In the broader context of racism against Black Americans and racism in the United States, mass racial violence in the United States consists of ethnic conflicts and race riots, along with such events as:
The 1856 United States presidential election was the 18th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 4, 1856. In a three-way election, Democrat James Buchanan defeated Republican nominee John C. Frémont and Know Nothing nominee Millard Fillmore. The main issue was the expansion of slavery as facilitated by the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854. Buchanan defeated President Franklin Pierce at the 1856 Democratic National Convention for the nomination. Pierce had become widely unpopular in the North because of his support for the pro-slavery faction in the ongoing civil war in territorial Kansas, and Buchanan, a former Secretary of State, had avoided the divisive debates over the Kansas–Nebraska Act by being in Europe as the Ambassador to the United Kingdom.
The Lager Beer Riot occurred on April 21, 1855 in Chicago, Illinois, and was the first major civil disturbance in the city. Mayor Levi Boone, a Nativist politician, renewed enforcement of an old local ordinance mandating that taverns be closed on Sundays and led the city council to raise the cost of a liquor license from $50 per year to $300 per year, renewable quarterly. The move was seen as targeting German immigrants in particular and so caused a greater sense of community within the group.
The Philadelphia nativist riots were a series of riots that took place on May 6—8 and July 6—7, 1844, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States and the adjacent districts of Kensington and Southwark. The riots were a result of rising anti-Catholic sentiment at the growing population of Irish Catholic immigrants. The government brought in over a thousand militia—they confronted the nativist mobs and killed and wounded hundreds of anti-Catholic rioters.
The Plug Uglies were an American Nativist criminal street gang, sometimes referred to loosely as a political club, that operated in the west side of Baltimore, Maryland, from 1854 to 1865. The term plug ugly was used to identify an extremely tough ferocious fighter who could give a sound beating to an opponent, with the Plug Uglies' name additionally stemming from their practice of stuffing oversized plug hats with wool and leather, pulling them down over their ears for head protection as primitive helmets during the numerous street battles they participated in. The name Plug Uglies was used to refer to a number of criminal gangs in New York City as well as Philadelphia.
Lewis Charles Levin was an American politician, newspaper editor and anti-Catholic social activist. He was one of the founders of the American Party in 1842 and served as a member of the U. S. House of Representatives representing Pennsylvania's 1st congressional district from 1845 to 1851. Levin was the first Jewish U.S. Congressman, although David Levy Yulee served as a territorial representative from Florida prior to Levin's election to the House.
Henry Joseph Gardner was the 23rd Governor of Massachusetts, serving from 1855 to 1858. Gardner, a Know Nothing, was elected governor as part of the sweeping victory of Know Nothing candidates in the Massachusetts elections of 1854.
The Know-Nothing Riots of 1856 occurred in Baltimore between September and November of that year. The Know-Nothing Party gained traction in Baltimore as native-born residents disliked the growing immigrant population. Local street gangs became divided on political grounds, with the Know-Nothing affiliated gangs clashing with Democrat affiliated gangs. The partisans were involved in widespread violence at the polls and across Baltimore during municipal and national elections that year.
The term Know-Nothing Riot has been used to refer to a number of political uprisings of the Nativist American Know Nothing Party in the United States of America during the mid-19th century. These anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic protests culminated into riots in Philadelphia in 1844, St. Louis in 1854, Cincinnati and Louisville in 1855, Baltimore in 1856, Washington, D.C., and New York in 1857, and New Orleans in 1858.
Bloody Monday was a series of riots on August 6, 1855, in Louisville, Kentucky, an election day, when Protestant mobs attacked Irish and German Catholic neighborhoods. These riots grew out of the bitter rivalry between the Democrats and the Nativist Know-Nothing Party. Multiple street fights raged, leaving twenty-two people dead, scores injured, and much property destroyed by fire. Five people were later indicted, but none were convicted, and the victims were not compensated.
John Barbee was the tenth Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky from 1855 to 1857 and chiefly remembered for his part in the anti-immigrant riots known as "Bloody Monday".
Philip Tomppert was the sixteenth and eighteenth Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky in 1865 and 1867 to 1868.
The Know Nothing movement was a nativist political movement in the United States in the mid-1850s. The national political organization of the Know Nothings was officially known as the "Native American Party" prior to 1855; thereafter, it was simply known as the "American Party". Members of the movement were required to say "I know nothing" whenever they were asked about its specifics by outsiders, providing the group with its colloquial name.
Nativism is the political policy of promoting or protecting the interests of "native-born" or established inhabitants over those of immigrants, including the support of immigration-restriction measures. Despite the name, and in the US in particular, this position is usually held by the descendants of immigrants themselves, and is not a movement led by Indigenous peoples. However, some anti-immigrants who hold this position maintain a different definition of "Indigenous".
The Cincinnati riot of 1853 was triggered by the visit of then-Archbishop Gaetano Bedini, the emissary of Pope Pius IX, to Cincinnati, Ohio, on 21 December 1853. The German Liberal population of the city, many of whom had come to America after the Revolutions of 1848, identified Cardinal Bedini with their reactionary opponents. An armed mob of about 500 German men with 100 women following marched on the home of Bishop John Purcell, protesting the visit. One protester was killed and more than 60 were arrested.
The Cincinnati race riots of 1829 were triggered by competition for jobs between Irish immigrants and native blacks and former slaves, in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States but also were related to white fears given the rapid increases of free and fugitive blacks in the city during this decade, particularly in the preceding three years. Merchants complained about the poor neighborhoods along the river as having ill effects on their waterfront shops and trade with southern planters. Artisans excluded blacks from apprenticeships and jobs in the skilled trades. In June 1829 overseers of the poor announced that blacks would be required to post surety bonds of $500 within 30 days or face expulsion from the city and state. This was in accord with a 1807 Black Law passed by the Ohio legislature intended to discourage black settlement in the state.
The history of Over-the-Rhine is almost as deep as the history of Cincinnati. Over-the-Rhine's built environment has undergone many cultural and demographic changes. The toponym "Over-the-Rhine" is a reference to the Miami and Erie Canal as the Rhine of Ohio. An early reference to the canal as "the Rhine" appears in the 1853 book White, Red, Black, in which traveler Ferenc Pulszky wrote, "The Germans live all together across the Miami Canal, which is, therefore, here jocosely called the 'Rhine'." In 1875 writer Daniel J. Kenny referred to the area exclusively as "Over the Rhine". He noted, "Germans and Americans alike love to call the district 'Over the Rhine'."
In the 1855 Chicago mayoral election, Know Nothing candidate Levi Boone defeated Democratic incumbent Isaac Lawrence Milliken by a 5.75% margin.
Nativism in United States politics is opposition to an internal minority on the basis of its supposed “un-American” foundation. Historian Tyler Anbinder defines a nativist as:
someone who fears and resents immigrants and their impact on the United States, and wants to take some action against them, be it through violence, immigration restriction, or placing limits on the rights of newcomers already in the United States. “Nativism” describes the movement to bring the goals of nativists to fruition.
