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The ‘Father Of Mother’s Day’: A Blatant Racist And Member Of The Ku Klux Klan?

By Jimmy Lee Beason II, Osage Nation

Initially, I wanted to write about Mother’s Day with a sense of whimsical remembrance regarding my mom, aunt, and grandmother and how they helped me become the man I am today. Although we didn’t have a Mother’s Day in our Osage culture, I acknowledge all the love and homecooked meals they provided over the years and how this all compensated for the absence of my father. Then I started doing a little research and, well, changed my mind because as it turns out, Mother’s Day was sponsored as an official holiday by J. Thomas Heflin; an Alabama congressman, and Ku Klux Klan member who proudly boasted about shooting a Black man in Washington D.C. in the early 1900’s. As an educator, the facts have motivated me to address the blithe on this day of motherly celebration.

As a Native man, I am not surprised. Most holidays in this country are geared toward upholding a sense of nationalism rooted in white American ideologies. Although Mother’s Day as we know it today is a feel-good moment to show appreciation for the women who brought us into this world, it was troubling to find it was created by a vehement racist – troubling, but not surprising.

Before Mother’s Day was an official celebration, its roots were in the post-Civil War era when Anna M. Jarvis started “Mother’s Friendship Day” in West Virginia. It was meant as a part of the “healing process” to bring together the Unionists and Confederates. I was curious about Black and Indigenous mothers, but this was West Virginia shortly after the Civil War, so we can only infer this was most certainly a “Whites only” affair meant to bolster the social standing of White women wanting to display a sense of neutrality.

When Anna M. Jarvis passed away, her daughter Anna Jarvis wanted to memorialize her mother and started advocating for Mother’s Day to become a recognized holiday. Jarvis was a wealthy spinster living in Philadelphia at the time and handed out white Carnations, her mother’s favorite flower. Early attempts at making Mother’s Day official fell short as most politicians thought the idea was silly. Eventually, the Protestants and their Sunday school organizations got involved and advocated for Mother’s Day as a rhetorical device to promote “middle-class American values.”
Jarvis and other White women tightened their corsets, rolled up the sleeves on their frilled blouses and started an intense letter writing campaign asking prominent White men to support an official recognition of Mother’s Day. Letters were mailed to businessmen, preachers, evangelists, and politicians. Eventually, this campaign caught the attention of J. Thomas Heflin.

James Thomas Heflin was an Alabama congressman who served in the House from 1904 to 1920 and afterwards had a seat in the Senate for 10 years. Heflin was the poster boy for Klan ideology during the early 1900’s. As a state legislator he argued to keep Black people from voting. He supported the convict leasing program which was viewed as nothing more than another form of slavery. Black prisoners, many of whom were wrongly convicted, were essentially sold to White farmers and industrialists to work off their sentences.

Heflin was also a staunch supporter of segregation. In 1908, he petitioned to have streetcars segregated in Washington D.C. He supposedly received death threats because of his viewpoint and started carrying a gun. Incidentally, around this same time he got into an altercation with Lewis Lundy, a Black man riding in the same streetcar. According to Heflin, Lundy was drinking alcohol, shouting, and “insulted” a white woman. Of course, all of this sounds rather convenient. After a physical struggle, Heflin threw Lundy out onto the platform, pulled his gun, and fired. Lundy was struck (fortunately it wasn’t fatal) and a ricocheted bullet hit a white bystander in the leg. Heflin claimed Lundy was “reaching” for something in his jacket. Although he was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, the charges were later dropped after Heflin paid for the white bystander’s medical bill.

A few years later, Heflin would propose Resolution 103 on May 10th, 1913, asking President Woodrow Wilson and other federal officials to wear white flowers to honor the mothers of America stating they were the greatest source of Americas strength. People were already celebrating Mother’s Day unofficially across the country, and the following year, the gun toting Klansman introduced legislation to officially mark the second Sunday of every May “Mother’s Day.” The bill swiftly moved through the House and Senate, and Wilson signed it on May 8th, 1914.

Ironically, Heflin would later vote against women’s rights as he opposed the suffrage movement. In another twist, Anna Jarvis would spend the rest of her life trying to get Mother’s Day rescinded. Not because the legislation was put forth by a white supremacist, but because she felt it had become too commercialized and lost it’s “true meaning.”
How ironic indeed.

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