The Red Scare of 1919–1920 had its origins in the hyper-nationalism of World War I and was marked by a widespread fear of Bolshevism and anarchism. Concerns over the effects of radical political agitation in American society and its alleged spread in the U.S. labor movement fueled the paranoia that defined the period. This concern was further inflamed following an anarchist bomb plot in 1919 to the point at which revolution and Bolshevism became the general explanation for all challenges to the social order used to excuse even such simple expressions of free speech as the display of certain flags and banners.
"Come Unto Me, Ye Opprest!"
A Red Scare depiction of a "European Anarchist" attempting to destroy the Statue of Liberty.
The Bolsheviks
Founded by Vladimir Lenin and Alexander Bogdanov, by 1905 the Bolsheviks were a mass political organization in Russia consisting primarily of workers governed by the principle of democratic centralism. A faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), the Bolsheviks split from the party’s other socialist faction, the Mensheviks, in 1903 and ultimately became the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
In a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, collectively known as the Russian Revolution, the Tsarist autocracy was dismantled and replaced by communists. In the first revolution of February 1917 in Petrograd, now St. Petersburg, members of parliament assumed national control and formed the Russian Provisional Government. The army leadership believed it did not have the means to suppress the revolution and subsequently forced the abdication of Nicholas II, the last Russian emperor.
Russian Revolution 1917
Russian soldiers marching in Petrograd, now St. Petersburg, in February 1917 as part of the revolutions that established a Bolshevik government.
When the Provisional Government chose to continue fighting World War I despite the Russian Army suffering huge losses, the Bolsheviks demanded an immediate end to the war and won over the common people. In the second phase of the revolution, in October 1917, the Bolsheviks led by Lenin overthrew the Provisional Government and appointed themselves leaders of government ministries and seized control of the countryside. The Bolsheviks founded the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic that would, in 1922, become the chief constituent of the Soviet Union.
The Red Scare and Organized Labor
American authorities saw the possibility of revolution at home in cases in 1919 such as the five-day Seattle General Strike in February, during which more than 65,000 workers in several unions struck for higher wages, and the Boston Police Strike in September for better wages and working conditions that resulted in several nights of lawlessness and the restoration of order by the state guard.
Seattle General Strike Headline
The front page of the Seattle Union Record newspaper on February 3, 1919, carrying a report of the city's general strike.
Newspapers exacerbated those political fears into xenophobia, a fear of people from other nations, because varieties of radical anarchism were perceived as answers to poverty and anarchism's advocates were often recent European immigrants. Moreover, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) backed several labor strikes in 1916 and 1917 that the press portrayed as radical threats to American society inspired by left-wing, foreign agents provocateurs . Thus, the press in 1919 misrepresented legitimate labor strikes as "crimes against society", "conspiracies against the government", and "Plots to establish Communism".
Anti-Communist Sentiment
Cartoon of U.S. Army machine gunner holding off hordes of Reds and Wobblies (Industrial Workers of the World party members).
In the wake of the Seattle General Strike, the U.S. Senate created a special five-man subcommittee from the panel whose original mandate was to investigate German subversion during World War I. Known as the Overman Committee, its mandate was to study efforts to propagate Bolshevism and in hearings during 1919 it developed an alarming image of Bolshevism as an imminent threat to the U.S. government and American values.
"Sock it Hard!"
The American Legion prepares to hit a ball labeled "Bolshevism" with a rifle butt labeled "100 per cent Americanism." He stands above a quote from Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.: "Don't argue with the reds; go to bat with them and go to the bat strong!"
The Palmer Raids
In April 1919, authorities discovered a plot to mail 36 bombs to prominent members of the U.S. political and economic establishment, including J. P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, and immigration officials. U.S. Attorney General Alexander Mitchell Palmer, another target of the mail bombs, attempted to suppress radical organizations through exaggerated rhetoric, illegal search and seizures, unwarranted arrests and detentions, and the deportation of several hundred suspected radicals and anarchists. In June of that year, eight bombs simultaneously exploded in eight cities. Palmer’s home in Washington, D.C., was hit by an explosion that killed the bomber, an Italian-American radical from Philadelphia. American authorities saw the threat of revolution in the bomb campaign and Palmer ordered the U.S. Justice Department to launch what became known as the Palmer Raids in November 1919 and January 1920.
A. Mitchell Palmer
United States Attorney General Alexander Mitchell Palmer in 1919.
The raids were intended to round up and rid the nation of radical leftists, especially anarchists. Yet fewer than 600 of Palmer's raids were substantiated with evidence and thousands of resident aliens were illegally arrested and deported. Initially the press praised the raids, but they were criticized as unconstitutional by 12 prominent lawyers. Defensively, Palmer warned in 1920 that a left-wing revolution aimed at government overthrow would begin on May 1, known as May Day, the International Workers' Day. When it failed to happen, he was ridiculed and lost much of his remaining credibility. In July 1920, Palmer's promising Democratic Party bid for the U.S. presidency failed.
Wall Street was indeed bombed on September 1, 1920 near Federal Hall and the JP Morgan Bank. While both anarchists and communists were suspected, no one was indicted for the bombing. The Red Scare effectively ended in the middle of 1920 after Palmer's predicted May Day uprising passed without incident.
Red Scare Legislation
The anti-immigrant, anti-anarchist Sedition Act of 1918 was approved in Congress to protect wartime morale by deporting people with undesirable politics. In 1919–20, several states enacted "criminal syndicalism" laws outlawing advocacy of violence in effecting and securing social change, which included free speech limitations. Passage of these laws provoked aggressive police investigations and unwarranted arrests and deportation for those suspected of communist or left-wing leanings. Regardless of ideological nuances, the Red Scare did not distinguish between communism, socialism, or social democracy and enable an overreach of government power while weakening civil liberties in the United States.