RED SCARE 1919

Apart from the coronation of Elizabeth II on the 2^nd June 1953, the 2^nd June in the United States of 1919 reflects the activities of the Angry Brigade in the United Kingdom of the 1970’s, although perhaps a bit more severe (see entry 31 May 2011).

Between 1850-1914, 40 million people emigrated to the USA and following the First World War and the Bolshevik Revolution, post war America was a refuge for millions of displaced people, although it was more difficult just after the WWI to get into the United States. Because of the existing numbers of immigrants, politicians were urging new legislation to curb the numbers, and indeed the Emergency Quota Act of 1921 restricted annual immigration from a given country to 3% of the number of people from that country living in the U.S. in 1910. My mother arrived in America in 1921 from Hungary. The unrest, however, was already brewing. Protest and activity from all parts of the political spectrum were rising. This enabled the first Red Scare in the United States.

Luigi Galleani

Following an earlier spate of attempted bombings, in April/May 1919, on the evening of June 2, 1919, Galleanists (anarchist followers of Luigi Galleani) managed to blow up eight large bombs nearly simultaneously in eight different U.S. cities. These bombs were part of an earlier campaign much in April of 1919. One used 20 pounds of dynamite, and all were wrapped or packaged with heavy metal slugs designed to act as shrapnel. Addressees included government officials who had endorsed anti-sedition laws and deportation of immigrants suspected of crimes or associated with illegal movements, as well as judges who had sentenced anarchists to prison. The homes of Mayor Harry L. Davis of Cleveland; Judge W.H.S. Thompson, Massachusetts State Representative Leland Powers; Judge Charles C. Nott of New York; and Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, already the recipient of a mail bomb in April, were attacked in the new wave of violence. None of the targeted men were killed, but the bombs took the lives of New York City night watchman William Boehner; a woman who had been passing by one of the victim's homes; and one of the anarchists, Carlo Valdinoci, a former editor of the Galleanist publication Cronaca Sovversiva and a close associate of Galleani. Though not injured, Palmer and his family were shaken by the blast.

Each of the bombs was delivered with a pink flyer, titled "Plain Words," that read:

War, Class war, and you were the first to wage it under the cover of the powerful institutions you call order, in the darkness of your laws. There will have to be bloodshed; we will not dodge; there will have to be murder: we will kill, because it is necessary; there will have to be destruction; we will destroy to rid the world of your tyrannical institutions.

The flyer was later traced to a printing shop operated by Andrea Salsedo, a typesetter and Roberto Elia, a compositor, both Galleanists according to the later memoirs of other members. Salsedo committed suicide, and Elia refused an offer to cancel deportation proceedings if he would testify about his role in the Galleanist organization. Unable to secure enough evidence for criminal trials, authorities continued to use the Anarchist Exclusion Act and related statutes to deport known Galleanists.

Palmer

Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, twice targeted by anarchist bombs, organized the nationwide series of police actions, known as the Palmer Raids, in November 1919 and January 1920. Under suspicion of violating the Espionage Act and Sedition Act thousands of people were arrested–a mix of violent radicals, miscellaneous foreigners, and innocent bystanders of all sorts–and more than 500 resident aliens were deported. The bombing campaign added to the Red Scare of 1919-1920, a widespread fear that radicals planned to overthrow the United States government and replace it with a Bolshevist dictatorship, such as that established by the Russian Revolution. It contributed to American resentment of immigrants, especially in those cities where people competed for scarce jobs and housing.

Louis Post

Fearful of extremist violence and revolution, the American public initially supported the raids. Civil libertarians, the radical left, and legal scholars raised protests. Officials at the Department of Labor, especially Louis Freeland Post, asserted the rule of law in opposition to Palmer's campaign, and Congressional attempts to impeach or censure Louis Post were short-lived, though Palmer was allowed to defend himself in two days of testimony before the House Rules Committee in June 1919. Much of the press applauded Louis Post's work at Labor as well, and Palmer, rather than President Wilson, was largely blamed for the negative results of the raids.