Germans in Politics

Although Germans had been in Indianapolis since at least the 1840s, their political influence did not become significant until the mid-1850s. Many of the early immigrants were liberals who left their homeland after the failed democratic revolutions of 1848 and found the ideals of Jacksonian Democracy much to their liking. This group also included a number of liberal Freethinkers who did not believe in organized Christian religions and relied instead on scientific explanations.

The German community of Indianapolis supported the Democratic Party in the 1854 election, primarily for its opposition to temperance and prohibition. The simultaneous rise of the American Party (also known as the Know-Nothings), which publicly opposed Germans, provided another reason for Germans to unite in order to preserve their political freedom.

Combating nativist sentiments, Germans joined with the Democrats and became active office seekers. The 1856 Indianapolis city election saw Germans Frederick Stein, John B. Stumph, and Charles G. Coulon winning the offices of clerk, assessor, and justice of the peace, respectively. When Mayor Henry West died in office, the Common Council elected Coulon interim mayor, a position he held for two weeks in November 1856.

The Democratic Party’s stance on slavery created divisions with the local German community and forced many to disassociate themselves from the party. The Freie Presse (established 1853) expressed the views of many liberal Germans when it advocated the total abolition of slavery rather than simply opposing its expansion into the territories.

While the Germans continued to support Democratic opposition to temperance and the prohibition of alcohol, they could not continue to vote for a party that did not value the freedom of all people. The presidential election of 1856, however, revealed the extent of divisions among the Germans. Some of the more established members continued their support of the party. The Turngemeinde, one faction of the utopian, nationalist German gymnastic and cultural associations brought to the U.S by German immigrants in the 19^th century, favored the Free Soil Party (See Turners/Turnvereins). The Freie Presse, an Indianapolis German-American newspaper, chose to endorse John C. Fremont and the newly created Republican Party (See German-Language Press).

In response, Freie Presse editor Theodore Hielscher formed the German Republican Society in 1856, and by 1860 the Indianapolis German community strongly supported Abraham Lincoln’s candidacy for president. Germans were not merely Republican supporters, they sided with the most liberal factions of the party. In 1860. Hielscher played a significant role in defeating the presidential candidacy of the more conservative Republican judge Edward Bates. Coming from an autocratic and oppressive system of government in their homeland, local Germans played an active role in recognizing the rights of all people.

Germans remained united in their support of the Republicans throughout the 1860s and early 1870s. In an 1868 Turnerbund convention in Boston, however, 17 delegates from the Indianapolis Turnverein were thrown out for their objections to the organization’s support of enfranchisement for African Americans.

New divisions within the local German political community began to appear with the 1876 election. The Zukunft, a previously pro-Republican, Turner-supported newspaper, endorsed the Democratic ticket of Samuel Tilden and Thomas A. Hendricks. In 1878, a new German Republican paper, the Indiana Tribüne, made its first appearance, while the Telegraph (founded 1865) presented the views of the independent Democratic Party within the German community.

The 1882 election saw temperance and prohibition legislation reemerge as an issue, and Germans worked actively against its introduction. Not only did Germans like their beer and maintain that within limits there was nothing wrong with its consumption, but they also argued that laws against it were an infringement upon the rights of all citizens. Germans supported the Democrats in this election and were instrumental in the defeat of temperance and prohibition legislation.

Nationally, Germans were often politically linked by religion, with Catholics favoring the Democrats and Protestants favoring the Republicans. German immigrants in Indianapolis, originating primarily from the northern regions, were mainly Protestant in their religious beliefs and tended to support the Republicans. The liberal German community was very supportive of the labor movement as it related to political issues.

Germans continued to be politically active as a group until the United States’ entrance into World War I. While Germans nationwide were generally sympathetic toward Spain during the Spanish-American War, local Germans supported President William McKinley’s policies. As a result, the Indianapolis News reported, “No truer Americans walk the soil or breathe the air than the Germans that have made this land their home.”

Many joined the local German-American Alliance to promote German culture and better education, and to lobby against laws restricting personal freedoms. Local German merchant Joseph H. Keller served as president of the Indiana German-American Alliance and vice president of the National Alliance and used his position to attack temperance and prohibitionist efforts.

With World War I, Indianapolis Germans demonstrated both through their press and political organizations their loyalty to the homeland and dissatisfaction with the United States’ neutrality and its initial threat to sever diplomatic relations with Germany. No evidence exists to determine if local Germans were involved in the national German-American Alliance movement that worked for the defeat of President Woodrow Wilson in 1916 because of his alleged bias toward Britain, although they did abandon the Democratic Party.

Following the declaration of war, most Germans affirmed their loyalty to America by participating in local bond drives and working in war relief efforts but continued to face social persecution for their German sympathies. Indiana governor James P. Goodrich acknowledged their support by appointing as his military secretary German-born businessman Richard Lieber, who helped rally German American opinion to the American cause. 

The war, however, hastened assimilation of the German population and effectively eliminated them as a unified political voice in the ensuing decades.