On Working-Class Americanism

I love this book. Gerstle here looks at two ethnic communities within Woonsocket, Rhode Island—immigrant Franco-Belgians and largely American-born French Canadians—and examines their production of a labor union, the Independent Textile Union (ITU). Really important to his argument is the way that Americanism was used as a tool for political activism for these two groups. In his telling, Franco-Belgians were largely “radical” social democrats who imported ideas about trade unionism and democracy from Europe, while French Canadians were generally traditionalist and really quite conservative. Important to the text is Gerstle’s definition of Americanism, which he argues was a political language rather than an ideology. “Americanism” as a political language had four interlocking components:

1. Nationalism, which primarily was manifested through fealty to American heroes and national myths.

2. Democracy, which focused less on heroes and more on ideals for which they fought—“liberty,” “rights,” “independence,” “freedom.”

3. Progression, the idea that American society is fundamentally rational, abundant, and ever-improving.

4. Traditionalism, which was rooted in the nostalgia of a mythic, simpler, and more virtuous past. Interestingly, traditionalism was the weakest link in the early years of the ITU, in large part because traditionalism was associated with nativism—it was only with the excising of nativism from conservative Americans’ worldview that traditionalism became an important component to the political language of ITU activists.

By relying on the language of Americanism, Franco-Belgians and French Catholics were able to move past their own ideological backgrounds (whether socialist or conservative) and develop coherence that allowed the groups to combine. However, the transformation of the language of Americanism in mainstream politics caused the union to fragment during the later years of the New Deal and the Second World War. The socialist Franco-Belgians sought out class conflict, but this was subordinated to classically New Deal corporatism, which was largely supported by French Canadians. The radical class-based nature of the ITU gave way to interest in produce equal rights on ethnic, racial, and religious terms. This continued to bind Franco-Belgians and French Catholics together, but it only functioned as a temporary agreement. With the end of World War II and the crushing of radical unionism during the Truman administration, the ITU gave way and collapsed in its entirety.

The most important insight here is about Americanism as a political language. I see Gerstle’s insights as largely true today—the American left and right all marshal the language of Americanism in different ways. However, conflict emerges because the American left subordinates the “traditionalist” aspect of Americanism to the “progressive” aspect. The American right, on the other hand, tends to subordinate the progressive character of the United States to the traditionalist branch, on which nativism has been renewed over the course of the past few decades. Another sore point for the two groups are disagreements of the second pillar: Democracy. Within the democratic aspect of Americanism, there are disputes about the meaning of “rights.” The American right tends to argue (although this is an oversimplification) of individual rights, excluding virtual all other possibilities of the definition of rights. The American left, on the other hand, tends to work in FDR’s tradition of also giving importance to “social rights”—a group of demands and claims that seem increasingly important but still, to this day, are not universally accepted within the US.

Anyways, this is a really interesting book and I highly recommend it.