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Palmer Raids & Election of 1920

Palmer Raids & Election of 1920. Olivia Herrera Tom Schumacher Corey Sautner Josh Grunden. Setting the Scene. Bolshevik revolution in Russia – 1917 Rise of communist party Created suspicion in America of socialist thinkers. What’s the dealio in America?.

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Palmer Raids & Election of 1920

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  1. Palmer Raids & Election of 1920 Olivia Herrera Tom Schumacher Corey Sautner Josh Grunden

  2. Setting the Scene • Bolshevik revolution in Russia – 1917 • Rise of communist party • Created suspicion in America of socialist thinkers

  3. What’s the dealio in America? • strikes over steelworkers, prohibition, women’s suffrage, and other current issues • Many suspected anarchists in strikes to be emulating the Russian revolutionaries

  4. Attorney General Palmer • Alexander Mitchell Palmer (May 4, 1872 - May 11, 1936) • Upset with Wilson’s non-violent stance on socialists • Actively wrote and spoke out against Bolshevik intentions and American strikers • “The blaze of revolution was sweeping over every American institution of law and order…eating its way into the homes of the American workman, its sharp tongues of revolutionary heat…licking at the altars of churches, leaping into the belfry of school bell, crawling into the sacred corners of American homes…burning up the foundations of society.”

  5. Palmer Raids • Overall, Palmer orchestrated the arrests and deportations of thousands of Americans he suspected as a blight to society • Provoked after an anarchist bomb destroyed half of Palmer’s Washington D.C. home • Most of these were presumed socialists/communists • December 1919: deported 249 people on the Buford ship to Russia, enticing them by calling it “Workman’s Heaven” • By January of 1920, arrested 4,000 people and deported 500 • He also ordered police and federal marshalls to raid suspects’ homes and destroy socialist institutions

  6. Election of 1920 • Palmer tried to gain Democratic nomination, but failed in primary due to his ultra-American views • James M. Cox of Ohio won nomination, and ran with FDR against Warren G. Harding, who ran with Calvin Coolidge

  7. Main Issues • Harding wanted to return to a normal state, after Wilson’s turbulent final term • Republicans favored entry into League of Nations, while Democrats opposed it • Cox focused more on slander than on the real issues at hand

  8. Election Results • Harding won the electoral vote 404 to 127 and the popular vote 16,144,093 to 9,139, 661 • Harding not fit to be president due to his equivocation on important issues and corrupt appointed officials • Died in office, allowed Coolidge to take helm

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