Moral Panics

Colonial Era Panics

Colonial era moral panics were, in large part, based in religion. The early colonies were small, closely knit, religiously based societies. The early settlers knew their neighbors and regarded themselves as their brother's keepers. Outsiders were viewed as deviant and dangerous. The Puritans, intent on building God's “shining city on the hill,” viewed Quakers as a threat to religious and social order. Laws were passed banishing them from the colony. When this did not work, punishments were escalated, resulting in a [Page 536]number of hangings. Similarly, Anne Hutchinson and her followers were banished from Massachusetts in 1638 for heresy and for challenging the authority of the government. The 1692 witchcraft trial of Salem Village, Massachusetts, resulting in 20 executions, was a product of a collective moral panic.

The colonists were also concerned with race issues. Slave codes were carefully crafted to regulate every aspect of slave behavior. However, fear of slave revolts sometimes escalated to the level of mass hysteria. Responses to real and perceived threats of slave insurrection were swift and severe. In 1741, for example, 170 people were put on trial in New York, charged with conspiracy and arson. Legal formality was suspended. Seventy Blacks and seven Whites were banished from North America. Sixteen Blacks and four Whites were hanged, and 13 Blacks burned at the stake.

19th-Century Panics

Nineteenth-century moral panics reflected a variety of dynamic and dialectically interacting forces. The arrival of millions of immigrants transformed the Untied States from a small, isolated agrarian society into a world industrial power. But the Irish, Italian, and German immigrants who served as the backbone of the industrial revolution were, from the perspective of native-born Americans, deviant and dangerous. Their dress, speech, behavior, and religion—especially Catholics, who were viewed as mindless servants of the Pope— threatened American institutions. Native Protestants viewed the vice, sin, and crime of emerging cities as a reflection of the immigrants' immoral character. Alcohol consumption was a particularly serious concern: the Irish drank hard liquor, Italians wine, Germans beer—and they disrespected God by drinking on Sunday.

Nineteenth-century moral entrepreneurs tried to regulate America's new “dangerous classes.” Throughout the 19th century, Protestants and Catholics battled over the control of American political, economic, educational, and legal institutions. State legislatures, still governed by native Protestants, passed laws controlling bars, brothels, gambling, card playing, and billiard halls. The passage of the Comstock Law by Congress in 1873 reflected the mind-set and fears of the times. Anthony Comstock, a politically connected Connecticut dry goods salesman, was charged with the authority to regulate American obscenity and vice. Prostitution, gambling, abortion, immoral books and literature (e.g., crime stories) were subjected to the critical gaze of Comstock and elitist moral entrepreneurs.

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