PARTY PREFERENCES AND POLITICAL LEADERSHIP
The great majority of the Scandinavians, prior to 1884, were thoro-going
and uncompromising Republicans, and tho the party still holds most of
them, profiting largely from their natural conservatism and their
loyalty to a principle, it can by no means depend upon them with the
assurance it had in the "good old days" when to find a Scandinavian
voter in the Northwest was to find a Republican.
The causes which determined the early party affiliations of the
naturalized sons of the Vikings, in the broad area of State and Federal
affairs, are to be found in the character of the immigrants themselves
and in the great questions agitating the country at the time they became
citizens. Coming to the United States with an endowment of natural
independence, with an innate respect for government, and with an
inclination for public concerns, their interest was at once actively
aroused in the great problem of slavery that vexed national life from
the time of the Sloop Folk to the Civil War. As their information about
the slave system grew more exact, and as the tremendous significance of
the restriction of the slave area as a cardinal political issue was made
clear to their minds, they became of one mind in the mighty agitation.
Neither they nor their ancestors for hundreds of years had held slaves;
few of them had ever seen a slave, for their numerous traders and
sailors, with slight exceptions, had no smell of blood of the African
slave trade on their hands.[391] It was not chance, therefore, which
kept the stream of North European immigrants from flowing into the South
and Southwest; no attractiveness of climate or soil could compensate for
the presence of Negro slavery. A horror and hatred of slavery colored
their thinking from their first month in the New World; it was first a
moral, then a political, conviction, not the sentiment of individuals,
but the well-reasoned opinion of the whole community.
[391] Du Bois, _Suppression of the African Slave-Trade_, 90 n 5, 131,
143 n 1.
Bound together on this great question, then so dominant, they naturally
maintained unity on other political questions as well as on slavery; and
when once their ideas were fixed, any change would be effected slowly
and with difficulty. The newcomers, in their first months in the older
settlements, were speedily indoctrinated with anti-slavery sentiment.
Thus it came about that one party received and retained the vast
majority of the Scandinavians down to 1884, simply because a bent that
way was given in the early years of immigration from the Northern
peninsulas, and because the question of the status of the Negro, in one
form or another, continued to be a political issue.
The first appearance of the Norwegians in State politics in Wisconsin,
as already noted, was under the Free Soil banner between 1846 and 1848,
when that State was endeavoring to form a constitution. The first
constitution submitted to the people, in 1847, was rejected by a large
majority, including a separately-submitted provision granting equal
suffrage to Negroes. While the State decisively voted thus, the counties
in which the Scandinavian vote was largest--Racine, Walworth, and
Waukesha--showed large majorities in favor of giving the Negroes
political privileges equal to those of the Whites. On the other hand,
counties where the German votes were numerous stood solidly against
equal suffrage, seemingly because in the constitutional convention the
question of Negro suffrage was coupled with that of the granting of
suffrage to foreign-born, in a way that greatly displeased the
Germans.[392] When the second convention finished its constitution, in
1848, resolutions were introduced to provide for printing and
distributing translations of the document, 6000 copies in German, and
4000 copies in Norwegian, a hint of the relative strength of the two
groups.[393]
[392] Baker, _History of the Elective Franchise in Wisconsin_, 9;
including a reference to the _Wisconsin Banner_, Oct. 17, 1846.
[393] _Journal of the Second Convention_, 511, 584.
The relation of James Reymert and his _Nordlyset_ to the Free Soil
movement has been mentioned. When the Democratic papers mercilessly
criticised the little sheet and poked fun at its name, the paper was
sold by Reymert to Knud Langeland in 1849, and by him removed to Racine;
the name was changed to _Demokraten_, but the politics of the paper were
not affected.[394] As a political organ among the Norwegians, it was
ahead of the times; the support of the paper was insufficient to pay the
bills, and it was discontinued in 1850. The Norwegian immigrants were
unaccustomed to a purely secular press; they preferred to have
their politics wrapped up in papers labelled "religious." Langeland
declares that many of them considered it a sin to read a political
newspaper.[395] But the Free Soil sentiment was too strong to go without
printed expression in Norwegian; and accordingly the propaganda
continued in the form of speeches of Chase, Seward, Hale, Giddings, and
other anti-slavery leaders, which were translated into Norwegian and
mixed in with non-political matter in _Maanedstidende_, a paper whose
publication, after the failure of _Demokraten_, Langeland undertook
along with four clergymen, Clausen, Preuss, Stub, and Hatlestad.[396]
[394] Langeland, _Nordmændene i Amerika_, 96.
[395] Langeland, _Nordmændene i Amerika_, 98: "Den förste
Indvandrer-befolkning hovedsagelig bestod af Folk fra
Landsbygderne, som for en stor Del ikke var vant til at læse
andet end Deres Religionsböger, og mange af dem ansaa det endog
for en Synd at læse politiske Blade."
[396] _Ibid._, 98.
As they read these speeches of the great leaders, as they heard from
Negroes themselves the evils of slavery, as they learned of the
high-handed doings in Kansas, the zeal of the Scandinavians for human
freedom increased. There were no old party traditions, feelings, or
feuds, to keep them from judging the issue of slavery's expansion on its
merits; no loyalty to the memories of dead heroes held them in mortmain.
Some few of them voted for Cass in 1848 and for Pierce in 1852, but by
1856 there was only one issue for them: simply and straightforwardly and
almost to a man, they became Republicans.[397] The Democrats, of
course, did not let the children of the North go without an effort to
secure them in their ranks. In 1856 Elias Stangeland of Madison,
Wisconsin, started a Norwegian paper, _Den Norske Amerikaner_, in
support of James Buchanan. His efforts to get Langeland to undertake the
editorship failed because the latter was an ardent admirer of Fremont.
The paper had a short life, and probably Langeland is right in
attributing its disappearance to the withdrawal of the Democratic
subsidy.[398] A long time was to elapse before a successful attempt
would be made to maintain a Democratic paper in Norwegian or Swedish.
[397] Peterson, _Svenskarne i Illinois_, xii; Mattson, _The Story of
an Emigrant_, 56; Nelson, _History of the Scandinavians_, I,
305, 310.
[398] Langeland, _Nordmændene i Amerika_, 110.
What the anti-slavery agitation left undone towards making the
Scandinavians unswervingly Republican, was accomplished by the Civil
War. The lingering glories of the golden age of the Democracy of Jackson
and Jefferson were entirely obscured by the attitude of the Democratic
party toward the conduct of the war. Only when the memories of the Civil
War grew less vivid and less influential with new arrivals from the Old
World, and not until moral questions were superseded in political
discussions by economic questions relating to the tariff, currency, and
labor, did the Scandinavians begin to arrange themselves in any
considerable numbers outside the Republican ranks.
Four times during the last thirty-five years the Scandinavian voters in
large numbers, under varying circumstances and in different degrees in
different States, have abjured Republican leadership. After each such
excursion they have returned, for the most part, to their old party
relations, but never with quite the same fervent, reliable zeal for
Republican principles and candidates. The development of the bacillus of
independence is unmistakable. One defection affected Wisconsin alone,
the only instance where the Democrats profited directly by the votes of
large numbers of Scandinavians. At a later time, when the Free Silver
and Populist ideas took strong hold on the Northwest, the Scandinavian
vote re-enforced the personal popularity of John Lind, the Swedish
candidate of the Populist-Democratic party, and secured his election,
tho the rest of the Fusion ticket suffered defeat.
The first time Norse voters broke from the Republican ranks was in
connection with the Greenback movement which began with the depression
following the panic of 1873 and culminated in the election of 1880. Many
of them, especially the Swedes in Illinois, became out-and-out
Greenbackers or Independents. In his book on the Swedes in Illinois,
published in 1880, C. F. Peterson gives brief biographies of some seven
hundred Swedes, men of all walks of life above day laborer, who may be
considered as representatives of the 40,000 Swedes in Illinois at that
time.[399] At least they represent the classes which would be least
likely to be led off into economic heresies. Of 628 whose party
affiliations are stated, 472 were Republicans; 76, Independents; 55,
Greenbackers; and 25, Democrats or Prohibitionists. In other words, out
of the total number canvassed, more than twenty per-cent were dissenters
from Republican orthodoxy.
[399] Peterson, _Svenskarne i Illinois_, part II.
The relation of political and religious sentiment is strikingly
illustrated in analyzing these biographies, for those who were Lutherans
or Methodists were usually Republicans in politics, and proud to belong
to "the party of moral ideas."[400] Those stating their religious
preferences as Lutheran numbered 388, and of these only 10 were
Democrats, 16 were Greenbackers, and 19 were Independent. On the other
hand, of 131 who belonged to the three political parties last mentioned,
87 were in religion also Independent, Free Thinkers, or "Ingersollites".
For States other than Illinois, no such complete contemporary data are
available; but since the Greenback vote in Minnesota was only 2% of the
total, and in Wisconsin 3%, it is fair to assume that the Scandinavians
did not desert the Republican standard in very large numbers in those
States.
[400] _Ibid._, 353; "Medlem i de 'moralska ideernas' politska
parti--det republikanska."
The second case of considerable defection among the Republican
Scandinavians occurred after the widespread development of agrarian
discontent in the late eighties. The farmers and laborers, American and
Scandinavian alike, felt the stress of hard times, turned to political
agencies for relief, forsook the old parties, and formed the party
called variously the Populist, People's, and Farmers' Alliance Party.
Besides those Norwegians and Swedes who had been for years Republicans,
whose political color was fixed by the mordant of slavery and the Civil
War, there was then a very large number of men who arrived in the vast
immigrant invasions between 1880 and 1885, and who were just coming into
the full exercise of the rights of citizenship. An increasing proportion
of these later arrivals went to the large cities and towns. All of them
were moved less by the traditions of "moral ideas" and more by the
contagious discontent of the older settlers and by the arguments of
industrial and political agitators.
In the election of 1890 a serious break occurred in the Republican Party
in Minnesota and in the Dakotas. There was a general impression in the
rural districts of Minnesota that the Republican candidate for governor,
William R. Merriam, a wealthy banker of St. Paul, was renominated for
his second term by a political ring composed of lumber-kings, wheat
dealers, and millers who combined to cheat and rob the farmer.
Accordingly the Farmers' Alliance nominated a third ticket headed by S.
M. Owen, the editor of an agricultural paper in Minneapolis, who polled
a vote of 58,513, and reduced Merriam's vote of 1888 by about
46,000.[401] Merriam was re-elected by a plurality of less than 2,500,
tho he had had more than 24,000 two years before.
[401] _Minnesota Legislative Manual_, 1893, 482:
1888 1890
Republican candidate 134,355 88,111
Democratic candidate 110,251 85,844
Prohibition candidate 17,026 8,424
Farmers' Alliance candidate ... 58,513
A careful examination of the votes for 1888 and 1890 in such strong
Scandinavian counties as Otter Tail, Douglas, Chisago, Freeborn, Polk,
and Norman leaves no doubt that the Swedes and Norwegians in very large
numbers either voted for Owen, or refused to vote for Merriam.[402] In
some cases the Republican vote fell off one-half and even two-thirds,
and third-party Alliance candidates for the legislature were elected. A
prominent Norwegian writer estimated that "25,000 Norwegian-born farmers
turned their backs upon Mr. Merriam and voted for Mr. Owen for
governor," disregarding the injunction of the Scandinavian Republican
press to "stick to the grand old party, for the grand old party is
particularly favorable to the Scandinavians, and the best political
party in America."[403]
[402] _Minnesota Legislative Manual_, 1889, 397; 1893, 472.
[403] Mr. J. J. Skordalsvold in _The North_, Aug. 10, 1892.
At the next state election in the presidential year, 1892, a Norwegian
ran for governor on the Republican ticket, and a large part of the
Scandinavian deserters wheeled into line and voted the Republican
ticket. With a total vote only 15,000 greater than in 1890, the vote for
the Republican candidate for governor increased in round number 20,000,
for the Democratic candidate, 9,000, and for the Prohibition candidate,
4,000, while the vote of the Alliance or People's party fell off
20,000.[404]
[404] The ticket in Minneapolis, Hennepin County, Minnesota, in this
year, 1892, is an interesting illustration of "recognition" of
the power of the recent deserters. The Scandinavians had:
Republican Democrat Populist
Presidential elector 1 2 2
Governor or Lieutenant Governor 1 ... 1
Secretary of State 1 1 1
Legislative ticket 2 2 ...
County officers 2 1 ...
City officers 4 1 ...
_Minneapolis Journal_, Nov. 3, 1892.
Conditions in North Dakota and South Dakota were even more favorable to
the new party than in Minnesota. Estimates based on a study of
statistics and newspapers have been confirmed by prominent officials of
those States, one of whom declares that "in some localities quite a
per-cent has joined the Populist party; but it is very rare indeed to
find a Scandinavian Democrat."[405] Another believes that a considerable
portion of the Scandinavians voted the Populist ticket in 1892 and in
1894, but that they were normally believers in the protective principle
and therefore naturally affiliated with the Republican party.[406] A
German lawyer of Valley City, North Dakota, a Democrat, practically
agreed with the Norwegian city attorney of Devil's Lake in the same
State, the one saying that a large part of the Norse voters were
Populists, the other declaring that the Populist party was largely
composed of Scandinavians.[407] All agreed that these voters later
tended to return to their former Republican alliance. It may be doubted,
however, whether the hold of the protection idea is one of the primary
reasons for Scandinavian Republicanism. At any rate the vote of the Hon.
Knute Nelson for the Mills Bill for tariff revision in 1888--one of six
Republican votes for the measure--did not make him politically _persona
non grata_ or a suspicious character among his Norwegian or Swedish
brethren.
[405] Letter of Thomas Thorson, Secretary of State of South Dakota,
April 9, 1906.
[406] Letter of C. M. Dahl, Secretary of State of North Dakota, March
24, 1896.
[407] Letter of E. Winterer, Valley City, March 21, 1896, and of Siver
Serumgard, March 24, 1896.
Another index of the shifting of political sentiment among the Norse
voters is found in the changes in the party affiliations of Scandinavian
newspapers, tho the varying importance of these journals imposes special
caution in interpreting these figures. It would be obviously unfair to
offset the staunch and well-supported Republicanism of the ably-edited
and widely-circulated _Skandinaven_ of Chicago with the less stable
_Normannen_ of Stoughton, Wisconsin, which had not one-third the
circulation nor one-tenth of the influence of the metropolitan
journal.[408] The "mugwump spirit" of the press is well illustrated by
the case of _Norden_, a Norwegian weekly of Chicago, Republican up to
1884, when it took an independent attitude. In 1888 it became avowedly
Democratic and supported Grover Cleveland for the presidency. This move
was made only after the proprietor and editor assured themselves that
the patrons of the paper would sustain them in the proposed change.[409]
[408] Rowell, _American Newspaper Directory_ for 1896, 1901, 1906;
_Cosmopolitan_, Oct., 1890, 689.
[409] Interview in 1890 with the editor of _Norden_, Mr. P. O.
Strömme. He said that the change was an excellent move for the
paper.
Of the secular political Scandinavian papers published in Minnesota
in 1889 nine were Republican--five Norwegian or Norwegian-Danish,
four Swedish; three were Democratic,--all Norwegian; two were
Prohibitionist,--one Norwegian and one Swedish; and one was
Labor,--Norwegian.[410] In the next five years, the independent press in
Minnesota and other states increased in numbers at least, and included
such influential journals as _Amerika_ and _Folkebladet_. George Taylor
Rygh, professor of Scandinavian languages in the University of North
Dakota, estimated in 1893 that "until a few years ago over four-fifths
of the [Scandinavian] secular press were strictly Republican in
politics. One after another has ceased to defend the Republican party,
and today not more than one-third of the whole number are strictly
Republican."[411] While this personal opinion or impression is probably
exaggerated, it may represent approximately the temporary state of that
year if proper emphasis be laid on the word "strictly." Since there
appears to be no evidence that these papers, with two or three
exceptions, were subsidized to induce their change of political creed,
it is reasonable to conclude that they had behind them a solidified
constituency, for they were run neither for personal amusement, pure
philanthropy, nor mere partisan propaganda.
[410] _Minnesota Legislative Manual_, 1889, 432-445.
[411] G. T. Rygh, "The Scandinavian American," _Literary Northwest_,
Feb., 1893. He estimated the total number of papers at "about
125."
The third defection occurred in Wisconsin alone, and took its rise in a
purely local question. Its interest lies in the peculiar and remarkable
temporary alliance to which it led. The Wisconsin Legislature passed an
act, approved April 18, 1889, "concerning the education and employment
of children."[412] To the ordinary provisions for coercing parents and
children, so that all children between the ages of seven and fourteen
years should attend at least twelve weeks in some public or private
school in the city or town or district in which they lived, nobody
objected. But the fifth section of the act, which was known as the
Bennett Law, was in certain church circles, like a dash of vitriol in
the face:
"No school shall be regarded as a school under this act unless there
shall be taught therein as a part of the elementary education of the
children, reading, writing, arithmetic, and United States history, in
the English language."
[412] _Laws of Wisconsin_, 1889, ch. 519.
The last four words of this section, innocent and reasonable as they
look to the average American, stirred up one of the bitterest political
fights ever known in Wisconsin. The Roman Catholic church, unalterably
committed to a system of parochial schools in many of which instruction
is given in a foreign language, was for once in accord with the German
and Scandinavian Lutherans who maintained similar schools. The
compulsory use of English in instructing pupils in specified subjects
turned priests and pastors and whole congregations into active,
vociferous politicians, for Germans, Norwegians, Poles, and Bohemians
claimed the right to educate their children in parochial schools of
their own choosing. Was not education education, whether carried on in
English or German or Polish or Norwegian? Were not the graduates of
church schools, even tho they spoke English brokenly or with brogue,
just as intelligent, just as capable, just as industrious, and just as
honest, as those educated in the "little red school house" and the
public high school?[413] The chairman of the Lutheran Committee on
School Legislation stated the matter clearly from the standpoint of the
churches:
"The Lutherans of Wisconsin do not oppose the Bennett Law because they
are the enemies of the English language.... The Lutherans oppose the
present compulsory school law because--whether designedly or not--it in
fact infringes on the rights of conscience guaranteed by the
constitution, and the right of parents to educate according to their
convictions, their own children.... In short, the Lutherans insist upon
their right to establish private schools at their own expense, and
regulate them, without any interference on the part of the State, ...
that their children may become Lutheran Christians as well as loyal and
good citizens."[414] The official circular of the State Superintendent
of Public Instruction of Wisconsin, dated January 25, 1890, almost a
year after the passage of the act, was a statement of the opposite point
of view, and a justification of attempts to enforce the law.
Incidentally it was a political pamphlet as well. Superintendent Thayer
said: "The thing that is antagonized by this law is the practice of
allowing children of this State of proper school age, to pass that
period of life without acquiring the minimum of education in elementary
branches; without acquiring the ability to think in the language of the
country, to express themselves intelligibly in that language, orally, in
writing, and in business forms."
[413] _The Bennett Law Analyzed_, a campaign pamphlet issued by the
Republicans in 1890, in English, German, Polish, and Norwegian,
had for its heading a picture of a district school house
labelled "The Little School House," and underneath, "Stand by
It."
[414] See F. W. A. Notz, "Parochial School System" in Stearns
(editor), _The Columbian History of Education in Wisconsin_
(1893).
All through the latter part of 1889 and the first ten months of 1890,
the agitation went on. The press gave great space to it; some papers
through several months, both in Wisconsin and in the neighboring States
where Lutherans and Catholics were numerous, offered "symposiums" which
printed arguments on both sides.[415] _Public Opinion_ summarized the
sentiment for the larger world.[416] Church assemblies took action, and
finally an Anti-Bennett Law convention was held in Milwaukee, June 4,
1890.
[415] _The North_, Apr. 30, May 7, 14, 21, 28, June 4, 25, July 2,
1890.
[416] _Public Opinion_, IX, no. 1, Apr. 12, 1890.
The Democrats were not slow in seizing the advantage offered, and
managed their campaign of 1890 very shrewdly. The combination of sternly
anti-Catholic German and Norwegian Lutherans, usually Republican, with
Roman Catholics, under the Democratic banner, was irresistible. In spite
of the frantic appeals of the Republican press and speakers for loyalty
to the American flag and to the "little red school house," the Democrats
elected their candidate for governor, and a legislature pledged to give
the desired relief. By the six-line act of February 5, 1891, the Bennett
Law was repealed, and two months later another compulsory education act
was passed without the offensive and troublesome four words.[417] The
work of the Lutheran-Catholic alliance was done; the heterogeneous,
naturally antagonistic elements fell apart; and in a few years old party
lines were re-established. The plurality of 28,000 by which the
Democratic Governor, G. W. Peck, was elected in 1890, overcoming the
usual Republican plurality of about 20,000, was reduced at his
re-election in 1892 to 7,700. In 1894 the Republican candidate defeated
Governor Peck by the handsome plurality of 50,000 votes.[418]
[417] _Laws of Wisconsin_, 1891, chaps. 4, 187.
[418] _Wisconsin Bluebook_ (1895), 342-342, 347.
While the Bennett Law agitation was going on in Wisconsin, a similar,
but milder disturbance occurred in Illinois. The compulsory education
act of the latter State, which went into effect July 1, 1889, was
closely, if not deliberately, modelled after the Wisconsin statute, and
enacted that "no school shall be regarded as a school under this act,
unless there shall be taught therein in the English language,
reading, writing, arithmetic, history of the United States, and
geography."[419] In the campaign of 1890, the Republican candidate for
State Superintendent of Education, favoring the new compulsory education
law, was defeated by some 36,000 votes by Raab, the Democratic candidate
who opposed the law. The Norwegians and Danes in the city of Chicago
probably voted for Raab in large numbers, tho he won the Swedish wards
of that city by small pluralities. In such counties as Knox, with its
two thousand Swedish voters, and Winnebago (in which is situated the
city of Rockford, with about fifteen hundred Swedish voters), where
one-third of the foreign born population was at that time Scandinavian,
the Republican candidate received large majorities. A writer for
_America_, the periodical published in English for Scandinavian readers,
claimed proudly that "the large Swedish settlements in Henry, Rock
Island, Bureau, De Kalb, Henderson, Warren, Mercer, Ford, Whiteside, and
other counties cast a solid vote for Edwards.... The Swedes were in
favor of compulsory education almost to a man."[420] In the city of
Chicago, the County Superintendent of Schools for Cook County was
re-elected by a plurality of 23,000 tho he favored the compulsory law.
The repeal of the law of 1889 was not so prompt in Illinois as it was in
Wisconsin, for it was not until 1893 that a new and expurgated
compulsory education measure took its place.[421]
[419] _Laws of Illinois_, 1889, Act of May 24.
[420] _America_, V. 201 (Nov. 20, 1890). See also editorial in the
same volume, 172-174 (Nov. 13, 1890).
[421] _Laws of Illinois_, 1893, Acts of February 17 and June 19, 1893.
A close and detailed examination of the legislative journals and the
statutes of the Northwestern States does not reveal above a half-dozen
laws which can be said to be due to the leadership and direct influence
of the Scandinavians as such. On the other hand, in the field of general
legislation these men have been indistinguishable from the native-born
in ability, efficiency, and uprightness; the gross and net products of
the labors of those legislatures with many Scandinavian representatives
in such states as Minnesota and North Dakota, are not perceptibly
different from the output of legislatures in which no Swede or
Norwegian ever sat, as in Michigan or Colorado. Scarcely a law has been
passed for the purpose of catering to the preferences, or of catching
the vote, of the sons of the Northlands.
An exception to this general statement is the Minnesota law of 1883
providing for the establishment of a "professorship of Scandinavian
language and literature in the State University, with the same salary as
is paid in said University to other professors of the same grade." The
man to be chosen must be "some person learned in the Scandinavian
language and literature, and at the same time skilled and capable of
teaching the dead languages so called."[422]
[422] _The General Statutes of the State of Minnesota_, 1894, secs.
3908-3909 (_Laws of 1883_, Chap. 140.)
The motives of the makers of the law were benevolent enough, and
circumstances warranted its passage, but nothing could better illustrate
the utter carelessness and looseness with which American State
legislators do their work, than this simple statute. It was drawn up by
a distinguished American lawyer, Gordon E. Cole of St. Paul, at
the request of Truls Paulsen by whom it was introduced into the
legislature.[423] It created a chair of "Scandinavian language," when
there is no such language, living or dead; the professorship was
established "in the State University," when the laws of the State
recognize no institution bearing such a name. The Norwegian who
presented the bill, the legislature (including twenty-one other
Norwegians and Swedes) which passed it, and the Governor who signed it,
all showed the same quality of ignorance and neglect of fact, law, and
English. A second law, undoubtedly based directly upon the first, even
to copying its confusion of terms, was the act passed by the legislature
of North Dakota in 1891, creating a chair of Scandinavian language and
literature in the University of North Dakota.[424]
[423] Nelson, _Scandinavians in the United States_ (1st ed.), I,
541-542.
[424] _Revised Codes of North Dakota_, 1895, sec. 887 (_Laws of 1891_,
chap. 60).
Another statute having still more distinct Scandinavian earmarks was
passed by the legislature of North Dakota in 1893, providing for
tribunals of conciliation, to be composed of four commissioners of
conciliation elected in each town, incorporated village, and city. The
measure was modelled in a feeble and tentative fashion after a statute
of Norway, where such courts have been in operation since 1824, proving
especially efficient in securing amicable adjustment of petty
neighborhood difficulties.[425] But the law in North Dakota speedily
fell into "innocuous desuetude," in spite of the enormous percentage of
Norwegians in that State; its construction was defective; its
constitutionality was questioned; its machinery was cumbersome and
expensive. During its first two years, many communities failed to elect
commissioners, and no serious attempt was made to comply with its
provisions; even the Norwegians themselves manifested no anxiety or
haste to make use of this characteristically Norwegian court. Nor did
the amendment of 1895, substituting for compulsory use of the tribunal
hearings at the request of one party and with the consent of both
parties, improve matters. One Norwegian attorney pronounced the law "an
unmitigated absurdity under present conditions," because most suits in
the United States arise out of contracts, debts, titles, etc., rather
than out of neighborhood quarrels, slanders, and the like.
[425] Letter of Siver Serumgard, City Attorney of Devil's Lake, N. D.,
March 24, 1896, and various other letters.
In all matters relating to temperance and temperance legislation, the
Scandinavian voters have almost invariably been on the side of
restriction of the saloon and the liquor traffic. They have supported
prohibition in Iowa and in the Dakotas, high license in Minnesota, and
the patrol-limit system in Minneapolis.[426] The prohibition State and
local tickets, especially in Minnesota, and in the Dakotas, always have
a large proportion of Norwegians and Swedes among their nominees.[427]
The best illustration of this sentiment, however, is to be found in the
history of prohibition in North Dakota. When the new constitution for
the proposed State was made and presented to the people in 1889, the
section which provided for the absolute prohibition of both the
manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors was submitted separately to
the voters. Thus the prohibition issue was presented fairly and squarely
to every man in the State. The constitution itself was carried by a
majority approximating twenty thousand in a total vote of upwards of
thirty-five thousand; the prohibitionist section received a majority of
1159. Analysis of the vote by counties makes it clear that in every
county where the Scandinavians predominated, with a single exception,
the section was carried by fair majorities.[428] The question of
re-submission of this section to the vote of the people of the State
came up in 1895, and was postponed indefinitely by the House of
Representatives of the State of North Dakota by a vote of twenty-six to
twenty-two, fourteen of the sixteen Scandinavian members of the House
voting with the twenty-six.[429] This seems to justify the opinion of
the Secretary of State of North Dakota: "Nearly all Scandinavian members
of the legislature have invariably voted against the resubmission of the
question to the people.... It is safe to say that at least three-fourths
of the Scandinavian population of this State favor prohibition, and
one-half of them are earnest advocates of the law."[430]
[426] _Minneapolis Journal_, Jan. 16, 1891. In Dakota "the reform was
asked for more earnestly by the Scandinavian element than by any
others." Ralph, _Our Great West_, 152.
[427] The ticket voted in Minneapolis in 1893, illustrates this
tendency. Among the Prohibitionist nominees were two
Scandinavian presidential electors, the lieutenant governor,
secretary of state, county treasurer, one candidate for the
legislature, and one for the city council!
[428] _Legislative Manual of North Dakota_, 1889-1890, 170, compared
with the population tables of the census of 1890; Ralph, _Our
Great West_, 152.
[429] _Ibid._, 1895, 19-20; _Minneapolis Sunday Times_, Feb. 10, 1895.
[430] Letter from C. M. Dahl, March 24, 1896.
The only remaining question as to the political influence of
the Scandinavians is the claim of the Swedes and Norwegians for
"recognition" at the hands of old parties; and the concessions which
such claims have extorted. From the foregoing accounts, it is evident
that the Scandinavians have been ready in fitting themselves into the
political system of the United States. Altho they have not been guilty
of that excessive and pernicious activity in the field of public affairs
which has characterized some classes of immigrants settling by
preference in the great cities, it must be admitted that they have now
and then appealed to race pride and prejudice and jealousy, re-marking
boundary lines and distinctions which should be obliterated. The
practical politicians, on their part, have not hesitated to stir up, for
party advantage, the sensitiveness of naturalized citizens to real or
imaginary slights and discriminations against them by "the other party."
The appeal of the Norwegian and Swedish press is not infrequently based
frankly on the essential sentiment of clannishness: "Scandinavians in
Superior and other places should always support a country man for
election to public office," and if he is in all ways worthy, "we should
all together rally around him, lay aside all small considerations, and
honor him with our trust and esteem."[431] Ridiculing the narrowness of
these "demands," another editor, under the heading "From Norway,
Birthplace of Giants," suggests a full Republican ticket of Norwegians,
including Rasmus B. Anderson, "Republican pro tem.," and also a full
Democratic ticket of Norwegians, including Rasmus B. Anderson, "thinking
that he may next year be a Democrat again."[432] This trick of asserting
their political importance in the Northwestern States was very early
learned; and so long as party managers bid for votes in the tongues of
the aliens, bribing them with nominations of the foreign-born, just so
long will these groups of adopted citizens reiterate and multiply their
demands, just so long will they capitalize their voting power
and collect a generous interest in the shape of nominations and
appointments. It must not be supposed that the Norwegian and Swedish
party papers in America exist for the primary purpose of forwarding the
political interests of people of those nationalities as such, for they
do not, any more than do the partisan papers printed in English, but the
Scandinavian groups are so large and so definite that appeals to them to
stand together as a race for their own interests are inevitable.
[431] Editorial in _Superior Tidende_ (Wisconsin), Feb. 2, 1898. See
also _Vikingen_, Aug. 18, 1888.
[432] P. O. Strömme in _Amerika og Norden_, Feb. 2, 1898.
So early as 1870, one of the leading Norwegian newspapers declared
that it was time for the Norwegians to get a Representative in
Congress just as well as other nationalities--"_ligesaavel som andre
nationaliteter_."[433] The editor suggested that the eight thousand
Norse voters in the southern Minnesota district hold a convention the
day before the regular Republican convention, and agree upon a candidate
for the Congressional nomination: if the Republicans refused to nominate
him, put on the screws! About twenty years later this very method was
resorted to in North Dakota, when the Scandinavians of that State "in
mass convention assembled," proceeded to pass resolutions and to
organize the Scandinavian Union of North Dakota, to secure for
themselves "that share in the government to which their competency,
their character and numerical strength, and their rank as pioneers in
all matters of civilization entitle them." While declaring that it
believed that every man should stand or fall on his own merits, the
convention resolved "that we have seen with deep regret the disposition
of a large number of our fellow citizens in some parts of North Dakota
to discriminate against us, because we are Scandinavians, and that an
unprovoked war has been waged against us."[434] The Hon. M. N. Johnson,
presiding officer, presumptive beneficiary of the Union, an aspirant for
nomination as Representative, stated the case very frankly: "The
Scandinavians constitute a majority of the Republican party in North
Dakota. Under the territorial government they have not received many
official favors, but with the opening of statehood it is proper that
they should have some recognition. The Scandinavians are not disposed to
leave the Republican Party. They are heartily loyal to the organization
and its principles.... We have the numerical strength to demand and
secure justice, and all we ask is fair play.... We are simply organizing
our forces for united action in urging our just demands."[435] Their
just demands consisted in "from three to five of the State officers, and
if they stand together and attend the primaries, there is no doubt but
that they will get what they ask for."[436]
[433] _Fædrelandet og Emigranten_, July 10, 1870. See also an
editorial in _The North_, June 12, 1889, regretting that the
question of national proportions and groups should be raised
"but the principle having been recognized, we consider it our
plain duty to see that it is fairly and squarely enforced."
[434] _The North_, July 10, 1889.
[435] _The North_, July 10, 1889, including translations from _Posten
og Vesten_ of Fargo.
[436] _Ibid._, letter of Sigurd Syr.
The effectiveness of this movement is sarcastically summed up by a
correspondent of _The North_, in reporting the Republican convention:
"M. N. Johnson's Scandinavian League has evidently come out of the small
end of the horn. To be sure M. N. was made the chairman of the
convention and the dear Scandinavians got honorary mention in the
resolutions: but M. N.'s chairmanship was evidently devoid of results
beneficial to the Scandinavians, and as for resolutions--talk is
cheap!"[437]
[437] _Ibid._, Aug. 28, 1889. After the fall election the same paper,
October 9, announced: "The Scandinavian Union thus seems barren
of results.... Peace be with its ashes!"--because it secured only
5 senators and 18 representatives in the State legislature.
In an editorial in English _Skandinaven_ discussed "Governor Sheldon's
Mistake" in 1893: "Upwards of one-third of the population of South
Dakota is of Scandinavian birth or origin, while Scandinavians furnish
not less than one-half of the Republican vote of the State. Governor
Sheldon is apparently oblivious to this fact; for in making his
appointments he saw fit to ignore the Scandinavian-American citizens of
South Dakota. For the sake of the Republican party of the State this
mistake is very much to be regretted. The Scandinavians are sensitive of
their rights as American citizens.... What has the Republican party of
South Dakota done to Governor Sheldon that he should deal it such a
dangerous blow?"[438] Five years later the governor of Minnesota was
accused of a like offence in that, on the State boards appointed by
Governor Merriam, the Scandinavians were "insufficiently represented,"
having only five out of one hundred members, or one-twenty-fifth, when
they constituted one-third of the population of the State.[439]
[438] _Skandinaven_, April 5, 1893.
[439] _The North_, Jan. 22, 1890, quoting in translation from
_Fædrelandet og Emigranten_.
The pettiness of these squabbles over political "recognition" and spoils
is well illustrated by a letter written in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, to a
Minneapolis newspaper in 1889: "While our people here number over 3000,
and the Irish only 1400, the latter hold a still larger percentage of
offices than they do in your city. This year for the first time the
Scandinavians (or more correctly speaking, the Danes) have succeeded in
obtaining a place on the police force"![440]
[440] _The North_, July 17, 1889.
These insistent demands do not stop with simple recognition of the
Scandinavian race: different sections must be satisfied. The most
influential Swedish paper of the Northwest announced in 1890 that "what
we on the other hand with full propriety and without the least danger of
transgression can demand, is a man of Swedish descent at the head of one
of our State departments.... To deny them (Swedes) this just recognition
would stir up bad feeling, and would be looked upon as a slight, not to
say contempt.... Our brethren, the Norwegians, are a little more
numerous in Minnesota, than the Swedes, although not equally good
Republicans. They, too, are entitled to a place on the State ticket, and
for a long time have had one [Lieutenant Governor Rice]."[441]
[441] Translated from _Svenska Folkets Tidning_ (Minneapolis), April
20, 1890.
The failure of the Scandinavians to receive what some of them consider a
just and due reward, one in proportion to their numbers and their
devotion to one party, is not to be attributed wholly to the hardness of
heart of the party leaders, nor to their shortsightedness. Nor can it be
fairly charged to any strong dislike of Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes
for each other: the Swedes, for example, have never bolted a ticket
because it happened to be headed by a Norwegian.[442] In addition to the
extension of religious antagonism into politics, "there is still another
reason for the limited success of the Scandinavians in the political
field, and that is their natural apathy [antipathy?] to following a
leader. Each one considers himself competent to work on his own hook. To
follow a leader seems incompatible with their ideas of liberty. Yet
without union and without leaders, victory is impossible.... 'Everybody
for himself, and the Devil for the hindmost' is the law governing
American life, and this the Irish have learned, while the Scandinavian
is generally waiting for someone to come along and offer something with
the polite 'if you please.' But he has to wait."[443]
[442] Boyeson, "The Scandinavians in the United States," _North
American Review_, CLV, 531; _Rockford Register_ (Ill.), Sept.
16, 1889.
[443] _The North_, Aug. 14, 1889, translating from _Skandinavia_
(Worcester, Mass.)
The Scandinavian press, in complaining of "a failure to get a due share
of offices," in declaring that Norwegians are "entitled to ten seats" in
the Wisconsin legislature when they happen to have but three, or in
insinuating that they have never been fittingly recognized in Iowa,
resorts to political claptrap, often quite unworthy of the journal
printing it. The facts so easily forgotten are that the counties and
legislative districts in which the Scandinavians are a ruling majority
are comparatively few, while the districts in which they are an
influential minority are very many.[444] The system of representation in
the United States is not based on any racial divisions or class
distinctions, and not until some scheme of minority representation is
adopted can any foreign element get its "share" of the political plums.
It would be hard to suggest a more dangerous and disrupting experiment,
in these decades when aliens by the hundreds of thousands, not to say
millions, enter the country and are incorporated into the body politic,
than to attempt to "recognize" the various alien factors in complex
public affairs, even if they were all as adaptable as the men from the
Northlands. Nothing would do more, for example, to develop the latent
religious and racial antipathies between the Scandinavians and the
Irish. The fundamental assumption, therefore, which lies back of all
claims for "recognition" of Swedish-Americans, or other hyphenated
Americans, as such, savors of ward politics and the machine, rather than
of political equity or right, and just so far as it does this it menaces
social and political safety.
[444] _Billed Magazin_, I, 139 (1869); _Skandinaven_, Feb. 5, 1896--an
editorial printed, like many others, in English and evidently
designed for the consumption of editors of English papers. It is
also evident that _Skandinaven's_ readers understood English.
Söderström, _Minneapolis Minnen_, 132, gives a fairly complete
list of all the Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes elected or
appointed to city, state or county office, even including
policemen. For similar list for a rural county, see Tew,
_Illustrated History and Descriptive and Biographical Review of
Kandiyohi County, Minnesota_ (1905).