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Know Nothings

Leaders:

  • Charles Allen created The Order of The Star Spangled Banner. This layed the formation of the Know Nothing Party.

  • Few Prominent Leaders

  • Membership included middle-class citizens who were mostly Protestant 

  • Members later absorbed by the Republican political party.(WorldEncyclopedia)

  • When members were asked if they had heard of the Party, their universal answer was "I know nothing about it".(Kutler)

  • Citizen Know Nothing.

  • This was the parties' nativist ideal.

  • If you look closely to the picture, it says, "Uncle Sam's Youngest Son" across the top. 

Goals of Reform Movement:

  • Fear of Catholic Immigration caused people to become dissatisfied with the Democratic Party during the mid 1800's. 

  • Activists, Or people opposed to the Democratic party, formed secret oranizations that were designed to vote all together and throw the weight of their votes behind candidates that supported their party.

  • Democrats, Whigs, and Freesoilers were other parties at the time. These three parties allied together to create a "Anti-Know Nothing Party", due to the amount of votes the Know Nothing party was getting in elections across the United States. (WorldEncyclopedia)

Arguments 

  • The Know Nothing party was a group of people that combined votes to weigh elections in a person's favor that supported their party.

  • they did not have arguements that stood behind their reasons

  • No one would get in trouble for this either because it was a extremely secret organization that people knew nothing about.(WorldEncyclopedia)

C.O.P.P.E.R.S.

  1.  Citizen Paricipation: Members of the Know Nothing Party were mainly Protestant and no one knew that they were apart of this group unless they told you, which they didnt.(WorldEncyclopedia)

  2.  Oppourtunity: Gave members the option to weigh the votes of people that they wanted to win in their elections. Also, they could live a life no one knew about. (WorldEncyclopedia)

  3.   People vs. Powerful: Members in the Know Nothing Party gained a ton of power throughout the duration of the parties' life. Being able to weigh elections allowed people that they wanted to be put in office a much better chance to win in the elections.(WorldEncyclopedia)

  4.  Equality: Members of the Know Nothing party did not believe in equality because they believed in weighing elections, which is definitely not equal.(WorldEncyclopedia)

  5.  Responsibiliy: The responsibilities of the members were to combine votes and weigh elections in the favor of the candidate that supported the Know Nothing Party.(WorldEncyclopedia) 

  6.  Self Improvement: The members believed that if they could get a candidate that supported their party, they would be able to get more members to join their party.(WorldEncyclopedia)   

 

  • Know Nothings supported Boston, Salem, and other New England parties in the elections of the spring of 1854

  • Their biggest victory was sweeping the state of Massachusetts in the fall election of 1854.

  • Because of how much they were winning in elections, member numbers went from 50,000 to nearly 1,000,000 people in less than a year!(WorldEncyclopedia)

Movement Successes

Movement Failures

  • The Know Nothing Party started to quickly decline after the wave of them winning. The party declined because it was divided over the issue of slavery

  • The slavery supporting side of the Know Nothing Party remained strong on local and state levels in a few southern states until the election of 1860, when they were not a nationwide political threat anymore. (WorldEncyclopedia)

Successful or Failure?

 In my personal opinion, the Know Nothing party, otherwise known as the American Party, was successful for the early stages of its life. After it had a massive wave of success, It declined drastically because of the topic of slavery splitting the party into two groups. By the election of 1860, the Know Nothing party was unheard of and was not a major threat anymore. 

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