American populism: the people and their enemies
Theodore Roosevelt in a procession along West Jackson Boulevard in Chicago, 1912.
CHICAGO DAILY NEWS/CHICAGO HISTORY MUSEUM/GETTY IMAGES
In the early 1850s immigration to the United States rose dramatically. Most were Catholics from Ireland and Germany. A movement of nativist reaction called “Know Nothings” had considerable electoral success. It was hostile to wealth, elites and expertise, and deeply suspicious of outsiders. An 1855 editorial in a Texas newspaper railed: