Harshita Gupta
Mathis US History
Chapter 4-6 Assessment
Dec. 18, 2014
COMMUNISTS ASSASSINATE MAYOR HANSON AND TURN TO TERRORISM: A HORRIFIC DANGER TO AMERICA IS PRESENT.
Seattle City Council reports brutal killing of the city’s leader and destruction of Central Labor Temple. Communists are behind the violence that is a part of their larger plan for anarchy.
Publishing Date: February 6, 1919
In their latest move to thwart peaceful society and bring an end to America as we know it, the Communists, who shut down the city of Seattle, have assassinated our Mayor Hanson. The very Mayor who has fought to bring Seattle city back out of this disastrous riot, the very Mayor who wanted the best for our noble city– ripped away from us. The communists had…show more content… It shut down the city for five whole days, but was always established as a peaceful strike with no violence. Its intent was to make the voices of workers heard.
Around the same time that the Seattle General Strike occurred, Americans had been frightened and surprised by Russia’s withdrawal from World War I. Lenin and the Bolsheviks had established a communist government, and socialism was reining its head. Russia’s moves were associated with helping Germany– and since America was so anti-Germany, communism and socialism began to be associated with anarchy, chaos, and destruction for America.
When the Seattle General Strike occurred, its peaceful intent was mistaken for a communist move. Much of the American public was afraid that the striking workers would attempt to overthrow the government to establish a communist one, and the strike began to be associated anti-American and nihilistic qualities. When newspapers shut down as well, innumerable rumors began to do rounds of Seattle. Among these rumors were reports that Communists had assassinated the Mayor of Seattle, and that they blew up the Labor