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Know Nothings (Boyer, 2008)
The Know-Nothings evolved out of a secret nativist organization, the Order of the Star-Spangled Banner, founded in 1850. (The party's popular name, Know-Nothing, derived from the standard response of its members to inquiries about its activities: "I know nothing.") This order was one of many such societies that mushroomed in response to the unprecedented immigration of the 1840s. It had sought to rid the United States of immigrant and Catholic political influence by pressuring the existing parties to nominate and appoint only native-born Protestants to office and by advocating an extension of the naturalization period before immigrants could vote.
Paul S. Boyer, et al., eds., The Enduring Vision: A History of the American People, 6th ed. (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2008), 406.
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Bibliography
| Chicago Style Entry | Link |
|---|---|
Anspach, F. R. The Sons of the Sires; A History of the Rise, Progress, and Destiny of the American Party, and its Probable Influence on the Next Presidential Election. To Which is Added a Review of the Letter of the Hon. Henry A. Wise, Against the Know-Nothings. Philadelphia: Lippincott, Grambo & Co., 1855. |
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| The American Text Book, for the Campaign of 1856. Baltimore, MD: Bull & Tuttle, 1856. | View Record |
| Anbinder, Tyler. Nativism and Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the Politics of the 1850's. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. | View Record |
| Baker, Jean H. Ambivalent Americans: The Know-Nothing Party in Maryland. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977. | View Record |
| Birkner, Michael J., ed. James Buchanan and the Political Crisis of the 1850s. Selinsgrove, PA: Susquehanna University Press, 1996. | View Record |
| Cantrell, Gregg. "Sam Houston and the Know-Nothings: A Reappraisal." Southwestern Historical Quarterly 96, no. 3 (1993): 326-343. | View Record |
| Dykstra, Robert R. "The Know Nothings Nobody Knows: Political Nativists in Antebellum Iowa." Annals of Iowa 53, no. 1 (Winter 1994): 5-24. | View Record |
| Frederick, Jeff. "Unintended Consequences: The Rise and Fall of the Know-Nothing Party in Alabama." Alabama Review 55, no. 1 (2002): 3-33. | View Record |
| Hansen, Stephen and Paul Nygard. "Stephen A. Douglas, the Know-Nothings, and the Democratic Party in Illinois, 1854-1858." Illinois Historical Journal 87, no. 2 (1994): 109-130. | View Record |
| Hansen, Stephen, and Paul Nygard. "Abraham Lincoln and the Know Nothing Question, 1854-1859." Lincoln Herald 94, no. 2 (1992): 61-72. | View Record |
| Horrocks, Thomas. "The Know-Nothings." American History Illustrated 17, no. 9 (1983): 22-29. | View Record |
| Shade, William G. "Know Nothing Populism and the Origins of the GOP." Pennsylvania History 71, no. 2 (2004): 227-231. | View Record |
| Taylor, John Charles Randolph. "Virginia Know Nothings: Whigs in Search of a National Party." Masters Thesis, University of Virginia, 1974. | View Record |
| Towers, Frank. "Violence as a Tool of Party Dominance: Election Riots and the Baltimore Know-Nothings, 1854-1860." Maryland Historical Magazine 93, no. 1 (1998): 4-37. | View Record |