the attorney general who jailed and deported communists was who

by Britney Fadel Published 2 years ago Updated 1 year ago 7 min read

Who was the Attorney General in 1919?

The raids, fueled by social unrest following World War I, were led by Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer and are viewed as the climax of that era’s so-called Red Scare. The emotional pitch of World War I did not abate with the armistice, and rampant inflation, unemployment, massive and violent strikes, and brutal race riots in the United States (most notably the Chicago Race

Who was Attorney General during the Red Scare?

Government officials led by Attorney General Palmer were convinced that radical communist was going to try to overthrow the government. In reaction, Palmer led raids between November 1919 and January 1920 arresting people with suspected radical ties. As a result of the raid 500, foreign citizens were deported.

Who was the head of the Department of Justice in 1919?

Apr 11, 2022 · During the spring of 1919, a group of anarchists (known as Galleanists because they were followers of Italian anarchist Luigi Galleani) sent a series of mail bombs to U.S. government officials and judges. On June 2, 1919, one of these bombs exploded at the home of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer, and he and his family barely escaped death. Later that …

What did Attorney General Palmer promise in June 1919?

Alexander Mitchell Palmer, was an American attorney and politician who served as the 50th United States attorney general from 1919 to 1921. He is best known for overseeing the Palmer Raids during the Red Scare of 1919–20. He became a member of the Democratic Party and won election to the United States House of Representatives, serving from 1909 to 1915. During …

What was the purpose of the Palmer Raids?

Department of Justice in 1919 and 1920 in an attempt to arrest foreign anarchists, communists, and radical leftists, many of whom were subsequently deported.

What is the Department of Justice?

U.S. Department of Justice. U.S. Department of Justice, executive division of the U.S. federal government responsible for law enforcement. Headed by the U.S. attorney general, it investigates and prosecutes cases under federal antitrust, civil-rights, criminal, tax, and environmental laws. It controls the Federal Bureau ...

What party was Palmer in?

He became a member of the Democratic Party and won election to the United States House of Representatives, serving from 1909 to 1915. During World War I, he served as Alien Property Custodian, taking charge of the seizure of enemy property. Palmer became attorney general under President Woodrow Wilson in 1919.

When was Palmer elected?

U.S. House of Representatives. Palmer was elected as a Democrat to the 61st, 62nd, and 63rd Congresses and served from March 4, 1909, to March 3, 1915.

Who was the attorney general of the United States in 1919?

Education. Swarthmore College ( BA) Alexander Mitchell Palmer (May 4, 1872 – May 11, 1936), was an American attorney and politician who served as the 50th United States attorney general from 1919 to 1921. He is best known for overseeing the Palmer Raids during the Red Scare of 1919–20 . He became a member of the Democratic Party ...

Was Palmer a labor leader?

His potential rivals for the presidency in 1920 were not inactive. In September and October 1919, General Leonard Wood led U.S. military forces against striking steel workers in Gary, Indiana. Employers claimed the strikers had revolutionary objectives and military intelligence seconded those charges, so Wood added acclaim as an anti-labor and anti-radical champion to his reputation as a military hero, critic of Wilson, and leading candidate for the Republican nomination for President in 1920.

What was the GID in 1919?

Within Palmer's Justice Department, the General Intelligence Division (GID), headed by J. Edgar Hoover, had become a storehouse of information about radicals in America. It had infiltrated many organizations and, following the raids of November 1919 and January 1920, it had interrogated thousands of those arrested and read through boxes of publications and records seized. Though agents in the GID knew there was a gap between what the radicals promised in their rhetoric and what they were capable of accomplishing, they nevertheless told Palmer they had evidence of plans for an attempted overthrow of the U.S. government on May Day 1920.

Who was Palmer's wife?

Widowed when his wife Roberta Dixon died on January 4, 1922, he married Margaret Fallon Burrall in 1923.

What was the Red Scare?

Palmer initiated the “Palmer Raids”, also known as the “Red Scare”, in which thousands of people suspected to be Socialists or Communists were rounded up and jailed. The prisoners were often denied their basic civil rights and writ of habeus corpus and detained for months before they were finally released.

Who was the first attorney general under Woodrow Wilson?

The first is A. Mitchell Palmer, who served as Attorney General under Woodrow Wilson from March 1919 to March 1921. For much of the period from October 1919 to March 1921, Wilson was incapacitated by a stroke, giving Palmer license to abuse his position. Palmer initiated the “Palmer Raids”, also known as the “Red Scare”, ...

What was Weinberger charged with?

In the aftermath of the Iran Contra Affair, Weinberger faced indictment and trial on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. After the Presidential Election of 2000, President George W. Bush selected former Senator John Ashcroft of Missouri as his first Attorney General, serving from February 2001 to February 2005.

Who was Nixon's campaign manager?

Four decades later, President Richard Nixon appointed his campaign manager, John N. Mitchell as Attorney General, a position he held from January 1969 to March 1972. Mitchell was regarded as one of the closest advisers to Nixon and was infamous, like his president, for his support of “law and order.”. Ironically, Mitchell didn’t always follow the ...

Overview

The Palmer Raids were a series of raids conducted in November 1919 and January 1920 by the United States Department of Justice under the administration of President Woodrow Wilson to capture and arrest suspected socialists, especially anarchists and communists, and deport them from the United States. The raids particularly targeted Italian immigrantsand Eastern Eu…

Background

During the First World War there was a nationwide campaign in the United States against the real and imagined divided political loyalties of immigrants and ethnic groups, who were feared to have too much loyalty for their nations of origin. In 1915, President Wilson warned against hyphenated Americanswho, he charged, had "poured the poison of disloyalty into the very arteries of our national life." "Such creatures of passion, disloyalty and anarchy", Wilson continued, "must be cru…

Preparations

In June 1919, Attorney General Palmer told the House Appropriations Committee that all evidence promised that radicals would "on a certain day...rise up and destroy the government at one fell swoop." He requested an increase in his budget to $2,000,000 from $1,500,000 to support his investigations of radicals, but Congress limited the increase to $100,000.
An initial raid in July 1919 against an anarchist group in Buffalo, New York, achieved little when …

Raids and arrests in January 1920

As Attorney General Palmer struggled with exhaustion and devoted all his energies to the United Mine Workers coal strike in November and December 1919, Hoover organized the next raids. He successfully persuaded the Department of Labor to ease its insistence on promptly alerting those arrested of their right to an attorney. Instead, Labor issued instructions that its represen…

Aftermath

In a few weeks, after changes in personnel at the Department of Labor, Palmer faced a new and very independent-minded Acting Secretary of Labor in Assistant Secretary of Labor Louis Freeland Post, who canceled more than 2,000 warrants as being illegal. Of the 10,000 arrested, 3,500 were held by authorities in detention; 556 resident aliens were eventually deported under the Immigration Act of 1918.

General bibliography

• Avrich, Paul, Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background (Princeton University Press, 1991)
• Chafee, Zechariah, Freedom of Speech (New York: Harcourt, Brace, and Howe, 1920)
• Coben, Stanley, A. Mitchell Palmer: Politician (New York: Columbia University Press, 1963)

External links

• Media related to Palmer Raids at Wikimedia Commons