american party. let's set that aside just for a minute here, stay focused on the 1852 election. traditionally, of course, the wigs -- it was the wigs who had appealed to native born americans, especially evangelical protestants in the north. and it was the wigs who had opposed unrestricted immigration and short naturalization periods for citizenship. in some states the naturalization period was very short, five years. actually, it's interesting, in some states recent immigrants could vote without becoming citizens so laws varied. the wig dilemma in 1852 could be described or expressed this way. are you going to continue if you're asking the question here of a wig party leader, is your political party going to continue to just kiss good-bye to all of those new voters or

are you going to try to somehow integrate them to somehow attract their support. so here's the dilemma. retain your traditional supporters but continue to turn away the growing body of new americans or, of course here's the danger, alienate your old supporters and make a play for these immigrant groups, otherwise, they would simply continue to flock or flood the ranks of the democratic party. in retrospect we can see that the wigs did the wrong thing, at least in terms of survival. they opted for changing their approach. they opted to make a play for this new immigrant vote. remember we talked about this a couple lectures ago, we talked about what we called negative reference group voting. we talked about the cultural factors, cultural religious factors that helped us understand why people voted the way they did in the 19th

century, especially in the second party system. and you can imagine how the traditional constituency of the wig party especially in the north is going to be at the very least confused and at the worst really antagonized by this new approach. the wigs opt for a risky strategy to go after the immigrants in 1852 they nominate general winfield scott, predictably another war hero, another mexican war hero to be their standard bearer. in the campaign they downplayed traditional issue. they downplayed their traditional opposition to unrestricted immigration. they downplayed some of their traditional issues like temperance prohibition laws that they had been champions of. they tried to portray franklin

pierce as anti-catholic, which is quite a stretch. there's scott on the left and franklin pierce on the right. pierce was a brigadier general from the war of mexico and democratic party politician and scott, as i said, one of the -- one of the most important generals in that war. he was the most important general in that war. they try to portray pierce as anti-catholic. this proves to be a huge miss calculation as people are not suddenly convinced that the wig party immigrants are suddenly not convinced that the wig party is now their friend. so immigrants continue to support the democratic party and the wigs thereby remove the last major source of difference. remember we said difference is important in a healthy two-party system. they removed the last major source of difference between themselves and their democratic opponent.

democrats, as i said, had nominated franklin pierce. senator from new hampshire. more recently a brigadier general during the war of mexico. the campaign was especially dirty, even by 19th century standards, and personal. a lot of what we would describe today as attack ads against the two candidates. the wigs had a lot of nasty things to say about franklin pierce. they said that he had personal problems including alcoholism. they said that he was in the -- because of his time in the mexican war, he was the victor of many a hard fought battles. anyway, you can imagine with the slavery issue taken out of the picture, the two parties are really kind of grasping at straws trying to figure out how to appeal to the electorate, and

especially now that the wigs are trying to portray themselves as suddenly pro-immigration. there seemed to be few real issues separating the major parties, and this appears to have undermined popular confidence in them. at the same time, some believed that the economic prosperity of the 1850s may also have played into the picture. at the time the baltimore sunday commented, quote, unexampled prosperity renders it difficult to create excitement about party politics. so there's some indication that people were simply interested in economic prosperity, not that interested in voting. voting analysis for 1852 suggests that the decline and support for the wigs did not translate into support for the democrats. rather, on stenion, that is eligible voters tried to stay home. those climbed markedly from the previous presidential election.

again, further evidence of a lack of public confidence in the second party system. all right? if the traditional party and your needs aren't addressing your concerns, you're either going to stay home or look elsewhere. maybe you'll do both. so the wigs end up losing badly, predictably, in 1852 and franklin pierce and the democratic party. most significant, however, was the fact that the two major parties were almost completely silent on the political issues that most interested americans during the middle 1850s. two of them we've already talked about a fair bit, right? talked about the slavery expansion, slavery extension issue, number one. and number two we talked a little bit about immigration. so on both those questions the parties are virtually silent in 1852. that alienates a lot of voters. oh, a third issue, which often

doesn't get much attention, was probably more important on the state level but, still, it was an issue is the question of temperance. temperance laws are what was sometimes called the main law which is the prohibition law first passed in maine back in the 1840s. that also was an issue. of course it was an issue again that traditionally the wigs had championed especially in the north, but all of those issues were not mentioned, were hardly mentioned at all, during the 1852 campaign. okay. i want to go back to the question of immigration for a moment here and see how the public alienation from the two parties gives fruit to the development of a new party which some people think might have been the replacement. we know ultimately in retrospect the gift of hindsight it wasn't, but at the time some people thought might be the replacement

for the declining wig party. and this is the no nothing or american party. okay. so what's happening? in the 1850s we witness political realignment, the wig party is dying. the democratic party is changing. it survives but it doesn't survive unchange. new minor parties vie for the support of americans who are disenchanted with the present political situation. for many americans something had gone terribly wrong so the minor parties that emerge in the 1850s are addressing the question, you know, what's gone wrong. what's the most serious threat to the republic and to self-government? what's the most serious threat? what is it? is it slavery's expansion? is that it? a lot of northerners would have said, yes. some southerners would have said yes in terms of defending their right to expand and take their

personal property anywhere. some would say immigration. i want to turn, as i said, and look at that group of the question -- of the -- for voters, the people who are most concerned about immigration as the primary issue. all right. well, as we said, the influx of roman catholic immigrants had helped spawn groups of anti-catholic natives. they were organized first into secret fraternal organizations, so-called no nothing lodges. they're given that name. they're secret fraternal organizations so when you're asked to talk about this group that you belong to, you're supposed to say, well, i know nothing, right? and so the name sort of stuck. nativists came from lower middle class backgrounds and they feared both the political and economic consequences of the arrival of thousands of immigrants, especially catholics, through the

democratic party native vices believed that the catholics could secretly control the government. and they talked about catholics being loyal to a foreign power, to a foreign pope. plus thousands of immigrants would also argue the nativists lower the wages of workers in the cities and push native born americans into what one editor called -- one nativist newspaper editor called pushing us into the western wild. so the political side of the issue here was probably the strongest for the nativists. that is, they were convinced that catholics had an inward influence within the national government, especially through their agent, the democratic party. still in the same way that free soil people in the north were concerned that southerners had

an inordinate influence in the national government through the agency of the democratic party. all right? so similar kinds of language was used to describe the situation, to describe the threat to republican government. so like the earlier free soilers and like the later republicans, the republican party, the know nothings used a traditional, small r, republican political rhetoric to portray catholics as a threat to government. it was the catholic church now rather than the slave power that was undermining true republican principles. as you can see in our cartoon here, you've got -- oops. here we go. you've got the two different immigrant groups here illustrated. what are they doing?

they're stealing the ballot box, right? who's this? germans drinking their lager beer. i don't know how you guys would know that. i'll just move on quickly. and we have, of course, the irish with their whisky who are of course always involved in rioting. so you've got them stealing the ballot box. so, again, it was how are these immigrant groups undermining the traditional political order, republican political order in america? catholicism said the native vice was a des spot particular faith. after all, it was organized hierarchically. it wasn't democratic like, say, the congregationalist church was in new england. you had to obey the people above you. and catholics supposedly wanted to control public education and wasn't public education the bull work of the republican system? not just the bull work of the

republican system but also a way in which the evangelical protestant faith was passed on. it may strike us as odd today, but remember public schools in those days are often run by religious societies and there's bible reading in the schools and so on. so nativists are concerned about catholics infiltrating the democratic party. the democrats were viewed as the toties of the catholics. meanwhile, the know nothings saw themselves as the people's party as opposed to the corrupt political parties that had been perverted by the catholic interests as they called it. the formal name of the party was the american party, and they were very successful, especially at the state level, in the mid-1850s. 1853, '54, '55 they were quite

successful in -- well, even in states like massachusetts. the know nothings won several key state elections because there was a general feeling among the voters they wanted to throw off the old party organization. in other words, in some respects the american party was a kind of no party or anti-party party, right, in that it was really saying, hey, we're different from the other two conventional traditional parties. they wanted to destroy, they said, the power of hack politicians and party wire pullers and bag men. they pushed for party nominees being named by votes in local lodges rather than, you know, in huge national nominating conventions that could be manipulated by, you know, the proverbial men in smoke-filled rooms. and there's some indication

political historians have analyzed the people who supported and participated in the american party. there's some indication that, yes, indeed, these american party, these know nothing people were different. they came from a lower socioeconomic strata. they tended to be younger. that's interesting. most of the candidates were under 35 years old. less wealthy. less after fluent than their opponents in the traditional parties. they often held more modest occupations, such as clerks, artisans. now prior to the rise of the republican party in the midwest, as i said, we'll be focusing mostly on that the next time, prior to the rise of the republicans you could be excused for thinking in, say, 1853, '54 that this is going to be the new major party, that is, the american party is going to

really be the replacement for the wig party. until the republican party emerges and shows significant northern support, it's unclear whether or not the know nothings might actually end up being -- might actually go on to become the major political opposition to the democratic party. there was some support for the american party in the south and there was support at the top of the national politics too. we'll see how filmore runs the party. there's some support for native i mean among wigs giving their traditional position on immigrants. that's not too surprising. all right. move on here. now all of that is background to what then happens in 1854 with another congressional

compromise. this time we're also talking about the issue -- coming up, the issue of expansion of slavery into the territory. here, however, we're talking about the introduction of legislation to organize a portion of that vast swath of territory that had been purchased from france by president jefferson, the louisiana purchase. a large portion of that territory had never really been organized, and congress turns to address that issue in 1854. historians have long scratched their heads about, well, why did they turn to it then? couldn't they see? couldn't, you know, northern politicians in particular see how dangerous an issue this slavery extension issue was and that maybe it would be good to have a little bit of a respite from the debate. but for a variety of reasons,

senator stephen a. douglas of illinois, the giant in our portrait there, the little giant introduces legislation which comes to be called the kansas-nebraska act. and what's he up to? well, in part he wants to organize, at least some of that portion, the northern portion, central and northern portion of the louisiana purchase territory. he wants to organize that. why is he so interested in organizing it? variety of explanations here, and i think one shouldn't necessarily, you know, zero in on one. douglas was a devoted unionist and he had been a champion of western development for some time. in his hopes to provide a kind of balance between the north-south conflict that had characterized politics for decades. so definitely douglas is a committed unionist.

of course, his unionism -- his commitment to the union dovetails rather nightly and needily with his own particular political ambitions. he's very interested in getting the democratic nomination for the presidency. and he recognizes that as a northern democrat, he needs southern support but, of course, it's a tricky balancing act, right? how do i be a successful -- how can i be a successful national politician given the sectional realignment that's occurring in american politics in the mid 1850s? how do i do that? how do i pull that off? how do i pull off that magic trick? douglas, it seems, hoped the democrats could use this, that is use this issue of, you know, organizing the territory, democrats could use this as a party issue. championing the popular sovereignty in the territories.

so douglas and others sought to facilitate the building of a transcontinental railroad line. transcontinental railroad line, and douglas from the state of illinois says i kind of like that line to be through illinois. that would certainly benefit my state, and the best way to do that is one of the ways to ensure that is to make sure -- is to make sure there'd be a northern route, would be to organize some of that territory. certainly that northerly transcontinental line would greatly benefit his state and his section, and douglas thought, proved to be i think a serious miscalculation in the long run, douglas thought i can do this with some southern support if we open up at least technically, potentially, if we open up some of that territory, that organized -- that previously unorganized territory to the possible expansion of

slavery but, of course, douglas being a good democrat wants to allow popular sovereignty to determine the status of slavery in those territories. now, i'm going to leave you today with a question. in order to do that, in order to organize that territory, in order to ensure that popular sovereignty determines the status of slavery in those two territories, there they are kansas and nebraska, unfortunately, you have to repeal the missouri compromise. because, remember, the missouri compromise stipulated that slavery would not expand into any new territory north of the latitude 36, 30. and that is opening up a huge can of worms. and we'll turn and look at the consequences of that that are very serious, indeed, next time. thank you.

lectures in history airs each saturday at 8:00 p.m. and midnight eastern and sundays at 1:00 p.m. we feature classroom lectures on different topics and eras in american history from across the country. to keep up with american history tv during the week or to send us your questions and comments, follow us on twitter. we're at twitter.com/c-spanhistory.

there's a new website for american history tv where you can find our schedules and preview our upcoming program. watch featured video from our regular weekly series as well as access ahtv's history tweets, history in the news and social media from facebook, youtube, twitter and foursquare. follow american history tv all weekend every weekend on c-span 3 and online at c-span.org/history. >> recently, american history tv and c-span's local content vehicles visited shreveport, louisiana, to showcase its history and literary culture. founded in 1836, shreveport has a population of about 200,000 people and located about 250 miles northwest of baton rouge. >> the inevitable end, retribution, collide barrow and bonnie parker who died as they lived, by the gun. the officers were on the left

side of the road nearest the driver. thus explains the fact that bonnie's body had more bullet holes than clyde's. any one of these bullets would have been fatal to both, but after having killed 14 people, most of whom were officers of the law and having come safely through so many gun battles, it did not seem advisable to fire just one bullet. >> bonnie and clyde were probably some of the most notorious gangsters of the 1930s crime era in the united states. because their crime story began in texas, east texas and involved louisiana, they're very sort of connected to the 1930s story of shreveport as well. probably most people associate bonnie and clyde with a very intense two-year period from 1932 to 1934 when they were involved in a string of armed robberies and murders throughout this part of the united states.

we think that bonnie and clyde actually met initially in 1930 when bonnie parker was working as a waitress in dallas, texas, and soon after that clyde barrow went to state prison, and so we know they resumed their relationship in texas, and their first crime actually took place in hillsboro, texas, not far from shreveport. "the shreveport times" was regularly reporting their exploits in the area. people in this area kept up with it just like they did the big gangsters of that era of american history. there was also the age of john dillinger, pretty boy floyd, and a lot of people don't realize that all three of those individuals, bonnie and clyde, john dillinger, pretty boy floyd, all were killed by law enforcement in the same year in 1934.

people were really fascinated by that. in early 1934 they were implicated in a prison escape involving a former associate of collide barrow, a man named raymond hamilton, and they helped him escape from prison and in the process helped kill a prison guard. that's when the net of law enforcement began to close around them was after the murder of the prison guard early in 1934, so it was april of 1934 that clyde barrow, we know, was in and around shreveport. as a matter of fact, there was a car that was stolen from shreveport, clyde barrow stole a car here in shreveport and abandoned it in kansas and his fingerprints, of course, proved he was in this area even before he was spotted here. we knew that they were in and about the vicinity. just a few days before the ambush took place in gibson,

louisiana, there was a local cafe here, not too far from where we're stand iing called t majestic cafe. and on this street, somewhere between the point we're standing and a couple of blocks from here, clyde barrow was spotted somewhere near the majestic cafe and someone in the neighborhood and someone in the neighborhood phoned the local authorities, and it was because of that report that law enforcement from the region, including, of course, texas rangers knew that they were in the vicinity. and so that's when the net sort of began to close around bonnie and clyde and their ambush occurred actually just four days after clyde was spotted here on this street. they were ambushed not far from gibson, louisiana, on a rural road. ther

laid in place by local law enforcement over in that part of louisiana who knew on good intelligence where they were going to be, what their movements were, and they laid in or them on a stretch of road and, of course, as many people know, opened fire on the car that they were riding in, and bonnie and clyde both suffered over 50 separate bullet wounds each in that ambush. like the story of john dillinger and others like that from this era, really is a part of, i think, a broader social commentary about america in the great depression. if you look at crime rates in the united states, there's a definite spike that takes place, in the early 1930s and a lot of social scientists have been quick to ascribe that to depressed economic conditions, the fact that you have banking failures, business failures,

farm closures, and to the point that you could almost blame the great depression for this era of the american gangster when, in fact, that's probably the reason that people followed their stories and maybe even associated some nostalgia with them, perhaps in the same way that we would have with the old outlaws of the old west. it really is a brief period in american history where you see this, the early 1930s. >> find out where c-span's local content vehicles are going next online at c-span.org/localcontent. you're watching american history tv all weekend, every weekend on c-span 3. they would wear garments made of homespun cloth, and this homespun