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In 1864, a pamphlet appeared throughout the North that shocked voters. The pamphlet coined a new word, “miscegenation”, for the sexual union of blacks and whites. A year after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, the pamphlet announced; “The word is spoken at last. It is Miscegenation — the blending of the various races of men — the practical recognition of the brotherhood of all the children of the common father.” Today, such a sentence would hardly be shocking, but in 1864 this self-proclaimed abolitionist pamphlet set public opinion on fire. It confirmed the worst fears of whites that the abolitionists were not interested in freeing the slaves, they were really lusting for sexual intercourse with them. 1
There had been a long history of white American revulsion at the thought of black men and white women sleeping together. The moral outrage that the thought of race-mixing raised had its political uses in defense of slavery. White abolitionists, a majority of whom were women, were often accused by slave owners of joining the movement to gratify their lust. 2
Amalgamation Waltz by Edward W. Clay is the first of three cartoons by Edward Clay published in 1839 showing graphically that emancipation of the slaves would lead to the seduction of white women by black men dancing the Amalgamation Waltz.
One of the great fears that slavery’s defenders mined in their argument for the preservation of human bondage was the certainty that if black men were free there would be widespread intermarriage. The resulting mixed race children, called “mulattos” (a name deriving from the same Spanish word as “mule”) were seen as a danger to society. Henry Hughes, in his 1854 Treatise on Sociology wrote that “if the white race is superior, their ethnical progress forbids intermixture with an inferior race.” He warned his educated readers that “Impurity of the races is against the law of nature. Mulattoes are monsters.” 3
The Waltz of course would lead to the Amalgamation Marriage of black men to white women.
Josiah Nott, a prominent surgeon and a leading American ethnologist from the South wrote that the “mulatto is a degenerate, unnatural offspring, doomed by nature to work out its own destruction.” He concluded that the “mulatto” was born in “violation of nature’s laws.”4
The sexual union of black man and white woman was expected to produce the “monstrous mulattoes” such as the girl and the baby shown here who have none of purity of their white mother.
While the 1864 abolitionist pamphlet made its argument for interracial sex based on religion (“We are all God’s children”) and political theory (“All men are created equal”), its central argument was scientific. Using the example of animal breeding the pamphlet argued that “while science has demonstrated that the intermarriage of diverse races is indispensable to a progressive humanity, its votaries, in this country, at least, have never had the courage to apply that rule to the relations of the white and colored races.” The authors of the pamphlet would show how a degenerate race like the Irish could be improved by interbreeding with blacks, or more specifically, why Irish women were meant for black men. Miscegenation 5
At a time when white Americans placed great pride in their racial purity, the Pamphlet insisted that “All that is needed to make us the finest race on earth is to engraft upon our stock the negro element which providence has placed by our side on this continent.” Using the language of livestock breeding, the authors boldly said that “Of all the rich treasures of blood vouchsafed to us, that of the negro is the most precious.” Since most Americans considered blacks members of an inferior race, and some thought blacks an inferior species, this abolitionist call for interracial breeding was bound to get a negative reaction.6
When the pamphlet Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro was published just as the 1864 presidential campaign was getting underway, its radical call for cross-breeding was denounced by newspapers, churches, and from the floor of Congress. It showed the newly ascendant abolitionists would not sleep until they were sleeping with a black man or woman. The pamphlet’s declaration that “When the President proclaimed Emancipation he proclaimed also the mingling of the races” confirmed the worst racial fears of millions of whites. 7
What no one knew at the time was that the miscegenation manifesto was a black op cooked up by two Democratic journalists to discredit Republican President Abraham Lincoln as a race mixer. The hoaxers, one of whom was born in Ireland and was a member of a post-Protestant religious sect, made a special play on the racial marginalization of the Irish.8
The Irish had been placed, by American caste theory, on the lowest rung of the white race. In many Northern cities they were condemned to the same poorly paid jobs as free blacks. In the South, they did the work of slaves. Irish women were denigrated for being more likely to give birth to mixed race children than any other group of white women. Blacks were often called “smoked Irishmen” in reference to their seeming interchangeability with the new immigrants. In a country where race was everything, the Irish were precariously placed on the edge of whiteness, bordering on the disabilities of blackness in a racist society. 9
The Irish were an important constituency, and the two hoaxers hoped that they could mobilize the Irish vote against Lincoln by mining the fear the Irish had of losing even their lowly place in America’s racial hierarchy. With the Draft Riots only six months in the past, the pamphlet told the Irish that “Notwitlistanding the apparent antagonism which exists between the Irish and negroes on this continent, there are the strongest reasons for believing that the first movement towards [interracial marriages] will take place between these two races.” The pamphlet said that “Indeed, in very many instances it has already occurred,” in a swipe at poor “racial hygiene” among the Irish. 10
Here is an 1864 cartoon influenced by the Amalgamation Waltz. Here is an explanation of the cartoon from Ta Neshi Coates: The Miscegenation Ball at the Headquarters of the Lincoln Central Campaign Club, Corner of Broadway and Twenty Third Street New York Sept. 22d. 1864 being a perfect facsimile of the room &c. &c. (From the New York World Sept. 23d. 1864). No sooner were the formal proceedings and speeches hurried through with, than the room was cleared for a “negro ball,” which then and there took place! Some members of the “Central Lincoln Club” left the room before the mystical and circling rites of languishing glance and mazy dance commenced. But that Many remained is also true. This fact We Certify, “that on the floor during the progress of the ball were many of the accredited leaders of the Black Republican party, thus testifying their faith by works in the hall and headquarters of their political gathering. There were Republican Office-Holders, and prominent men of various degrees, and at least one Presidential Elector On The Republican Ticket. Caption from Ta-Nehisi Coates
The Irish were depicted as a degraded people, “no better than blacks”, throughout the pamphlet. In a sentence designed to stir up images of Irish women in wanton non-marital sexual relationships, the authors wrote that “Wherever there is a poor community of Irish in the North, they naturally herd with the poor negroes, and as the result of the various offices of kindness which only the poor pay to one another, families become intermingled and connubial relations are formed between the black men and white Irish women.”11
The authors warned Irish men that they would be no match for blacks in securing the sexual favors of their own women “The white Irishwoman loves the black man, and in the old country, it has been stated, that the negro, is sure of the handsomest among the poor white females.”12
Lincoln is shown on the far left bowing to a black woman in this depiction of a miscegenationist nightmare.
The Irish had been repeatedly denounced throughout the Civil War Era as inferior to other white Americans and the pamphlet said flatly that they were “a more brutal race and lower in civilization than the negro.” Because they were nearly brutes, the sexual “fusion, whenever it takes place, will be of infinite service to the Irish.” The Irish had long suspected that the Republicans were just Know Nothings in disguise, and the pamphlet seemed to confirm that fear saying that; The Irish are coarse-grained, revengeful, unintellectual, with very few of the finer instincts of humanity.”13
The pamphlet went so far as to claim that the Irishman was a degenerate form of African, saying the Irishman “was originally of a colored race, and has all the fervid emotional power which belongs to a people born in or near the tropics. His long habitation north, however, and the ignorance in which he has been kept by misgovernment, have sunk the Irishman below the level of the most degraded negro.”14
This pamphlet published after Lincoln’s election shows the sexual implications of the Abolitionists’ victory.
The authors tried to use social science to degrade the Irish, saying “Take an equal number of negroes and Irish from among the lowest communities of the city of New York, and the former will be found far superior to the latter in cleanliness, education, moral feelings, beauty of form and feature, and natural sense.”15
It also used the new science of physical ethnology to impugn the Irish:
One of the evidences of degeneracy which has been pointed out in certain of the negro races has been the prognathous skull, the projecting mouth, the flat and open nostril. Yet this is a characteristic as true of certain portions of the people of Ireland as of the Guinea African. The inhabitants of Sligo and Mayo, portions of Ireland under peculiarly bad government, have developed these precise types of feature. The people have become thin-legged, pot-bellied, with mouth projected, head sloped, nostril distended ; in short they exhibit all the characteristics by which we have marked the lowest type of the negro16.
New York’s Five Points, where many Irish did intermarry with blacks, was filled with immigrants from Sligo and Mayo.
While the term miscegenation may seem a relic of the distant past, most states had anti-miscegenation laws prohibiting interracial marriage until after World War II. States of the old Confederacy had these laws until 1967 when the Supreme Court ruled them unconstitutional.
The authors then touted the improvement that the Irish would experience if they mated with blacks: “The blending of the Irish in this country with the negro will be a positive gain to the former. With education and an intermingling with the superior black, the Irish may be lifted up to something like the dignity of their ancestors…” 17
The pamphlet includes this humanitarian call:
The Irish-American press of this country have a duty to perform to their patrons in impressing these facts upon our Irish population. The black man is their brother in more senses than one, and, as in times past the Irish have shown themselves the most prejudiced and inhuman toward their dark-skinned fellow-laborers and friend, they should in the future set aside the prejudice which is the result of unfortunate education, and proclaim, both by word and by the practice of intermarriage, their true relations with the negro.18
The forgery was important enough that it introduced a new word into the English language. Whether it would change any votes was yet to be determined.
Video: The History of Anti-Miscegenation Laws in the U.S.:
Professor Victor Goode discusses Loving v. Virginia and the history of anti-miscegenation laws from Brooklyn Historical Society on Vimeo.
Resource:
Here is an online copy of Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
Sources:
1. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro (1864); Reelecting Lincoln: The Battle For The 1864 Presidency by John Waugh published by DeCapo Press (2001); Abraham Lincoln: Volume 2 by Michael Burlingame published by Johns Hopkins Press; Lincoln by David Herbert Donald published by Simon and Schuster.
2. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
3. The Ideology of Slavery: Proslavery Thought in the Antebellum South, 1830-1860 edited by Drew Gilpin Faust published by LSU Press (1981) pp. 259-260.
4. The Ideology of Slavery: Proslavery Thought in the Antebellum South, 1830-1860 edited by Drew Gilpin Faust published by LSU Press (1981) p. 231.
5. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 1.
6. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
7 .Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
8. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
9. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
10. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro pp. 30-31.
11. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 30.
12. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 30.
13. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 30.
14. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro pp. 30-31.
15. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
16. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro
17. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 31.
18. Miscegenation; The Theory of the Blending of the Races, Applied to the American White Man and Negro p. 32.
The Immigrants’ Civil War is a series that examines the role of immigrants in our bloodiest war. Articles will appear twice monthly between 2011 and 2017. Here are the articles we have published so far:
1. Immigrant America on the Eve of the Civil War – Take a swing around the United States and see where immigrants were coming from and where they were living in 1861.
2. 1848: The Year that Created Immigrant America – Revolutions in Europe, famine and oppression in Ireland, and the end of the Mexican War made 1848 a key year in American immigration history.
3. Carl Schurz: From German Radical to American Abolitionist– A teenaged revolutionary of 1848, Carl Schurz brought his passion for equality with him to America.
4. Immigrant Leader Carl Schurz Tells Lincoln to Stand Firm Against Slavery.
5. …And the War Came to Immigrant America -The impact of the firing on Fort Sumter on America’s immigrants
6. The Rabbi Who Seceded From the South
7. The Fighting 69th-Irish New York Declares War
8. The Germans Save St. Louis for the Union
9. New York’s Irish Rush to Save Washington
10. Immigrant Day Laborers Help Build the First Fort to Protect Washington-The Fighting 69th use their construction skills.
11. Carl Schurz Meets With Lincoln To Arm the Germans
12. Immigrants Rush to Join the Union Army-Why?– The reasons immigrants gave for enlisting early in the war.
13. Why the Germans Fought for the Union?
14. Why Did the Irish Fight When They Were So Despised?
15. The “Sons of Garibaldi” Join the Union Army
16. The Irish Tigers From Louisiana
17. Immigrant Regiments on Opposite Banks of Bull Run -The Fighting 69th and the Louisiana Tigers
18. The St. Louis Germans Set Out To Free Missouri
19. Wilson’s Creek Drowns Immigrant Dream of Free Missouri
20. English-Only in 1861: No Germans Need Apply
21. After Bull Run: Mutineers, Scapegoats, and the Dead
22. St. Louis Germans Revived by Missouri Emancipation Proclamation
23. Jews Fight the Ban on Rabbis as Chaplains
24. Lincoln Dashes German Immigrants Hopes for Emancipation
25. When Hatred of Immigrants Stopped the Washington Monument from Being Built
26. Inside the Mind of a Know Nothing
27. The Evolution of the Know Nothings
28. The Know Nothings Launch a Civil War Against Immigrant America
29. The Know Nothings: From Triumph to Collapse
30. The Lasting Impact of the Know Nothings on Immigrant America.
31. Lincoln, the Know Nothings, and Immigrant America.
32. Irish Green and Black America: Race on the Edge of Civil War.
33. The Democratic Party and the Racial Consciousness of Irish Immigrants Before the Civil War
34. The Confederates Move Against Latino New Mexico
35. Nuevomexicanos Rally As Confederates Move Towards Santa Fe—But For Which Side?
36. The Confederate Army in New Mexico Strikes at Valverde
37. The Swedish Immigrant Who Saved the U.S. Navy
38. The Confederates Capture Santa Fe and Plot Extermination
39. A German Regiment Fights for “Freedom and Justice” at Shiloh-The 32nd Indiana under Col. August Willich.
40. The Know Nothing Colonel and the Irish Soldier Confronting slavery and bigotry.
41. Did Immigrants Hand New Orleans Over to the Union Army?
42. Did New Orleans’ Immigrants See Union Soldiers As Occupiers or Liberators?
43. Union Leader Ben Butler Seeks Support in New Orleans-When General Ben Butler took command in New Orleans in 1862, it was a Union outpost surrounded by Confederates. Butler drew on his experience as a pro-immigrant politician to win over the city’s Irish and Germans.
44. Union General Ben Butler Leverages Immigrant Politics in New Orleans
45. Thomas Meager: The Man Who Created the Irish Brigade
46. Thomas Meagher: The Irish Rebel Joins the Union Army
47. Recruiting the Irish Brigade-Creating the Irish American
48. Cross Keys: A German Regiment’s Annihilation in the Shenandoah Valley
49. The Irish Brigade Moves Towards Richmond-The Irish brigade in the Peninsula Campaign from March 17 to June 2, 1862.
50. Peninsula Emancipation: Irish Soldiers Take Steps on the Road to Freedom-The Irish Brigade and Irish soldiers from Boston free slaves along the march to Richmond.
51. Slaves Immigrate from the Confederacy to the United States During the Peninsula Campaign
52. The Irish 9th Massachusetts Cut Off During the Seven Days Battles
53. Union Defeat and an Irish Medal of Honor at the End of the Seven Days
54. Making Immigrant Soldiers into Citizens-Congress changed the immigration laws to meet the needs of a nation at war.
55. Carl Schurz: To Win the Civil War End Slavery
56. Carl Schurz: From Civilian to General in One Day
57. Did Anti-German Bigotry Help Cause Second Bull Run Defeat?
58. Immigrant Soldiers Chasing Lee Into Maryland
59. Scottish Highlanders Battle at South Mountain
60. Emancipation 150: “All men are created equal, black and white”– A German immigrant reacts to the Emancipation Proclamation
61. The Irish Brigade at Antietam
62. Private Peter Welsh Joins the Irish Brigade
63. Preliminaries to Emancipation: Race, the Irish, and Lincoln
64. The Politics of Emancipation: Lincoln Suffers Defeat
65. Carl Schurz Blames Lincoln for Defeat
66. The Irish Brigade and Virginia’s Civilians Black and White
67. The Irish Brigade and the Firing of General McClellan
68. General Grant Expells the Jews
69. The Irish Brigade Moves Towards Its Destruction At Fredericksburg.
70. Fredericksburg: The Worst Day in the Young Life of Private McCarter of the Irish Brigade
71. Forever Free: Emancipation New Year Day 1863
72. Private William McCarter of the Irish Brigade Hospitalized After Fredericksburg
73. The Immigrant Women That Nursed Private McCarter After Fredericksburg
74. Nursing Nuns of the Civil War
75. The Biases Behind Grant’s Order Expelling the Jews
76. The Jewish Community Reacts to Grant’s Expulsion Order
77. Lincoln Overturns Grant’s Order Against the Jews
78. Irish Families Learn of the Slaughter at Fredericksburg
79. Requiem for the Irish Brigade
80. St. Patrick’s Day in the Irish Brigade
81. Student Asks: Why Don’t We Learn More About Immigrants in the Civil War?
82. Missouri’s German Unionists: From Defeat to Uncertain Victory
83. Missouri Germans Contest Leadership of Unionist Cause
84. German Leader Franz Sigel’s Victory Earns a Powerful Enemy
85. Immigrant Unionists Marching Towards Pea Ridge
86. German Immigrants at the Battle of Pea Ridge: Opening Moves
87. Pea Ridge: The German Unionists Outflanked
88. German Immigrants at the Battle of Pea Ridge
89. The Organization of the “German” XI Corps
90. The Irish Brigade on the Road to Chancellorsville
91. The “German” XI Corps on the Eve of Chancellorsville
92. The “Germans Run Away” at Chancellorsville
93. The New York Times, the Germans, and the Anatomy of a Scapegoat at Chancellorsville
94. An Irish Soldier Between Chancellorsville and Gettysburg
95. Lee’s Army Moves Towards Gettysburg: Black Refugees Flee
96. Iron Brigade Immigrants Arrive at Gettysburg
97. Iron Brigade Immigrants Go Into Battle the First Day at Gettysburg
98. The “German” XI Corps at Gettysburg July 1, 1863
99. An Irish Colonel and the Defense of Little Round Top on the Second Day at Gettysburg
100. A Prayer Before Death for the Irish Brigade at Gettysburg: July 2, 1863
101. The Irish Regiment that Ended “Pickett’s Charge”: July 3, 1863
102. Five Points on the Edge of the Draft Riots
103. Before the Draft Riots: The Cultivation of Division
104. The New York Draft Riots Begin
105. Convulsion of Violence: The First Day of the New York Draft Riots
106. The Draft Riots End in a Sea of Blood-July 14-15, 1863.
107. Pat Cleburne: The Irish Confederate and the Know Nothings
108. Killing Pat Cleburne: Know Nothing Violence
109. Pat Cleburne: Arresting a General, Becoming a General
110. The Immigrant Story Behind “Twelve Years a Slave”
111. A German Immigrant Woman’s Gettysburg Address
112. Pat Cleburne: The Irish Confederate’s Emancipation Proclamation
113. Pat Cleburne: The South Can’t Use Black Soldiers Without Ending Slavery
114. The Suppression of Pat Cleburne’s Emancipation Proposal
115. An Irish Immigrant Colonel’s Warnings Ignored at Chickamauga
116. An Immigrant Colonel’s Fighting Retreat at Chickamauga
117. August Willich: German Socialist at Chickamauga
118. Hans Heg:at Chickamauga: Norwegian Commander on the Eve of Battle
119. Ivan and Nadine Turchin: Russian Revolutionary Aristocrats at Chickamauga
120. German Immigrants Pinned Down at Chickamauga
121. Hans Heg: To Die for His Adopted Country at Chickamauga
122. Patrick Guiney: An Irish Colonel on the Edge of the Wilderness
123. Immigrants March Out of The Wilderness and Into a Wicked Hail of Gunfire
124. Peter Welsh in the Irish Brigade’s Purgatory at Spotsylvania
125. Peter Welsh: What Sacrifice Must the Immigrant Make for His Adopted Land?
126. A Second Irish Brigade’s Catastrophe at a Forgotten Fight Near Fredericksburg
127. An Irish Man and a French Woman Between Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor
128. Two Irish Brigades Swept Away by a Hurricane from Hell at Cold Harbor
129. Petersburg: The Start of a Ten Month Siege that Devoured Men and Disabled the Irish Brigade
130. A Volcano in Virginia: The Battle of the Crater
131. 1864 Election: The Immigrant Voter & Abraham Lincoln
132. August Belmont: The German Jewish Immigrant Who Led the Opposition to Lincoln’s 1864 Reelection
133. Lincoln and the Superiority of the “Negro” over the Irish
Cultural
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The Five Meanings of “The Immigrants’ Civil War”
The Fallout from No Irish Need Apply Article Spreads Worldwide
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New Immigrants Try to Come to Terms with America’s Civil War
Important Citizenship Site to be Preserved-Fortress Monroe
Should Lincoln Have Lost His Citizenship?
The First Casualties of the War Were Irish-Was that a Coincidence?
Civil War Anniversaries-History, Marketing, and Human Rights
Memorial Day’s Origins at the End of the Civil War
Germans Re-enact the Civil War-But Why Are They Dressed in Gray?
Leading Historians Discuss 1863 New York City Draft Riots
The Upstate New York Town that Joined the Confederacy
Civil War Blogs I Read Every Week
First Annual The Immigrants’ Civil War Award Goes to Joe Reinhart
Damian Shiels Wins Second Annual The Immigrants’ Civil War Award
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Free Yale Course with David Blight on the Civil War
Cinco de Mayo Holiday Dates Back to the American Civil War
It is a good article and did touch, slightly, on how the Democrats tried to brand the Republicans as supporters of racial equality. Mr Young does fail to point out that it was the pro segregationist policies of the Democrat Party that ket the miscegenation laws on the books in the solid Democrat South till the end of the 60s and the election of Richard Nixon in 1968.