The Political Context of Terrorism in America: Ignoring Extremists or Pandering to Them?

Terrorism and Political Violence

Volumn 12, Issue 3-4, 2000, Pages 325-344

  Hewitt, Christopher ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND BALTIMORE COUNTY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0034560701     PISSN: 09546553     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/09546550008427582     Document Type: Article

References (45)

1. A. Schmid and J. de Graaf, Violence and Communication: insurgent Terrorism and the Western News Media (London and Beverley Hills: Sage, 1982).
2. Extremism can be defined in three ways: statistically, normatively and stylistically. In practice, whichever definition is used the same list of groups and ideologies is produced. See John George and Laird Wilcox, Communists, Klansamen and Others on the Fringe (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus, 1992).
3. Wayman Mullins, 'Hate Crimes and the Far Right.' in Kenneth Tunnell (ed.), Political Crime in Contemporary America (New York: Garland, 1993) p. 155.
4. Michael Kelly, 'Playing with Fire', New Yorker 15 July 1996.
5. Dallas Blanchard and Terry Prewitt, Religious Violence and Abortion (Gainesville, FL: University of Florida, 1993).
6. The data on terrorist incidents used in this article are taken from a chronology compiled by the author. The chronology uses the FBI's definition of terrorism: 'the unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in pursuit of political or social objectives.'
7. Although Kennedy had pledged during his 1960 election campaign to ban racial discrimination in federally-assisted housing, he delayed issuing the order until November 1962.
8. Allan Wolk, The Presidency and Black Civil Rights (Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1971) pp.232-4.
9. Reed Sarratt, The Ordeal of Desegregation (New York: Harper and Row, 1966).
10. Ibid., pp.8, 24-5.
11. Ibid., pp.6-7.
12. The statistics on the number of Klansmen in each state is taken from the House on UnAmerican Activities Report. The segregationist vote is defined as the vote for the National States Rights Party and 'unpledged Democrats' in 1960, the Goldwater vote in 1964, and the Wallace vote in 1968.
13. Sarratt (note 9) pp.6, 11, 248.
14. For survey data on black public opinion, see Peter Goldman, Report from Black America (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1970) and 'Black Mood: More Militant, More Hopeful', Time, 6 April, 1970.
15. For survey data on black public opinion, see Peter Goldman, Report from Black America (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1970) and 'Black Mood: More Militant, More Hopeful', Time, 6 April, 1970.
16. Both the Panthers and the Black Muslims were drawn largely from the urban underclass. For estimates of the number and characteristics of the two groups see Stephen Bowman, When the Eagle Screams (Secaucus, NJ: Carol, 1994); Claude Clegg, An Original Man: the Life and Times of Elijah Muhammad (New York: St Martin's Press, 1997); Essien-Udom, Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962); Michael Friedly, Malcolm X: The Assassination (New York: Caroll and Graf, 1992); and G. Louis Heath, Off the Pigs! (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1976).
17. Both the Panthers and the Black Muslims were drawn largely from the urban underclass. For estimates of the number and characteristics of the two groups see Stephen Bowman, When the Eagle Screams (Secaucus, NJ: Carol, 1994); Claude Clegg, An Original Man: the Life and Times of Elijah Muhammad (New York: St Martin's Press, 1997); Essien-Udom, Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962); Michael Friedly, Malcolm X: The Assassination (New York: Caroll and Graf, 1992); and G. Louis Heath, Off the Pigs! (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1976).
18. Both the Panthers and the Black Muslims were drawn largely from the urban underclass. For estimates of the number and characteristics of the two groups see Stephen Bowman, When the Eagle Screams (Secaucus, NJ: Carol, 1994); Claude Clegg, An Original Man: the Life and Times of Elijah Muhammad (New York: St Martin's Press, 1997); Essien-Udom, Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962); Michael Friedly, Malcolm X: The Assassination (New York: Caroll and Graf, 1992); and G. Louis Heath, Off the Pigs! (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1976).
19. Both the Panthers and the Black Muslims were drawn largely from the urban underclass. For estimates of the number and characteristics of the two groups see Stephen Bowman, When the Eagle Screams (Secaucus, NJ: Carol, 1994); Claude Clegg, An Original Man: the Life and Times of Elijah Muhammad (New York: St Martin's Press, 1997); Essien-Udom, Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962); Michael Friedly, Malcolm X: The Assassination (New York: Caroll and Graf, 1992); and G. Louis Heath, Off the Pigs! (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1976).
20. Both the Panthers and the Black Muslims were drawn largely from the urban underclass. For estimates of the number and characteristics of the two groups see Stephen Bowman, When the Eagle Screams (Secaucus, NJ: Carol, 1994); Claude Clegg, An Original Man: the Life and Times of Elijah Muhammad (New York: St Martin's Press, 1997); Essien-Udom, Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1962); Michael Friedly, Malcolm X: The Assassination (New York: Caroll and Graf, 1992); and G. Louis Heath, Off the Pigs! (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1976).
21. Wolk (note 8) p.239.
22. Ernest Patterson, Black City Politics (New York: Dodd Mead & Co., 1974); Joint Center for Political Studies, Profiles of Black Mayors in America (Washington, DC: 1977); Rufus Browning, Racial Politics in American Cities (New York: Longman, 1990) p.222.
23. Ernest Patterson, Black City Politics (New York: Dodd Mead & Co., 1974); Joint Center for Political Studies, Profiles of Black Mayors in America (Washington, DC: 1977); Rufus Browning, Racial Politics in American Cities (New York: Longman, 1990) p.222.
24. Ernest Patterson, Black City Politics (New York: Dodd Mead & Co., 1974); Joint Center for Political Studies, Profiles of Black Mayors in America (Washington, DC: 1977); Rufus Browning, Racial Politics in American Cities (New York: Longman, 1990) p.222.
25. Kirkpatrick Sale, 5DS (New York: Random House, 1973); and Jack Newfield, A Prophetic Minority (New York: New American Library, 1966).
26. Kirkpatrick Sale, 5DS (New York: Random House, 1973); and Jack Newfield, A Prophetic Minority (New York: New American Library, 1966).
27. Melvin Small, Johnson, Nixon and the Doves (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1988) p.1.
28. In a 1980 poll when respondents were first asked if they supported a constitutional ban on abortions, 62 per cent were opposed while 29 per cent were in favour, but when asked if they supported a constitutional amendment 'protecting the life of the unborn child', 50 per cent were in favour and only 39 per cent opposed. Barbara Craig, Abortion and American Politics (Chatham, NJ: Chatham House, 1993) pp. 264-71.
29. Donald Granberg, 'The Abortion Activists', Family Planning Perspectives (13 July/Aug. 1981) pp.157-63; James Guth, 'Cut from the whole cloth: Antiabortion mobilization among religious activists.' in Ted Jelen and Marthe Chandler (eds), Abortion Politics in the US and Canada (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994); Kristin Luker, Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984).
30. Donald Granberg, 'The Abortion Activists', Family Planning Perspectives (13 July/Aug. 1981) pp.157-63; James Guth, 'Cut from the whole cloth: Antiabortion mobilization among religious activists.' in Ted Jelen and Marthe Chandler (eds), Abortion Politics in the US and Canada (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994); Kristin Luker, Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984).
31. Donald Granberg, 'The Abortion Activists', Family Planning Perspectives (13 July/Aug. 1981) pp.157-63; James Guth, 'Cut from the whole cloth: Antiabortion mobilization among religious activists.' in Ted Jelen and Marthe Chandler (eds), Abortion Politics in the US and Canada (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1994); Kristin Luker, Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984).
32. Guth, ibid.
33. Jaquelin Scott and Howard Schuman, 'Attitude Strength and Social Action in the abortion dispute.' American Sociological Review 53 October 1988, 785-93.
34. Blanchard and Prewitt (note 5) p.271.
35. Ibid., p.270.
36. Reagan brought the anti-abortion movement into the Republican Party, and the 1980 abortion platform called for a constitutional amendment banning abortion. For a somewhat hysterical account of the power shift within the Republican Party, see Tanya Melich, The Republican War Against Women (New York: Bantam Books, 1996).
37. After the decline of Operation Rescue, some activists turned to violence. The history of one individual convicted of a series of arson attacks against abortion clinics was given in the Washington Post (11 Feb. 1998, p.A6): 'He was among the defendants in a civil suit filed in 1988 by several Washington state clinics seeking to enjoin protestors from blockading their facilities, and in 1990 an injunction against such blockades was issued. Officials say that Andrews then began his campaign of arson attacks.'
38. James C. Davies, When Men Revolt and Why (New York: Free Press, 1971).
39. Cited in William Martin, With God on our Side: the Rise of the Religious Right in America (New York: Broadway Books, 1996).
40. Thomas Powers, The War at Home: Vietnam and the American People (New York: Grossman, 1973) p.xiii.
41. Small (note 19), p.158.
42. Jonathan Schell, The Time of Illusion (New York: Vintage, 1976) p.18.
43. Powers (note 30) p.xix; and Nancy Zaroulis and Gerald Sullivan, Who Spoke Up? American Protest against the War in Vietnam (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1984) p.314.
44. Powers (note 30) p.xix; and Nancy Zaroulis and Gerald Sullivan, Who Spoke Up? American Protest against the War in Vietnam (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1984) p.314.
45. Wyn Wade, The Fiery Cross: The Ku Klux Klan in America (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987) p.364.