Dbq Thibodax Massacre

One of the examples was the Thibodaux massacre happened in Louisiana in 1887. It was originally a protest strike for increasing wages, but later turned into a racial attack against the blacks. The situation was similar with the massacre activities against Chinese mentioned in the last paragraph. It was believed more than 300 blacks were killed or injured in this incident, made this a sanguinary page in America’s labor and racial history. In my opinion, 19th century America’s politics and labor movements were closely linked with the violence against the colored peoples.

Besides the Asians and the blacks, the whites also implemented removal or even genocide policies to the Native Americans. Since the arrival of the Europeans, the number of

the Native Americans dropped drastically due to the new fatal virus and more than hundred times of massacres.

In an editorial written by the famous writer Lyman Frank Baum, he mentioned “the best safety of the frontier settlements will be secured by the total annihilation of the few remaining Indians” and this represented one of the mainstreams social opinion. This kind of view laid the foundation of the forceful removal of the Native Americans since the Europeans believed they were inferior and should be exterminated, and did not deserve any respect. The conflicts reached its peak in 19th century due to the expansion activities. In this period, several small and large scale of massacres were conducted throughout the southeast part of the nation. Among these massacres, the 1813 Fort Mims and Autossee Massacre, the 1850 Yontoket Massacre and the Dakota War of 1862 caused an excessive number of more than 200 casualties each time. Also, the Indian Removal Act that passed on May 1830 forced the local tribes to migrate to the west of the

Mississippi River. The plan was strongly opposed by the natives and the relocations was described as the ‘Trail of Tears’. In the three Seminole Wars, the troops of the federal government conducted numerous massacre against the Seminoles. There were only around 250,000 Native Americans remained in the 1890s, dropped more than half as compared with 1800. From the examples above, we can observe the American government did not strive to deal with the question through peaceful attempt, but to ‘solve’ it by military power under the Social Darwinism theory that led to frequent violence.

The violence was not only emerged among different racial groups, but also the peoples with same skin colors.

The divergence on religions was another main contradiction that led to violence. In 19th century’s America, the mainstream society was not inclusive to the ‘pagans’ in their eyes. One of the examples was the attacks against the Irish Catholic immigrants. From 1820-60, nearly two million Irish moved to America as to survive from the Potato Famines and intensified the pressure of the society. Their Catholic faith were magnified and criticized by the local people. There were negative descriptions against the Irish, depicted them as a beast and ogre in the cartoons. This sentiment fermented and finally led to the 1844 Philadelphia Nativist Riots. An argument of the Bible version use in schools then developed to an attack against the Catholic churches and Irish communities. The riots led to about fifty injuries, burnt down of two hundred houses and a direct damage of at least US$150,000. This also reflected the limited protection of properties by the government in 19th century’s America. Another example of religion conflicts could be the violence between the Protestants and the Mormons. The formal name of the Mormon Church is ‘The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ which originated in New York in 1830. Although both religions believe in Jesus Christ and the Bible, the Protestants accused the Mormonism deviated from the pure Christianity and is a kind of

heresy. The Mormon believers were robbed, attacked and evicted by the residents of Missouri. The most significant event was the Haun's Mill massacre happened in 1838. 17 Mormons were killed in this incident and the remains fled to Illinois then Utah. The confrontation between the state force and the Mormons led to the Utar War (1857-58). In the Mountain Meadows massacre, the Mormon settlers killed more than one hundred passengers of a wagon train. Violent crimes and massacres always happened in this period since so many expanded territory were still out of efficient control.

There were few reasons for the chaotic condition in this period. In my opinion, the more important reasons were the solidification of social classes and the numerous immigrants disrupted the original order.

The class antagonism was popular in 19th century’s America, and it was a main reason for the violence happened in the metropolitan areas. After the Civil War, different new industries and technologies grew rapidly. This progress created a great number of working places, attracted the freedman from the Southern states and workers around the world. Most of these people rushed into the manufacturing centers (e.g. Chicago and Detroit) as they provide more job opportunities, and led to the great expansion of the city’s population. There were only nine cities with populations over 100,000 in 1860’s America, and the number increased to fifty by 1910. Since these new comers faced fierce competition in the labor market, their only earn little salaries for long working times and need to endure bad living conditions. Also, the newly-invented machines destroyed some traditional industries and directly led to the unemployment problem of the handicraft workers. On the other side, the Second Industrial Revolution generated a new bourgeois class formed by entrepreneurs.