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Tag: Anti-Catholic

Un-separating Church & State

Un-separating Church & State

An ape-like Catholic nun is sewing together church and state. Get it?  Thomas Nast not-to-subtle message is that American Catholics wanted to destroy the sacred system of separation of church and state. Indeed, a quick way to signal your anti-Catholic bona fides was to declare your support for separation.  Note, too, the simian Irishman sneering at Liberty who is chained to a bucket of “fraudulent votes.” Protestants accused Catholics of wanting state money to subsidize Catholic schools, which did happen…

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The River Ganges

The River Ganges

Look closely: those crocodiles coming ashore to eat the children are actually Catholic Bishops!  The boy standing bravely on the beach has a Holy Bible sticking out of his coat. A gutted building behind them is labelled Public Schools.  What’s this all about? In the 1870s, when this Thomas Nast cartoon was published, Protestants were aggressively casting Catholics as anti-Bible.  The reason: the Catholics resisted having their kids forced to read the King James version of the Bible (instead of…

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Katholic Killers

Katholic Killers

Note that this cheerful Klansman, sitting on a Catholic clergyman,  is holding both a Holy Bible. That’s because in the 19th and early 20th century, many Protestants claimed that Catholics were anti-Bible. This stemmed in part from Catholic efforts to stop the Protestants from forcing public school children to read from the King James translation of the Bible.   Ironically, Catholics actually did want the Bible to be taught but wanted their children to work off of a Catholic translation. Protestants…

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The Bible Riots

The Bible Riots

This is the image used on the cover of Sacred Liberty. This illustration depicts what were called “the Bible Riots,” which took place in 1834 in Philadelphia and killed 30 people. These days we tend to think of religion-in-schools fights being about believers vs. secularists. But for most of our history it was a fight between Protestants and Catholics. In Philadelphia, Protestants insisted that school children read from the King James Version – which Catholic families viewed as the wrong…

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Twin Reptiles

Twin Reptiles

Not much subtlety here. The popular political cartoonist Thomas Nast hated Catholics and Mormons.  The cartoon was published in 1880, a period when both Catholics and Mormons clout was rising – as was the backlash against both. Federal agents scoured Utah jailing more than 1,000 Mormons for practicing polygamy. Meanwhile, surging immigrant populations of Irish immigrants meant increasing clashes in schools over whether Protestant Ten Commandments and Bible should be forced on Catholic Children and whether federal dollars should support…

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John F. Kennedy’s speech before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association

John F. Kennedy’s speech before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association

John F Kennedy September 12, 1960 John F. Kennedy decided he needed to address the Catholic Issue directly. He did so during a speech in Houston. Reverend Meza, Reverend Reck, I’m grateful for your generous invitation to speak my views.  While the so-called religious issue is necessarily and properly the chief topic here tonight, I want to emphasize from the outset that we have far more critical issues to face in the 1960 election; the spread of Communist influence, until…

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“Yes, the Klan Has No Catholics”

“Yes, the Klan Has No Catholics”

Klu Klux Klan Song Book A couplet from “Yes, the Klan Has No Catholics,” one of the anti-Catholic songs in the Ku Klux Klan Song Book:     Source(s): Jacobs, “Co-Opting Christian Chorales,” p. 370; Danny O. Crew, Ku Klux Klan Sheet Music (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2003), p. 207.

Imminent Dangers to the Free Institutions of the United States Through Foreign Immigration and the Present State of the Naturalization Laws by Samuel Morse

Imminent Dangers to the Free Institutions of the United States Through Foreign Immigration and the Present State of the Naturalization Laws by Samuel Morse

Samuel Morse 1835 Excerpts from Imminent Dangers to the Free Institutions of the United States (1835).  At the time, Samuel Morse was a well known painter and a prominent anti-Catholic writer. He would later go on to help invent the telegraph and the Morse Code. He also ran for mayor of New York City as a nativist, but lost badly. [W]e well know what is the nature of Roman Catholic ecclesiastical rule, — it is the double refined spirit of despotism,…

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Al Smith Response To Charles Marshall in the Atlantic

Al Smith Response To Charles Marshall in the Atlantic

Al Smith May 1927 Charles Marshall had written a major piece in The Atlantic arguing that Al Smith, the 1928 Democratic nominee, could not be truly independent from the Church.  Smith’s response, largely written by his advisor Joseph Proskauer, was a significant explication of how to be a Catholic politician in America. Charles C. Marshall, Esq. DEAR Sir: — In your open letter to me in the April Atlantic Monthly you ‘impute’ to American Catholics views which, if held by them, would leave open…

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