Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer on Charges Made Against Department of Justice by Louis F. Post and Others, Vol. 1: Hearings Before the Committee ... Congress, Second Session (Classic Reprint)
(Excerpt from Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer on Charg...)
Excerpt from Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer on Charges Made Against Department of Justice by Louis F. Post and Others, Vol. 1: Hearings Before the Committee on Rules, House of Representatives, Sixty-Sixth Congress, Second Session
I call your attention next to the fact that the methods of spreading the social revolutionary conspiracy - and it is an international one by profession and organization - engineered now b the Communist International, the celebrated Third Intern ationa established at Moscow, of delegations from all Europe and the United States on March 6, 1919, have been everywhere the same - in Russia, in Europe, in Asia, Africa, and America.
This, as far as I know - unless it be the French Revolution - is the only revolution in the world's history which has been amply and completely financed.
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Aims and Purposes of the Chemical Foundation, Incorporated: And the Reasons for Its Organization
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Alexander Mitchell Palmer was an American lawyer and politician. He served as a Member of the U. S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania's district from 1909 to 1915.
Background
Alexander Mitchell Palmer was born on May 4, 1872 near White Haven, Pennsylvania, United States. He was the second son and fourth of six children of Samuel Bernard and Caroline (Albert) Palmer. His father, a bridge builder, was employed at the time. Natives of Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, his parents were devout Quakers and came from families which had been influential in the Stroudsburg area since its initial settlement in the eighteenth century. Young Palmer, therefore, was early instilled not only with the Quaker faith but also with the desire to excel to "be somebody".
Education
Possessing a keen mind, Alexander Mitchell Palmer completed public school in record time, spent a year in the Moravian parochial school in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and in 1891 graduated summa cum laude from Swarthmore College, sharing top honors with his roommate, the later Republican governor of Pennsylvania, William C. Sproul. After his graduation Palmer "read law" for two years under Judge John B. Strom of Stroudsburg and in 1893 was admitted to the Pennsylvania bar.
Career
In 1893 Palmer started to practise law with Judge Strom until the latter's death in 1901. While busy building a reputation as one of Pennsylvania's leading attorneys, Palmer became active in local Democratic politics. In a short time he was a leader of insurgent forces within the party determined to overthrow the "old guard. "
In 1908 he was chosen to run for Congress from the 26th Pennsylvania district as a "reformer" and was elected. Reelected in 1910 and 1912, he received considerable attention on Capitol Hill because of his able debating. His leadership qualities won him a position on the powerful Ways and Means Committee in his second term in Congress, and as a member of that committee he had charge of the steel schedule for the Underwood Tariff of 1913. The year 1912 marked a turning point in Palmer's career.
As national committeeman from Pennsylvania he controlled that state's delegation to the Democratic National Convention at Baltimore, a control which proved vitally important in the ultimate nomination of Woodrow Wilson for president. Even more important was Palmer's dogged work as floor manager for the Wilson forces and his refusal to be swayed or bought, although offered the vice-presidential nomination at one point by the supporters of Champ Clark.
President Wilson sought to reward Palmer with the position of Secretary of War in his first cabinet, but Palmer gracefully declined because of his Quaker beliefs. In 1914, primarily upon Wilson's advice, he relinquished a chance for reelection to the House in order to run, unsuccessfully, for the Senate against Boies Penrose. Wilson then named him to a seat on the United States Court of Claims, but Palmer, feeling that he could not endure the sedentary life of a federal judge, chose instead to retire to private life.
Shortly after American entry into the first World War, however, he accepted the post of Alien Property Custodian. Serving in this capacity from October 1917 to March 1919, he sequestered approximately $600, 000, 000 worth of property owned by or owed to enemy aliens. As legal trustee of this property, he was authorized by Congress to sell it to American citizens; his management of these sequestrations and sales for the first time embroiled him in controversy. Because he was viewed with favor by both labor and business interests, because he maintained considerable influence in Pennsylvania's Democratic organization, and because the Democrats had to mollify the apparent public vexation with the predominating southern element in the Wilson administration, Palmer became the obvious choice to replace Thomas W. Gregory as Attorney-General when the latter retired on March 4, 1919.
During the remaining two years of Wilson's administration Palmer accepted the duties of damping labor unrest, profiteering, inflation, and domestic radicalism. When John L. Lewis called a strike in the coal mines in 1919, Palmer promptly issued an injunction, acting under the war-emergency authority of the Lever Act of 1917. Although Lewis canceled the strike, the miners struck anyway, and Palmer threatened further injunctions, despite the conciliatory efforts of other cabinet officers. In his campaign against profiteering and inflation Palmer employed the antitrust laws, notably against the "Beef Trust" for alleged price-fixing arrangements; his campaign, however, was generally unsuccessful, the task being too large for the powers of his office. Palmer's greatest notoriety resulted from his onslaught on alleged domestic radicalism during the "Red Scare" period, a campaign characterized by government-sponsored raids on private homes and establishments and by the deportation of aliens, among them Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman.
Bitterly denounced in various circles for his actions as Attorney-General and as Alien Property Custodian (charges were made that he confiscated property not actually belonging to aliens and that he sold the properties for less than their true values and to personal favorites), Palmer spent his last months in office facing numerous congressional investigating committees, though all charges of dishonesty and misfeasance were ultimately dismissed.
Palmer reached the high point of his political career at the Democratic National Convention at San Francisco in 1920, where he was a leading contender for the presidential nomination, along with William G. McAdoo and James M. Cox. Losing to Cox, he retired from public life in 1921 and resumed his law practice in Stroudsburg and in Washington, D. C.
Handicapped during the last years of his life by a severe cardiac condition, Palmer displayed a forceful personality to the end. Palmer died in Washington, D. C. , of cardiac complications arising from an emergency appendectomy on May 11, 1936.
Achievements
Alexander Mitchell Palmer was an eminent politician and lawyer. As United States attorney general, he was known for creating “Palmer raids, ” a series of mass roundups and arrests by federal agents of radicals and political dissenters suspected of subversion. Relying on the new Espionage Act and Sedition Act, his agents raided headquarters of communist, socialist, and anarchist organizations as well as labor union offices.
(Excerpt from Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer on Charg...)
Religion
Palmer was a member of the Religious Society of Friends.
Politics
Palmer was a member of Democratic party. He was a staunch supporter of progressive measures, among them an anti-child-labor bill of which he was co-sponsor. He campaigned for John W. Davis in 1924 and for Al Smith in 1928. In 1932, as a delegate to the Chicago convention, he supported Franklin D. Roosevelt for the presidential nomination and is credited with writing most of the campaign platform.
Personality
Alexander Mitchell Palmer had a booming voice and friendly smile marked him as an extrovert. He was a dignified, handsome man and a meticulous dresser, he had great personal charm, used the Quaker "thee" in his speech, showed an intense loyalty toward his friends, and received great respect in return. Yet even his friends had to admit that from time to time he was too combative, too dogmatic, and too conceited. His consuming pride and his love of a political fight contrasted oddly with his religious faith. It is little wonder the most common epithet used to describe him was "Fighting Quaker. "
Connections
On November 23, 1898, Alexander Mitchell Palmer married Roberta Bartlett Dixon of Easton, Pennsylvania. They had a daughter, Mary Dixon, his only child. After the death of his first wife in 1922, he married Margaret Fallon Burrall, on August 29, 1923.
