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History Of Socialism in America – Part 2

Did you know… Old Economy Village?
Continuing series on the history of socialism in the United States

Last week we looked at Robert Owen and the Harmony Society, attempting
to form a socialist utopia in the United States. This week, we look at
another attempt by the Harmonists, coming to Pennsylvania, this time
settling in Beaver County along the Ohio River. There they founded
“Oekonomie,” now better known as Old Economy Village.

Owen was
the financial end of the Harmonists – he bought Rapp’s failing Indiana
settlement. George Rapp was the religious end. Born in Lutheran Church
in 1785 and was promptly banned from meeting. The persecution that Rapp
and his followers experienced caused them to leave Germany and come to
the United States in 1803. Rapp viewed himself as a modern day prophet.
Rapp was a Pietist, and a number of his beliefs were shared by the
Anabaptists, as well as groups such as the Shakers.
Rapp’s
religious beliefs and philosophy were the cement that held his community
together both in Germany and in America – a Harmony Society.
Experiencing persecution, he persuaded his followers to pool all their
resources, share alike for the common good, and emigrate to America.

Economy was the third and final home of the Harmony Society. In 1824,
leaders purchased 3,000 acres in Beaver County on the Ohio River,
eighteen miles downriver from Pittsburgh. The soil was rich for farming
and the location was ideal for shipping Society products to markets on
the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers and to the West in the newly settled
areas on the frontier.

The Society’s financial success and
self-sufficiency stirred the interest of economists and social reformers
in the United States and Europe. Among Economy’s many important
visitors was prominent German economist Friedrich List, who visited
Economy in 1825 and observed the community at work. The same year,
British social reformer Frances Wright stayed for several days, seeking
guidance from George’s son Frederick Rapp as she planned a community for
freed slaves in Tennessee. German royals also visited, as did
President Zachary Taylor while in office.

But paradise didn’t
last long. Within six years, members grew dissatisfied with Rapp. He
took control of all property, and advocated members practicing celibacy.
Rapp was the spiritual and financial leader, and dissent was not
tolerated.
Soon the arguing became violent.

Many lawsuits
sprang up relating to the monetary claims by former Society members who
did not feel properly compensated for their time and labor, other cases
concerned the ownership and sale of property Society members left in
Württemberg, and legal complications from fines and payments made to
avoid militia service.

Rapp was called a tyrant and Society
members his slaves. During elections, the Society was seen as a
monolithic voting block which caused political ill feelings and
generated animosity against Rapp. He was accused of killing his son
Johannes – who died in an industrial accident.

Following the uprising and departure of disgruntled members in 1832 and the death of Frederick Rapp in 1834, the Society became less open to the outside world and less active in the political arena. The discontent came from the perception that hard work was not rewarded, that distribution of assets was unfair, and there was no future. The families of members sued the group and the entire society was engulfed in legal battles, until finally a lawsuit by member John Duss, a school teacher, ended the experiment. Assets were divided among members, and six acres with the town buildings were given to the state of Pennsylvania, which still operates it as a historic site.

[image error]Old Economy



[image error]Plan for Old Economy

History of Socialism in America

Our motto here is we make history fun – but also looking at the past with relevance for today.

In that spirit, this is the start of a new series on the history of socialism – what it is, what it isn’t, and how it’s been implemented and lived out in the past in the United States, the men, and women who have promoted and opposed it. This will temporarily replace the Thursday “History in the Headlines” feature.

First, let’s get our terms straight: Socialism, according to Webster’s dictionary: 1: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods

2a: a system of society or group living in which there is no private property

b: a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state

3: a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done.

Usually, socialism says it allows freedom of religion, but often promotes secularism.

Communism: Definition of communism

1a: a system in which goods are owned in common and are available to all as needed

b: a theory advocating the elimination of private property

You can see more of the distinctions between socialism and communism here: https://www.diffen.com/difference/Com...

No society has yet incarnated pure communism – a totalitarian form of socialism is about the closest, as seen in China and the former Soviet Union.

Webster’s defines democracy as 1a: government by the people

especially: the rule of the majority

b: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections.

A pure democracy would have all citizens vote on all laws and measures – similar to a town meeting. No nation in modern times has incarnated a pure democracy. Instead, as Benjamin Franklin said when asked what the result of the Constitution was, we have “a republic, if you can keep it.”

Webster’s defines a republic as:

1a(1): a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and who in modern times is usually a president

(2): a political unit (such as a nation) having such a form of government

b(1)

: a government in which supreme power resides in a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives responsible to them and governing according to law.

Sorry for the slightly boring high school civics lesson, but it’s tough to talk about without using the correct terminology.

So now, how about it? To what extent is our American way of life socialist, and how has it been tried in the past?

A quick glance at a few high school history and economics texts should convince you that this wasn’t covered in school

Mary Ellen Pleasant

[image error]Mary Ellen Pleasant

Did you know… Mary Ellen Pleasant (19 August 1814 – 4 January 1904)?
Black history day
Mary Ellen’s origins have conflicting sources and birth dates. In one version of her memoirs dictated to her god-daughter Charlotte Downs, she claimed she was born a slave to a Voodoo priestess and John Hampden Pleasants, youngest son of Governor of Virginia James Pleasants. In any case, she showed up in Nantucket, Massachusetts circa 1827 as a bonded servant to a storekeeper, “Grandma” Hussey. She worked out her bondage, then became a family member and lifelong friend to Hussey’s granddaughter Phoebe Hussey Gardner. The Husseys were deeply involved in the abolitionist movement, and Mary Ellen met many of the famous abolitionists. Working in the shop, Mary Ellen also gained business skills that were to aid her in later life.

Due to her white
father, she often passed for white. This helped in her Underground
Railroad work. Mary Ellen married another mulatto, James Smith in about
1840. Smith had founded a successful flour mill, and owned a plantation
to support it – but freed all of the slaves working it. Together, Mary
Ellen and James worked on the Underground Railroad, helping slaves reach
freedom. This attracted the attention of slave catchers. James and Mary
Ellen had to relocate to somewhere they were not known well. For four
years, they transported slaves to Ohio, Canada, and other free states.
James fell ill on one of their journeys and died. His will left
instructions and money for continuing the abolition and Underground
Railroad work.

In 1848, Mary Ellen formed an alliance, and then
marriage with JJ Pleasant. She and Pleasant continued Underground
Railroad work, attracting the attention of the slave catchers. JJ had
Creole relatives in New Orleans opposed to slavery, and they traveled
there to escape, though both were legally free. JJ booked passage to San
Francisco, and Mary Ellen followed in April 1852.

Mary Ellen was
not too proud to clean and cook – she took work where she could find
it, and soon was in the Case and Heiser exclusive white eating
establishment. She often passed herself as white to gain access, but
soon her cooking and business skills made everyone forget what color she
was. With other blacks, she never pretended. She opened her own
restaurants and boarding houses, taking advantage of the rough San
Francisco boom town environment.

“She engaged a young clerk,
Thomas Bell, at the Bank of California and they began to make money
based on her tips and guidance. Thomas made money of his own, especially
in quicksilver, and by 1875 they had amassed a 30 million dollar
fortune (roughly 647 million dollars in 2017[4]) between them. J.J., who
had worked with Mary Ellen from the slave-stealing days to the civil
rights court battles of the 1860s and ’70s, died in 1877 of diabetes.” –
Wikipedia

With her wealth, she continued her Underground
Railroad activities, helping slaves escape west and north, earning her
the nickname, “The Harriet Tubman of California.” She actively
supported John Brown – purportedly when he was captured at Harper’s
Ferry, there was a note in his pocket signed “MEP”. She always used her
wealth and business acumen to help those of her race find employment
and freedom. After the Civil War and the 13th Amendment, she officially
changed her race on census and other official documents to Black.

Mary Ellen received a letter from a governor addressing her as “Mammy
Pleasant” – she returned the letter with the curt response that her name
was Mrs. Mary Ellen Pleasant. Beyond that, she didn’t deem his
correspondence a waste of paper.

This caused no little stir and some discrimination. Like an early Rosa Parks, she fought court battles to eliminate discrimination against blacks on San Francisco public transit. Pleasant v. North Beach & Mission Railroad Company, went to the California Supreme Court and took two years to complete. She won, but the court reduced her damages severely. Another series of court battles with Senator Thomas Bell and William Sharon damaged her reputation in a smear campaign.

“On the first day of the trial, William Sharon’s attorney asserted that his client was the victim of a plot involving an elderly black woman who had used voodoo to steal Sharon’s hard-earned fortune. That woman was known to the San Francisco public as “Mammy Pleasant,” around whom sinister rumors had swirled for years. Some accused her of being a murderess, a madam, and a practitioner of black magic who befriended white families only to curse them and bleed them dry; a nightmarish image of “the mammy gone wrong,” to quote one historian. But just as many—especially among the black community—knew her as Mary Ellen Pleasant: an ingenious entrepreneur, pioneering civil-rights activist, and beloved benefactor who broke racial taboos and played a singular role in the early years of San Francisco.” – Paris Review

Her legal battles cost her so much that she died in San Francisco, California on January 4, 1904, in poverty.

Did you know…Glyndwyr Michael (4 January 1909 – 24 January 1943)?

Tales of WW2…

How a homeless vagrant corpse contributed to the British war effort

[image error]Glyndwr Michael

In 1939, British intelligence wrote a memo popularly known as “the Trout memo”, about how to deceive the enemy. It said in part: “The memo reads, in part: “The Trout Fisher casts patiently all day. He frequently changes his venue and his lures. If he has frightened a fish he may ‘give the water a rest for half-an-hour,’ but his main endeavour, viz. to attract fish by something he sends out from his boat, is incessant.” The memo goes on to describe numerous ways that the enemy, like trout, may be fooled or lured in.

A operation was created based on this idea, Operation Mincemeat.

Michael was a poverty stricken homeless vagrant who died from eating rat poison. British intelligence created the fictitious Major William Martin, dressed Michael’s corpse in a Royal Marines uniform, and attached a black attache case to his wrist. They planted false personal identity papers on the body, along with correspondence in the attache case between two British generals, discussing invasion plans.

The plans mentioned invading Greece and Sardina, rather than the true target, Sicily. The body was loaded into a submarine, and set adrift near the southern coast of Spain.

[image error]

The German Abwehr received the intelligence from friendly Spanish authorities, and diverted extra troops to defend Greece and Sardinia. Sicily received no reinforcements.

British authorities began their frantic attempts to recover the case, counting on the fact that their efforts would convince the Nazis of the documents’ validity. As a result of the false intelligence carried by “William Martin,” the Nazis were caught unawares when 160,000 Allied troops invaded Sicily on July 10, 1943.

The operation was a success.

Did you know… the Kaw tribe?

Tales of the Old West

[image error]White Plume, Kaw leader

In the mid seventeenth century, a large group of Native Americans began a westward migration. The exact reason for the move is not known – some say it was to escape pressure from the Europeans in the east, some say bad weather and unfavorable harvest, yet others say to escape disease or enemies. Whatever the reason, they drifted west, until they reached the Missouri, Mississippi, and Arkansas Rivers. At that point, they split. The Osage and some of their kin went north, others went south, and the Kaw, or Kanza group settled just west of the Missouri River. It is estimated that there were about 1500 in the group. They were hoping for a new life, for prosperity – but it was not to be.

In their old home, they were agricultural, but in their new environs, the buffalo were plentiful. They became part of the Plains hunter culture. They built a city, near present day Manhattan, Kansas, with lodges sixty feet long, twenty-five feet wide. Passing by them June 5, 1804, William Rogers Clark makes this note in his journal: “the Kanza Nation hunted on the Missourie last Winter and are now persueing the Buffalow in the Plains “.

The Louisiana Purchase meant a flood of new settlers over the next several decades, all desiring the land, killing the buffalo and bringing disease. Smallpox wiped out many. To the west, the more powerful Sioux and Cheyenne resisted any effort to expand, as did their traditional enemies, the Pawnee, to the north. The coming of the settlers left the Kaw with little place to go. War was continually upon them, from all sides. Floyd of the Lewis and Clark estimated that between smallpox and depredations of their neighbors, the Kaw were reduced to about three hundred adult men.  

“The traveler George C. Sibley gave a favorable description of the Kaw in 1811. He visited their village at the junction of the Big Blue River and Kansas Rivers. “The town contains 128 houses, or lodges, which are generally about sixty feet long and twenty-five feet wide…They are commodious and quite comfortable….” The Kaw “are governed by a chief and the influence of the oldest and most distinguished warriors. They are seldom at peace with any of their neighbors, except the Osage, with whom there appears to be a cordial and lasting relationship. The Kansas are a stout, hardy, handsome race, more active and enterprising even than the Osage. They are noted for their bravery and heroic daring.”[14] The Kaw lived in their village about one-half the year. The women tended corn fields. The other half year they journeyed to western Kansas to hunt buffalo while living in teepees. Horse racing and hunting were said to be the two passions of the men. They were, in the words of Sibley, “homeless wanderers and such is the stubbornness of their Nature that they will rather remain as they are”.

In 1825, hoping for protection and peace, a treaty was signed with the United States government calling for the Kaw to cede most of their lands and move to a reservation near Council Grove, in return for an annuity of about $3400 each year. The annuity either didn’t come, came late, or found its way into the pockets of dishonest agents. In response, the tribe split into three groups, with White Plume leading a group that wanted to continue to try for rapprochement with the United States.

In 1844, a huge flood washed out the Kaw crops, and put the tribe on the brink of starvation. They ceded more land to get funds to live on. Then in 1860, the government arbitrarily reduced the reservation to 80,000 acres.

With the coming of the Civil War, some of the Kaw were pressed less than voluntarily into the 9th Kansas Cavalry. They served in the pursuit of Quantrill after the sack of Lawrence.

When the war ended, so ended the government’s concern for the Kaw. Pressure increased to remove them from Kansas. Finally, in 1873, the government force them to move to a new reservation in Oklahoma, departing forever the state named for them.

In Oklahoma, they declined further, swindled and pushed on all sides, until finally one of their own broke the tribal government – Charles Curtis, one-quarter Kaw, elected Vice President under Herbert Hoover, pushed for the assimilation of Native American tribes and the breakup of tribal governments. Each Kaw was given 400 acres. In 1959, the Kaw reorganized, and founded a tribal government, achieving tribal recognition. In 1960, the government created the Kaw Reservoir, flooding most of the Kaw land. According to Dorothy Roberts, full-blooded Kaw women were subject to sterilization by the Indian Health Service in the 1970s.

Today there are no longer any full-blooded Kaw, or living native speakers, though the language remains available through recordings online. A proud people have mostly passed into history. Descendants maintain the Kaw Nation near Kaw City, Oklahoma.

Topeka is a word from the Kaw language that means “good place to grow potatoes”.

[image error]Kaw head chief, Al-le-ga-wa-ho, 1870