Thread by @opinion

It’s tempting to view QAnon’s rise as a threat to democracy – especially with a believer poised to win a seat in the House of Representatives.

But history suggests that conspiracy-based movements have been a part of America since its founding trib.al/jv8J56V

Long before the modern Republican and Democratic parties held sway, fringe movements surged, often embracing some pretty bizarre conspiracies.

Eventually, the QAnons of the past were absorbed – or alternatively, excommunicated – by mainstream parties trib.al/jv8J56V

In the 1790s, the New Englander Federalists became convinced that Illuminati members headquartered in Europe were plotting to destroy the new nation.

A strange coalition of politicians and Congregational preachers joined together to sound the alarm trib.al/jv8J56V

Some Federalist true believers argued that Thomas Jefferson was the leader of the American Illuminati and the embodiment of the Antichrist.

After Jefferson’s victory in 1800, this early movement quickly faded out – as did the Federalist Party trib.al/jv8J56V

In the 1820s, the U.S. was left with only a single major political party, the Democratic Republicans.

In this fresh wave of paranoia, a new political party was born in 1828: the Anti-Masonic Party trib.al/jv8J56V

Back then, many political elites belonged to the Freemasons.

Members pledged secrecy, and high-ranking Masons earned titles like “master” and “high priest.” This was the “Deep State” circa 1826, complete with a star defector like Q: William Morgan trib.al/jv8J56V

William Morgan, critic of the Masonic Order, was arrested and promptly disappeared. A body was never found.

As one historian wrote, “Masonic secrecy became synonymous with darkness, sin, immorality, intemperance, treason, and the work of Satan” trib.al/jv8J56V

And yet, this didn't lead to the end of the republic. Instead, the Anti-Masonic Party became politically institutionalized.

In total, 40 anti-Masons went to Congress, and many more to state legislatures. It was then largely absorbed by the Whig Party trib.al/jv8J56V

After this, an even more elaborate set of conspiracists would soon coalesce:

–– The “Order of the Star-Spangled Banner”
–– The “Know Nothings”
–– The John Birch Society trib.al/jv8J56V

In 1958, a candy magnate named Robert Welch founded the John Birch Society, a group that anticipated much of the QAnon worldview.

In his writings, Welch traced the roots of a collectivist conspiracy back to – you guessed it – the Illuminati trib.al/jv8J56V

According to Welch, Communism was but a “tool of the total conspiracy.”

Welch held that politicians were either unwitting dupes of a master plan or ruthless agents. He considered Dwight Eisenhower “a dedicated, conscious agent of the Communist conspiracy” trib.al/jv8J56V

Rank-and-file Republicans flocked to Welch’s organization. At its peak, it had:

🇺🇸At least 100,000 members
📘400 bookstores that sold Welch’s manifesto, The Blue Book, as well as the society’s other publications trib.al/jv8J56V

Republicans had an uneasy relationship to the John Birch Society.

Eventually it fell in the early 1960s, giving way to a larger rebranding of the party, which would ultimately propel Richard Nixon, and later, Ronald Regan, to the White House trib.al/jv8J56V

Forty years later, we are watching the demise of that incarnation of the Republican Party.

As the two major political parties buckle under the strain of the latest realignment, conspiratorial thinking has re-emerged with the rise of QAnon trib.al/jv8J56V

All the familiar ingredients are there:

✔️Nativism
✔️Anti-Semitism
✔️A world controlled by secretive groups who are agents of secularism and Satan himself

Can our political system tame this madness? If history is any guide, there’s reason for optimism trib.al/jv8J56V