“Immigration during the first five years of the 1850s reached a level five times greater than a decade earlier. Most of the new arrivals were poor Catholic peasants or laborers from Ireland and Germany who crowded into the tenements of large cities. Crime and welfare costs soared. Cincinnati's crime rate, for example, tripled between 1846 and 1853, and its murder rate increased sevenfold. Boston's expenditures for poor relief rose threefold during the same period.” (James McPherson)

It is not uncommon that a failed movement or group from the past might be cited as a “cautionary” example for the world today. In the wake of contemporary debates over immigration, the “Know Nothings” have been regularly cited as an example of how dangerous nativist attitudes can become and, indeed, have proven to be in America’s history.

Several columnists, for instance, have striven to make comparisons between the Know Nothings of antebellum America and President Donald Trump’s immigration policies, helping, in part, to generate modern interest in a political party that many Americans have heard of, but tend to know little about.

The Know Nothing movement can actually be tied to a number of violent episodes and ethnically charged riots that occurred during the last 1850s. The debate over immigration in the 1850s was more than a clash of worldviews - it touched upon the core of America’s values.

While nativists, like the Know Nothings, believed that immigrants who embraced politics from their native lands represented a threat to America’s values, those who opposed them argued that it was precisely America’s values that made immigration a necessity and a valuable component of American life.

As the Republicans and Know Nothings spread from the ashes of the Whig Party, the Republicans, led by President Lincoln, rejected nativism and embraced a kind of American exceptionalism. Lincoln did not believe that America was “better” or even more “moral” than other nations, but his brand of exceptionalism advanced the view that America represented a great experiment, one that proposed that a society based on the ideals of the Declaration of Independence (i.e. life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness). Should it fail, Lincoln believed it would shatter the hopes of the rest of the world, as people sought to overcome despotic and tyrannical forms of rule. Thus, to the Republicans, when it came to the issue of immigration, America’s economy and democracy itself were at stake.

At the same time, there was quite a bit more to the background of this short-lived, but widely impactful “third party” than xenophobia and religious intolerance. In places like Boston, where the Know Nothings took over nearly all of the city’s elected offices, including capturing the state’s governorship in 1854, the Know Nothings were largely viewed as a progressive party.

While the North’s Know Nothings supported the party’s national anti-immigrant positions, it also embraced an anti-slavery policy, supported an expansion of the rights of women, believed that industries should be more heavily regulated, and supported a variety of measures intended to support the labor class.

Accordingly, in order to understand the Know Nothing party’s nativism, it requires more nuance than simply condemning them as xenophobes. It is typical in the contemporary media and in political commentary to cite a caricature of the Know Nothings as an example of “hate” and a dark xenophobic history, but the movement grew out of the controversial political landscape of the mid-19th century, and the party achieved prominence and power across wide sections of the society.