Women Smugglers of the Gilded-Age

customs_women_inspection_1Gilded-age American newspapers commonly printed drawings of female customs inspectors undressing young women looking for contraband. They published them partly to titillate (more…)

Smuggling and Citizenship

I wrote a guest post for Religion in American History:

The nineteenth-century United States was a paradoxical place for Jews. No land on Earth was more open to Jewish immigration. The First Amendment to the Constitution and the disestablishment of state religions meant non-Christians could be citizens and office holders. Yet, Jews were a tiny minority. If discrimination was less common in the U.S. than in nations like Russia, it was nonetheless a reality that democratic ideology could not staunch.

Read the full post at Religion in American History!