Carpet excavator

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Caricature of Carl Schurz as a carpet excavator, Thomas Nast 1872
Carpetbag around 1860

Carpetbagger (to German carpet bag carrier ) was a derogatory term for Northerners who after the Civil War came in the defeated South, especially during the Reconstruction designated period of reintegration of the southern states in the United States and the abolition of heretofore legal slavery, which politically strong was characterized by the influence of the central government in Washington and the leading representatives of the north. Many southerners accused the northerners , who are now coming to the south , of base motives, namely to want to enrich themselves as beneficiaries of their defeat in the population and economy of the south. The name refers to this accusation by suggesting that the newcomers from the northern states were exploiting the south and filling their pockets with its riches (or: they came with nothing but a travel bag and their idealism). These bags were then made of carpet-like fabrics and carpet were pockets (Engl. Carpetbags ) called.

The term refers to Northerners in general, but is mostly related to a widespread sense of political tutelage. Since many leadership positions became vacant in the south after the defeat of the Confederation , many lucky seekers actually succeeded in becoming mayor or even governor with the blessing of Washington . At the same time, many white southerners as well as supporters of the Democratic Party and White Supremacy justified the racist terror of the Ku Klux Klan with the argument that it was an understandable reaction to the republican southern policy and the carpet excavators.

In today's parlance, the term is often used to refer to a politician moving to another state in order to increase his electoral and career opportunities.

See also

literature

  • William L. Richter: Historical Dictionary of the Civil War and Reconstruction . Scarecrow Press, Lanham, MD 2011, ISBN 978-0-8108-7959-1 , pp. 97-99 ( excerpt (Google) )
  • Richard Current : Those Terrible Carpetbaggers. A reinterpretation . Oxford University Press, New York 1988, ISBN 0-19-504872-5 .
  • James M. Martinez: Carpetbaggers, Cavalry, and the Ku Klux Klan. Exposing the Invisible Empire during Reconstruction . Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham Md. 2007, ISBN 0-7425-5077-X .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Riffel, Andreas: The Invisible Empire - the Ku Klux Klan from 1866-1871 as a secret society . In: Frank Jacob (Ed.): Secret Societies: Kulturhistorische Sozialstudien / Secret Societies: Comparative Studies in Culture, Society and History . Würzburg 2013, p. 237-273, here pp. 267-268 .
  2. ↑ "Carpet excavator". In: Merriam and Webster Dictionary. Retrieved July 13, 2016 .