Lewis Cass Jr. Quotes

There are almost 200 different inscribed commemorative stones that were placed in the Washington monument at its original construction. These were sent from all over and were cemented into the inside and are still visible. However this particular stone roused the ire of the strong anti-Catholic element who violently opposed the concept that a Pope’s gift or anything from the Church would “blaspheme” the hallowed memory of George Washington. At the time, this Pope held temporal power in Italy as well as religious, and there was paranoid fear that with so many Catholics coming to America, they would want to turn over control of the American government to the Pope. A group of right wing Know Nothings broke into the warehouse and stole the Pope’s stone before it could be cemented into place. They then smashed it into pieces and spread the pieces in the Potomac River. The Know Nothings also managed to get control of the Washington Monument Society and then Congress cut off Federal Funds for the construction. When control had been wrested from the Know Nothings, the construction continued. However, the anti-Catholics had kept the Catholic stone out of the structure. In the1980s, the Papal gift stone was reproduced and placed in the Washington Monument with the other commemorative stones.

This is a very important historical quotation in that it shows the extensive degree of anti-Catholic prejudice that existed in America in the late 1930s. Most of the anti-Catholic feeling was based in the absurd but real belief of millions of Protestants that the Pope was trying to control America. Then there was the fear and that American Catholics would take political direction from the Vatican and the Catholic bishops. The perception of the Church was hundreds of years out of date. Most of the anti-Catholic bias reduced along with anti-Semitism in the remainder of the 20th century as Americans became much more religiously tolerant. By the 21st century, religious prejudice still existed but it was limited to a small group of Americans whose views were generally condemned by the American mainstream of thought and opinion.

This quotation was used by the Lyndon B. Johnson 1964 Campaign as: “We represent the majority of the people in Alabama who hate niggerism, Catholicism, Judaism, and all the isms of the whole world.” So said Robert Creel of the Alabama Ku Klux Klan. He also said, “I like Barry Goldwater. He needs our help.” The second statement was made at a different time.

Smith was the first Roman Catholic to run for President. He was very popular but there was a substantial amount of anti-Catholicism in America at the time. He lost, probably by the margin of the anti-Catholic vote.

The conclusion that Iran was probably pursuing nuclear weapons was not based on any device, but on five sets of data: 1) The Iranians lied to the UN Atomic Energy Commission and were caught several times. They then refused to let UN inspectors observe their research. 2) The Russians offered to supply Iran with all the nuclear fuel that they needed to run nuclear power generating plants, but then the Russians would reprocess the fuel so that it could not be used for weapons. 3) Iran is the only country in the United Nations which has stated that it wants to destroy another UN member—specifically to “wipe Israel off the map” and commonly officially calls for death to the United States. 4) Iran is one of the very few nations that provide arms including rockets, to terrorist organizations, and 5) Iran is controlled by extreme Islamic fundamentalists and have a history of taking the Muslim concept of Jihad and martyrdom literally. In their war with Iraq, they marched young preteen and teenagers into minefields, killing their own children by the hundreds of thousands, in order to enable their troops to follow. They might be the only nation that would be willing to sacrifice a substantial part of their population in order to strike at their enemies. Mutually assured destruction which shaped the atomic age is not necessarily an inhibiting factor on them. Their own leaders claim the it is not and for Jihad and God it could be worth it.

The “Know-Nothings” were populist extremists opposed to anything foreign and immigration and were religiously and racially bigoted—somewhat like the Tea Party of the early 21st century. The difference was that the Tea Party was not anti-Catholic and their bigotry was against foreigners and Blacks and Hispanics. However where the Know-Nothings were proud of their bigotry. Many Tea Party members were distressed by the racists in their ranks, However, they did little to stop bigots from having racist signs and slogans at rallies and did not purge the racists from their midst.

President Thomas Jefferson and the Congress worked at making a workable set of relationships with the Indians. Here Congress gave Jefferson a fund so that he could invite influential Indian leaders to Washington and give them presents. The hope was that the Indian leaders would see the achievements of white society and then work to transform their people to this more desirable way of life. While this was a good strategy with a few Indian nations, the reaction of most Indian leaders was being very impressed but not really wanting to trade their existing lifestyle, customs and values for the undeniable advantages that American society could bring. Both the white and Indian leadership miscalculated, Jefferson believed that as soon as the Indian leaders could examine the two alternative societies, they would clearly choose to change. The Indians were so impressed with the sincerity, reasonableness, and friendliness that the white leadership exhibited, that the Indians did not realize that a large part of white society was different from the leadership and that the leaders spoke for and could control the other whites.

He had been exiled to the United States.