Read on Twitter
I've decided that the 1920s, not the 1950s or the 1800s, are the era of "greatness" that Trumpists want to return us to.
1. white supremacism as an explicit, widespread ideology
2. immigration ban
3. leftover jingoism from WW1
4. laissez-faire economics and massive inequality
1. white supremacism as an explicit, widespread ideology
2. immigration ban
3. leftover jingoism from WW1
4. laissez-faire economics and massive inequality
The New KKK was on the march in the 1920s, boasting millions of members and taking over whole cities. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/second-klan/509468/
They took over Oregon! https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/07/racist-history-portland/492035/
There were anti-Black riots in hundreds of cities in 1919: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/racial-violence-pandemic-how-red-summer-1919-relates-2020-n1231499
And of course Tulsa in 1921: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/long-lost-manuscript-contains-searing-eyewitness-account-tulsa-race-massacre-1921-180959251/
World War 1 spawned a nasty form of nationalism and forced assimilation known as "100 Percent Americanism" that was popular in the 1920s. https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2018/11/11/were-still-haunted-by-our-failure-grapple-with-dark-side-world-war-i/
Madison Grant published "The Passing of the Great Race" in 1916, but the proto-Nazi theory of "Nordic superiority" that it promoted was popular in the 20s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Passing_of_the_Great_Race
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Passing_of_the_Great_Race
And Lothrop Stoddard published "The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy" in 1920, which influenced Nazi ideology.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lothrop_Stoddard
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lothrop_Stoddard
But Grant and Stoddard didn't just influence Nazi Germany. Their ideas were also the basis of the racist U.S. immigration restriction of 1924, which halted almost all U.S. immigration and banned nonwhite immigration. https://www.amazon.com/Strangers-Land-Patterns-American-1860-1925/dp/0813531233
Jeff Sessions explicitly praised that 1924 law.
Stephen Miller too.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/jeff-sessions-1924-immigration/512591/
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2019/11/12/stephen-millers-affinity-white-nationalism-revealed-leaked-emails
Stephen Miller too.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/jeff-sessions-1924-immigration/512591/
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2019/11/12/stephen-millers-affinity-white-nationalism-revealed-leaked-emails
The 1920s, like now, were a period of staggering inequality.
President Calvin Coolidge slashed taxes, saying that "the chief business of the American people is business". https://millercenter.org/president/coolidge/domestic-affairs
Meanwhile, the U.S. government attempted to crush leftism in 1919 and 1920 with a series of brutal crackdowns known as the Palmer Raids. https://www.history.com/topics/red-scare/palmer-raids
America had embraced military adventures earlier in the century, but in the 1920s its nationalism became "isolationism", which was generally a racist, inward-looking sort of nationalism, focused on suppressing dissent and minorities. Very Trumpian. https://theweek.com/articles/627638/brief-history-american-isolationism
But despite being racist, and unequal, the 1920s were also a prosperous time for many Americans (especially WASPs), when living standards shot up. It was the Babe Ruth era.
This combination makes it especially appealing as a target for Trumpist nostalgia.
This combination makes it especially appealing as a target for Trumpist nostalgia.
The other eras that the Right sometimes pines for -- the big-government 1950s, the chaotic premodern 1800s -- don't quite seem to fit the ethos of Trumpism.
The 1920s fit it perfectly.
The 1920s fit it perfectly.
And we should remember that the 1930s -- the darkest period of modern history -- didn't come out of nowhere.
The 1920s primed us for everything bad that happened in the 30s.
(end)
The 1920s primed us for everything bad that happened in the 30s.
(end)
