Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
Speaker 1: Frye and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. I almost said I'm
Speaker 1: Holly Friday. I don't know what that's about. I literally
Speaker 1: had to pull myself back. But today we are talking
Speaker 1: about Mary Elizabeth Lease, and I will tell you upfront
Speaker 1: she is a mixed bag. In initial research on her,
Speaker 1: what I kept finding was most biographical sketches describe her
Speaker 1: in pretty positive terms, even though she was not universally beloved.
Speaker 1: She was a progressive political activist. She fought big business,
Speaker 1: she worked on behalf of the common man, particularly farmers,
Speaker 1: and she believed really strongly in the importance of third
Speaker 1: parties in the US political system. Oh that's true, and
Speaker 1: it makes her sound pretty cool, but it leaves out
Speaker 1: some really proba aboutic parts of her story ideology. Her
Speaker 1: story which also plays out during the Gilded Age, when,
Speaker 1: much like today, the difference between rich and poor in
Speaker 1: the US very stark, very unbalanced, with just a handful
Speaker 1: of people holding the vast majority of the nation's wealth.
Speaker 1: But it also offers a glimpse into the repetitive nature
Speaker 1: of politics and social structure in the US as a
Speaker 1: lot of the issues she spoke about and advocated for
Speaker 1: are things we were hearing about all the time in
Speaker 1: the news today. There is also a moment in this
Speaker 1: show where one of her detractors says something that sounds
Speaker 1: like you heard it on a SoundBite from nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 1: It was took me so by surprise. So. Mary Elizabeth
Speaker 1: Cliens was born September eleventh, eighteen fifty three, in Ridgeway, Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: Her father was Joseph P. Cleons and her mother was
Speaker 1: Mary Elizabeth Murray Clients, and both of them were i
Speaker 1: and had immigrated to the United States. Mary had two
Speaker 1: older brothers who had been born in Ireland. They were
Speaker 1: Patrick and Daniel. The family had left their home country
Speaker 1: after Joseph had been involved in a conflict with British landowners.
Speaker 1: He had lost his tenant property during the famine and
Speaker 1: had also been instrumental in leading a revolt against the landowners,
Speaker 1: and that had made him a wanted man. During the
Speaker 1: US Civil War, which started when Mary was just eight,
Speaker 1: her father, Joseph, and her two brothers served in the
Speaker 1: Union Army Joseph was drafted, but her brothers volunteered. Both
Speaker 1: of her brothers, one of whom was adopted, were killed
Speaker 1: in action, and Joseph is said to have starved to
Speaker 1: death while he was a prisoner of war. There is
Speaker 1: we should note some conflicting information about all of this
Speaker 1: because in some accounts, Joseph, Patrick and Daniel are said
Speaker 1: to have received money to service stand ins for military survice.
Speaker 1: We've talked about this practice on the show before, where
Speaker 1: they would report in lieu of wealthy draftees who basically
Speaker 1: paid them to say, go be me for this conflict. Mary,
Speaker 1: after all of this had happened, believed that the war
Speaker 1: was entirely the fault of the Democratic Party and that
Speaker 1: it was the direct cause of her sorrow, and she
Speaker 1: grew up with a deep disdain for pretty much all Democrats.
Speaker 1: The Democrat Party at this point in history was generally
Speaker 1: a party of wealthy, white slave owners. That's where we
Speaker 1: are in the arc of political parties in the US.
Speaker 1: So Mary Elizabeth attended Saint Elizabeth's Academy in Allegheny, New York,
Speaker 1: and graduated in eighteen sixty eight at the age of fifteen.
Speaker 1: She taught in a school in Pennsylvania for two years
Speaker 1: before moving to Kansas in search of better wages for teachers.
Speaker 1: She had already showed an interest in the labor movement
Speaker 1: at that point, even as a team fresh to the profession.
Speaker 1: She had tried to get a teacher's union together at
Speaker 1: her first job, primarily because of poor pay clients. Got
Speaker 1: a teaching appointment in a Kansas Catholic school, which was
Speaker 1: Saint Anne's academy, and that was in the town of
Speaker 1: Osage Mission in Kansas. Mary Elizabeth met a pharmacist clerk
Speaker 1: named Charles L. Lease, and the two of them married
Speaker 1: on January thirtieth, eighteen seventy three. According to Charles's account,
Speaker 1: it had been Mary who pursued him. He had not
Speaker 1: particularly been interested in courtship or marriage, and then she
Speaker 1: kind of inserted herself into his life. Because Mary was
Speaker 1: politically active before she met Charles, they had what was
Speaker 1: probably sort of a unique marriage for the time, one
Speaker 1: in which she and her husband were of differing political views,
Speaker 1: although it seems that Charles was a lot less passionate
Speaker 1: about his Democrat affiliation than Mary was about her ideologies.
Speaker 1: Mary left her teaching job when she married Charles and
Speaker 1: she became a homemaker. Although that role did not particularly
Speaker 1: suit her, she started coming up with ways to stay
Speaker 1: mentally stimulated, and one of them was that she started writing.
Speaker 1: And among the works that she wrote during this time
Speaker 1: was a play that was put on at one of
Speaker 1: the local schools that imagined what the US might be
Speaker 1: like if it had been run by women. Charles and
Speaker 1: Mary Elizabeth moved to Kingman County, Kansas in early eighteen
Speaker 1: seventy three. They got a plot of land through the
Speaker 1: Homestead Act and they started a farm there. They had
Speaker 1: borrowed money to set up the farm with everything that
Speaker 1: it needed, but they found that things were really rough going.
Speaker 1: After living a pretty comfortable life for their first several
Speaker 1: months of marriage, they found themselves living in a dugout
Speaker 1: house before they could get a sod house made. They
Speaker 1: also realized that farming is very difficult work. They were
Speaker 1: not good at it. They did not produce anything to sell.
Speaker 1: They defaulted on their loans and the farm was repossessed.
Speaker 1: Just a year after they had ventured into farming, they
Speaker 1: had lost everything and moved to Denison, Texas. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: get the vibe, because farming will come up again that
Speaker 1: Mary had kind of a romantic idea of what it
Speaker 1: was to be a farmer. Even as she became very
Speaker 1: well acquainted with a lot of farmers, she really thought
Speaker 1: that was going to be a great life. Mary was
Speaker 1: pregnant when they made this move to Denison, and she
Speaker 1: gave birth to their first child, Charles Henry, in late
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy four. In Texas, Charles found work at a
Speaker 1: pharmacy once again. This time he was working for Atchison's
Speaker 1: drug Store, and to help make ends meet, Mary Elizabeth
Speaker 1: worked as a washerwoman, and during this time she also
Speaker 1: started studying law. Now this was not a case where
Speaker 1: she attended law school. Rather, she apprenticed with the law
Speaker 1: firm of Aldrich and Brown and she studied law there.
Speaker 1: Apprentices who learned in this manner were allowed to sit
Speaker 1: for the bar exam, and Mary is said to pinned
Speaker 1: her law notes over her washtub, so as she did
Speaker 1: her customer's laundry, she could also study. Attison's drugstore provided
Speaker 1: the leases with more than an income for Charles. It
Speaker 1: was owned by doctor Alexander Atchison, and he and his wife,
Speaker 1: Sarah became a significant influence on Mary Elizabeth. Sarah Atchison
Speaker 1: was active in the temperance movement, and she recruited Mary
Speaker 1: Elizabeth into that cause. Mary Elizabeth joined the Women's Christian
Speaker 1: Temperance Union and started giving speeches to promote temperance. She
Speaker 1: was really good at this. Many years later, The New
Speaker 1: York Times would write of Mary quote, she had a
Speaker 1: resounding voice and a knack for forceful phraseology that carried
Speaker 1: conviction and enthusiasm. So that voice and her use of
Speaker 1: it would really define the rest of her life. Charles, meanwhile,
Speaker 1: was trying to improve their finances by flipping lots. He
Speaker 1: recognized that Dennison was growing, and so he would purchase
Speaker 1: empty lots when they came available, and then he would
Speaker 1: sell those lots at a markup as the town expanded.
Speaker 1: In eighteen eighty Mary and Charles also had a second child, Evelyn,
Speaker 1: and then a third child in eighteen eighty three. That
Speaker 1: was their daughter, Grace. After almost a decade in Denison,
Speaker 1: Mary and Charles moved back to Kingman County, Kansas. They
Speaker 1: didn't completely leave Denison behind, though at least not financially,
Speaker 1: because Charles continued to be active in the real estate
Speaker 1: market there for years. They had decided to try to
Speaker 1: farm again in Kansas. This time they went with the
Speaker 1: route of renting a house with land instead of taking
Speaker 1: on property. They didn't have a whole lot greater success
Speaker 1: the second time than they had the first, though, although
Speaker 1: they apparently did a little bit better in terms of
Speaker 1: producing an actual corn crop, it still didn't make them
Speaker 1: very much money. After they moved back to Kingman County,
Speaker 1: the Leases had a son named Ben Herr. Biographer Brookspear
Speaker 1: or theat we arised that he was named after the
Speaker 1: character in the book, which came out in eighteen eighty.
Speaker 1: Mary and Charles had two other babies during their time
Speaker 1: in Dennison who did not survive their infancy. The family
Speaker 1: moved from their failed second farm to Wichita, and over
Speaker 1: time Mary used her growing circle in Wichita society to
Speaker 1: talk to other women about things like temperance and suffrage,
Speaker 1: and soon she was a leading voice in women's activism circles.
Speaker 1: Mary became involved with the Knights of Labor, which had
Speaker 1: been founded in eighteen sixty nine to advocate for reforms
Speaker 1: in labor practices, including things like an eight hour workday,
Speaker 1: ending child labor, and also ending the use of incarcerated
Speaker 1: people as laborers as well as other reforms. Unlike a
Speaker 1: lot of other organizations, the Knights of Labor also advocated
Speaker 1: for women's suffrage and labor equality, and through this group,
Speaker 1: Mary was engaged as a speaker, and that was something
Speaker 1: that brought her in contact with a lot of other
Speaker 1: activists of note, including Susan B. Anthony. Mary often invoked
Speaker 1: her own experiences when she talked about issues like class
Speaker 1: inequality in the ways that banking and industrial companies actively
Speaker 1: harmed the nation's farmers with their policies. We'll talk about
Speaker 1: another significant step and Mary's activism after we pause for
Speaker 1: a sponsor break. In eighteen eighty eight, Mary's involvement in
Speaker 1: activism kind of shifted into high gear when she attended
Speaker 1: the Union Labor Party's state convention. She had been aligned
Speaker 1: with the Republican Party prior to that, but the party's
Speaker 1: stance on tariffs as good for the economy and their
Speaker 1: lack of support for farmers had soured her opinion of
Speaker 1: the organization. In contrast, the Union Labor Party wanted a
Speaker 1: financial structure for the country that was beneficial to the
Speaker 1: people actually doing the work, so it was very much
Speaker 1: much in line with her ideology. Lease actually ran for
Speaker 1: office as a member of the Union Labor Party. At
Speaker 1: the convention in eighteen eighty eight, she was chosen as
Speaker 1: the Union Labor candidate for superintendent of Sedgwick County Schools,
Speaker 1: although neither she nor the other candidates that the Union
Speaker 1: Labor Party put forth for various offices fared well at
Speaker 1: all in the election. After the election, Lee stayed active
Speaker 1: in the Union Labor Party and even edited its newspaper.
Speaker 1: Before the end of the decade, though Mary moved to
Speaker 1: the Farmers Alliance, which had started in Texas almost two
Speaker 1: decades earlier. She wasn't eligible for membership in the Farmer's
Speaker 1: Alliance because she was not considered to be part of
Speaker 1: a farming family, but she was welcomed as a participant,
Speaker 1: and her involvement really drove the membership numbers way up.
Speaker 1: We've already said she was a compelling speaker, but she
Speaker 1: also offered women in farm communities a glimpse at ways
Speaker 1: that they could be politically active, and a lot of
Speaker 1: that growth came from women joining the movement. The Farmer's
Speaker 1: Alliance wasn't a political party. It was a protest group
Speaker 1: and an agrarian movement. As Mary Leesa's involvement in activism
Speaker 1: with the Farmer's Alliance was heating up, she gained a
Speaker 1: very powerful enemy in Kansas Republican Senator John James Ingalls.
Speaker 1: Ingles was anti suffrage, and he made statements about activists
Speaker 1: that truly sound exactly like conservative rhetoric in the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 1: This is what I mentioned at the top of the show.
Speaker 1: He said of women's suffrage that it was quote that
Speaker 1: obscene dogma whose advocates are long haired men and short
Speaker 1: haired women, the unsext of both sexes, human capons and episscenes.
Speaker 1: That sounds like he's like you hippies. Yeah, maybe without
Speaker 1: the capons and epissenes part, it does sound like he's
Speaker 1: talking about hippies. He and his wife made a lot
Speaker 1: of public comments about Mary Lease being a ladylike and
Speaker 1: insinuating that she was quite vulgar by the way. It
Speaker 1: wasn't like she was out there swearing. She just was very,
Speaker 1: very direct and very vocal, and that was not cool
Speaker 1: for women in their eyes. Mary as a consequence, made
Speaker 1: it her mission to publicly criticize Ingles for his stance,
Speaker 1: and the entire Republican party along with him. The two
Speaker 1: of them traded barbs in the press, and it made
Speaker 1: big news every time one of them said something about
Speaker 1: the other. And as this was all playing out, although
Speaker 1: she was really busy as an activist and she was
Speaker 1: still a full time mom, Mary was able to complete
Speaker 1: her law studies and she passed the bar examine Kansas
Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty nine, and at that point she and
Speaker 1: another woman named Mary Merrill opened a law practice together.
Speaker 1: During the eighteen ninety election cycle, Mary campaigned hard. She
Speaker 1: made more than one hundred and sixty speeches. Ingles was
Speaker 1: up for reelection, and she and the Farmer's Alliance were
Speaker 1: focused on making sure he was defeated. In her speeches,
Speaker 1: she talked about how he and other Republicans were ensuring
Speaker 1: that wealth inequality was the standard, with a small group
Speaker 1: of men controlling most of the money in Kansas. Some
Speaker 1: of her rhetoric regarding Ingles would be perceived as dangerously
Speaker 1: close to a threat of physical violence today, likening their
Speaker 1: vote to pulling a trigger to take out the mark.
Speaker 1: When Senator John Ingalls was ultimately defeated in the election,
Speaker 1: which took a long time due to legal tie ups
Speaker 1: over certification. Mary openly stated that she was the reason
Speaker 1: why he had lost. This was probably true, at least
Speaker 1: to a degree. One of Lisa's most famous speeches during
Speaker 1: this time is often referred to by the title wall
Speaker 1: Street owns the Country, although you will sometimes also see
Speaker 1: it referred to by other names. And in this speech
Speaker 1: she denounced the entire setup of the USA economy. This
Speaker 1: is a really good example of the kinds of things,
Speaker 1: she said, so I want to include a lot of it.
Speaker 1: That speech opens with quote, this is a nation of inconsistencies.
Speaker 1: The Puritans, fleeing from oppression, became oppressers. We fought England
Speaker 1: for our liberty and put chains on four million of blacks.
Speaker 1: We wiped out slavery and our tariff laws, and national
Speaker 1: banks began a system of white wage slavery worse than
Speaker 1: the first. Wall Street owns the Country. It is no
Speaker 1: longer a government of the people, by the people, and
Speaker 1: for the people, but a government of wall Street, by
Speaker 1: wall Street, and for wall Street. The great common people
Speaker 1: of this country are slaves, and monopoly is the master.
Speaker 1: The West and South are bound and prostrate before the
Speaker 1: manufacturing East. Money rules, and our vice president is a
Speaker 1: London banker. Our laws are the output of a system
Speaker 1: which clothes rascals and robes, and honesty in the political
Speaker 1: parties lie to us, and the political speakers mislead us.
Speaker 1: The speech continues by noting that farmers were told they
Speaker 1: just needed to produce a good crop, but when they
Speaker 1: all managed to do so, they were told they had
Speaker 1: over produced and thus their various products like corn, beef,
Speaker 1: and eggs would be devalued. She notes that they were
Speaker 1: told that there was too much product, but according to
Speaker 1: the statistics, there were ten thousand kids starving in the
Speaker 1: US every year. She finished with a threat quote, we
Speaker 1: want money, land and transportation. We want the abolition of
Speaker 1: the national banks, and we want the power to make
Speaker 1: loans direct from the government. We want the foreclosure system
Speaker 1: wiped out. We will stand by our homes and stay
Speaker 1: by our fireside, by force if necessary, and we will
Speaker 1: not pay our debts to the loan shark companies until
Speaker 1: the government pays its debt to us. The people are
Speaker 1: at bay. Let the bloodhounds of money who dogged us
Speaker 1: thus far beware. There is also another quote that's attributed
Speaker 1: to Mary during this phase of her activism, in which
Speaker 1: she was alleged to have told farmers in Kansas to quote,
Speaker 1: raise less corn and more hell. This is something that
Speaker 1: still gets repeated today. But she did not say it,
Speaker 1: And when asked about the quote, Mary said that no,
Speaker 1: she hadn't said it, but she did think it was
Speaker 1: pretty good advice. Mary's rhetoric and her speeches roused a
Speaker 1: lot of people, but by its very nature it also
Speaker 1: turned off a lot of people, even in the groups
Speaker 1: she's most associated with. For example, the Daily Kansas People
Speaker 1: and other papers ran an account of the Farmer's Alliance
Speaker 1: picnic that was held in August of eighteen ninety that
Speaker 1: described an estimated ten thousand attendees, but also notes after
Speaker 1: mentioning that M. W. Wilkins and Mary E. Lease were speakers,
Speaker 1: quote the speeches were of intolerable length and were not
Speaker 1: very well received. Yeah. I ran across that after I
Speaker 1: had seen several instances of people talking about the crowds
Speaker 1: she drew and saying like there were instances where ten
Speaker 1: thousand people at a time came to see her speak,
Speaker 1: and it's like, well, they were there for a picnic,
Speaker 1: and they also didn't all seem to really like it.
Speaker 1: In eighteen ninety two, the Farmers Alliance, which had realized
Speaker 1: that their political influence would always be limited if they
Speaker 1: couldn't actually put candidates on ballots, formed the Populist Party officially,
Speaker 1: and Mary was of course a major player in the
Speaker 1: Populist Party, and it was within that group that she
Speaker 1: got the nickname the People's Joan of Arc. When James
Speaker 1: Weaver ran for president as the Populist candidate in eighteen
Speaker 1: ninety two, Mary traveled the campaign trail with him, and
Speaker 1: Weaver was amazed at the way that Lease was received
Speaker 1: by people on the campaign trail. He described her in
Speaker 1: the ways you would describe like a rock star walking
Speaker 1: into an auditorium today. In eighteen ninety three, she briefly
Speaker 1: ran for senator, but papers reported in January of that
Speaker 1: year that she had chosen to withdraw from the race.
Speaker 1: Some accounts noted that it was quote in the interest
Speaker 1: of harmony. Her candidacy had caused so much debate even
Speaker 1: among the people who supported her. There were concerns that
Speaker 1: she would be polarizing in a way that would lose
Speaker 1: the Populist Party votes, or that even people who agreed
Speaker 1: with her politics wouldn't vote for her because she was
Speaker 1: a woman. She was also relentlessly attacked by her rivals
Speaker 1: who suggested that no woman would have the constitution to
Speaker 1: handle public office. That same year, Mary also had a
Speaker 1: very public conflict in Kansas after she became president of
Speaker 1: the Kansas Board of Charities, and that was an appointment
Speaker 1: she received just after she withdrew from the Senate race.
Speaker 1: In this role, which oversaw a mix of asylums, homes
Speaker 1: for the poor, and special schools, she ran into problems
Speaker 1: in working with Kansas Governor Lorenzo Llewelling, who had actually
Speaker 1: been the one that appointed her to that job. The
Speaker 1: two of them butt heads over a number of things,
Speaker 1: including connections to the Democratic Party. Llewellyn had run as
Speaker 1: a Populist Democrat under the Populist Democrat coalition, and Lese
Speaker 1: hated this. She did not believe in the two parties fusing,
Speaker 1: and she was completely comfortable being very vocal about it
Speaker 1: and also saying that she simply did not want to
Speaker 1: work with anyone who had been elected as a fusion candidate.
Speaker 1: She also got really mad when Llewelling appointed Democrats to
Speaker 1: the Board of Charities, not only because of their political affiliation,
Speaker 1: but also because she thought that she was supposed to
Speaker 1: be the only one who could make decisions on who
Speaker 1: was going to be on the board. Llewelling grew so
Speaker 1: irritated and frustrated with Mary and her furious pronouncements about
Speaker 1: his politics that he tried to have her moved from
Speaker 1: her role with the Board of Charities. This proved to
Speaker 1: be more difficult than he had anticipated, though. Mary fought
Speaker 1: him tooth and nail in his efforts to take her
Speaker 1: out of her position, and things got really ugly. Llew
Speaker 1: Welling's office even circulated rumors that she and presidential candidate
Speaker 1: Weaver had an affair on the campaign trail, and Lese
Speaker 1: accused Llewelling of things like having taken bribes from the railroads.
Speaker 1: The conflict ended up in front of the Kansas Supreme Court,
Speaker 1: and Mary emerged victorious. Yeah, there were a lot of
Speaker 1: other allegations in the midst of all of that mud slinging,
Speaker 1: but those were like the two big ones. Although Mary
Speaker 1: had been legally vindicated at this point, her political standing
Speaker 1: really faltered in the wake of the Court's decision. People
Speaker 1: really started to consider that she was so staunchly dug
Speaker 1: in on her views that she could never compromise or
Speaker 1: really work with others, and because she was seen as
Speaker 1: one of the primary voices of the Populist Party, that
Speaker 1: meant that shifting opinions about her also turnished the party's reputation.
Speaker 1: This in turn led to poor support for the party
Speaker 1: in the eighteen ninety four election, and the party was
Speaker 1: unable to secure even a single office that it had
Speaker 1: run a candidate for. Although the political party tried to
Speaker 1: recapture its momentum, it kind of sputtered out before the
Speaker 1: century ended. Coming up, we're going to talk about Mary's book,
Speaker 1: which was kind of a rambling pastiche of socio political
Speaker 1: ideas and spoiler alert, it's got some problems. We'll get
Speaker 1: into it after we hear from the sponsors that keep
Speaker 1: the show going. In eighteen ninety five, Mary published a
Speaker 1: book titled The Problem of Civilization Solved Just Pretty Bold.
Speaker 1: In it, she examines the rising numbers of the lowest
Speaker 1: income classes in the United States and she explains what
Speaker 1: she feels are the causes of this problem. She does
Speaker 1: so this way, quote, the tide of poperism is steadily rising,
Speaker 1: and we are rapidly approaching the condition of Europe in
Speaker 1: the last century. Class legislation has done much to swell
Speaker 1: the list of America's poppers, but Europe's system of dumping
Speaker 1: its poperized class upon our shores has done more. An
Speaker 1: ever increasing swarm of dependence are with us. The cause
Speaker 1: can be traced to class legislation and militarism, the one
Speaker 1: the curse of our free institutions, and the other the
Speaker 1: bane of European civilization. The remedy lies not in doling
Speaker 1: out alms to humanity until the recipients of charity become
Speaker 1: chronic beggars, but in first removing the cause of extreme
Speaker 1: poverty by giving every toiler access to the soil, making
Speaker 1: the ballot the key to unlock the garner where his
Speaker 1: birthright lies. The solution she puts forward in this writing
Speaker 1: to pull people out of poverty is offering them land
Speaker 1: to work on with the potential to earn its ownership. Quote.
Speaker 1: A cabbage garden or potato patch with the incentive of
Speaker 1: proprietorship and compensation, will keep drunkards from tippling, dead beats
Speaker 1: from mendacity, criminals from crime, and prove not only the
Speaker 1: source of health, happiness, and honesty as well as a
Speaker 1: source of revenue to the commonwealth, but a panacea also
Speaker 1: for tough sinners, where soap and water, sunshine and air,
Speaker 1: work and play will take the place of the seven sacraments.
Speaker 1: In the forty days, fast on fish and eggs, it
Speaker 1: is time for earnest men and women to act. Never
Speaker 1: were needs so pressing and deeds so necessary as today.
Speaker 1: Gigantic want and gigantic wealth step side by side. But
Speaker 1: the cry of the untaught, uncomforted millions, sending forth like
Speaker 1: tortured beasts, and inner articulate cry from the depths of
Speaker 1: their destitution and debasement, is unheeded, if not unheard. So
Speaker 1: if all of this rhetoric sounds a little bit sketchy
Speaker 1: to you, rest assured it gets a whole lot worse.
Speaker 1: And it really gets outright racist and white supremacist. And
Speaker 1: this is a racism that is completely slathered in white saviorism.
Speaker 1: She notes that one of the things that is damaging
Speaker 1: people is over population. So the population, by which she
Speaker 1: really means the white population, should spread out by taking
Speaker 1: land from other people. Note as we go into this
Speaker 1: that this quote has some very outdated language. Quote the
Speaker 1: homeless condition of the highly enlightened Caucasian and the debase
Speaker 1: degradation of the Negro and Oriental calls in thundertones to
Speaker 1: Heaven for a great readjustment of the social condition of mankind.
Speaker 1: Europe and America are on the eye of a dire revolution,
Speaker 1: before which all modern civilization may go down to ruin
Speaker 1: in blood and fire, or perish more slowly beneath the
Speaker 1: iron hoofs of Russian despotism. Between the dreaded modern goth
Speaker 1: of Russian supremacy or Universal Empire, and the vandalism of
Speaker 1: the British financial system which threatens to enslave the industrial world,
Speaker 1: our civilization cannot long survive. The only hope of averting
Speaker 1: this universal reign of terror lies in inaugurating the most
Speaker 1: stupendous migration of races the world has ever known, and
Speaker 1: thereby relieve the congested centers of the world's population of
Speaker 1: half their inhabitants and provide free homes for half of mankind.
Speaker 1: This can be done by colonizing the tropics in America
Speaker 1: and Africa with fifty million white families as planters on
Speaker 1: estates of two hundred acres each with three families of
Speaker 1: Negroes or Orientals as tillers of the soil. Through all
Speaker 1: the vicissitudes of time, the Caucasian has arisen to the
Speaker 1: moral and intellectual supremacy of the world. Until now this
Speaker 1: favored race is fitted with the stewardship of the earth
Speaker 1: and emancipation from manual labor. The era has arrived when
Speaker 1: the Caucasian must either sync to barbarism or become the
Speaker 1: planter by occupancy of the tropics and the professional man
Speaker 1: and business manager for the inferior races, the Oriental and
Speaker 1: Negro are in a pitiable condition of ignorance, destitution, and
Speaker 1: misery from a lack of proper encouragement and a just
Speaker 1: and intelligent supervision of their efforts. Cannot the resources and
Speaker 1: genius of Christendom rescue civilizations from its perils by tropical colonization.
Speaker 1: She says a lot more. Of course, She mentions, for example,
Speaker 1: how dangerous it would be if Russia were to diminish
Speaker 1: Britain's power in India, even though she doesn't love Britain,
Speaker 1: because that would undermine the art of Western supremacy. In
Speaker 1: eighteen ninety six, Lese moved to New York City, where
Speaker 1: she took on a number of roles that gave her
Speaker 1: an expanded platform. She started writing for the New York
Speaker 1: World and became an editor for the National Encyclopedia of
Speaker 1: American Biography. Mary's advocacy had made her famous, and her
Speaker 1: arrival in the city was reported in the New York
Speaker 1: Times in an article that opened with quote, we noticed
Speaker 1: that missus Mary Elizabeth Lease has arrived in this city,
Speaker 1: and that she is to address public audiences on behalf
Speaker 1: of mister Brian and the fifty three cent silver standard.
Speaker 1: That Brian was William Jennings Brian, and while Mary certainly
Speaker 1: didn't want to join the Democratic Party, she did support
Speaker 1: Brian in regards to his stance on establishing a silver standard,
Speaker 1: as famously stated in his Cross of Gold speech at
Speaker 1: the Democratic Convention in eighteen ninety six. In it, Brian
Speaker 1: concluded his argument for bimetallism with quote, having behind us
Speaker 1: the producing masses of this nation and the world, supported
Speaker 1: by the commercial interests, the laboring interests, and the toilers everywhere,
Speaker 1: we will answer their demand for a gold standard by
Speaker 1: saying to them, you shall not press down upon the
Speaker 1: brow of labor, this crown of thorns. You shall not
Speaker 1: crucify mankind upon a cross of gold. So that article
Speaker 1: in the New York Times that mentioned that they had
Speaker 1: noticed she had arrived in New York was not complimentary
Speaker 1: of Mary. It featured a quote that she gave to
Speaker 1: the press, which was quote, we out West think it's
Speaker 1: time for a financial system of our own without the
Speaker 1: interference of European money lenders. Some people in the West
Speaker 1: think the East is acting very selfishly. It is the
Speaker 1: debtor party that is going to elect Brian and Sewell.
Speaker 1: But the paper had dug up information on that mortgage
Speaker 1: that Mary and Charles had defaulted on in Kansas, having
Speaker 1: spoken with someone at the Jervis Conklin Mortgage trust company,
Speaker 1: and the Times We're referred to this mortgage in question
Speaker 1: as quote, a matter of legitimate public interest, and it
Speaker 1: insinuates that Mary and other Populists were basically trying to
Speaker 1: cheat the system by never paying back money they borrowed
Speaker 1: and then claiming that this was because the odds had
Speaker 1: been stacked against them. This is an example of how
Speaker 1: the overall conflict regarding the Populist Party was playing out
Speaker 1: on the public stage. Mary and other members of the
Speaker 1: party were lobbying for legislation against predatory lending practices, while
Speaker 1: their opponents responded that farmers had basically just been bad
Speaker 1: at business. When Mary moved to New York with the
Speaker 1: children in eighteen ninety six, she had done so without Charles,
Speaker 1: and the couple started living separately. At that point. The
Speaker 1: press had hinted for a long time that their marriage
Speaker 1: must be trouble. There were insinuations the woman like Mary
Speaker 1: couldn't be a good wife, along with other barbs at
Speaker 1: both her and Charles. There had also been a distance
Speaker 1: growing between them, some of which was just a matter
Speaker 1: of logistics. Mary was in demand as an orator and
Speaker 1: so she wasn't home a lot of the time, and
Speaker 1: it does seem that her activism made Charles uncomfortable over time,
Speaker 1: especially as her fame grew and she was often embroiled
Speaker 1: in very public feuds with prominent people. The two of
Speaker 1: them seemed to have maintained a pretty cordial relationship, although
Speaker 1: they did divorce in nineteen oh two. In nineteen twelve,
Speaker 1: Mary joined the Bull Moose Party, and she spoke at
Speaker 1: rallies supporting Teddy Roosevelt's campaign that year. By this time,
Speaker 1: she had nothing positive to say about the Democratic or
Speaker 1: Republican parties. She called the Democrats a political putrescence, and
Speaker 1: she referred to the Republican Party as quote the slave
Speaker 1: of the money power. But she felt like Roosevelt aligned
Speaker 1: with what she had advocated for as a populist, and
Speaker 1: she even stated to the press that quote Rooseveltism spells populism.
Speaker 1: But she didn't stick with Roosevelt, and by nineteen fourteen
Speaker 1: she was critical of the party, claiming that it had
Speaker 1: stolen its entire platform from the populists, and she claimed
Speaker 1: that she had not been paid her speaker's fees by
Speaker 1: Roosevelt's campaign. So she made a switch to supporting Woodrow Wilson,
Speaker 1: but that didn't last, largely because he was really not
Speaker 1: a supporter of women's suffrage. As the nineteen teens wound down,
Speaker 1: so did Mary. She retired from political life by the
Speaker 1: end of the decade, although she was still involved in
Speaker 1: various reform movements, especially in support of women's interests. She
Speaker 1: lived in Brooklyn until nineteen thirty, when she moved to
Speaker 1: Long Eddy, New York, on the Delaware River. Mary Elizabeth
Speaker 1: Lease died on October twenty ninth, nineteen thirty three, in Callicoon,
Speaker 1: New York from complications of a leg infection. She was
Speaker 1: eighty years old at the time, and as her obituary
Speaker 1: in The New York Times noted, quote, the populists were
Speaker 1: fighting for direct election of senators, postal savings bank, government
Speaker 1: control of railways, federal supervision of corporations, the initiative and referendum,
Speaker 1: the income tax, woman suffrage, prohibition, and free silver. She
Speaker 1: lived to see every one of those planks except the last,
Speaker 1: put into effect, to varying degrees of success. Right. That
Speaker 1: is what is kind of a very abbreviated version of
Speaker 1: Mary Elizabeth Lease, because she was so publicly active that
Speaker 1: there is a lot of documentation of not only just
Speaker 1: what she said, but how people perceived her, which was
Speaker 1: not always great. We can talk about some of that
Speaker 1: on behind the scenes, as well as that really problematic
Speaker 1: yearn for colonization. But before that we'll have adorable kiddie talk.
Speaker 1: This is from our listener Kelsey and it's a short email,
Speaker 1: but it is adorable. Kelsey Rights just dropping a line
Speaker 1: to issue a Mary Festive season and grace your inbox
Speaker 1: with an image of my cat assistant Jack. He was
Speaker 1: desperate to help with baking, but had to settle for
Speaker 1: early morning coloring and podcast listening with gratitude for all
Speaker 1: you do to educate and entertain us huddled masses and
Speaker 1: bleak midwinter and all through the year. Jack is an
Speaker 1: adorable orange creamsicle baby. Oh his little feats. He's so cute.
Speaker 1: He's so cute. And I also want to give a
Speaker 1: shout out to Catherine who shared her adorable orange tabby
Speaker 1: on Twitter. And it's pretty insistent that he is not
Speaker 1: one of the smart ones. But he's adorable and he
Speaker 1: looks sweet as pie. So thank you, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: If you would like to write to us, you could
Speaker 1: do so at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com. You
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Speaker 1: Stuff You mus and History Class is a production of iHeartRadio.
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