Erasing Anarchism

By examining Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti’s 1920s trial—and the radical and progressive literature written in its wake—this article offers a revised explanation for anarchism’s decline before World War II. It contends that the era’s legal and literary discourses shared a common drive: each forced Sacco and Vanzetti to represent . Placing two anarchists within these representational discourses effectively erased anarchism: the trial disposed of the criminal bodies and eliminated anarchism’s threat to the nation while denying any interest in radical politics; the literary Left then sublimated anarchism in order to form a nonanarchist collective and to reshape—yet retain—national government. Ultimately, then, the essay argues that anarchism faded during the period because it faced a paradox: it must be represented to appear as a meaningful political movement, even as it challenged the structures of representation that sustained American criminal law and democracy

Aesthetics · Democracy · Government (linguistics · Linguistics · Order (exchange · Political radicalism · Political science · Politics · Representation (politics · Sociology · Anarchism and Radical Politics · History · Italian Fascism and Post-war Society · Law · Philosophy · Walter Benjamin Studies Compilation

• The Transference and the Case of Sacco and Vanzetti

  Open Access•Michael Mayo•Open Library of Humanities•2020

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• Men, Mobs, and Law

  Rebecca Hill, Rebecca D Hill et al.•Men, Mobs, and Law•2020

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• The Will to Empower

  Barbara Cruikshank•The Will to Empower•1999

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• Dos Passos' U.S.A

  James A Miller, Donald Pizer•American Literature•1991

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• John Dos Passos

  Walter B Rideout, Townsend Ludington•American Literature•1982

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• Reconstituting Authority

  Greg Crane, William E Moddelmog•American Journal of Legal History•2001

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• Radical representations

  Barbara Foley•Radical representations•1993

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• Violence and the Word

  Robert M Cover•The Yale Law Journal•1986

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• Residues of Justice

  Wai Chee Dimock, Wai-Chee Dimock•Residues of Justice•1996

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