1 00:00:18,320 --> 00:00:21,600 Speaker 1: Meetings and welcome back to another edition of Hayden's History Hour. 2 00:00:21,760 --> 00:00:24,399 I'm your host, Hayden Daniel, an editor at The Federalist. 3 00:00:24,800 --> 00:00:27,160 As always, you can email the show at radio at 4 00:00:27,199 --> 00:00:31,480 Federalist dot com, follow us on x at Federalist fdr LST, 5 00:00:32,640 --> 00:00:35,280 make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts, and 6 00:00:35,320 --> 00:00:37,600 of course to the premium version of our website as well. 7 00:00:38,200 --> 00:00:42,600 Today we have a very special episode for Saint Patrick's Day, 8 00:00:43,240 --> 00:00:46,679 and we're going to explore the burning question that's on 9 00:00:46,719 --> 00:00:51,840 everybody's mind in the Irish ruin America. Now, tens of 10 00:00:51,880 --> 00:00:55,439 millions of Americans estimated up to thirty million Americans can 11 00:00:55,439 --> 00:00:58,439 claim some sort of Irish ancestry and that's the point 12 00:00:58,439 --> 00:01:00,759 of pride for many of them. As we've seen with 13 00:01:01,119 --> 00:01:06,200 the amount of celebration that goes on for Saint Patrick's 14 00:01:06,239 --> 00:01:09,879 Day and today, most people would say that the Irish 15 00:01:10,239 --> 00:01:14,280 Americans are solidly American in both culture and temperament. They 16 00:01:14,319 --> 00:01:17,680 are just as American as the people who were here 17 00:01:18,319 --> 00:01:22,159 during the Revolution or earlier in the nineteenth century. But 18 00:01:22,280 --> 00:01:26,319 that wasn't always the case. Americans who saw Irish immigrants 19 00:01:26,359 --> 00:01:29,680 coming over the Atlantic in the mid nineteenth century certainly 20 00:01:29,719 --> 00:01:32,719 did not think so. They saw the Irish Catholics coming 21 00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:36,040 off the boats as invaders who brought a foreign culture, 22 00:01:36,239 --> 00:01:40,040 an alien religion, crime, and corruption to their young republic. 23 00:01:42,239 --> 00:01:45,239 That being said, as you might expect, the Irish faced 24 00:01:45,280 --> 00:01:47,560 a lot of hostility when they first came to America, 25 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:51,959 and their arrival and how they began to assimilate into 26 00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:55,920 America changed the very nature of American politics in foundational 27 00:01:55,959 --> 00:01:59,680 ways that we still feel today. But before we dive 28 00:01:59,680 --> 00:02:02,959 into the history of Irish immigration to America, we need 29 00:02:03,000 --> 00:02:06,040 to do just a real quick rundown of Ireland's history 30 00:02:06,599 --> 00:02:12,319 and its relationship with England before colonization. The English conquest 31 00:02:12,439 --> 00:02:14,879 of Ireland began at eleven sixty nine during the reign 32 00:02:14,879 --> 00:02:17,960 of Henry the Second, the King of England at the time. 33 00:02:18,919 --> 00:02:22,080 Ireland at that point was not a unified country. It 34 00:02:22,120 --> 00:02:26,520 was a very fractured island full of small, petty kingdoms. 35 00:02:26,560 --> 00:02:28,800 It was not a unified country at all, and this 36 00:02:28,879 --> 00:02:32,439 gave the English, which for a medieval kingdom was relatively 37 00:02:32,479 --> 00:02:38,039 centralized in the twelfth century, the advantage in conquering large 38 00:02:38,080 --> 00:02:43,719 parts of Ireland, and they managed to capture large swalls 39 00:02:43,719 --> 00:02:49,159 of territory one by one over decades, so they end 40 00:02:49,240 --> 00:02:54,479 up controlling roughly half the island by the middle of 41 00:02:55,080 --> 00:02:59,199 the fourteenth century, but their control begins to wane after that, 42 00:02:59,240 --> 00:03:02,479 mostly because of because of distractions from one hundred Years 43 00:03:02,520 --> 00:03:05,159 War with France that takes away most of Britain or 44 00:03:05,199 --> 00:03:10,400 England's attention, and then after that you have political instability 45 00:03:10,400 --> 00:03:12,599 with things like the War of the Roses in the 46 00:03:12,639 --> 00:03:17,039 fifteenth century really prevents England from concentrating on Ireland, and 47 00:03:17,319 --> 00:03:20,919 the native Irish are able to sort of reclaim large 48 00:03:20,919 --> 00:03:24,319 parts of their territory, but the English begin to re 49 00:03:24,719 --> 00:03:28,680 establish control over the island during under the Tudor dynasty, 50 00:03:29,879 --> 00:03:33,240 notably with Henry the Eighth. Henry's made King of Ireland. 51 00:03:33,319 --> 00:03:37,560 This is the first person to really claim a kingship 52 00:03:37,599 --> 00:03:43,360 over the entire island. In fifteen forty two, as you 53 00:03:43,439 --> 00:03:47,960 might expect, there were many many rebellions against English rule 54 00:03:48,039 --> 00:03:50,439 in Ireland, and there would be from this point on 55 00:03:50,680 --> 00:03:54,479 dozens of rebellions, but the entire island eventually does fall 56 00:03:54,560 --> 00:04:00,319 under English control by sixteen o three. The Tutors also 57 00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:04,080 begin what's called the plantation system, which that might sound 58 00:04:04,159 --> 00:04:07,479 familiar but it's a little bit different from the plantation 59 00:04:07,840 --> 00:04:11,039 system that we would think of today that went on 60 00:04:11,120 --> 00:04:16,120 in the American South or in the Caribbean with slavery. 61 00:04:16,160 --> 00:04:20,879 This is basically just the confiscation of Catholic Irish land 62 00:04:20,920 --> 00:04:24,079 and giving it to settlers from Britain and especially nobles 63 00:04:24,079 --> 00:04:28,600 from Britain. So the peasants who worked the land would 64 00:04:28,639 --> 00:04:32,639 still mostly remain Irish Catholics, it's just the their noble 65 00:04:32,680 --> 00:04:37,399 lord in the feudal system would be Proto, not really 66 00:04:37,399 --> 00:04:42,920 the feudal system would be English. James the First, the 67 00:04:42,959 --> 00:04:46,759 first Stuart King, who takes over after the Tutors after 68 00:04:46,879 --> 00:04:50,839 Elizabeth First dies without a male heir, creates the plantation 69 00:04:51,040 --> 00:04:55,120 of Ulster, which is what it basically what is today 70 00:04:55,199 --> 00:05:02,519 Northern Ireland. Is that about northeastern quarter of the country. 71 00:05:03,519 --> 00:05:05,600 If you look at a map, it's what basically what 72 00:05:05,680 --> 00:05:09,000 is today Northern Ireland, which had been before this the 73 00:05:09,199 --> 00:05:13,720 most Irish and the least controlled by the English of 74 00:05:13,759 --> 00:05:18,439 all the Irish provinces. This results in the colonization of 75 00:05:18,519 --> 00:05:24,600 Ulster Province by mostly Scots and English Protestants. This begins 76 00:05:24,720 --> 00:05:28,160 the process of the creation of what is today Northern 77 00:05:28,199 --> 00:05:33,279 Ireland and all around two hundred thousand Scots alone. This 78 00:05:33,319 --> 00:05:36,759 doesn't include English move to Ulster, moved to that province. 79 00:05:37,800 --> 00:05:40,079 And this is where the term Scott's Irish comes from. 80 00:05:40,279 --> 00:05:42,800 You've probably heard that before, and this is where that 81 00:05:43,399 --> 00:05:46,160 those people when someone says Scott's Irish, this is who 82 00:05:46,160 --> 00:05:49,199 they're talking about, and we need to make it. That 83 00:05:49,920 --> 00:05:52,399 means we need to make a very important distinction here 84 00:05:54,120 --> 00:05:57,920 at this point in history, about the early seventeenth early 85 00:05:57,959 --> 00:06:02,000 eighteenth century, there are two tight of Irishmen. There are 86 00:06:02,079 --> 00:06:04,920 the vast majority of Irish at this time who are 87 00:06:05,079 --> 00:06:10,680 Catholic and Gaelic speaking, who are very much the quote 88 00:06:10,759 --> 00:06:13,959 unquote natives of the island, and they are deeply hostile 89 00:06:14,000 --> 00:06:17,279 to English authority and are the ones launching all the rebellions. 90 00:06:17,399 --> 00:06:21,319 And then there are the Protestant Irish who are part 91 00:06:21,319 --> 00:06:24,480 of the minority who have been converted to Protestantism or 92 00:06:24,519 --> 00:06:28,439 are the descendants of the Protestant settlers from the plantation era. 93 00:06:28,519 --> 00:06:30,759 So they're the Scots and English who have been brought 94 00:06:30,759 --> 00:06:35,759 over specifically to sort of plant a loyal Protestant population 95 00:06:35,959 --> 00:06:41,399 within Ireland itself to hopefully this is the English government's 96 00:06:41,399 --> 00:06:48,639 hope that that will stamp out rebellions, but many of 97 00:06:48,680 --> 00:06:55,160 those Ulster Protestants prefer America over Northern Ireland, and by 98 00:06:55,240 --> 00:06:59,079 seventeen seventy five, about two hundred and fifty thousand Ulster 99 00:06:59,199 --> 00:07:03,439 Scots Scotts have moved to the American colonies, meaning that 100 00:07:03,800 --> 00:07:08,480 Scott's Irishmen comprize over ten percent of the entire population 101 00:07:08,560 --> 00:07:10,839 of what will become the United States or what was 102 00:07:10,839 --> 00:07:14,680 the United States in seventeen ninety ten percent quite big. 103 00:07:17,040 --> 00:07:23,600 They mostly moved to the frontier Appalachia, Kentucky, Tennessee, those places. 104 00:07:25,199 --> 00:07:28,519 Scott's Irish immigrations to the United States remains relatively high 105 00:07:28,560 --> 00:07:30,839 after the Revolution all the way up to the end 106 00:07:30,879 --> 00:07:35,399 of the nineteenth century. At this point, virtually all Irish 107 00:07:35,439 --> 00:07:39,480 immigration to America is Protestant, and it's those Scott's Irishmen. 108 00:07:40,000 --> 00:07:43,680 The United States only has around twenty thousand Catholics in 109 00:07:43,720 --> 00:07:48,639 a nation of two million people in seventeen ninety and 110 00:07:48,839 --> 00:07:52,920 immigration to America in general was relatively low for the 111 00:07:52,959 --> 00:07:54,879 first thirty years the Republic. And this is something that 112 00:07:55,879 --> 00:07:58,199 schools don't often teach you, and people really don't realize 113 00:07:58,199 --> 00:08:02,600 that for the first thirty some odd years of America's existence, 114 00:08:02,680 --> 00:08:07,160 immigration was very very low. Only about five hundred thousand 115 00:08:07,160 --> 00:08:10,279 people come to America from seventeen ninety to eighteen twenty. 116 00:08:10,680 --> 00:08:15,240 That averages about sixteen thousand people a year in a 117 00:08:15,319 --> 00:08:18,560 nation that starts out at two million. That's relatively relatively low. 118 00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:22,279 Before the Irish, the vast majority of immigrations to the 119 00:08:22,360 --> 00:08:26,480 United States was from England, Scotland, and those Scots Irish 120 00:08:26,480 --> 00:08:31,199 from Orthern Ireland. These immigrants were virtually all Protestant and 121 00:08:31,279 --> 00:08:35,519 virtually all English speaking. The next largest group were the Germans, 122 00:08:35,679 --> 00:08:39,000 who came over to states like Pennsylvania. It's where the 123 00:08:39,159 --> 00:08:42,159 Pennsylvania Dutch comes from. They're not actually Dutch, they're Germans 124 00:08:43,159 --> 00:08:46,440 who came during the colonial period, and you also have 125 00:08:46,519 --> 00:08:49,159 the leftovers of the Dutch colonization of New York. There 126 00:08:49,159 --> 00:08:54,440 are another semi substantial minority in America, but they're tiny 127 00:08:54,759 --> 00:09:00,000 in comparison, and the majority of those immigrants coming over 128 00:09:00,679 --> 00:09:05,480 in those first thirty years are also Protestant. Immigration doesn't 129 00:09:05,519 --> 00:09:08,559 start to ramp up until about eighteen thirty. The country's 130 00:09:08,600 --> 00:09:13,159 population is thirteen million in eighteen thirty and before that, 131 00:09:13,759 --> 00:09:18,519 as you might expect almost all population growth was from 132 00:09:18,639 --> 00:09:22,720 internal increase, so it's just people having kids and growing 133 00:09:22,799 --> 00:09:26,639 nashurally without a whole lot of immigration. But that all 134 00:09:26,720 --> 00:09:30,639 changes after it begins to grow through the eighteen thirties. 135 00:09:30,919 --> 00:09:35,360 That all changes in eighteen forty five. This is a 136 00:09:35,399 --> 00:09:38,480 part of the story you're probably familiar with. The Irish 137 00:09:38,480 --> 00:09:43,799 potato famine hits the island of Ireland in eighteen forty five, 138 00:09:44,600 --> 00:09:47,960 and it is absolutely devastating for the seven years that 139 00:09:48,000 --> 00:09:52,799 it ravages that island, and it fundamentally transforms Irish society. 140 00:09:53,360 --> 00:09:56,279 One million people are estimated to have died from it 141 00:09:56,559 --> 00:09:59,759 out of a total population of around eight million people. 142 00:10:01,279 --> 00:10:05,799 And an additional and estimates vary on this, between one 143 00:10:05,840 --> 00:10:08,399 and a half and two million people leave the country 144 00:10:09,200 --> 00:10:12,679 between eighteen forty five and eighteen fifty five, so in 145 00:10:12,720 --> 00:10:16,799 a ten year time span, Ireland loses almost half its 146 00:10:16,840 --> 00:10:19,519 population three million out of eight million people. This is, 147 00:10:19,879 --> 00:10:27,000 as you might expect, absolutely devastating for Ireland socially, culturally, 148 00:10:27,200 --> 00:10:31,519 and economically. But another facet of the people may not 149 00:10:31,679 --> 00:10:36,960 know is that that specific potato blight hit all of Europe, 150 00:10:37,120 --> 00:10:40,039 not just Ireland, and caused about one hundred thousand deaths 151 00:10:40,039 --> 00:10:46,799 in other parts of the continent as well. Now, why 152 00:10:46,799 --> 00:10:51,720 did it affect Ireland so much and not the rest 153 00:10:51,759 --> 00:10:57,279 of Europe as hard? The two main reasons are absentee 154 00:10:57,320 --> 00:11:01,159 landlordism that arose from the plantations system, which meant that 155 00:11:01,279 --> 00:11:04,840 landlords were often back in England and not particularly responsive 156 00:11:04,919 --> 00:11:08,320 to the immediate needs of their tenants and really didn't 157 00:11:08,320 --> 00:11:11,399 care as long as their rent got paid. And the 158 00:11:11,799 --> 00:11:16,120 near total dependence on potatoes as a staple prop and 159 00:11:18,639 --> 00:11:22,039 what I was reading into how dependent the Irish were 160 00:11:22,159 --> 00:11:24,279 on potatoes, I was a little shocked. I didn't really 161 00:11:25,039 --> 00:11:29,600 believe some of the numbers that I was seeing. Several 162 00:11:29,600 --> 00:11:32,879 scholars have estimated that the average adult male Irish worker 163 00:11:33,440 --> 00:11:38,320 ate fourteen pounds of potatoes a day. Fourteen pounds of 164 00:11:38,360 --> 00:11:42,320 potatoes a day. That's a lot of potatoes, and that's 165 00:11:42,360 --> 00:11:46,200 basically all that they're eating. It is not just a 166 00:11:46,320 --> 00:11:49,559 staple crop for the Irish. It is the only crop 167 00:11:49,960 --> 00:11:55,080 that they eat basically, so when there's a big light, 168 00:11:55,799 --> 00:12:01,080 suddenly there is literally no food. And they paid quite 169 00:12:01,080 --> 00:12:05,279 dearly for that sort of monoculture that had had sprung 170 00:12:05,360 --> 00:12:12,919 up because of that dependence. Now the English government at 171 00:12:12,919 --> 00:12:17,519 the time was run by the Tories, and they've made 172 00:12:18,120 --> 00:12:24,159 a few limited attempts to send aid, but it was 173 00:12:24,360 --> 00:12:28,840 pretty half hearted. And when the Whig government took control 174 00:12:29,279 --> 00:12:33,039 in mid eighteen forty six, they immediately adopted a laissez 175 00:12:33,120 --> 00:12:36,120 fair attitude toward the whole thing, said, the free market 176 00:12:36,120 --> 00:12:40,759 will will figured out. We have no obligation to help 177 00:12:40,799 --> 00:12:46,720 them at all, and that just makes it worse. So 178 00:12:48,559 --> 00:12:52,200 the Irish people are faced with a difficult choice. Do 179 00:12:52,279 --> 00:12:54,200 they stay and try to eke out a meager living 180 00:12:54,600 --> 00:12:57,080 in Ireland or do they try to go somewhere else 181 00:12:57,120 --> 00:13:02,600 where they can feed themselves and white a few Irishmen 182 00:13:02,720 --> 00:13:08,840 decide to leave. As previously noted, this Irish wave of 183 00:13:08,840 --> 00:13:12,519 immigrants that begins in late eighteen forty five, early eighteen 184 00:13:12,600 --> 00:13:17,039 forty six and continues through eighteen fifty five. That ten 185 00:13:17,120 --> 00:13:20,440 year span really is sort of the biggest wave of 186 00:13:20,480 --> 00:13:23,440 Irish immigrations to the United States, and it coincides with 187 00:13:23,480 --> 00:13:26,600 a wave of German immigration in the wake of the 188 00:13:26,679 --> 00:13:30,279 revolutions of eighteen forty eight. That's when all across Europe 189 00:13:30,279 --> 00:13:36,759 there were liberal revolutions against autocracy and monarchy. Almost all 190 00:13:36,799 --> 00:13:40,240 of them fail and in the German States. Germany is 191 00:13:40,240 --> 00:13:42,679 not a unified country at this time. It's broken into 192 00:13:43,039 --> 00:13:47,600 dozens and dozens of small states. The repression after those 193 00:13:47,600 --> 00:13:53,720 revolutions fail is particularly hard in Germany, and many German 194 00:13:53,799 --> 00:13:58,200 liberals decide to leave and come to America, and they do. 195 00:14:00,519 --> 00:14:02,480 Most of the German immigrants are Protestant, but there is 196 00:14:02,480 --> 00:14:06,320 a sizable percentage of Catholics among them because many people 197 00:14:06,320 --> 00:14:09,799 from southern Germany, which is predominantly Catholic, also decided to leave. 198 00:14:11,960 --> 00:14:15,919 The eighteen forties sees a total of one point seven 199 00:14:16,000 --> 00:14:20,519 million people immigrate to America, mostly from Ireland and Germany. 200 00:14:20,559 --> 00:14:25,080 As previously noted, three hundred thousand people came in eighteen 201 00:14:25,200 --> 00:14:28,519 forty nine alone. Now remember I didn't note that in 202 00:14:28,559 --> 00:14:32,200 the first thirty years of America, five hundred thousand people 203 00:14:32,559 --> 00:14:35,559 came in thirty years, whereas three hundred thousand come in 204 00:14:35,600 --> 00:14:40,120 a single year. So this is a massive increase in immigration. 205 00:14:40,320 --> 00:14:43,120 Just to illustrate that further, the level of immigration in 206 00:14:43,159 --> 00:14:46,639 the eighteen forties was twelve times that of the eighteen twenties, 207 00:14:47,639 --> 00:14:54,480 twelve times. In a twenty year span, between one million 208 00:14:54,519 --> 00:14:57,279 and one point five Irish come to America during the 209 00:14:57,320 --> 00:15:00,200 Fame years from eighteen forty five to eighteen fifty five. Again, 210 00:15:02,000 --> 00:15:05,360 many others go to Canada, and a few go to 211 00:15:05,399 --> 00:15:07,960 other British colonies, but the vast majority of Irish who 212 00:15:08,039 --> 00:15:13,240 leave Ireland come to America relatively obvious reasons. They don't 213 00:15:13,240 --> 00:15:15,679 really want to go anywhere else controlled by the English 214 00:15:15,720 --> 00:15:23,159 after their response to potato famine. By eighteen fifty, with 215 00:15:23,360 --> 00:15:28,799 the first few years of the immigration wave completed, the 216 00:15:28,879 --> 00:15:33,840 US population is twenty three million people. In New York City, 217 00:15:34,320 --> 00:15:37,360 about a quarter of all residents were Irish immigrants. By 218 00:15:37,360 --> 00:15:40,679 eighteen fifty five, order of the city is Irish and immigrant. 219 00:15:41,200 --> 00:15:45,039 They have a population of around six hundred and fifty 220 00:15:45,080 --> 00:15:50,120 thousand In Boston, a city that had one hundred thousand residents, 221 00:15:50,399 --> 00:15:53,080 saw an influx of thirty seven thousand Irishmen by the 222 00:15:53,159 --> 00:15:59,399 end of famine by eighteen fifty five or eighteen fifty two. Sorry, 223 00:15:59,519 --> 00:16:05,360 the Irish represent the first truly alien minority group within 224 00:16:05,399 --> 00:16:09,679 the United States, at least from the Americans who were 225 00:16:09,720 --> 00:16:16,000 seeing it happen perspective. Many of these Irishmen did not 226 00:16:16,000 --> 00:16:19,960 speak English again, they spoke Gaelic, or if they did, 227 00:16:20,000 --> 00:16:23,799 it was heavily accented English, with that Irish brogue that's 228 00:16:23,840 --> 00:16:27,279 become very famous, but it was probably far thicker in 229 00:16:27,320 --> 00:16:32,679 the nineteenth century. But it's really their Catholicism that marks 230 00:16:32,679 --> 00:16:35,919 the US culturally distinct from Americans. And I should really 231 00:16:37,879 --> 00:16:42,039 explain that more because today it's not really that big 232 00:16:42,039 --> 00:16:45,240 of a deal to most people. But in the nineteenth century, 233 00:16:45,279 --> 00:16:50,159 and especially before nineteenth century, it's hard to stress how 234 00:16:50,200 --> 00:16:54,159 important the distinction between Protestant and Catholic was to people, 235 00:16:54,279 --> 00:16:59,240 especially people in the English world. And I keep bringing 236 00:16:59,240 --> 00:17:05,079 that up because American colonists brought over their anti Catholic 237 00:17:05,119 --> 00:17:09,720 attitudes from mother country. The English were fanatically anti Catholic 238 00:17:09,759 --> 00:17:13,960 in the late eighteenth and nineteenth century. There were laws, 239 00:17:14,039 --> 00:17:17,000 many laws on the books restricting what Catholics could and 240 00:17:17,000 --> 00:17:21,119 could not do in England. As just one example, Catholics 241 00:17:21,160 --> 00:17:24,440 were barred from serving in parliament until eighteen twenty nine. 242 00:17:24,440 --> 00:17:29,319 If you were a Catholic, you could not serve in 243 00:17:29,359 --> 00:17:34,880 the legislature until eighteen twenty nine. That anti Catholicism was 244 00:17:34,960 --> 00:17:40,119 rooted in the English Reformation from the sixteenth century and 245 00:17:40,200 --> 00:17:42,720 the English Civil Wars of the seventeenth century which were 246 00:17:44,519 --> 00:17:53,240 bloody and long and societally extremely damaging to English society. 247 00:17:53,440 --> 00:17:56,039 That's a whole other, very fascinating topic that might be 248 00:17:56,039 --> 00:18:04,039 a future episode. But the conflicts between Catholics and Protestants 249 00:18:04,079 --> 00:18:10,200 in England really engendered this this fanatical anti Catholic attitude 250 00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:13,200 in the English and that carries over with Americans when 251 00:18:13,200 --> 00:18:20,400 they I'm over and colonize the New World. To illustrate 252 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:24,400 that even more, as I previously noted, they are only 253 00:18:24,440 --> 00:18:27,319 about twenty thousand Catholics in the entire United States in 254 00:18:27,359 --> 00:18:31,839 seventeen ninety. Yes, Maryland was founded as a quote unquote 255 00:18:31,839 --> 00:18:35,400 Catholic colony, but by the Revolution only about one in 256 00:18:35,519 --> 00:18:40,480 eight Marylanders was still Catholic. Vast majority or Protestant, and 257 00:18:40,640 --> 00:18:44,400 America as a whole is ninety eight to ninety nine 258 00:18:44,400 --> 00:18:48,400 percent Protestant. In seventeen ninety it is overwhelmingly Protestant. Now, 259 00:18:48,400 --> 00:18:52,079 of course, there are dozens of denominations within that ninety 260 00:18:52,119 --> 00:18:56,720 eight ninety nine percent Protestanism, but they are Protestant, and 261 00:18:56,759 --> 00:19:04,640 by eighteen forty it's still ninety five percent or higher Protestant. 262 00:19:04,799 --> 00:19:13,640 It's somewhat unthinkable today about how monolithic American religious attitudes were, 263 00:19:13,640 --> 00:19:18,720 and of course, remember religion and religious attitudes were far 264 00:19:18,799 --> 00:19:23,759 more important to Americans sided than they are today. That's 265 00:19:23,880 --> 00:19:27,720 what informs people's politics, morals, all of that, it's all, 266 00:19:27,759 --> 00:19:31,720 it's basically all Protestant before the Irish come and between 267 00:19:31,759 --> 00:19:34,759 eighteen thirty and eighteen sixty the Catholic population of the 268 00:19:34,759 --> 00:19:40,319 country grew around nine hundred percent, and it's almost entirely 269 00:19:40,359 --> 00:19:46,279 because of Irish immigration. And as you might expect with 270 00:19:46,440 --> 00:19:51,400 a population that has carried over a lot of that 271 00:19:51,519 --> 00:19:56,920 anti Catholic sentiment from England and one that seeing rapid 272 00:19:56,960 --> 00:19:59,720 immigration in only a few years. Remember three hundred thousand 273 00:19:59,720 --> 00:20:02,000 people came in only a year in eighteen forty nine, 274 00:20:03,200 --> 00:20:10,519 you might expect some nativist and anti immigration groups to 275 00:20:10,559 --> 00:20:15,240 start forming, and they did. But also some people start 276 00:20:15,319 --> 00:20:20,079 to see the opportunity in all these immigrants coming coming over. 277 00:20:20,519 --> 00:20:26,640 And the organization that capitalizes that the best is Tammany Hall. 278 00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:31,240 And you might have heard of Tammany Hall. Four. Tammany 279 00:20:31,279 --> 00:20:33,920 Hall was founded in seventeen eighty nine as a fraternal 280 00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:38,640 organization and it was restricted to men who, ironically enough, 281 00:20:38,839 --> 00:20:45,240 were one hundred percent pure Americans. No immigrants allowed an 282 00:20:45,279 --> 00:20:49,559 early leader of Tammany Hall was Aaron Burr of duel 283 00:20:49,599 --> 00:20:53,960 with Alexander Hamilton Fame and Martin Van Buren president after 284 00:20:54,000 --> 00:20:59,039 Andrew Jackson was a close associate of Tammany Hall. Now, 285 00:20:59,039 --> 00:21:04,480 it started off as a nativist organization and did not 286 00:21:04,599 --> 00:21:10,240 have very good relations with the early Irish immigrants, but 287 00:21:10,599 --> 00:21:14,079 it slowly evolved into a very powerful political machine in 288 00:21:14,279 --> 00:21:18,920 New York City politics. Just to quickly define, a political 289 00:21:18,920 --> 00:21:24,960 machine is a highly centralized political organization that uses incentives 290 00:21:25,079 --> 00:21:29,279 like jobs, favors, and money to recruit and maintain member loyalties. 291 00:21:29,319 --> 00:21:33,920 They hand out you know, government contracts, good government jobs, 292 00:21:34,039 --> 00:21:46,799 things like that to keep members happy and to buy votes. Basically, Initially, 293 00:21:47,519 --> 00:21:50,640 again Tammany Hall and the Irish Immigrants are opposed, but 294 00:21:52,880 --> 00:21:57,400 Tammany's electoral fortunes begin to decline in the eighteen forties, 295 00:21:59,279 --> 00:22:03,599 so they decide to court the Irish immigrants, a new 296 00:22:04,039 --> 00:22:07,480 voting base that they can tap into. That the opposing party, 297 00:22:07,720 --> 00:22:10,839 Tammany Hall is a Democrat at this point, they are 298 00:22:10,920 --> 00:22:15,200 part of the Democratic Party. The other party that they're 299 00:22:15,240 --> 00:22:20,839 mostly going at the Whig Party. The Whigs are also 300 00:22:21,160 --> 00:22:24,920 very anti immigrant, and we'll see what they turned into later. 301 00:22:26,599 --> 00:22:30,960 But Tammany decides, well, there's this whole untapped market for 302 00:22:31,240 --> 00:22:35,599 votes from these voters who the other party won't won't court, 303 00:22:36,039 --> 00:22:42,200 will court them instead. So Tammany evolves into one of 304 00:22:42,240 --> 00:22:46,880 the first true community organizers in America and establishes a 305 00:22:47,160 --> 00:22:51,839 vast and powerful network of patronage, raft and get out 306 00:22:51,839 --> 00:22:55,720 the vote operations that allowed it to completely dominate the 307 00:22:55,799 --> 00:22:59,599 politics of New York City for decades and decades and decades. 308 00:23:00,480 --> 00:23:05,880 The organization would secure social services from the city jobs, 309 00:23:05,920 --> 00:23:12,440 whether that's direct government jobs like post masters, postmen, things 310 00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:19,119 like that, customs officials, and or even you know, private 311 00:23:19,200 --> 00:23:22,799 jobs with private companies that were owned by members of 312 00:23:22,799 --> 00:23:27,400 Tammany Hall, and make sure that businessmen who were allied 313 00:23:27,400 --> 00:23:33,839 with Tammany Hall would get juicy government contracts for constituents 314 00:23:33,880 --> 00:23:38,160 and things like that in exchange for boats. Tammany Hall 315 00:23:38,200 --> 00:23:42,359 operators soon found themselves in practically every influential office you 316 00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:44,960 can think of in New York City and expanded the 317 00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:51,480 graft operations from there. Now, what I've described before is 318 00:23:51,519 --> 00:23:55,400 often called honest graft quote unquote. That's a term Tammany 319 00:23:55,440 --> 00:23:59,920 Hall quote coin itself is honest draft, but they all 320 00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:06,000 engaged in just good old fashioned embezzlement, insider trading, and 321 00:24:06,119 --> 00:24:11,240 other forms of just blanket corruption. In other words, they 322 00:24:11,359 --> 00:24:14,039 use the political power to help their friends in exchange 323 00:24:14,039 --> 00:24:18,880 for support. Tammany really cemented its power with the election 324 00:24:18,960 --> 00:24:21,519 of Fernando Wood as the Mayor of New York in 325 00:24:21,519 --> 00:24:25,400 eighteen fifty four. Wood would eventually go on and have 326 00:24:25,480 --> 00:24:29,960 a falling out with Tammany and would serve in the 327 00:24:30,039 --> 00:24:34,039 United States House of Representatives. And fun fact, Fernando Wood 328 00:24:34,119 --> 00:24:36,200 was one of the main opponents of the Thirteenth Amendment 329 00:24:36,279 --> 00:24:38,279 in the House when it came up for a vote 330 00:24:38,279 --> 00:24:41,920 in eighteen sixty five. Just as a little fun fact. 331 00:24:43,920 --> 00:24:49,720 The architect for Tammany Hall's rise to power and by 332 00:24:49,799 --> 00:24:54,799 far their most famous member, is Boss Tweed, whose real 333 00:24:54,880 --> 00:24:59,440 name is William Tweed. He was the son of a 334 00:24:59,519 --> 00:25:04,039 chairmaker and his grandfather had immigrated to the United States 335 00:25:04,079 --> 00:25:09,519 from Scotland probably before probably before the Revolution, but maybe 336 00:25:09,559 --> 00:25:14,880 just after the the timeline isn't particularly clear. After succeeding 337 00:25:15,039 --> 00:25:18,039 Fernando Wood as the Boss of Tammany, Queed proceeded to 338 00:25:18,079 --> 00:25:20,920 take over almost every facet of city life and just 339 00:25:21,000 --> 00:25:25,319 made sure that Tammany Hall's tentacles were just in every 340 00:25:25,359 --> 00:25:28,039 little facet that he could get into and could make 341 00:25:28,079 --> 00:25:31,920 money off of. He used city funds to dull out 342 00:25:32,079 --> 00:25:35,759 lucrative contracts to allies and spend on large urban projects 343 00:25:35,799 --> 00:25:41,039 that gave ample employment opportunities to his constituents and gave 344 00:25:41,880 --> 00:25:48,119 business allies ample opportunities for corruption and embezzlement. His Ring 345 00:25:48,200 --> 00:25:52,240 of Embezzlement, also known as the Queed Ring, embezzled around 346 00:25:52,279 --> 00:25:55,799 thirteen million dollars that's one hundred and seventy eight million 347 00:25:55,839 --> 00:25:58,359 dollars in today's money in the eighteen sixties and seventies. 348 00:25:59,880 --> 00:26:03,119 His whole career as the boss of Tammany Hall, we 349 00:26:03,799 --> 00:26:08,720 need stole up to two hundred million dollars in nineteenth 350 00:26:08,720 --> 00:26:13,559 century dollars that's five billion dollars today. He was eventually 351 00:26:13,680 --> 00:26:16,839 arrested and convicted for stealing money, and after a brief 352 00:26:16,839 --> 00:26:21,039 prison escape, very dramatic prison escape, he died in jail 353 00:26:21,440 --> 00:26:25,839 in eighteen seventy eight. The Irish eventually take over Hammany 354 00:26:25,880 --> 00:26:33,759 Hall and Irish Americans dominate its leadership for fifteen years. 355 00:26:34,759 --> 00:26:38,240 Speaker 2: We are officially in a market riptide with Iran who 356 00:26:38,279 --> 00:26:41,119 watched Dout on Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski. Every 357 00:26:41,200 --> 00:26:43,960 day Chris helps unpack the connection between politics and the 358 00:26:44,000 --> 00:26:46,319 economy and how it affects your wallet. If you have 359 00:26:46,400 --> 00:26:49,759 a good portfolio with good companies, just get out of 360 00:26:49,799 --> 00:26:53,079 the way. Don't guess what's going to happen tomorrow. Do 361 00:26:53,200 --> 00:26:56,319 not fight the riptide. Whether it's happening in DC or 362 00:26:56,359 --> 00:26:58,279 down on Wall Street, it's affecting you financially. 363 00:26:58,359 --> 00:26:58,880 Speaker 1: Be informed. 364 00:26:58,960 --> 00:27:00,799 Speaker 2: Check out the watch Dot on Wall Street podcast with 365 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:04,759 christ Markowski on Apples, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. 366 00:27:08,079 --> 00:27:11,920 Speaker 1: Now. The anti Irish sentiment that sort of bubbled up 367 00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:16,599 in response to their Catholicism and then in response to 368 00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:23,880 things like Tammy Hall's corruption, boils over in several incidents 369 00:27:23,920 --> 00:27:30,680 of riot's violence and just general discrimination. The vast majority 370 00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:32,880 of irishmen who came to America during the Fame and 371 00:27:32,920 --> 00:27:36,160 were subsistence farmers and had no real skills beyond basic 372 00:27:36,240 --> 00:27:43,240 farm work. So why did America allow English our Irish 373 00:27:43,279 --> 00:27:46,400 immigration if through so much anti Irish and anti Catholic sentiment. 374 00:27:47,559 --> 00:27:51,480 The answer was cheap labor. It's because they were subsistence 375 00:27:51,480 --> 00:27:55,720 farmers with no real skills. They could underbid just about 376 00:27:55,720 --> 00:27:59,880 any American labor, so that they became the source of cheap, 377 00:28:00,039 --> 00:28:05,200 flintiful labor for especially big cities on the East Coast 378 00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:08,960 that we're looking for cheap work either on the docks 379 00:28:09,079 --> 00:28:15,240 or in factories. Even before the wave of immigration from 380 00:28:15,279 --> 00:28:18,440 the famine, there were anti Irish riots in Philadelphia in 381 00:28:18,480 --> 00:28:23,279 eighteen forty four, and there are many instances of other 382 00:28:23,359 --> 00:28:31,480 attacks on irishmen irate Americans, who mostly opposed the Catholic angle. 383 00:28:34,759 --> 00:28:38,400 There is an infamous incident during the Mexican American War. 384 00:28:40,400 --> 00:28:42,599 Some Irish who had signed up for the US Army 385 00:28:42,839 --> 00:28:48,839 due to the allure of higher pay, higher pay compared 386 00:28:48,880 --> 00:28:53,880 to being, you know, a regular wage labor. Because these 387 00:28:53,920 --> 00:28:57,319 Irish deserted during the Mexican American War and actually joined 388 00:28:57,359 --> 00:29:01,079 the Mexicans, feeling greater affinity with their fellow Catholics than 389 00:29:01,160 --> 00:29:06,599 with the Americans. They formed the Saint Patrick's Battalion and 390 00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:12,279 fought in several battles against American forces. Eventually they were defeated, 391 00:29:12,359 --> 00:29:16,240 just like Mexico itself was defeated in the war, and overall, 392 00:29:16,440 --> 00:29:20,640 fifty men from Saint Patrick's Battalion were executed by the 393 00:29:20,720 --> 00:29:31,079 US Army for desertion. Cartoonists like Thomas Nast very famously 394 00:29:31,119 --> 00:29:35,799 depicted irishmen as violent, drunkards, hell bent on barbarism and destruction. 395 00:29:37,279 --> 00:29:40,200 If you go and look up especially Thomas Nast cartoons, 396 00:29:40,480 --> 00:29:48,559 they are very pointedly anti Irish in their tone and 397 00:29:50,519 --> 00:29:55,119 make the Irish people look terrible, Like I said, either 398 00:29:55,200 --> 00:30:03,640 as violent drunks or glible people who are led around 399 00:30:03,680 --> 00:30:07,160 by the likes of Boss Tweed into helping with corruption, 400 00:30:09,079 --> 00:30:12,000 or as being beholden to the Pope. That's a big 401 00:30:12,440 --> 00:30:15,279 complain about the Irish as being Catholic. They are holding 402 00:30:15,359 --> 00:30:22,400 to the Pope in Rome rather than to America. So 403 00:30:22,680 --> 00:30:26,519 overall American attitudes towards the Irish were pretty hostile in 404 00:30:26,559 --> 00:30:31,000 the eighteen forties, fifties, and sixties, driven by competition for jobs, 405 00:30:31,119 --> 00:30:38,240 concerned about crime, and most pointedly they're anti Catholicism. And 406 00:30:38,279 --> 00:30:41,880 this sort of comes to a head in the presidential 407 00:30:41,920 --> 00:30:46,799 election of eighteen fifty six, in which a new party 408 00:30:46,920 --> 00:30:52,119 rises up to oppose Irish immigration, and that anti Irish, 409 00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:56,039 anti immigrant sentiment grew so much that it birthed the 410 00:30:56,079 --> 00:31:01,720 American Party more infamously known as the Know Nothings Now 411 00:31:01,720 --> 00:31:06,319 They're called the know Nothings because members were instructed to 412 00:31:06,319 --> 00:31:09,279 say I know nothing if an outsider asked them about 413 00:31:09,279 --> 00:31:12,359 specifics about their party. So they sort of started out 414 00:31:12,359 --> 00:31:15,960 as a sort of secret society that eventually became a 415 00:31:16,400 --> 00:31:21,240 legitimate political party. Now No Nothings were mainly comprised of 416 00:31:21,400 --> 00:31:25,640 former Whigs. Whigs were the ones who also opposed Irish 417 00:31:25,680 --> 00:31:29,119 immigration in the eighteen forties and continued to do so. 418 00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:40,799 But Whigs were the primary anti slavery party in America 419 00:31:41,319 --> 00:31:43,920 before the rise of the Republican Party, but they were 420 00:31:43,960 --> 00:31:48,000 not as strongly anti slavery. They were more of a 421 00:31:48,079 --> 00:31:52,599 soft anti slavery party. They didn't want expansion into the Web, 422 00:31:52,640 --> 00:31:55,279 they didn't want slavery to expand into the West, but 423 00:31:55,359 --> 00:31:59,039 otherwise they were not particularly anti slavery. They tried to 424 00:32:01,519 --> 00:32:05,079 forge a middle ground and eventually the Whigs, the big 425 00:32:05,200 --> 00:32:11,440 party eventually disintegrates because of the rising anti slavery attitude 426 00:32:11,480 --> 00:32:14,119 in the North and the Whigs just I don't want 427 00:32:14,119 --> 00:32:16,839 to be the compromise party, and that's something that the 428 00:32:18,720 --> 00:32:21,759 that the know Nothing's want to do too. They want 429 00:32:21,799 --> 00:32:24,519 to sort of sidestep the issue of slavery and promote 430 00:32:24,599 --> 00:32:29,720 immigration as the greatest threat to the country. By eighteen 431 00:32:29,759 --> 00:32:35,200 fifty four, one in nine Americans were foreign born, and 432 00:32:35,839 --> 00:32:40,839 the know Nothing stressed that the new immigrants were poor 433 00:32:40,880 --> 00:32:44,079 and taking jobs, and that they were Catholic and therefore 434 00:32:45,519 --> 00:32:50,359 anti Protestant and sort of anti American values. Like Catholics, 435 00:32:50,599 --> 00:32:55,200 especially Catholics. At this time, you can't adopt democracy. They 436 00:32:55,519 --> 00:33:02,160 they're not suited to self governing. One pro No Nothing 437 00:33:02,279 --> 00:33:07,680 paper called The Baltimore Clipper wrote, let all sectional disputes 438 00:33:07,720 --> 00:33:10,440 and all discussion of the slave question be set aside. 439 00:33:10,519 --> 00:33:14,000 Our future should turn upon whether natives or foreigners shall 440 00:33:14,119 --> 00:33:18,279 rule end quote, and that pretty much sums up the 441 00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:25,279 the No Nothing parties platform is that slavery isn't that important. 442 00:33:25,359 --> 00:33:28,880 We can figure that out later. The big question is 443 00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:32,720 whether we're going to let in more immigrants, and whether 444 00:33:32,759 --> 00:33:39,759 immigrants should rule America or the native populationship. I think 445 00:33:39,759 --> 00:33:43,240 in most American textbooks and history classes that no Nothings 446 00:33:43,240 --> 00:33:45,799 are kind of just glossed over. It's like, ah, well, 447 00:33:46,200 --> 00:33:48,759 it appeared in one election and then disappeared very quickly. 448 00:33:49,160 --> 00:33:51,799 But the No Nothing's actually enjoyed quite a bit of 449 00:33:52,079 --> 00:33:56,519 state and local successes in several states, especially Maryland, where 450 00:33:56,519 --> 00:33:59,319 the party won the state's legislature and four out of 451 00:33:59,440 --> 00:34:03,039 six comrismen in eighteen fifty four. Two years later, it 452 00:34:03,119 --> 00:34:07,519 captured the state's governorship as well. The party also swept 453 00:34:07,599 --> 00:34:13,480 Massachusetts and put in quite a few soft anti Catholic 454 00:34:13,519 --> 00:34:18,400 and anti Irish policies after they took power there. And 455 00:34:18,599 --> 00:34:21,400 it's very interesting to know that the No Nothing's captured 456 00:34:22,239 --> 00:34:25,880 fifty two seats in the House in eighteen fifty four, 457 00:34:26,000 --> 00:34:30,320 which makes them the third largest party, I mean third 458 00:34:30,360 --> 00:34:33,320 largest party in the country by default, but also there 459 00:34:33,320 --> 00:34:36,679 are only two seats away from becoming the second biggest party. 460 00:34:36,880 --> 00:34:41,679 The Whigs only capture fifty four. Most of their power 461 00:34:41,719 --> 00:34:47,000 comes from Tennessee, Kentucky, Maryland, and New England, especially Massachusetts 462 00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:52,440 and New Hampshire. And that's very interesting because Tennessee, Kentucky, 463 00:34:52,519 --> 00:34:57,880 Maryland were strongholds for Whigs, so that's again the former 464 00:34:57,880 --> 00:35:00,760 Whigs sort of turning to the No Nothing after the 465 00:35:00,760 --> 00:35:05,199 Whig Party disintegrates. And Tennessee, Kentucky, and Maryland are also 466 00:35:05,320 --> 00:35:10,360 kind of the most neutral en slavery. Of course, all 467 00:35:10,360 --> 00:35:17,000 three of them are slave states, but they are declining 468 00:35:17,039 --> 00:35:21,599 in slave population, especially Kentucky and especially Maryland, and they 469 00:35:21,599 --> 00:35:25,760 are sort of desperate to sort of move on from 470 00:35:25,800 --> 00:35:31,400 the question, especially Kentucky. And it's very interesting that New 471 00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:35,119 England is very pro No Nothing because they're going to 472 00:35:35,159 --> 00:35:38,719 become one of the hot beds for Republican the Republican 473 00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:43,920 Party in the eighteen sixty election, and eighteen fifty six 474 00:35:44,039 --> 00:35:51,519 is the first Republican presidential election, not the first one 475 00:35:51,519 --> 00:35:53,519 that they that they win, it's the first one that 476 00:35:53,519 --> 00:36:03,400 they run in. But New England becomes a stallwart bastion 477 00:36:03,639 --> 00:36:06,000 for the Republican Party and becomes one of the most 478 00:36:07,440 --> 00:36:11,360 flagrantly anti slavery areas in the country. And that's just interesting. 479 00:36:11,800 --> 00:36:15,199 But in eighteen fifty four to eighteen fifty six they 480 00:36:15,199 --> 00:36:19,000 were very anti immigrant and they seem to switch to 481 00:36:20,119 --> 00:36:23,639 being anti slavery instead after the No Nothing's don't work out. 482 00:36:24,840 --> 00:36:29,320 Speaking of which, the movement's momentum sort of stalls and 483 00:36:29,639 --> 00:36:32,320 it fails to really come into its own as the 484 00:36:32,360 --> 00:36:36,559 new second party to replace the Whigs. And that begins 485 00:36:36,559 --> 00:36:39,440 with the defeat of the No Nothing candidate in Virginia's 486 00:36:39,480 --> 00:36:42,880 eighteen fifty five gubernatorial election. And that's sort of like 487 00:36:42,920 --> 00:36:47,039 the bell Weather for the eighteen fifty six election, because 488 00:36:47,079 --> 00:36:53,079 at this time Virginia is a lot Likeentucky and Tennessee 489 00:36:53,239 --> 00:36:55,360 and Maryland. They're sort of in the middle of the 490 00:36:55,400 --> 00:36:58,079 slavery debate. They're a bit more pro slavery than those 491 00:36:58,079 --> 00:37:02,360 three states, but there's still more moderate than say Mississippi 492 00:37:02,440 --> 00:37:07,320 or Alabama or South Carolina. And even at the time 493 00:37:07,360 --> 00:37:13,039 it was seen as a bell Weather state. And they 494 00:37:13,480 --> 00:37:17,239 come up just short the know Nothings. They're very narrowly defeated, 495 00:37:17,239 --> 00:37:21,039 I think by like four points by the Democrats in 496 00:37:21,119 --> 00:37:26,440 eighteen fifty five, and then the wind is sort of 497 00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:29,800 taken out of their sales an even more when the 498 00:37:29,840 --> 00:37:34,079 new Republican Party, which has just been formed and is 499 00:37:34,639 --> 00:37:38,960 running John C. Fremont in eighteen fifty six, siphoned votes 500 00:37:39,000 --> 00:37:42,639 from the north from New England while the South sort 501 00:37:42,679 --> 00:37:46,440 of rallies around the pro slavery Democrats in response to 502 00:37:46,480 --> 00:37:50,159 the Republican Party, so that siphons votes from Tennessee and 503 00:37:50,280 --> 00:37:55,519 Kentucky and they run Democrats run Buchanan, who is more 504 00:37:55,559 --> 00:38:00,559 of a moderate Democrat, so he appeals to the moderate 505 00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:06,199 voters in Tennessee and Kentucky. The No Nothing's run ex 506 00:38:06,320 --> 00:38:11,239 President Millard Fillmore as their candidate in eighteen fifty six, 507 00:38:11,639 --> 00:38:15,440 and for that sort of stall momentum for Filmore performs 508 00:38:15,559 --> 00:38:18,920 very well for a third party candidate. He receives twenty 509 00:38:19,079 --> 00:38:23,079 one point five percent of the popular vote, but he 510 00:38:23,159 --> 00:38:25,519 only carries the state of Maryland and only gets eight 511 00:38:25,559 --> 00:38:31,119 electoral votes. So and then after their failure in eighteen 512 00:38:31,199 --> 00:38:35,599 fifty six, the No Nothing Party really just starts to 513 00:38:37,199 --> 00:38:40,639 spiral out of control and sort of by eighteen sixty 514 00:38:40,639 --> 00:38:44,679 it's totally dead. So it's it was a flash in 515 00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:47,000 the pan that became very powerful, very quickly, and then 516 00:38:47,119 --> 00:38:52,159 fell almost as quickly as it rose. But it really 517 00:38:52,559 --> 00:38:57,519 underlines that sentiment that almost became a major national movement, 518 00:38:58,599 --> 00:39:07,960 that anti immigrant, anti Catholic sentiment, and well, in a 519 00:39:08,000 --> 00:39:12,639 couple of instances they had a pretty good point. The 520 00:39:12,679 --> 00:39:15,719 Irish brought grudges and political tensions with them across the Atlantic. 521 00:39:16,199 --> 00:39:19,320 It wasn't just the Americans in English who didn't like 522 00:39:19,360 --> 00:39:22,400 the Irish. The Irish also did not like the English 523 00:39:22,480 --> 00:39:30,320 at all and had a relatively low opinion of Americans 524 00:39:30,320 --> 00:39:35,800 who were descended from Englishmen, and especially low opinion of 525 00:39:36,840 --> 00:39:40,960 Irishmen who were Protestant Secretarian violence broke out in eighteen 526 00:39:41,000 --> 00:39:44,559 seventy and eighteen seventy one during the Orange Riots in 527 00:39:44,639 --> 00:39:49,400 New York City, which pitted Protestant Irish and Catholic Irish 528 00:39:49,440 --> 00:39:54,559 against each other. They were the Proston Irish are trying 529 00:39:54,559 --> 00:40:01,119 to have a parade and the Irish Atholics came in 530 00:40:01,119 --> 00:40:06,159 and disrupted the parade, and there was a fighting. Tammany 531 00:40:06,199 --> 00:40:08,199 tried to step in and it didn't really work out, 532 00:40:08,280 --> 00:40:12,039 And on several occasions there were riots throughout the city 533 00:40:12,079 --> 00:40:14,599 and dozens of people were killed in these riots. So 534 00:40:16,159 --> 00:40:21,320 it wasn't just you know, sour words exchanged between you know, 535 00:40:22,119 --> 00:40:24,119 the Protestants and the Catholics. It was a real physical 536 00:40:24,199 --> 00:40:26,280 violence that these people were doing on the streets of 537 00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:30,320 America based on a you know, feud that was centuries 538 00:40:30,360 --> 00:40:36,679 old in another country across the ocean. That might sound 539 00:40:36,679 --> 00:40:43,480 familiar to UH instances today in which that still happens. 540 00:40:43,639 --> 00:40:47,880 The Senian Brotherhood, an Irish republican organization founded in eighteen 541 00:40:47,960 --> 00:40:52,400 fifty eight, launched several terrorist raids from the United States 542 00:40:52,440 --> 00:40:56,119 from the United States soil against British Canada to try 543 00:40:56,159 --> 00:41:02,000 to force Britain to withdraw from Ireland and the Canadian 544 00:41:02,559 --> 00:41:05,079 militia and the British army had to mobilize to stop 545 00:41:05,119 --> 00:41:07,679 these raids. That's how that's how serious they were and 546 00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:10,800 there and the raids resulted in the deaths of fifty 547 00:41:10,880 --> 00:41:14,239 nine people on both sides, and I suspect almost nobody 548 00:41:14,280 --> 00:41:19,679 in America knows about that today. The US, for its part, 549 00:41:19,679 --> 00:41:23,960 helped arrest members of the Fenian Brotherhood who were hiding 550 00:41:23,960 --> 00:41:31,440 out in America and confiscated weapons. But it just shows 551 00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:39,599 that Irish immigrants coming over brought their ancient feuds from 552 00:41:39,599 --> 00:41:43,280 the Old Country here to America and we're willing to 553 00:41:45,199 --> 00:41:49,840 violently act out those feuds. And one quick side note, 554 00:41:50,599 --> 00:41:53,519 then they failed to make the Brits leave Ireland. That 555 00:41:53,519 --> 00:41:57,679 wouldn't happen for another fifty years. The raids are an 556 00:41:57,679 --> 00:42:00,320 important event in the formation of the Canadian Confederation eighteen 557 00:42:00,360 --> 00:42:05,400 sixty seven because Britain's response was deemed to be pretty 558 00:42:05,480 --> 00:42:12,239 lackluster and Canada then decided to sort of move towards 559 00:42:12,239 --> 00:42:16,039 a more unified government structure so they could respond to 560 00:42:16,159 --> 00:42:20,960 things like that more easily, so that a sort of 561 00:42:21,039 --> 00:42:26,159 unintended consequences of these pretty much terrorist attack it started 562 00:42:26,519 --> 00:42:34,199 the process for creating the country of Canada. Meanwhile, back 563 00:42:34,239 --> 00:42:40,320 in New York City, how Many begins to decline in 564 00:42:40,400 --> 00:42:43,719 eighteen ninety eight because of several reforms that are pushed 565 00:42:43,719 --> 00:42:50,119 through in New York City, but it eventually dissolves totally 566 00:42:50,159 --> 00:42:53,920 in nineteen sixty seven, a shadow of its former self, 567 00:42:54,000 --> 00:42:59,320 of course, But it can't really be understated how much 568 00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:04,079 of a mark leaves on American politics. It is the 569 00:43:04,119 --> 00:43:08,400 first main political machine in American politics, and it's probably 570 00:43:08,440 --> 00:43:13,119 the most powerful that's ever existed at the city level. 571 00:43:16,000 --> 00:43:18,639 As a result, other political machines popped up in other 572 00:43:18,719 --> 00:43:26,280 northern cities like Boston, which also catered to patronage for 573 00:43:26,599 --> 00:43:31,000 Irish immigrants and really relied on Irish support to create 574 00:43:31,079 --> 00:43:35,400 that political machine. But it's really that machine blueprint that 575 00:43:35,519 --> 00:43:41,079 Tammany Pioneers and those successive machines that spring up in 576 00:43:41,119 --> 00:43:45,679 other cities across the North during the eighteen sixties and seventies, 577 00:43:45,760 --> 00:43:48,920 especially in the last for decades and decades and decades, 578 00:43:49,639 --> 00:43:52,360 they leave a lasting impact on American politics and eventually 579 00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:58,760 become state machines and even national political machines, and they 580 00:43:58,800 --> 00:44:01,800 spread all over the country. Have political machines out west 581 00:44:01,800 --> 00:44:04,800 in California, and then you have political machines in the 582 00:44:04,880 --> 00:44:10,360 South in places like Memphis, and in some ways, the 583 00:44:10,440 --> 00:44:17,039 New Deal UH nationalized Tammany's tactics of honest graft, of 584 00:44:17,039 --> 00:44:23,559 getting lots of goodies and jobs and contracts and bogus 585 00:44:23,599 --> 00:44:27,480 government health for your for your constituents and patronage to 586 00:44:27,559 --> 00:44:32,119 create the political machine that kept Franklin Delano Roosevelt and 587 00:44:32,239 --> 00:44:36,559 later New Deal Democrats in power for literally decades. 588 00:44:39,199 --> 00:44:39,320 Speaker 2: Uh. 589 00:44:40,159 --> 00:44:43,679 Speaker 1: We still see that basic strategy of of Tammany at 590 00:44:44,119 --> 00:44:51,480 at play today in Democrat politics hand or to certain 591 00:44:51,519 --> 00:44:55,119 subsections of the population, including foreign minorities, and build up 592 00:44:55,119 --> 00:44:57,400 a giant network of aid and patronage to those voters. 593 00:44:57,400 --> 00:45:01,960 And there's a healthy amount of uh fraud, embezzlement and 594 00:45:02,000 --> 00:45:04,599 graph that goes with that. I mean, we've seen it 595 00:45:04,639 --> 00:45:10,880 in places like Minneapolis, and multiple investigations into Los Angeles 596 00:45:10,880 --> 00:45:15,360 and California in general seems to indicate that that sort 597 00:45:15,360 --> 00:45:18,679 of thing never really went away, and the fact that 598 00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:22,360 it's alive and well in today's politics. And it all 599 00:45:22,360 --> 00:45:27,440 started with trying to get votes from Irish immigrants. So overall, 600 00:45:28,119 --> 00:45:30,760 four and a half million Irishmen came to America between 601 00:45:30,760 --> 00:45:36,039 eighteen twenty and nineteen thirty. Their assimilation took quite a 602 00:45:36,039 --> 00:45:40,119 long time, at least from Heritage Americans perspective and the 603 00:45:40,119 --> 00:45:49,159 people who are already here. While anti Irish sentiment, many 604 00:45:49,199 --> 00:45:52,639 Heritage Americans thought that Irishmen could never be assimilated it 605 00:45:52,639 --> 00:45:57,719 they'll always be sort of this other, this separated minority 606 00:45:57,719 --> 00:46:00,639 in America, that they can never learn to to live 607 00:46:00,679 --> 00:46:07,039 in a republic. But that sentiment began to decline with 608 00:46:07,119 --> 00:46:11,000 the influx of other immigrants like Italians and Eastern Europeans 609 00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:14,199 in the late eighteen eighties into the eighteen nineties and onward. 610 00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:20,320 But the negative stereotypes of Irishmen as sort of the 611 00:46:20,360 --> 00:46:24,960 Thomas Nasty caricatures of you know, alcoholic foreign barbarians who 612 00:46:24,960 --> 00:46:27,800 are just looking to you know, commit crimes and things 613 00:46:28,000 --> 00:46:30,480 continues weoll into the Prohibition era. In fact, that's one 614 00:46:30,519 --> 00:46:34,239 of the main caricatures used to sort of gin up 615 00:46:35,039 --> 00:46:40,480 unintended support for prohibition was to try and say that, 616 00:46:40,760 --> 00:46:45,719 you know, Christian German ceminals get drunk and then go 617 00:46:45,760 --> 00:46:49,199 out and you know, smash windows or accost women or 618 00:46:49,320 --> 00:46:52,400 going break into people's houses and things, and that's how 619 00:46:52,440 --> 00:46:59,760 they sort of promoted prohibition. But those stereotypes as of 620 00:46:59,880 --> 00:47:04,760 Irishman as Aglian others does start to decline from the 621 00:47:04,760 --> 00:47:09,320 eighteen nineties on, and then I think it really disappears 622 00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:13,239 with the election of Kennedy in nineteen sixty. That's sort 623 00:47:13,280 --> 00:47:19,400 of like the final death knell of Irishmen as non Americans. 624 00:47:19,880 --> 00:47:23,320 It probably mostly disappeared before that, but that's kind of 625 00:47:23,320 --> 00:47:27,840 the final, the final say we had really gotten over that. 626 00:47:28,239 --> 00:47:30,280 And today, of course, like I've said at the at 627 00:47:30,280 --> 00:47:34,480 the beginning of the show, we see the Irish as 628 00:47:34,920 --> 00:47:38,079 just as American as anybody else really, and a lot 629 00:47:38,119 --> 00:47:42,320 of non Irish people do take part in Irish cultural 630 00:47:43,159 --> 00:47:48,960 stuff like Saint Patrick's day. But I think the main 631 00:47:49,000 --> 00:47:52,519 point is we often ask who's to blame for the 632 00:47:52,559 --> 00:47:55,239 broken and corrupt politics that we see play out today 633 00:47:55,320 --> 00:48:03,079 in Washington, DC and states like California or cities like Minneapolis. Certainly, 634 00:48:03,079 --> 00:48:05,440 the people who continue to rob and defraud the American 635 00:48:05,480 --> 00:48:09,000 people today need to be held accountable for all that 636 00:48:09,639 --> 00:48:14,440 corruption and honest or not. But we see the origins 637 00:48:14,480 --> 00:48:17,280 for this system of graft and crooked back when deal 638 00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:19,960 stretch all the way back to the beginning of political 639 00:48:20,000 --> 00:48:25,119 machines in the eighteen forties, with the rise of Tammany Hall. 640 00:48:25,280 --> 00:48:29,079 So are the Irish immigrants to blame for coming and 641 00:48:29,119 --> 00:48:31,920 then voting in sort of this tribalistic way as a 642 00:48:31,960 --> 00:48:36,880 group because they've been courted by this very obviously corrupt 643 00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:41,599 political machine. And then you know they willfully feed off 644 00:48:41,639 --> 00:48:45,679 of the government corruption provided to them by politicians like 645 00:48:45,960 --> 00:48:49,920 Boss Tweed and Tammany Hall. Or do we blame the 646 00:48:49,960 --> 00:48:53,239 politicians who paindered to and use the Irish to build 647 00:48:53,400 --> 00:48:59,000 their sort of empires of corruption. I noted it earlier, 648 00:48:59,039 --> 00:49:02,960 but it should be noted again that William Tweed the 649 00:49:03,039 --> 00:49:05,800 man perhaps most responsible for the power and influence of 650 00:49:05,840 --> 00:49:09,559 Tammany Hall, and then therefore you could say the power 651 00:49:09,599 --> 00:49:12,559 and influence of machine politics in America stretching all the 652 00:49:12,599 --> 00:49:15,519 way forward to a New Deal, all the way up 653 00:49:15,559 --> 00:49:21,280 to today in American politics. He would be considered a 654 00:49:21,320 --> 00:49:28,320 heritage American today. As I said, his grandfather came probably 655 00:49:28,320 --> 00:49:31,920 before the Revolution and if not right after the Revolution. 656 00:49:32,119 --> 00:49:37,079 So he and he was from Scotland. So most people 657 00:49:37,119 --> 00:49:40,239 would say William Tweed was a heritage American, just as 658 00:49:40,239 --> 00:49:47,360 American as anybody else, but perhaps he deserves quite a 659 00:49:47,400 --> 00:49:55,800 bit of the blame for the state of our politics today. 660 00:49:55,920 --> 00:50:01,000 So I asked that you just side who's to blame. 661 00:50:01,119 --> 00:50:05,239 Is it the group, or is it the individuals within 662 00:50:05,320 --> 00:50:08,199 that group? Or is it is it the people who 663 00:50:08,280 --> 00:50:11,400 take advantage of that group who are truly to blame? 664 00:50:12,039 --> 00:50:18,719 Or what the situation that we've found ourselves in. Thank 665 00:50:18,760 --> 00:50:22,000 you so much for listening today on this very special episode, 666 00:50:22,519 --> 00:50:26,280 And this is another edition of Hayden's History Hour. I'm 667 00:50:26,280 --> 00:50:29,159 Hayden Daniel, editor at the Federalists. We'll be back soon 668 00:50:29,239 --> 00:50:33,199 with more. Until then, be lovers of freedom, anxious for 669 00:50:33,599 --> 00:50:40,079 the frame. Oh Tenny boy, the pipe, the pipe are 670 00:50:40,280 --> 00:50:40,880 calling