Nativism

Historians of the United States apply the term nativism to political and cultural ideologies developed and embraced primarily by white men. Although these men share the racial, ethnic, and religious background of the most powerful groups in the culture, they feel economically and politically disadvantaged in relation to those they deem alien to the society. Nativism has been both a component and reflection of the masculinity of these disaffected white males.

Nativist ideology in the United States has typically defined new immigrants (and often nonimmigrant racial and religious minorities) as unable or unwilling to become “true Americans” or “real men,” and also as threats to the rightful dominance of white, Protestant, heterosexual males. Most nativist groups have believed that legal—and sometimes illegal—actions are imperative to “preserve” the United States from the pernicious influence of the groups they have identified as un-American and unmanly, and thus unsuited for the rights and privileges of citizenship. At different points in American history, U.S. nativists have identified as “inferior” members of nondominant races (any nonwhite group), nondominant ethnicities (e.g., Irish and Asian immigrants), nondominant religions (e.g., Catholicism, Judaism, and Mormonism), and even members of unpopular groups (e.g., members of the Masonic Brotherhood).

Periods of large-scale immigration and difficult economic situations have often coincided with and helped to produce nativist activity, particularly among working-class men seeking to preserve the perceived link between Americanness, manhood, and economic self-sufficiency. In the mid–nineteenth century an influx of Irish-Catholic immigrants, combined with the rapidly fluctuating economic conditions generated by industrialization, prompted the rise of a number of nativist groups. The Know-Nothings (a semi-secret political party originally named the Order of the Star Spangled Banner and later called the American Party) was the most prominent and most successful, significantly affecting a number of elections in both the northern and southern states during the 1850s. The Know-Nothings defined the “true American” man as a white heterosexual who had been born—and whose parents had been born—in the United States. Know-Nothing publications provided idealized images of American nativists: young, beardless, and blandly handsome men with curling blond or brown hair and dark eyes. One description of the representative Know-Nothing (called “Sam”) portrayed him as “a tall American whose forefathers fought in the battles of the Republic,” with a “sound head and a pure heart” that was “as tender as his nerves are strong” (Overdyke, 181–83). Other nineteenth-century nativists conceived the ideal American man similarly: He was an industrious, frugal Protestant who made a living doing “honest” (usually physical) labor.

Nativist ideology has generally defined “alien” males as either excessively or insufficiently masculine. During the mid–nineteenth century, for example, nativists portrayed the Irish laborers they saw threatening their livelihood as lazy, immoral, stupid, and lacking the qualities nativists associated with manliness. Nativist literature of the period was typified by the novel Stanhope Burleigh: The Jesuits in Our Home (1855), which titillated readers with a plot contrasting the pure manly love of Know-Nothing patriots with lascivious, violent attacks on American women by hypersexualized Irish priests. Later nativist writings similarly attributed sexual violence against women and “white slavery” to immigrants and other target groups. In the early twentieth century, fiction, popular theatre, and films incorporated nativist images that reinforced stereotypes of Irish Catholic priests, Asian males, and African-American men as sexual threats against whom the “true American” man served as a defender of female virtue.

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