America’s 99-Year War Against Terrorist Bombers
On Independence Day 1914, New York experienced a powerful dynamite explosion
that killed four people and injured dozens.
As police investigated the scene -- a tenement house on Lexington Avenue in
East Harlem -- they discovered the bodies of three notorious anarchists.
Further searches unearthed bomb fragments, radical literature and evidence of a
plot to assassinate John D. Rockefeller. The device had detonated prematurely,
instantly killing its creators.
Last week, the U.S. was horrified and captivated by another terrorist attack. A
longer perspective on terrorism and counterterrorism in U.S. history reveals
clear patterns that -- especially at times, like these, of high emotion -- are
worth recalling.
Violence against civilians (or assassination attempts on leading figures) has
inevitably led to increased repression, security and surveillance. The reaction
is understandable, but the laws and institutions that arose from previous
episodes were far more effective at stifling free speech, chilling dissent and
breeding distrust than they were at preventing future attacks. No regulation
has consistently stopped determined terrorists.
Anarchists’ Campaign
The first age of terror lasted from about 1886 to 1920 and was defined by a
campaign against radical anarchists who believed that violent means could bring
about an economic and social revolution. Today’s “If You See Something, Say
Something” society has its origins in this largely forgotten past.
The initial wave of terrorism was largely carried out by European immigrants:
Italians, Germans and Russians. In 1886, an unknown anarchist killed seven
policemen with a homemade grenade in Chicago’s Haymarket Square. In the ensuing
hysteria, four radicals were hanged (a fifth committed suicide in prison),
despite a lack of evidence connecting them directly to the crime. Yet the
reprisals did nothing to slow the campaign of violence.
In subsequent years, a series of attacks, near-attacks and threatened
conspiracies justified an unprecedented set of governmental security measures,
as fear of anarchists often blurred with prejudice against immigrants and black
Americans.
The very aspects of U.S. society that made it a beacon to the peoples of the
world came to be seen as grave disadvantages. When an Italian immigrant living
in New Jersey traveled home to assassinate the Italian king, U.S.
law-enforcement officers bemoaned the lack of a centralized national police
force, similar to the Italian Carabinieri, the French Surete or Scotland Yard’s
Special Branch. It’s worth noting that terrorist violence remained endemic in
Europe despite the labyrinthine spy networks.
Fears about domestic terrorism reached new heights in 1901 when President
William McKinley was assassinated by an anarchist in Buffalo, New York. In
response, Congress enacted a sweeping immigration law known as the Anarchist
Exclusion Act of 1903. The legislation was the first to cite ideological
justifications as a valid reason to bar foreigners from entering the U.S. It
was largely ineffectual because most anarchists in the U.S. hadn’t arrived as
radicals, but had become politicized by conditions in American factories.
Less than one month after the July 4, 1914, explosion on Lexington Avenue, the
New York Police Department announced the creation of a new secret service, the
Anarchist and Bomb Squad, its first permanent counterterrorism task force. The
unit’s officers employed the most modern techniques, as well as elaborate
disguises and subterfuges. Even so, the most devastating bombing campaign in
the city’s history occurred in the squad’s first years. Explosives detonated in
city churches and courthouses across the boroughs. No one was ever arrested for
those attacks.
Security Apparatus
When the U.S. entered World War I, in April 1917, counterterrorism and
antiradicalism efforts spread far beyond New York. The Military Intelligence
Division, the Secret Service, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Investigation
(later to become the FBI), and vigilante volunteers harassed anarchists,
socialists, Germans or anyone else who failed to support the war effort.
These steps impinged on free speech, devastated labor unions and destroyed the
Socialist Party, but they didn’t curb terrorism. The most brazen campaign of
bombings occurred in 1919 and 1920. Mail bombs sent to dozens of prominent
politicians and capitalists were intercepted by alert postal workers. But in
June 1919, powerful bombs detonated in seven cities, including Washington,
where the home of U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer was damaged.
In response, hundreds of the most notorious anarchists and communists were
deported to the newly founded Soviet Union. In late 1919 and early 1920, the
attorney general and his young protege, J. Edgar Hoover, authorized a series of
mass arrests -- known as the Palmer Raids -- which stand as one of the most
repressive government actions in U.S. history.
It was also ineffective. On Sept. 16, 1920, dynamite detonated near the Wall
Street headquarters of J.P. Morgan. (JPM) It was lunch hour and the street was
packed. Almost 40 people were killed and 400 were injured.
It was the deadliest terrorist strike attack on U.S. soil until the attacks of
Sept. 11, 2001. Despite a huge manhunt, the identities of the perpetrators were
never discovered.
In the years after World War I, there was a growing acknowledgement that the
government had gone too far. Organizations such as the American Civil Liberties
Union were founded to curb infringements on free speech and the right to
dissent. Their work created a new understanding of the importance of
constitutional rights and the idea that more freedom, not less, is the best
guarantee of security.
(Thai Jones is an assistant professor of history at Bard College’s Master of
Arts in Teaching Program. His most recent book is “More Powerful Than Dynamite:
Radicals, Plutocrats, Progressives, and New York’s Year of Anarchy.” The
opinions expressed are his own.)
To contact the writer of this article: Thai Jones at [email protected]
To contact the editor responsible for this article: Max Berley at
[email protected]
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