U.S. Racism: a Major Influence on the Nazis

By David Starr

If one researched the history of U.S. racism up to the present time, and compared it with the racism of Nazi Germany, one would find disturbing similarities. 

U.S. racism is a strain of U.S. ultranationalism, a precursor to the Nazi version. Particularly, in the 1890s going into the 1900s, U.S. ultranationalism erupted on the world stage characterized by the eugenics movement, the Spanish-American War, and the Philippine-American War. All three were brutally barbaric, reflecting the accusations made by the perpetrators who, ironically, thought of people of color as “barbaric.” 

In the U.S., although slavery was officially abolished after the Civil War, residues of slavery continued in the form of racism against people of color by ultranationalist whites, i.e., those who thought they were the “true Americans.”

A book review by Rebecca Brenner Graham in Black Perspectives looks at Hitler’s American Model, written by legal scholar James Q. Whitman. Brenner Graham writes that “Whitman provides essential material to understanding how and why the United States and Nazis share certain similarities.”

Brenner Graham–a PhD candidate in history at American University in Washington, D.C–quotes Whitman, who said, “What this research unmistakingly reveals is that the Nazis did find precedents and parallels and inspirations in the United States.”

Brenner Graham writes, “The most radical Nazis were often the most enthused about American legal precedents. She also notes that, “More moderate, less anti-Semitic members of the Nazi party tended to be more skeptical of American approaches.

“[T]his book investigates institutional discrimination against Jews in 1930s Germany and against people of color throughout U.S. history. In the 1930s, both the United States and Nazi Germany assaulted their own citizens. As Whitman explains, ‘Jews of Germany were hounded, beaten and sometimes murdered, by mobs and by the state alike. In the same years the blacks of the American South were hounded, beaten and sometimes murdered as well.’”

Brenner Graham further writes that Whitman focuses attention on “Hitler’s Mein Kampf because it serves as a manifesto for Nazi ideology and hatred.” Mein Kampf, Brenner Graham writes, “praised America as the only nation that had ‘made progress toward the creation of a healthy racist order…’”

In conclusion, Brenner Graham writes, “Nazi Germany’s treatment of Jews and America’s treatment of people of color are each gruesome in their own ways, and each remains controversial.” But to add the following: in all, both Jews and people of color suffered persecution for similar objectives, i.e., white supremacy propped up while the Other is inferior and evil.

Another review of Whitman was written by journalist Becky Little in History.com, where she reveals that, “In 1935, Nazi Germany passed two discriminatory pieces of legislation inspired by American laws: the Reich Citizen Law and the Law for Protection of German Blood and German Honor. Together, these were known as the Nuremberg Laws…”

German blood. Donald Trump used a phrase similar to these words when he said that immigrants were poisoning the blood of the United States.

Little quotes Whitman, saying that, “America in the early 20^th century was the leading racist jurisdiction in the world.” Nazi lawyers studied American race law and as a result were influenced by it.

Little concludes, “It should come as no surprise then, that the Nazis weren’t uniformly condemned in the U.S. before the country entered [WWII]. In the early 1930s, American eugenicists welcomed Nazi ideas about racial purity and republished their propaganda. American aviator Charles Lindbergh accepted a swastika medal from Nazi Germany’s government in 1938.”

Leading up to the war, the U.S. decided to take an anti-Nazi stance. This could reflect that both the U.S. and Nazi Germany were rival, imperial powers and both wanting to establish their versions of a new world order. It must be said, however, that many in the U.S. population came out against Nazi Germany’s objectives.

Looking at the present time, there has been an attempted reemergence of Nazism in the U.S. and elsewhere. The Republican Party has virtually embraced Nazism. The words and deeds spell this out. The GOP’s agenda is sometimes covered in a layer of veneer where “free speech,” “liberty” and “freedom” are preached but its’ actions are quite the opposite. Orwellian would be an accurate phrase to use.

An example of this veneer covering was evident in a Piers Morgan segment where right-wing panelists used Orwellian language to make their points. Their accusations were not only blatantly hypocritical but also meaningless, devoid of important truths.

Meanwhile, right-wingers, including those in the Republican base, have expressed Nazi, white supremacist and racist memes and messages on social media. 

These right-wingers have become bolder in showing what they really are, without the veneer. 

A piece was published in The Nerve by John Mulholland a former editor and an advisor on The Nerve. Mulholland gives examples of coded and not-so-coded language from the right: 

• “We’ll have our home again.”

In other words, a white supremacist home for “true Americans.” Mulholland, citing information from The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), writes that the slogan “is the title of a song attributed to a group called the Pine Tree Riots,” which is associated with white ultranationalism.

• “One Homeland. One People. One Heritage. Remember who you are American.”

This is similar to a slogan used by the Nazi Party, “One People. One Country. One Leader.” It was an often-used slogan.

• “Remember Your Homeland’s heritage.”

The word “homeland” compliments the Nazis’ agenda. It was used in Nazi Germany with the translation, heimat, a word coopted by the Nazis to fit their ultranationalist mindset.

• “A Heritage to be proud of, a Homeland worth defending.”

The two Hs are capitalized, which are, Mulholland writes, “accepted in right-wing circles as a way to write, ‘Heil Hitler.’”

MS News’ show, All In, with host Chris Hayes, revealed how the right-wing have become bolder in using racist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic epithets on social media. It’s happening among youth and some government officials. So, the provocations and hostility have become even more evident among the right.

Given the U.S. political climate is tarnished by Nazi propaganda, the similarities between U.S. racism and Nazi Germany’s racism is becoming ever, clearer. Nazi Germany, however, was defeated. Will the same fate fall upon the U.S., as an empire?