Yankee Values vs. Identity Politics

[Wikipedia delenda est]

Finally someone who gets it!

These supposed egalitarian Yankees, were aghast by Catholicism, their opposition to the Church of England was because it was "too Catholic" in its trappings as much as anger at hierarchical control and they disdained such influences. So what happens when a bunch of Irish Catholics start arriving by the boatload in Boston. 1) You discriminate like crap against them and 2) you move to Michigan/Illinois/Oregon.

They were opposed to Catholicism because of their egalitarianism, which came from their religion. The Catholic Church was a deeply reactionary institution that all radicals and liberals, Protestant or not, American or Italian, English or French, fought against for the cause of liberty.

These two papers have also got a lot on 19th century Yankee liberalism and its coming into conflict with conservative Catholicism, the Republicans being the party of Protestant liberalism vs. the Democrats being the party of reactionary Southerners and Catholics, the role these ideologies played in the Civil War and the slavery debate, reactions to liberal revolutions of 1848, etc:

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3440&context=etd

https://rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu/rutgers-lib/55595/PDF/1/play/

I would encourage anyone who is immediately dismissive of the OP’s argument to spend some time reading these.

[Wikipedia delenda est]

Finally someone who gets it!

These supposed egalitarian Yankees, were aghast by Catholicism, their opposition to the Church of England was because it was "too Catholic" in its trappings as much as anger at hierarchical control and they disdained such influences. So what happens when a bunch of Irish Catholics start arriving by the boatload in Boston. 1) You discriminate like crap against them and 2) you move to Michigan/Illinois/Oregon.

They were opposed to Catholicism because of their egalitarianism, which came from their religion. The Catholic Church was a deeply reactionary institution that all radicals and liberals, Protestant or not, American or Italian, English or French, fought against for the cause of liberty.

These two papers have also got a lot on 19th century Yankee liberalism and its coming into conflict with conservative Catholicism, the Republicans being the party of Protestant liberalism vs. the Democrats being the party of reactionary Southerners and Catholics, the role these ideologies played in the Civil War and the slavery debate, reactions to liberal revolutions of 1848, etc:

https://ir.library.louisville.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3440&context=etd

https://rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu/rutgers-lib/55595/PDF/1/play/

I would encourage anyone who is immediately dismissive of the OP’s argument to spend some time reading these.

One of the core tenets of liberalism is religious tolerance Henry. Just because of historical political leanings and allusions to such made by figures in the times, it doesn't change that fact that you have the dynamic of a religious minority being discriminated against by a religious majority in power.

Taking these people at face value either because of personal religious bias or naive trust in spoken words of people is folly. They are engaging in an action, that objective implementation of the enlightenment would regard as being unacceptable. It is not without accident that by this point already, most of the support for Catholic minority rights in England are being advanced not by the Tories, but by the Liberal Party of course with a few exceptions obviously.

I get the sense you are trying to shoe horn a 17th century dynamic 200 years later and relying on hypocritical bigots doesn't well lend credence to your arguments. We don't take the slave holders at face value when they say they are acting in the best interest of their slaves, why should we take religious bigots at face value when they engage in this kind of obfuscation to defend their actions in the name of protecting freedom from the Popish menace?

The North was religiously tolerant though. Religious liberty is literally one of the core Yankee values that this thread is all about. It's true that the original Puritans weren't all that tolerant, but by the 19th century there were all sorts of religious wanderers who never would have been allowed to exist in the South. Southerners hated the North for allowing such a wide variety of opinions and free sects. It's no accident the National Liberal League came from the North not the South. If some Northerners weren't tolerant of Catholicism, it was because Catholicism itself was intolerant, making a paradox of tolerance. As Horace Walpole said, "I have ever been averse to toleration of an intolerant religion." There was undoubtedly some real anti-Catholic bigotry as well, but so was there among the old Cromwellians and English radicals generally.

Would it be unacceptable under the Enlightenment? Voltaire and the other religious skeptics saved their harshest criticism for the Catholic Church and supported the suppression of the Jesuits throughout Europe. I don't recall the French revolutionaries being particularly tolerant of Catholicism either, what with their anti-clerical policy and mass drownings of Catholic peasants in the Vendée. Neither do I with the Italian revolutionaries of 1848, who attempted to establish a Roman Republic and dislodge Pius IX from the Vatican. Good point with regard to England and Catholic Emancipation though; you've got me there.

I don't think the "who's in power" dynamic is as important as you make it out to be. It plays some role, but all things equal I would argue Protestantism is inherently more liberal than Catholicism thanks to its doctrines and historical development (like the anti-hierarchical individualist stuff I've been over). And had the 17th century dynamic around Catholics even changed really? Catholics in 17th century Britain were even more of a persecuted minority than in 19th century America, but still you had the Whigs as the most fervent anti-papists and the champions of political and religious liberty for non-Catholics. I think the situations are actually quite comparable. The only thing missing is the immigration factor.

[Wikipedia delenda est]

The Federalists were not great egalitarians. I have to agree with North Carolina Traitor on this one.

How am I traitor.

I am a carpetbagger, not a traitor.

Because you have Yankee in your username yet have made the post most critical of "Yankee" identity.

Well unlike the caricature created by Lost causers and for some reason embraced by left wing revisionists of yankees seeing themselves as pure and noble champions of all that is good in history, I prefer a more realistic and honest approach that demonstrates that far from being a 400 year old champion of "egalitarianism" they were in fact during the period in question a dominant political force and establishment in terms of politics, economics, religion and culture and went to great lengths to "conserve" that power dynamic, but did happen to get it right once because of varying motives ranging from noble, to self interested, to cultural supremacy and that of course being abolitionism.

Understanding that myriad of motivations as well as understanding the power dynamic of the 19th century is critical to an accurate understanding of the period, and also to appreciating the impact that power has on people in positions of strength in terms of corrupting them and also the impact that one's placement in an inferior positions relatively speaking can thus be impacted differently.

I am sure the Catholic immigrant slaving in the coal mines reveled in this reactionaryism as he fought for the right to unionize against the fat Yankee WASP swimming in robber baron cash.

Its times like this I miss Mechaman, who being if memory serves me Irish and very left wing would eat Henry for lunch in these discussions.

He certainly had no patience for this glorification of Hamilton and the Federalists as "liberals" and posted a thread that literally nuked this conceptualization.

Mechaman would do that.  If Mechaman at all took HenryWallace seriously.

Are you somehow related to Mechaman? Asking because of the similar display name.

[Wikipedia delenda est]

The Federalists were not great egalitarians. I have to agree with North Carolina Traitor on this one.

How am I traitor.

I am a carpetbagger, not a traitor.

Because you have Yankee in your username yet have made the post most critical of "Yankee" identity.

Well unlike the caricature created by Lost causers and for some reason embraced by left wing revisionists of yankees seeing themselves as pure and noble champions of all that is good in history, I prefer a more realistic and honest approach that demonstrates that far from being a 400 year old champion of "egalitarianism" they were in fact during the period in question a dominant political force and establishment in terms of politics, economics, religion and culture and went to great lengths to "conserve" that power dynamic, but did happen to get it right once because of varying motives ranging from noble, to self interested, to cultural supremacy and that of course being abolitionism.

Understanding that myriad of motivations as well as understanding the power dynamic of the 19th century is critical to an accurate understanding of the period, and also to appreciating the impact that power has on people in positions of strength in terms of corrupting them and also the impact that one's placement in an inferior positions relatively speaking can thus be impacted differently.

I am sure the Catholic immigrant slaving in the coal mines reveled in this reactionaryism as he fought for the right to unionize against the fat Yankee WASP swimming in robber baron cash.

Its times like this I miss Mechaman, who being if memory serves me Irish and very left wing would eat Henry for lunch in these discussions.

He certainly had no patience for this glorification of Hamilton and the Federalists as "liberals" and posted a thread that literally nuked this conceptualization.

Mechaman would do that.  If Mechaman at all took HenryWallace seriously.

Are you somehow related to Mechaman? Asking because of the similar display name.

This is he.  And I have no interest in discussing things with an ignorant bigoted buffoon like you.  I could go all day about how historic things like anti-Irish prejudice is among Europeans, the Penal Laws, etc that would demolish your pathetic sense of Protestant superiority but I'm not.  Reading your posts educates me on how a black person must feel when reading people defending the Confederacy.

Have a nice day.

I don't think I'm bigoted, and I'd like to think I am neither ignorant nor a buffoon, but I can be no judge. I know all about anti-Irish prejudice actually, and the Penal Laws. I addressed that in my latest history post. You might be surprised to learn that I consider myself a Jacobite sympathizer because of the very persecutions that the Irish faced for centuries. Not everyone is as simplistic or narrow-minded as you are.

Thanks for not giving me the benefit of the doubt.