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Knute Nelson and the Immigration Question Robert F. Zeidel The story of Norwegian immigrants in Minnesota in many ways represents the challenges faced by every ethnic group who comes to a new place:what to retain from the old cultural heritage; how far to become assimilated in order to be accepted.Every immigrant faced this dilemma, but foreign-born citizens who became active in politics and the democratic process found these issues both personalized and public.Robert Zeidel’s article analyzes the life of Knute Nelson,a Civil Warveteran, the first Norwegian-born U.S.Congressman,a Minnesota governor,and the first Scandinavian in the U.S.Senate, from the 1880s to his death in 1923.His long career depended on his creating and keeping a winning coalition in Minnesota’s Republican party of “Yankee”and Norwegian voters in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century,when the immigration question was becoming increasingly diIcult.Immigration became embroiled in labor and urban conflicts and later in the antiimmigrant hysteria and militant one-hundred-percent-Americanism generated byAmerican participation in World War I. The career of Minnesotan Knute Nelson, the first Norwegian immigrant to serve in both the U.S.House of Representatives and the Senate,exemplifies the personal dilemma that ethnicity has posed for foreign-born politicians. From the 1880s to the 1920s, during Nelson’s congressional tenure, millions of immigrants arrived in the United States. Minnesota attracted a significant number of immigrants, especially Germans, Scandinavians, British, and people from the Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires. The state’s foreign-born population ranged from 36 percent in 1890 to 20 percent in 1920,with a high of 544,000 in 1910.1 Many Americans distrusted these newcomers, blaming them for a host of socio-economic maladies and eventually demanding that the federal government reduce their numbers.This demand put ethnic politicians in the predicament of facing a contentious issue directly related to their own foreign birth. Nelson tried to resolve this diIculty by endorsing restrictive legislation and, at the same time, praising immigrant virtues, thereby striking an intriguing 375 balance between his Old Country identity and the majority’s expectations in his adopted land. Conditions during these years of Minnesota’s often turbulent transition from a predominantly rural-agrarian state to an increasingly urban-industrial one help to explain the development of Nelson’s seemingly contradictory stance.The excellent works of historian Carl H.Chrislock have captured the essence of these chaotic times and are particularly important for understanding Nelson. Chrislock has shown that the “political heterogeneity” of Minnesota ’s growing foreign-born population “prevented the organization of a solid immigrant voting block.”This fragmentation necessitated coalition building with old-stock or native-born Americans. Biographers Millard L. Gieske and Steven J.Keillor have presented Knute Nelson as the embodiment of such a union,calling him a “Norwegian Yankee.”Their fine work gives a richly detailed account of Nelson’s life while ultimately assessing his era as a time of political failure. Examination of his response to the immigration question, however,shows his mastery of this especially diIcult issue.2 As a Norwegian immigrant,the politically ascending Nelson no doubt identi fied with others of foreign birth who wished to improve their lot in America. They, in turn, could look to him as one of their own, as their spokesman. In 1892 John Lind,a Swedish immigrant and U.S.congressman from Minnesota, shared his thoughts on theircommon obligations:“Both of us are burdened to a certain extent not only with the responsibility of our individual success, but by reason of the peculiarity of our situation with maintaining and furthering the good name and fame of a great people in a strange land.” Nelson’s transplanted countrymen certainly expected nothing less as they supported him in his bids for elective oIce.3 Yet to succeed in public oIce,Nelson had both to maintain and transcend his ethnic heritage.He had to preserve his ties to fellow immigrants,especially Minnesota’s large Norwegian American community, while at the same time demonstrating that he had assimilated mainstream American values.This balance was especially important in his statewide campaigns for governor and senator,which required broad-based support. Nelson met this challenge by successfully combining his innate ethnic appeal with evidence of an acquired native-born sensibility. Over the course of his career, this dichotomy served him well. Its formation began with his own immigration and assimilation. Born in Evanger, Norway...

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