Bolsheviks, led by Lenin, seize control of Russia and establish the Soviet Union.

Red Scare – panic over the spread of communism sweeps through the U.S.

No private property

Equal distribution of wealth

Government control of industry

No religion, no borders.

World-wide revolution.

Socialism is a system of government in which the state controls the economy and runs businesses for the benefit of citizens.

State owns the means of production

A. Mitchell Palmer (Attorney General) rounds up suspected communists and deports them from the country.

Labor strikes fuel a fear of communism and a hatred of foreigners.

Ku Klux Klan re-emerges as the nativist movement achieves power.

Immigration is restricted.

Sacco and Vanzetti Trial

For the next 5 mins. describe a situation in which you were accused of something that you didn’t do. Why were you accused? How did you feel?

Victims of Xenophobia or

Guilty?

Sacco was a shoemaker

Vanzetti was a fish peddler

Both Italian immigrants

Anarchists: All forms of gov’t should be abolished

Both accused of murdering a paymaster & shoe store security guard

Neither had ever been accused of a prior crime

Paymaster carrying $15,000 in payroll receipts when shot

Money was never traced to either man

Judge Webster Thayer

Not impartialReferred to Sacco & Vanzetti as “Dagos”

Both convicted of murder & sentenced to death.

Vanzetti - I wish to say to you that I am innocent. I have never done a crime, some sins, but never any crime. I thank you for everything you have done for me. I am innocent of all crime, not only this one, but of all, of all.

I am an innocent man.

…Only because they were foreigners

Xenophobia: Fear of strangers (foreigners)

Where are they coming from?

Sacco & Vanzetti represented everything Americans feared about foreigners

Many wanted all foreigners out of US

Welcome

Some protests & riots ensued

The American Immigration Act of 1924 limited immigration from countries where 3% of the total U.S. population, per the 1890 census, were immigrants from that country.

The massive influx of Europeans that had come to America during the first two decades of the century slowed to a trickle. Asians and citizens of India were prohibited from immigrating altogether.

Alien Land Laws, such as California's Webb-Haney Act in 1913, prevented aliens ineligible for citizenship of the right to own land in California. It also limited the leasing of land by said aliens to three years. Many Japanese immigrants circumvented this law by transferring the title of their land to their American-born children, who were citizens.

Similar laws were passed in 11 other states.