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ABSTRACTSeveral recent analyses have examined the effects of religious beliefs, belonging, and behaviors on the representation of women in American politics. Taken collectively, these studies present an interesting puzzle. Specifically, they demonstrate that religious adherents express attitudes that are less supportive of women in positions of political leadership and that at every stage of the process, from primary candidacy to general-election victory, women are less likely to run and win in districts with greater numbers of religious adherents. However, this does not appear to be the result of even the most devout voters' unwillingness to support women candidates in general elections. This body of work, therefore, suggests that the effect of religion on the representation of women manifests at earlier stages of the process, including individual vote choice in primary elections, party and elite recruitment, and potential candidates' strategic entry decisions.

ABSTRACTMuch has been written about efforts to expand women's social, cultural, and political representation, roles, and opportunities. However, as political scientists, we have done little to document the early history of incorporating women into the discipline. This article illustrates how the General Federation of Women's Clubs (GFWC) established the study of politics as an acceptable course of baccalaureate study for women: first, by crafting a model curriculum; second, by advocating for the creation of endowed chairs in political science at women's colleges; and, third, by publishing in scholarly outlets. The GFWC's efforts can be viewed as the first steps to the incorporation of women into the discipline—a question that continues to be the subject of much analysis and consternation by professional associations and the academic community.

AbstractThe lynching literature often considers how the Populist Party affected lynching, yet the Southern Farmers' Alliance—a short-lived but influential voluntary association that mobilized large numbers of white farmers—is overlooked. We argue that this is a critical oversight, as the Alliance was the origin of populism in the South. Specifically, we hypothesize that where the Alliance had more local organizations, the greater the likelihood of lynching from 1888 to 1895, the peak period of populism. To test this, we focus on two states with different experiences with the Alliance: North Carolina, in which the state's Alliance was a strong supporter of the Populist Party, and South Carolina, where the Democrats sought to court Alliancemen and deter the creation of, and voting for, the Populist Party. Our empirical findings reveal that lynchings were more common in counties where the Farmers' Alliance had more organizations in South Carolina, but no similar connection exists in North Carolina. These findings suggest that the Southern Farmers' Alliance is, at times, pivotal to understanding populism's connection to lynching in the late-nineteenth century American South.

AbstractObjectiveThis study seeks to investigate how social, political, and economic factors shaped demand for membership in three major federated fraternal orders in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th centuries: the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Knights of Pythias, and the Improved Order of Red Men.MethodsError‐correction, time‐series‐cross‐sectional models are estimated using state‐level data, with the first differences in total membership, new initiations, and suspensions serving as dependent variables.ResultsWe find evidence that railroads, urbanization, immigration, bank panics, and presidential election years all had significant effects on membership; those effects, however, varied by fraternal order.ConclusionThe demand for American fraternalism was affected by civil society, politics, and the economy in ways that scholars have not previously studied.

AbstractScholars and journalists connect pandemics to a rise in support for radical political movements. In this study, we draw on this insight to investigate the relationship between the 1918–1919 Spanish influenza pandemic and political extremism—here, the rise of the second Ku Klux Klan—in the United States. Specifically, we ask whether U.S. states and cities with higher death rates from the Spanish flu also had stronger Ku Klux Klan organizations in the early 1920s. Our results do not provide evidence of such a connection; in fact, the data suggest greater Klan membership where the pandemic was less severe. This provides initial evidence that pandemic severity, as measured by mortality, is not necessarily a cause of extremism in the United States; power devaluation as a result of social and cultural change, however, does appear to spur such mobilization.

AbstractRelatively little is known about how late nineteenth-century associations worked to get their policy goals adopted by state governments. We study this question here, considering the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) and three policies it supported: scientific temperance instruction, increasing the age of consent, and prohibiting tobacco sales to minors. Overall, WCTU-supported legislation was more likely to succeed in states with unified Republican state legislatures, aided by neighboring state adoptions (scientific temperance) and greater WCTU membership (increasing age of consent and prohibiting tobacco sales to minors). These findings are supported by historical evidence, which reveals how WCTU leadership targeted particular states when lobbying for scientific temperance instruction laws and utilized its broad membership base to pressure state legislatures on the other two issues. In total, these results show how one late nineteenth-century membership group was able to facilitate the successful spread of its policies throughout the nation.

AbstractObjectiveLarge, federated voluntary associations of the late 19th and early 20th centuries produced detailed reports of national meetings that included comprehensive data on state‐level membership. Though used in previous scholarship, the veracity of these data has never been evaluated.MethodsWe test 16 associations' state‐level membership data, generally between 1880 and 1920, using Benford's Law, a mathematical principle used to discern whether data are potentially problematic—through error, fraud, or other reasons—and require further investigation.ResultsOur initial analyses reveal that these data deviate statistically from Benford's predictions. Further investigation, however, finds that these differences are not substantively significant; an aggregate measure of all associations shows close conformity to the Newcomb–Benford distribution.ConclusionThe data presented in voluntary associations' annual reports are likely trustworthy. These findings have important implications for future use of these data, other association data, and the role of associations in promoting civil society.