OldYgg

Hi folks,
It has been a long time since I have posted, but I would like to write an article in a public forum in regard to the religion riots in the USA. I remember reading about them in a book of atheist orientation, but unfortunately, I do not have specific dates in which to search for first person material.
The actions that happened in that time frame were the following:
There were religion riots in the past of the USA in Philadelphia and New York City. In Philadelphia, a protestant mayor attempted to get the fire department to put out fires of Catholic churches, but was prevented from stopping the fires by his own police department which was made up primarily of protestants.

There was a lot more to it than that - but I lack a time reference to research the matter, I think it was in the late 1800's , but I could be incorrect. Any help in direction to an appriate time frame would be helpful.

In essence people are walking around so holier-than-thou because they have god - and I really would like to write an informative article to a broad audience - in regard to Christians behaving badly, and that this specifically is why we need to keep religion and government separate. Even the remote possibility of government in control by religion creates the tendency towards impropriety - and this is the kind of end result that we can look forward to when government leans in the direction of one religion or another.

Thanks,
Old Ygg/ Alex

Toto

I think you mean this:

Bible Riots: When Christians Killed Each Other Over Religion in Public Schools

eta: Google "Philadelphia Bible Riots" for more, or this:

The Philadelphia Nativists Riots

Julian

This might be it: http://www.atheists.org/publicschools/street.html

Julian

OldYgg

Thanks guys, this information should help me get a good start on my article - and an idea of 'when' to look for newspaper headlines on the topic and first person resources.

Old Ygg / Alex

OldYgg

http://www.hsp.org/default.aspx?id=394

Primary resources about these riots. There is also this book at Amazon.com:

The Philadelphia Riots of 1844: A Study of Ethnic Conflict (Contributions in American History)

But at $100, it is too much for me to go out and purchase.

Old Ygg/ Alex

Toto

You notice that many people like to recast these religious riots as "ethnic" or "nativist."

OldYgg

It seems that by giving these people a label that is not Christian or any currently used label for Christians they avoid having to look at this episode in history and say 'Hey, Christians did that, maybe we aren't so nice after all.'

Old Ygg / Alex