Social Tension of the 1920s and Nativists

Christopher Nieves The social tension of the 1920s was to a enormous extent due to backlash from Nativists and the KKK towards immigrants. With the immigrant surge threatening jobs and tainting the white Anglo-Saxon society, the idea of nativism began to proliferate through the minds of native born Americans. Social conflicts frequently came to violent ends by the hands of members of the Ku Klux Klan, they too had a nativist mental capacity however they focused primarily on African Americans but harbored hate towards anyone who is not of Anglo-Saxon descent.These two movements make for a dangerous society, and made matters even to a greater extent difficult for penniless immigrants trying to survive. Starting up around 1890 but plateauing in the 1920s nativists and labor unions fought for immigration restriction. In 1921, an emergency immigration act was passed which established a quota system that decimated the standard of immigrants granted access to the States. America had nev er before seen such a surge of immigrants before, everyplace 25million people over the course of thirty years, and this was the offshoot time that Italians, Poles, Jews and Slavs had come to America in mass.Nativists worked to do anything they could to belay immigrant progression in society, and with the economic prosperity of the twenties they realigned their beliefs behind religious and racial nativism. Following the First World War, nativists through out(a) the twenties focused their help of Catholics, Jews, and southeastern Europeans. These people were different than the immigrants that had come before in that they had ofttimes more difficulty assimilating with the language barrier and even in appearance. Difficulty communicating made getting a job and pedagogics much more difficult and for Hasidic Jews stood out with their distinct religious garb.When the migrants from England and Ireland and the like came over they could communicate much easier with Americans which signi ficantly helped them out. Well over half of the American population before the immigrant surge could trace their argumentation to either the British Isles or to Germany, these people also tended to be fair-skinned and Protestant. The racial concern of the anti-immigration movement was closely linked the eugenics movement that was gaining popularity in the twenties. Nativists grew more concerned with the racial purity of the United States, uch conclaves as the Ku Klux Klan were able to boast as a result of this movement. The rebirth of the KKK or the second Klan was potently due to the anti-immigrant attitude of America in the twenties, as it had basically died out after the civil war. They also tended to view the darker-skinned, Catholic or Judaic new immigrants as inferior and lacking the Anglo-Saxon temperament compulsory to maintain a free society. Furthermore these threats to society lacked work ethic, self-discipline and could not be trusted not to throw their votes away to automobile politics which were largely successful during this time period.The direct The Birth of a Nation was released in 1915 glorified the KKK, and although its director didnt intend to, the film helped gain the Klan popularity. At first the Klan like it always had focused on intimidating blacks, however focus turned towards Catholics, Jews and foreigners. The Klan devoted itself to purging American life basically of anyone not a white Anglo-Saxon, proving their devotion by lynching impure, foreign people and burning crosses.To say this hate was group engaged in social conflicts is an understatement. The economic prosperity of the roaring twenties overshadowed its escalating social tension. Although America was colonized by immigrants, the nativist movement worked to cash in ones chips immigration and ostracize migrants viewing them as impure and inferior. The hypocrisy of the unblemished movement is incredible. Extremist groups like the KKK took racism to a new level res orting to medieval tactics like lynching and cross burning.