To Shake Their Guns in the Tyrant's Face: Libertarian Political Violence and the Origins of the Militia Movement

by Robert H. Churchill

After the bombings of Oklahoma City in 1995, most Americans were shocked to discover that tens of thousands of their fellow citizens had banded together in homegrown militias. Within the next few years, numerous studies and media reports appeared revealing the unseen world of the American militia movement, a loose alliance of groups with widely divergent views. Not surprisingly, it was the movement’s most extreme voices that attracted the lion's share of attention. In reality the militia movement was neither as irrational nor as new as it was portrayed in the press, Robert Churchill writes. What bound the movement together was the shared belief that citizens have a right, even a duty, to take up arms against wanton exercise of unconstitutional power by the federal government. Many were motivated to join the movement by what they saw as a rise in state violence, illustrated by the government assaults at Ruby Ridge, Idaho in 1992, and Waco, Texas in 1993. It was this perception and the determination to deter future state violence, Churchill argues, that played the greatest role in the growth of the American militia movement. Churchill uses three case studies to illustrate the origin of some of the core values of the modern militia Fries' Rebellion in Pennsylvania at the end of the eighteenth century, the Sons of Liberty Conspiracy in Civil War-era Indiana and Illinois, and the Black Legion in Michigan and Ohio during the Depression. Building on extensive interviews with militia members, the author places the contemporary militia movement in the context of these earlier insurrectionary movements that, animated by a libertarian interpretation of the American Revolution, used force to resist the authority of the federal government. A historian of early America, Robert H. Churchill has published numerous articles on American political violence and the right to keep and bear arms. He is currently Associate Professor of History at the University of Hartford.
"This book is about how we think about the past, how cultural memories are formed and evolve, and how these memories then come to impact current understandings of issues. Churchill provides an enlightening analysis of the ideology, structure, and purpose of the militia movement. Where much scholarship has categorized it as a cohesive, single movement, Churchill begins the process of unraveling its complexity."
---Steve Chermak, Michigan State University " To Shake Their Guns in the Tyrant's Face addresses an area---the relationship of American political violence to American ideology---that is of growing importance and that is commanding an ever increasing audience, and it does so in a way like nothing else in the field."
---David Williams, Indiana University Bloomington

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction

384 pages, Hardcover

First published March 3, 2009

Reviews

[Peter · Rating 2 out of 5]

Has some useful analysis in some places, but is way too thesis-heavy and credulous towards the claims of militia enthusiasts, to the point of absurdity.

[University of Michigan Press]

After the Oklahoma City bombings in 1995 Americans were shocked to learn that homegrown extremists—not Middle Eastern or Muslim terrorists—had blown up the Alfred Murrah Federal Building. Prior to Oklahoma City, most of us believed that terrorism rarely, if ever, originated in the United States.

Within the next few years, however, numerous studies and media reports appeared uncovering the shadowy world of American militias, a loose alliance of groups with widely divergent views. Whatever their disagreements, they nevertheless shared a common interest in guns and martial training. Not surprisingly, it was the most extreme among them who attracted the lion's share of attention.

Equally disturbing and largely overlooked amid the growing publicity was a shared belief among the various militia factions that civilians had a right—even a duty—to take up arms against what they saw as the wanton exercise of unconstitutional power by the federal government. In the years following the government's actions at Ruby Ridge, in 1992, and the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, in 1993, it was this concept, Robert Churchill argues, that played the greatest role in the growth of the American militia movement.

Churchill uses three case studies to identify the origins of the militia movement: Fries's Rebellion in Pennsylvania at the end of the eighteenth century, the Sons of Liberty Conspiracy in Civil War-era Indiana and Illinois, and the Black Legion in Michigan and Ohio during the Depression. Building on extensive interviews with militia members, the author places the contemporary militia movement in the context of earlier insurrectionary movements that, clinging to a libertarian interpretation of the American Revolution, used force to resist the authority of the Federal Government.