urging the army to “suspect the man who would advise to more
moderation and longer forbearance.”75 As a result of his fear of
Gates, Washington wrote to Hamilton, “The source [of army discontent] may be easily traced as the old le[a]ven, it is said, for I
have no proof of it, is again, beginning to work, under the mask
of the most perfect dissimulation, and apparent cordiality.”76 Despite having “no proof of it,” since Gates was his longtime rival,
Washington was quick to accuse him of “again” conspiring just
as he did in the Conway Cabal. Consequently, Washington acted
on March 15 not only to avoid “separation between the civil and
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Gabriel Roth
military powers of the continent,” but also to crush his longstanding rival who seemingly planned yet again to supplant him.77
Over the course of the American Revolution, whenever
his authority faced opposition, Alexander Hamilton served as
Washington’s most impressive political ally. During the Conway
Cabal, Hamilton deemed the conspirators “vermin” and “villainous” since they were threatening America’s chances at aligning
with France. He also belittled Gates’ victory against Burgoyne at
Saratoga while he justified Washington’s loss in Philadelphia, saying
he “was defeated by a superior number” and still led “the finest”
campaign in history.78 Hamilton also accused Mifflin of causing
the supply crisis at Valley Forge, claiming he wanted to “wound the
general’s (Washington’s) reputation.”79 A devout revolutionary,
Hamilton consistently demonstrated his loyalty to Washington.
In accordance with his devotion to Washington throughout
the war, when the Newburgh Conspiracy emerged in 1783, Hamilton took action to benefit Washington’s political position. He
viewed the scheme as an opportunity to glorify Washington and
to crush his enemy, Gates. Even though Hamilton was a prominent Nationalist, he abandoned the Nationalist plan by warning
Washington of the threat. Hamilton wrote to Washington that he
“wished him to be the conductor of the army in their plans for
redress, in order that they might be moderated and directed to
proper objects, and exclude some other leader who might foment
and misguide their councils.”80 He hoped that Washington would
eliminate the threat of “some other leader,” probably referring to
Gates, and reestablish his control over the army. Instead of telling
Washington to take preemptive measures against the developing
conspiracy, Hamilton advised him to act only after the Newburgh
Address made the threats public. This would allow Washington to
appear as a preserver of order, the savior of the young republic.81
As it turned out, Hamilton’s political plan succeeded. Washington
successfully ended the conspiracy and Congress satisfied the army
with advanced pay for three months and a five-year full-salary
pension plan.82 Washington’s role in the conspiracy displayed
him as an honest and strong leader, loyal to the government and
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249
the Revolution.83 Timothy Pickering said in a letter to Armstrong
40 years after the affair, that the Newburgh Conspiracy was a dramatic event that gave “a sort of political and moral finishing to
the character of Washington in the Army.”84
Although Washington was certainly influenced by his
political ideology, his intense, well established rivalry with Gates
was also a factor that helped determine his role in the Newburgh
Conspiracy. After constantly competing with Gates for power,
Washington became conditioned to suspect Gates of disloyalty.
Since Gates led the zealous Young Turks in the Newburgh Conspiracy, like the Conway Cabal, Washington assumed the plot was
specifically targeting his authority. Washington, with Hamilton’s
counsel, realized that the Conspiracy was an opportunity to protect
his reputation. On the verge of achieving national independence,
the Newburgh Conspiracy risked everything the Continental Army
had fought to achieve. Washington, the army’s Commander-inChief, was the patriot who saved the quasi-independent nation
from disorder by preserving the bond between the military and
civil authorities. The Newburgh Conspiracy was both the first and
the last serious threat to America’s delicate civil-military structure.
The peaceful disbanding of the army was truly remarkable. General
Knox correctly concluded that, “Though intended for opposite
purposes,” the Newburgh affair “has been one of the happiest
circumstances of the war, and will set the military character of
America in a high point of view.”85
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Notes
Robert Middlekauff, The Glorious Cause: the American
Revolution, 1763–1789 (New York: Oxford University Press,
1982) p. 604.
2
Daniel A. Hayden, “George Washington and CivilMilitary Relations During the Revolutionary War: A Study of
the Establishment of Civilian Control,” (MA Thesis, U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College, 2012) p. 56.
3
Richard H. Kohn, Eagle and Sword: the Federalists and the
Creation of the Military Establishment in America, 1783–1802 (New
York: Free Press, 1975) p. 25.
4
Ibid., p. 26.
5
Edward C. Skeen and Richard H. Kohn, “The Newburgh
Conspiracy Reconsidered,” The William and Mary Quarterly
31.2 (1974) p. 278, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1920913
(November 4, 2013).
6
Middlekauff, p. 603.
7
Kohn, p. 25.
8
John Richard Alden, The American Revolution, 1775–1783
1st ed. (New York: Harper, 1954) p. 266.
9
Ibid., p. 266.
10
Mary A. Y. Gallagher, “Reinterpreting the ‘Very Trifling
Mutiny’ at Philadelphia in June 1783,” The Pennsylvania
Magazine of History and Biography 119.1/2 (1995) p. 12, http://
www.jstor.org/stable/20092924 (accessed November 4, 2013).
11
Kohn, p. 19.
12
Hayden, p. 54.
13
Kohn, p. 20.
14
Skeen and Kohn, p. 275.
15
Ibid., p. 286.
16
Paul David Nelson, “Horatio Gates at Newburgh, 1783:
A Misunderstood Role,” The William and Mary Quarterly 29.1
(1972) p. 149, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1921331 (accessed
November 4, 2013).
17
Skeen and Kohn, p. 277.
18
Kohn, p. 30.
19
Skeen and Kohn, p. 278.
20
Kohn, p. 30.
21
Nelson, p. 149.
22
Kohn, p. 29.
23
Skeen and Kohn, p. 278.
24
Kohn, p. 12.
1
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Gallagher, p. 11.
John E. Ferling, Almost a Miracle: the American Victory in
the War of Independence (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007)
p. 554.
27
Middlekauff, p. 606.
28
Kohn, p. 12.
29
Ibid., p. 20.
30
Ferling, p. 554.
31
Middlekauff, p. 606.
32
Kohn, p. 20.
33
Gallagher, p. 12.
34
Kohn, p. 18.
35
Ibid., p. 21.
36
Ibid., p. 24.
37
Gallagher, p. 12.
38
Skeen and Kohn, p. 275.
39
Kohn, p. 27.
40
Ibid., p. 25.
41
Skeen and Kohn, p. 275.
42
Kohn, p. 29.
43
Gallagher, p. 31.
44
Skeen and Kohn, p. 281.
45
Kohn, p. 26.
46
Skeen and Kohn, p. 283.
47
Kohn, p. 26.
48
Hayden, p. 54.
49
Ibid., p. 55.
50
Skeen and Kohn, p. 290.
51
Ibid., p. 290.
52
Ibid., p. 289.
53
Ibid., p. 289.
54
Kohn, p. 12.
55
Skeen and Kohn, p. 285.
56
Kohn, p. 26.
57
Ibid., p. 30.
58
Middlekauff, p. 604.
59
Kohn, p. 31.
60
Hayden, p. 56.
61
Ferling, p. 556.
62
Skeen and Kohn, p. 288.
63
Kohn, p. 32.
64
Skeen and Kohn, p. 288.
65
Ferling, p. 437.
25
26
251
252
Gabriel Roth
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
Hayden, p. 50.
Ibid., p. 51.
Ferling, p. 290.
Ibid., p. 291.
Hayden, p. 51.
Nelson, p. 144.
Ferling, p. 282.
Ibid., p. 283.
Kohn, p. 25.
Skeen, p. 278.
Nelson, p. 148.
Hayden, p. 56.
Ferling, p. 283.
Ibid., p. 284.
Skeen, p. 284.
Ferling, p. 555.
Alden, p. 267.
Kohn, p. 34.
Ibid., p. 18.
Ibid., p. 34.
THE CONCORD REVIEW
Bibliography
Alden, John Richard. The American Revolution, 1775–1783.
1st ed., New York: Harper, 1954, print.
Ferling, John E. Almost a Miracle: the American Victory in the
War of Independence. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.
Print.
Gallagher, Mary A. Y. “Reinterpreting the ‘Very Trifling
Mutiny’ at Philadelphia in June 1783.” The Pennsylvania
Magazine of History and Biography 119.1/2 (1995): 3–35. JSTOR,
Web, 4 November 2013.
Hayden, Daniel A. “George Washington and Civil-Military
Relations During the Revolutionary War: A Study of the
Establishment of Civilian Control.” MA Thesis, U.S. Army
Command and General Staff College, 2012. Web, 25 March
2014.
Kohn, Richard H. “The Inside History of the Newburgh
Conspiracy: America and the Coup d’Etat.” The William and
Mary Quarterly 27.2 (1970): 187–220. JSTOR, Web, 4 November
2013.
Kohn, Richard H. Eagle and Sword: the Federalists and the
Creation of the Military Establishment in America, 1783–1802. New
York: Free Press, 1975. Print.
Middlekauff, Robert. The Glorious Cause: the American
Revolution, 1763–1789. New York: Oxford University Press,
1982. Print.
Nelson, Paul David. “Horatio Gates at Newburgh, 1783:
A Misunderstood Role.” The William and Mary Quarterly 29.1
(1972): 143–158. JSTOR, Web, 4 November 2013.
Skeen, Edward C., and Richard H. Kohn. “The Newburgh
Conspiracy Reconsidered.” The William and Mary Quarterly 31.2
(1974): 273–298. JSTOR, Web, 4 November 2013.
253
Notes on Contributors
Deniz Dutz (Child Labor Cases) is a Senior at St. Albans
School in Washington, DC, where he won first place in an essay
competition sponsored by the Carnegie Council. He is of joint
Canadian and Turkish heritage, and has taken part in a number
of Model United Nations conferences. Last summer he had an
internship at Koç University in Istanbul.
Heather Harrington (Universities of the People) is a Senior
at the Ellis School in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she won the
Virginia P. Stevenson award for special achievement in U.S. History.
She is an archer, a harpist, and a programmer and scientist, and
she is senior editor of the school literary magazine, Elm.
Callie Phui-Yen Hoon (Johann Bernoulli) is a Senior at
Deerfield Academy in Deerfield, Massachusetts, where she is a
National AP Scholar. She was selected to attend the New England
Young Writer’s Conference at Bread Loaf, and her paper on
Chernobyl was published in The Concord Review in Summer 2013.
William S. Zaubler (Segregated Swimming) is a Senior at
Montclair Kimberley Academy in Montclair, New Jersey. He holds
a state swimming record, and is interested in foreign languages,
specifically German and Arabic. He spent two weeks each summer
for the past three years in Spain studying the language.
Michelle Li (Eugenics in North Carolina) is a Senior at
Raleigh Charter High School in Raleigh, North Carolina, where
she was a National Winner of the Rocket 121 Dream Big for the
President contest. She won a NSLI-Y scholarship for an all-expenses
paid trip to China, and she is a National AP Scholar.
Eliott Thornton (Mission to Mao) is a Junior at Hotchkiss
School in Lakeville, Connecticut. He wrote this paper while at the
Palm Beach Day Academy in Palm Beach, Florida.
Abraham Cheloff (1937 Supreme Court) is at Brandeis.
At Gann Academy in Waltham, Massachusetts, he was able to
THE CONCORD REVIEW
participate in religious studies while maintaining a strong secular
curriculum. He has done independent study of Fibonacci sequences
in modular arithmetic, and worked in science labs as an assistant.
At college he plans premedical work, hoping to become a doctor.
Jianing Wang (Right of Revolution) is at Hunter College
High School on Manhattan Island in New York City. She obtained a
full scholarship to spend last summer in South Korea. She received
national merit awards for the last five years on the National Latin
Exam, and she has performed in the Chamber Music Society of
Lincoln Center’s Young Musicians Program. She is the editor of
the school paper, What’s What, and the school yearbook, Annals.
Mehitabel Glenhaber (Millennialism) is a Senior at the
Commonwealth School in Boston, Massachusetts, where she is an
AP Scholar with Distinction and captain of the women’s saber team.
She works at the Zhang Lab at Harvard helping with neurobiology
research on c. elegans, and she likes to draw comics. She was 5th
in the state last year in saber, and she is co-captain of the debate
team and the swing dance club.
Jacob Graber-Lipperman (Negro Leagues) is a Senior at Hall
High School in West Hartford, Connecticut, where he is on the
cross-country, track, and tennis teams. He is an AP Scholar with
Distinction, and in the summer of 2013 travelled to the Czech
Republic, Poland, and Israel with the NFTY L’Dor V’Dor Program.
Gabriel Roth (Newburgh Conspiracy) is a Senior at the
Ramaz School on Manhattan Island in New York, where he is
on the math team and the volleyball and basketball teams. He
has taken four years of Spanish and several history courses. He
is also a youth leader at his community’s synagogue.