Manuscripts Collection
Knute Nelson was born in Vosse Elven, Norway, on February 2, 1843. In 1849 he and his widowed mother emigrated to the United States, settling first in Chicago (1849-1850), then in Dane County, Wisconsin, where he enlisted in the Fourth Wisconsin Cavalry Regiment (1861-1864) during the Civil War. Following the war he was graduated from the Albion Academy and studied law in a Madison, Wisconsin, law office, being admitted to the bar in 1867 and then serving as a representative in the Wisconsin assembly (1868-1869).
In 1871 he moved with his family to Alexandria, Minnesota, where he practiced law while farming a homestead tract. He served as Douglas County attorney (1872-1974), Minnesota state senator (1875-1878), presidential elector (1880), University of Minnesota regent (1882-1893), and fifth district representative to Congress (1883-1889). He was elected governor of Minnesota in 1892 and 1894, which post he resigned in 1895 to run successfully for the United States Senate, where he remained until 1923. Nelson was chairman of the Senate judiciary committee and the senate committee on public lands, and was active on the commerce and Indian affairs committees. His most notable legislative measures included the Nelson Bankruptcy Act (1898) and the act creating the Department of Commerce and Labor (1902), and he was also active in the establishment of the Interstate Commerce Commission. Nelson also supported a low tariff, a federal income tax, Prohibition, the Sherman Act, and the League of Nations. He died on April 28, 1923, during his fifth senatorial term.
The above information was taken from the following sources:
Nelson's papers consist of 76 boxes of correspondence and related items, arranged chronologically, and 5 boxes of miscellaneous materials. They document his life as a soldier with the Fourth Wisconsin Cavalry (1861-1864), as a country lawyer at Alexandria, Minnesota (1866-1892), and as Minnesota governor and United States senator (1892-1923). The papers become voluminous with the year 1916 when carbon copies of Nelson's own letters become frequent.
The majority of the papers focus on political and legislative affairs, largely dealing with Minnesota matters or reflecting Minnesota attitudes and interests. There is material on political parties and election campaigns; on Nelson's interactions with, and services to, his constituents; on a wide spectrum of matters of interest to the Senate judiciary and commerce committees, including shipping and trade, currency and banking legislation, industry and its regulation, tariffs, income and other taxes, child welfare, water power, rural postal service, and prohibition; and on such other topics as natural resource conservation, Indian affairs, foreign relations and affairs, and World War I.
One subject that pervades the entire collection is Nelson's close relationship to Minnesotans, and Americans in general, of Scandinavian ancestry. Throughout the papers he can be seen as an ethnic group leader and an exemplar of what the Scandinavian could become. He depended on their votes, cultivated their friendship and correspondence, and reached them through foreign-language newspapers, with whose editors--like F. C. Listoe of the Nordvesten--he was in close contact. Another general subject area is public opinion and public pressure, for which documentation is abundant throughout Nelson's political career.
In his earlier years, many of Nelson's legal activities related to land, including homestead entries, pre-emption rights, mortgage foreclosures, claim jumping, and conflicts between settlers and railroad companies. His papers as collection agent for farm equipment firms afford data on debtor-creditor relations between the East and the West. There is also considerable material on Minnesota politics and elections, especially the Republican Party, on public opinion and public pressure, and on the Nonpartisan League.
These documents are organized into the following sections:
Access to and use of reserve materials requires the curator's permission.
Accession numbers: 1767; 2092; 2107; 2109; 2110; 2121; 2194; 2205; 2212; 2369; 2382; 2592; 2601; 2977; 3203; 3826; 5217; 5299; 5438; 5468; 5841; 5982; 6372; 6635; 8376; 8798; 9193; 10,062; 12,467; 12,468
Processed by: Dennis Meissner, Lydia Lucas, December 1982
Digitized by: Christopher G. Welter, May 2011
Digitization of reserve material was made possible by the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund through the vote of Minnesotans on November 4, 2008.
Catalog ID numbers: 001738001
The early correspondence (1861-1870) documents Nelson's personal life and education during and immediately following the Civil War and his early law practice in Madison, Wisconsin. The 1871-1892 correspondence and the other legal materials are largely concerned with his general law practice in Alexandria, Minnesota, as well as with his increasingly significant political activities leading up to his 1892 gubernatorial election. The paragraphs below give an overview of the significant areas of Nelson's legal practice.
Largely handwritten and undated documents.
The political papers may be divided into three general subject areas: (1) those dealing with party politics and political campaigns, (2) request for favors from constituents, and (3) those dealing with national issues, policies, and legislation. Nearly all the material deals with Minnesota, and letters on national issues generally reflect Minnesota attitudes and interests. Only the correspondence that Nelson received because of his position on the senate judiciary and commerce committees contains significant material having no direct bearing on Minnesota.
There are some 1867 letters regarding Nelson's race for assemblyman from Dane County, Wisconsin, and the 1874 papers show Nelson in Minnesota with political aspirations. There is some material showing Nelson's relationship with Senator Moses E. Clapp and a large amount tracing the political rise of Frank B. Kellogg and his campaigns of 1916 and 1922. In 1900, there are some letters regarding the William D. Washburn candidacy for Republican vice presidential nominee, as well as letters from surrounding states indicating the popularity of Nelson with Scandinavian-Americans. Other letters (1901) give information on the functioning of political machines and the effect of the new primary election legislation on "ring" politics. There are letters in 1904 regarding the John A. Johnson-Robert C. Dunn contest for Minnesota governor, in which there was danger of a nationality contest between Minnesota Swedes and Norwegians; ethnic rivalry fear cropped up again in 1908 during the Johnson-Jacob F. Jacobson gubernatorial campaign.
Numerous letters during 1916-1920 give a clear picture of the condemnatory attitude of Nelson and the conservative Republicans toward Senator Robert La Follette of Wisconsin and Representative Charles Lindbergh, Sr. The two men were classed with Arthur C. Townley, the Industrial Workers of the World, and the pro-Germans, to whom public opinion in Minnesota (at least the part that wrote to Nelson) was greatly opposed, and Nelson's papers afford a vivid idea of the heights to which passions stimulated by war propaganda reached. Townley and the Nonpartisan League appear in 1917, replacing La Follette letters in number and importance after 1918. Also, a few letters in 1918-1919 deal with the Tom Mooney case, a few in 1919 support the "Centralia massacre" (a violent clash between townspeople and organized lumber workers in Centralia, Washington), and a few beginning in 1919 relate to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, bolshevism, and the "Red Scare" in the United States.
There is practically no contemporaneous reference to perhaps the two most exciting political contests in which Nelson was engaged: The Nelson-C. F. Kindred congressional campaign of 1882 and the Nelson-William D. Washburn contest for the United States Senate in 1894-1895, although some later letters throw light on the Nelson-Kindred campaign.
Nelson used methods other than ethnic appeal in building up his political support. The papers reveal his technique of asking Minnesota postmasters for lists of their patrons, to whom he would send campaign literature, public documents, and free seeds under government frank (see letters of A. M. Hayes to C. H. Hicks, Oct. 15, 1906 and Sept. 4, 1912). Also, if a letter to Nelson was from an important local political figure, Nelson was careful to send him a special letter in reply. In addition, there is a good deal of correspondence with the Minnesota men who looked after Nelson's political affairs while he was in Washington. Such men include L. M. Willcuts, J. A. O. Preus, William Grimshaw, Ivan Bowen, William E. Hale, George H. Sullivan, and Laurits S. Swenson.
Somewhat different was his relationship with Minnesota industrial and financial leaders, who supported Nelson but expected him to give their interests careful attention. They include Joseph Chapman, Albert C. Loring, Edward W. Decker, J. M. Crosby, Edward W. Backus, Charles S. Pillsbury, Charles M. Harrington, John R. Van Derlip, Clive T. Jaffray, J. N. MacMillan, Clarence P. Carpenter, Edmund Pennington, A. A. D. Rahn, Rome G. Brown, Fred C. Van Dusen, Mortimer H. Boutell, Thomas B. Walker, and Herschel V. Jones.
The manipulative struggle of John F. McGee (1920-1923) to become a United States district judge illustrates office-seekers' methods, while the 1908 Hale-Purdy conflict over the United States district judgeship and the 1914 Minneapolis post office fight demonstrate the use of letters to pressure a politician into securing an appointment. The correspondence of A. A. D. Rahn, I. T. Caswell, Edward E. Smith, and George H. Sullivan is filled with recommendations and suggestions for appointments. The papers suggest that once a job was secured the appointee often requested Nelson's aid in obtaining pay raises, a better position, transfers, better hours, help in keeping the position, retirement pay when aged or infirm, or a pension. A few apparently depended upon the senator's influence in keeping their jobs, and the impression is given that the Indian Service was worst in terms of personnel quality. The postal service is shown as being the most active in seeking pay increases or better working conditions, with rural free delivery men and railroad postal clerks perhaps the most persistent, and certainly the best organized, of the groups of government employees appearing in the correspondence.
The war also brought many requests for furloughs, discharges, help in finding missing soldiers, and help in straightening out a soldier's insurance, dependent allotment, or Liberty Bond installment. Complaints about the mail service to France were numerous. With the armistice came many requests for discharge from the army or for maintaining army rank, as well as requests seeking to reverse dishonorable discharges and military prison sentences. Also, in August 1914, there were numerous letters asking Nelson's service in getting relatives out of Europe, in locating them, or in sending them money. After the war came letters seeking passports, the return of soldiers' bodies, recompense for cancelled government contracts, and aid in getting European relatives admitted to the United States.
With Woodrow Wilson's inauguration as President, the letters regarding currency and banking legislation increase in number. In 1913 there was the Glass-Owen currency bill and the Federal Reserve Act, and in 1914 a controversy developed regarding the appointment of Paul M. Warburg and Thomas D. Jones to the Federal Reserve Board, with Nelson opposing Jones' appointment. The same year saw many protests against the proposed taxes on freight, bank checks, telephone calls, gasoline, transactions on exchanges, real estate conveyances, proprietary medicines, life insurance, and motion picture houses. Discussion of branch banking began in 1916, continuing throughout the papers, and there was a flood of letters in 1918 from stockholders in the Pan Motor Company, the stock sales and promotional activities of which had been curtailed by the Capital Issues Commission. The Farm Loan Bank Act brought letters in 1919 which continue in lesser numbers to the end of the collection. There is little mention of the panic of 1907 and only incidental reference to the depression of 1921.
Letters from the Lakes to the Gulf Deep Waterway Association document the effort to improve the Mississippi River as a commercial waterway. Associated with the river's development are the issues of flood prevention, regulation of Minnesota lake levels, dams on rivers and at the outlets of lakes, bridges, drainage, and levees, which topics are well documented in the papers, many of the letters being those of the U. S. Army Chief of Engineers or his subordinate stationed in St. Paul. Letters regarding the Great Lakes to the Sea Waterway, which begin in 1919, are fewer than those regarding the Mississippi project.
The following ocean shipping issues are documented in the collection: a 1909 ship subsidy proposal; the Panama tolls controversy and coastwise shipping problems in the 1913 letters; a number of letters dealing with lifeboats, safety devices, and safety regulations following the Titanic disaster of 1912; and requests for better hours and pay in 1914 and 1915 by members of the Revenue Cutter Service and Life Saving Service. Most of the correspondence, like the 1915 letters regarding the ship purchase bill, came from the owners but occasionally a seaman is heard from, as in the 1915-1916 letters about La Follette's seaman bill. During the war the Emergency Fleet Corporation's activities and the U. S. Shipping Board are subjects, and, in 1919, letters appear regarding the Rowe bill to improve marine and shipping working conditions.
Attempts to amend the Sherman Anti-Trust Act brought both criticism and support. In 1913 there was the Bacon bill amending the act in favor of labor unions, and the Clayton bill of similar import in 1914. At the same time, Newland's Trade Commission bill aroused interest as did the Stevens price standardization bill, the Pomerene bill of lading bill, the Lindquist pure fabric bill, and the Stephens-Ashurst price maintenance bill. The Hughes-Booker convict labor bill, which would have abolished interstate trade in prison-manufactured goods--thereby affecting the trade of the Stillwater penitentiary--was of particular interest to Minnesota and the subject of letters from 1913 to 1916.
Some of the reform-oriented legislative proposals of the Wilson administration are discussed in the papers, including the Harrison narcotic bill and the Esch phosphorus bill, letters about which appear in 1912. The Harrison bill caused a conflict between pharmacists and doctors as to whether or not the druggists should be allowed to sell preparations containing narcotics without a prescription and also received the strong opposition of the patent medicine industry. Minnesotans favored the Esch bill, which was designed to end harms associated with the phosphorus match industry. Another reform measure was the McLean bill for the protection of migratory birds, letters concerning which appear in 1913 and 1914. There is correspondence in 1913 regarding the Simmons bill to prohibit the transportation of prize fight motion pictures and 1915-1916 letters about federal censorship of motion pictures. Letters on this subject reappear in 1919, and a similar measure for radio control brought out letters in 1918-1921.
Nelson's connection with the Commerce Committee brought him many letters regarding the railroads and their regulations. There is material concerning the eight-hour day agitation and threatened strike of the railroad employees in 1916. Throughout the remainder of the papers there is evidence pertaining to employer-employee relationships, wage adjustments, industrial conflicts and settlements, and improvement of working conditions in the railroads and in other industries as well. The 1918-1919 papers provide a good deal of material on government operation of railroads through the Federal Railroad Administration as well as agitation both for and against government ownership of the railroads. This period also offers letters in favor of federal control of wireless telegraphy and telephone and telegraph systems as well as letters concerning the Interstate Commerce Commission and attempts to amend its powers.
The work of the Federal Fuel Administration in Minnesota during World War I is well illustrated in the letters of John F. McGee to Nelson. The issue of Minnesota's coal supply continued into the postwar years, merging with the issue of the coal miners strike of 1921. Those issues, including coal, iron ore, and steel freight rates, are discussed in letters from 1918 to 1922.
The above papers documenting Nelson's work with the Commerce Committee illustrate the conflicts among various economic interest groups: big millers, city bankers, country millers, country merchants and bankers, and farmers, and the conflict is most plain in the correspondence dealing with grain marketing. There are letters throughout the collection demonstrating the importance of the produce exchanges in Minnesota's economic life and throwing light on the operations of the Minneapolis grain market and on Northwest agricultural conditions. Millers, bankers, and farmers were all interested in, and corresponded with regard to, such subjects as cooperative agricultural extension work and the feedstuffs bill in 1913, federal inspection of grain in 1914, and freight rates on grain products in 1919. Other 1919 letters deal with the issues of fair food prices and the Kenyon and Kendrick bills to regulate packing houses, and in 1921 the cooperative marketing act is discussed.
After the prohibition amendment went into effect, there were letters from patent medicine and flavoring extract concerns regarding the law's effect on their preparations. During prohibition there were many letters, especially in 1920-1921, concerning the appointment of enforcement officers and considerable correspondence (1918-1923) with Edwin C. Dinwiddie and George B. Safford concerning prohibition and its enforcement. For Nelson's attitude toward prohibition see letter to Dinwiddie, September 23, 1918.
There is quite a bit of material on Alaskan railways, coal lands, general economic conditions, and Alaskan politics. Nelson received correspondence from persons living in Alaska, many of them former Minnesotans, and in 1903 he visited Alaska and became acquainted with conditions there so that thenceforth the people of Alaska seemed to rely upon his help. (Correspondence regarding Alaska trip, April-Oct. 1903. See also Appendix 1.) Letters from Henry W. Elliott regarding the Alaska fur seals and demonstrating his interest in their protection are found throughout the collection, although they are most numerous for the years 1908-1916.
The outbreak of war brought a great mass of correspondence regarding the Fuel Administration in Minnesota, the Food Administration, the Railroad Administration, trading with the enemy and the Espionage Act, the Alien Property Custodian, the Public Safety Commission of Minnesota, the War Revenue Act, the National Defense Act, the Draft Law, Minnesota Home Guards, the Minnesota National Guard, the training camp at Fort Snelling, army cantonments, government contracts, war risk insurance, Liberty Loans and drives, prohibition in war time, the draft boards and their work, the War Industries Board, the Priority Board of the Council of National Defense, and the National War Labor Board. This correspondence creates a good picture of Minnesota during the war and of Nelson's efforts to place the state's resources behind the national war mobilization, as well as his efforts to win over or neutralize those groups that believed the war was a mistake. In connection with this, Nelson used the "Pro-Germanism" label to vilify opponents like Robert La Follette, Charles Lindbergh, and Arthur C. Townley although he appeared to do so with greater restraint than most.
Following the war, Nelson broke with his party on the League of Nations issue, and his letters offer an interesting glimpse into the Senate attitude toward the League and toward Wilson. (For data on the League fight see Nelson to Listoe, Dec. 2, 1919 and to Grevstad, Dec. 5, 1919; for Nelson on the twelve irreconcilables see letter to Willcuts, April 23, 1920.) Accompanying and following the League fight is propaganda from the League to Enforce Peace.
Other topics in letters of this period include the influenza epidemic of 1919, repeal of the Daylight Saving Law, and agitation for and against the release of conscientious objectors, interned aliens, and other war prisoners. The Borah amnesty bill created a lot of discussion as did the judiciary subcommittee investigation of German propaganda and brewing interests. Nelson received many requests for the hearings of that committee in 1919. The interest thereby aroused led to a demand in 1919 for strengthening of the sedition laws. Letters in 1913 concerning the Burnett-Dillingham bill and in 1914 concerning the Dilllingham-Smith bill for a literacy test show that public opinion was then in conflict with regard to immigration restriction. The letters continue but in 1918 there is a demand for legislation against undesirables and the deportation of immigrants who do not conform to American ways. Nelson also received a number of letters asking him for aid in preventing the deportation of aliens.
The correspondence for the years 1919-1923 is full of lobbying on behalf of Ireland, China, Korea, Syria, Poland, Greece, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Armenia; the Shantung and Fiume questions are also reflected in the correspondence. In 1921 war loans to the allies are under discussion. Some 1923 letters contain requests for relief of conditions in Austria and Germany, which Nelson received in large numbers because many of his constituents were of German extraction. The most active ethnic group in Minnesota, however, was the Irish, and thousands of names were obtained for petitions favoring the recognition of Irish independence.
The most active and powerful of the groups lobbying Nelson was the former soldiers. Letters favoring a monetary compensation for the solders (1918-1923) ask Nelson to support the various bills calling for a bonus or adjusted compensation and for veterans' rehabilitation and vocational training. Nelson was evidently disgusted with the apparent raid upon the treasury and contrasted it with what he felt to be the relatively selfless behavior of union soldiers following the Civil War. (For Nelson's ideas regarding the bonus agitation see his letters to Peter G. Peterson, January 31, 1921 and to Fred H. Russell, February 15, 1921.)
Concerns Roosevelt's recollection on the creation of Department of Commerce and Labor.
Digital version
Most are handwritten.
Printed bills, laws,
Memoranda, notes, circulars, statements, transcripts of letters and speeches (by others), background information, and typed copies of bills and articles relating to legislation of interest to Nelson.
Memoranda, notes, circulars, statements, transcripts of letters and speeches (by others), background information, and typed copies of bills and articles relating to legislation of interest to Nelson.
Daybook entries, case notes, and lists of debts for collection (largely 1868-1872); income tax returns (1916-1922).
Reminiscences cover the 1843-1862 period.
Includes Nelson's birth certificate and related materials, including translations; three pieces of U.S. currency, 1842, 1850, 1858; a photograph of Nelson's Washington, D.C. home, and a title and deed to the property (1884-1897); a hardbound, decorated menu inscribed to Nelson as governor-elect, 1892; a suedebound certificate of election to U.S. Senate, 1901.
Transcripts of a few of Nelson's wartime letters and reminiscences, lists of those who served in the regiment, and letters to Nelson from regimental comrades.
Maps accumulated by Nelson, largely during his senatorial years. Most are printed, but there are some manuscript maps pertaining to his Minnesota farmstead and other properties.
Sacred readings for home use, based upon New Testament texts.
A geography of the world.
Handwritten book of ecclesiastical choral works.
A Bible.
Anti-Nelson campaign broadside from 1882 Nelson-Kindred campaign.