An un-American objection: Mennonite conscientious objectors and American antagonisms in Kansas during World War I

Michael Horton Dennis

As pacifistic and traditionally-isolated people, Mennonites have been persecuted throughout their history, often fleeing to more accepting places. Beckoned by American's open land and religious freedom, around 4,000 Russian Mennonites immigrated to Kansas in the 1870s, escaping mandatory conscription during the Crimean War and Russo-Turkish War. These ethnically-German Mennonites were initially respected as German-Americans as they began acculturating into American society. America's entrance into World War I triggered suspicion toward Mennonites as disloyal "alien" citizens. Mandatory conscription attendant to the Selective Service Act of 1917 fueled the belief that Mennonite pacifist convictions and their religious identity threatened the nation more than being ethnic Germans. Although Mennonites refused to serve in combat roles, they registered for the draft and applied for conscientious objector (C.O.) status. While waiting for government-created noncombatant roles, 3,898 Mennonites suffered mental and physical persecution at Camp Funston and Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Some avoided the harshest abuse by accepting noncombatant roles; 135 refused any form of service, resulting in continued persecution and military censure via court-martial. Their circumstances during World War I notwithstanding, Mennonites resumed their acculturation after the war. Fifty years after the last C.O. was released in 1920, the Mennonite Library and Archives in Newton, Kansas, conducted interviews with approximately 300 World War I Mennonite C.O.s. About forty interviews fit this study's specifics and emphasized the significance of Kansas: either the interviewees lived in Kansas before the war experiencing society's tension toward Mennonites and C.O.s or they had been sent to Camp Funston and Fort Leavenworth during the war. These oral histories serve as the main primary source for this study. Kansas newspapers such as the Kansas City Star and Hays Free Press are also an important component of this study because they represent Kansas society's views toward Mennonites and C.O.s. These sources together with published memoirs, and personal accounts from Mennonite C.O.s, and national pacifist and anti-pacifist leaders are supplemented by selected secondary sources. This study explains how the experiences of ethno-religiously different Kansas Mennonite C.O.s during World War I demonstrate the ironies of tolerance, inclusion, and American liberty in wartime.

An un-American objection: Mennonite conscientious objectors and American antagonisms in Kansas during World War I

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