Aug 02, 2010
FOX News host Glenn Beck's reportedly German (Catholic) immigrant ancestors would be ashamed.
As we learn more about Beck's inciting rhetoric against the Tides Foundation--his latest liberal obsession--and a troubled man's foiled armed assault on
the liberal foundation in Oakland, and as the fear-mongering in Arizona
against Mexican immigrants by Gov. Jan Brewer reaches absurd levels of "terrorist attacks" and "drug mule" accusations and Neo Nazi border patrols,
I can't help but be reminded of the Bloody Monday riots that took the
lives of at least two dozen immigrants and Americans in Louisville on
August 6, 1855.
Beck's German ancestors would have reminded the TV host what happened
this week in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1855, when a nationally prominent
newspaper editor repeatedly let loose the hounds of hatred and fomented
what would become the worst anti-immigrant massacre in US history--of
German and Irish Catholics.
A Connecticut Yankee turned Louisville Journal newspaper
editor, George Prentice was considered the best known commentator in the
nation, according to the New York Times, who described him as a
"bitter, unrelenting political foe, and several times had street
fights." And, as the great editorial voice of the anti-immigrant Know
Nothing party, Prentice relished attacking the "foreign hordes" of
Germans and Irish that poured into the Midwest. Fearful of an election
upset, he penned a series of editorials that would unleash the wrath of
hired thugs on Louisville's darkest and bloodiest day.
On the eve of the riots, Prentice declared: "Let the foreigners keep
their elbows to themselves to-day at the polls. Americans are you all
ready? We think we hear you shout 'ready,' 'well fire!' and may heaven
have mercy on the foe."
Fueled by rumors and booze, drunken mobs roamed the German and Irish
wards the next day with rifles and muskets and pitchforks and torches,
leading to street fights, leaving behind the smoldering remains of
destruction, strewn and burned bodies, and at least 22 dead--most
historians place the deathtoll much higher. In the process, hundreds,
if not thousands of immigrants and sympathizers fled Louisville.
Now, as Eric Boehlert of Media Matters writes: Glenn Beck's Incendiary Angst Is Dangerously Close to Having a Body Count.
As Dana Milbank wrote in the Washington Post on Sunday:
Beck has at times spoken against violence, but he more often forecasts
it, warning that "it is only a matter of time before an actual crazy
person really does something stupid." Most every broadcast has some
violent imagery: "The clock is ticking. . . . The war is just beginning.
. . . Shoot me in the head if you try to change our government. . . .
You have to be prepared to take rocks to the head. . . . The other side
is attacking. . . . There is a coup going on. . . . Grab a torch! . . .
Drive a stake through the heart of the bloodsuckers. . . . They are
taking you to a place to be slaughtered. . . . They are putting a gun to
America's head. . . . Hold these people responsible."Beck has prophesied darkly to his millions of followers that we are
reaching "a point where the people will have exhausted all their
options. When that happens, look out."
Back in Louisville, one of my favorite cities in the nation, the opposing Courier newspaper called out Prentice's violence-inciting words that disgraced the great city: "We fully agree with the Journal that there is a terrible responsibility somewhere, and that no language is too strong for its condemnation. And the Journal
knows full well where this responsibility belongs. To its incendiary
articles continued day after day before the election, and its violent
appeals on the morning of the election, articles and appeals calculated
to bring into active exercise all bad passions of the human heart."
Toward the end of his life, the famed Prentice spoke publicly about
his regret in stirring anti-immigrant violence. Within a decade of the
riot, Louisville elected a German-American mayor.
Will Glenn Beck, FOX News and Gov. Brewer have the same regrets--and terrible responsibility--in the future?
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Jeff Biggers
Jeff Biggers is the author of numerous books, including his latest: "Resistance: Reclaiming an American Tradition?" His previous works include: "State Out of the Union: Arizona and the Final Showdown Over the American Dream;" "The United States of Appalachia;" and "Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland."
FOX News host Glenn Beck's reportedly German (Catholic) immigrant ancestors would be ashamed.
As we learn more about Beck's inciting rhetoric against the Tides Foundation--his latest liberal obsession--and a troubled man's foiled armed assault on
the liberal foundation in Oakland, and as the fear-mongering in Arizona
against Mexican immigrants by Gov. Jan Brewer reaches absurd levels of "terrorist attacks" and "drug mule" accusations and Neo Nazi border patrols,
I can't help but be reminded of the Bloody Monday riots that took the
lives of at least two dozen immigrants and Americans in Louisville on
August 6, 1855.
Beck's German ancestors would have reminded the TV host what happened
this week in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1855, when a nationally prominent
newspaper editor repeatedly let loose the hounds of hatred and fomented
what would become the worst anti-immigrant massacre in US history--of
German and Irish Catholics.
A Connecticut Yankee turned Louisville Journal newspaper
editor, George Prentice was considered the best known commentator in the
nation, according to the New York Times, who described him as a
"bitter, unrelenting political foe, and several times had street
fights." And, as the great editorial voice of the anti-immigrant Know
Nothing party, Prentice relished attacking the "foreign hordes" of
Germans and Irish that poured into the Midwest. Fearful of an election
upset, he penned a series of editorials that would unleash the wrath of
hired thugs on Louisville's darkest and bloodiest day.
On the eve of the riots, Prentice declared: "Let the foreigners keep
their elbows to themselves to-day at the polls. Americans are you all
ready? We think we hear you shout 'ready,' 'well fire!' and may heaven
have mercy on the foe."
Fueled by rumors and booze, drunken mobs roamed the German and Irish
wards the next day with rifles and muskets and pitchforks and torches,
leading to street fights, leaving behind the smoldering remains of
destruction, strewn and burned bodies, and at least 22 dead--most
historians place the deathtoll much higher. In the process, hundreds,
if not thousands of immigrants and sympathizers fled Louisville.
Now, as Eric Boehlert of Media Matters writes: Glenn Beck's Incendiary Angst Is Dangerously Close to Having a Body Count.
As Dana Milbank wrote in the Washington Post on Sunday:
Beck has at times spoken against violence, but he more often forecasts
it, warning that "it is only a matter of time before an actual crazy
person really does something stupid." Most every broadcast has some
violent imagery: "The clock is ticking. . . . The war is just beginning.
. . . Shoot me in the head if you try to change our government. . . .
You have to be prepared to take rocks to the head. . . . The other side
is attacking. . . . There is a coup going on. . . . Grab a torch! . . .
Drive a stake through the heart of the bloodsuckers. . . . They are
taking you to a place to be slaughtered. . . . They are putting a gun to
America's head. . . . Hold these people responsible."Beck has prophesied darkly to his millions of followers that we are
reaching "a point where the people will have exhausted all their
options. When that happens, look out."
Back in Louisville, one of my favorite cities in the nation, the opposing Courier newspaper called out Prentice's violence-inciting words that disgraced the great city: "We fully agree with the Journal that there is a terrible responsibility somewhere, and that no language is too strong for its condemnation. And the Journal
knows full well where this responsibility belongs. To its incendiary
articles continued day after day before the election, and its violent
appeals on the morning of the election, articles and appeals calculated
to bring into active exercise all bad passions of the human heart."
Toward the end of his life, the famed Prentice spoke publicly about
his regret in stirring anti-immigrant violence. Within a decade of the
riot, Louisville elected a German-American mayor.
Will Glenn Beck, FOX News and Gov. Brewer have the same regrets--and terrible responsibility--in the future?
Jeff Biggers
Jeff Biggers is the author of numerous books, including his latest: "Resistance: Reclaiming an American Tradition?" His previous works include: "State Out of the Union: Arizona and the Final Showdown Over the American Dream;" "The United States of Appalachia;" and "Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland."
FOX News host Glenn Beck's reportedly German (Catholic) immigrant ancestors would be ashamed.
As we learn more about Beck's inciting rhetoric against the Tides Foundation--his latest liberal obsession--and a troubled man's foiled armed assault on
the liberal foundation in Oakland, and as the fear-mongering in Arizona
against Mexican immigrants by Gov. Jan Brewer reaches absurd levels of "terrorist attacks" and "drug mule" accusations and Neo Nazi border patrols,
I can't help but be reminded of the Bloody Monday riots that took the
lives of at least two dozen immigrants and Americans in Louisville on
August 6, 1855.
Beck's German ancestors would have reminded the TV host what happened
this week in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1855, when a nationally prominent
newspaper editor repeatedly let loose the hounds of hatred and fomented
what would become the worst anti-immigrant massacre in US history--of
German and Irish Catholics.
A Connecticut Yankee turned Louisville Journal newspaper
editor, George Prentice was considered the best known commentator in the
nation, according to the New York Times, who described him as a
"bitter, unrelenting political foe, and several times had street
fights." And, as the great editorial voice of the anti-immigrant Know
Nothing party, Prentice relished attacking the "foreign hordes" of
Germans and Irish that poured into the Midwest. Fearful of an election
upset, he penned a series of editorials that would unleash the wrath of
hired thugs on Louisville's darkest and bloodiest day.
On the eve of the riots, Prentice declared: "Let the foreigners keep
their elbows to themselves to-day at the polls. Americans are you all
ready? We think we hear you shout 'ready,' 'well fire!' and may heaven
have mercy on the foe."
Fueled by rumors and booze, drunken mobs roamed the German and Irish
wards the next day with rifles and muskets and pitchforks and torches,
leading to street fights, leaving behind the smoldering remains of
destruction, strewn and burned bodies, and at least 22 dead--most
historians place the deathtoll much higher. In the process, hundreds,
if not thousands of immigrants and sympathizers fled Louisville.
Now, as Eric Boehlert of Media Matters writes: Glenn Beck's Incendiary Angst Is Dangerously Close to Having a Body Count.
As Dana Milbank wrote in the Washington Post on Sunday:
Beck has at times spoken against violence, but he more often forecasts
it, warning that "it is only a matter of time before an actual crazy
person really does something stupid." Most every broadcast has some
violent imagery: "The clock is ticking. . . . The war is just beginning.
. . . Shoot me in the head if you try to change our government. . . .
You have to be prepared to take rocks to the head. . . . The other side
is attacking. . . . There is a coup going on. . . . Grab a torch! . . .
Drive a stake through the heart of the bloodsuckers. . . . They are
taking you to a place to be slaughtered. . . . They are putting a gun to
America's head. . . . Hold these people responsible."Beck has prophesied darkly to his millions of followers that we are
reaching "a point where the people will have exhausted all their
options. When that happens, look out."
Back in Louisville, one of my favorite cities in the nation, the opposing Courier newspaper called out Prentice's violence-inciting words that disgraced the great city: "We fully agree with the Journal that there is a terrible responsibility somewhere, and that no language is too strong for its condemnation. And the Journal
knows full well where this responsibility belongs. To its incendiary
articles continued day after day before the election, and its violent
appeals on the morning of the election, articles and appeals calculated
to bring into active exercise all bad passions of the human heart."
Toward the end of his life, the famed Prentice spoke publicly about
his regret in stirring anti-immigrant violence. Within a decade of the
riot, Louisville elected a German-American mayor.
Will Glenn Beck, FOX News and Gov. Brewer have the same regrets--and terrible responsibility--in the future?
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