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Group: Ben Franklin Hated Immigrants

"Although immigration was a number one worry with Franklin, it is illuminating to see how he couched his arguments to oppose it, for he phrased them in terms of skin color. That racism was very much on the mind of this foremost American spokesman for the capitalist ethic is clearly shown by his concern that America could be swamped by nonwhites (see Wright 1986:82-83). Franklin opposed the Quaker pacifism that he felt put at risk the people of the Pennsylvania frontier. In the face of what he regarded as the unshakeable obstinacy of the Quakers on this matter, plus the selfishness of the merchant class, he wrote that the common people of Pennsylvania would have to set up their own voluntary defense associations. In a pamphlet entitled Plain Truth, published in 1747, he went out of his way to assuage the fears of the pacifists that armed groups would be a threat to the social order. Rather, he noted (quoted by Wright 033 1986:78) that the real threat to the society came not from these troops but from "licentious privateers": "your persons, fortunes, wives, and daughters, shall be subject to the wanton and unbridled rage, rapine, and lust of Negroes, mulattos and others, the vilest and most abandoned of mankind." Thus did Franklin use race explicitly as a bogeyman in his arguments. Continuing his argument, Franklin wrote that the non-English immigrants were not "purely white." He maintained that the Germans, Russians, and Swedes were of a swarthy complexion. Furthermore, only the Saxons and the English constituted the principal body of white people on the face of the earth. This concern with skin color caused him to ask (quoted in Wright 1986:83): "Why increase the sons of Africa by planting them in America, where we have so fair an opportunity, by excluding all blacks and tawnys, of increasing the lovely white and red?" This concern with the importation of blacks was partly based on the belief in the racial inferiority of blacks. In 1758 an English philanthropic society established a school for blacks in Philadelphia. In 1763 Franklin visited the school and remarked (cited in Zilversmit 1967:26-27) that the experience gave him "a higher opinion of the Natural Capacities of the black Race." Obviously, Franklin had a low opinion of the natural intelligence of blacks." Hmmm. Republicanism has a lot in common with Ben. See: http://www.vernonjohns.org/vernjohns/sthfrnkl.html In the spirit of current Republican Xenophobia, let us not forget that Ben Franklin hated immigrants. He was quite the Xenophibiac, much as you will find exists in Republicanism today. So let's remember, one of the founding fathers hated immigrants. Ben didn't exactly win this argument, since it was not predicated on everything that America ultimately stood for. Just ask the Irish and the Italians. If you are of Germanic or Italian origin, Ben would have kept you out. Probably if you were anything but English he would have kept you out. David Dukes would be proud of Ben. So let's here it to Xenophobia. The founding fathers were in favor it. Well, at least Ben was. I sure hope this site lasts. It sure seems to be going down fast. Hope I'm not censured or removed. But I doubt it. My grandfathers family came from Germany. Egads! Ben would have kept us out of America.