It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Here is a fascinating thesis that shows that the conspiracy theory meme began in America with its founding during the revolutionary war. And since then conspiracy theory has dominated American politics.
This is a PhD. Thesis and is a full length book available for download as a PDF.
Conspiracy Theory and the Society of the Cincinnati, 1783-1790 At the same time, I became aware of a tradition of radical political dissent in modern America, an abundance of conspiracy theories that also extended into popular culture. It was the time of Timothy McVeigh and the militia movement, of Waco, Ruby Ridge, Pat Robertson, and the X-Files. Suddenly conspiratorial explanations for current and historical events seemed everywhere. From Richard Hofstadter’s writings I realized that conspiracy theories occurred in episodic waves throughout American history, and from Bernard Bailyn and Gordon Wood I learned that the founding fathers believed in a secret English plot against American liberty. I decided to investigate, but soon became aware that other scholars were already writing on conspiracy theories in post-World War II America. Clearly, I had to look off the beaten path for a case study in American political “paranoia.”
It was then that I remembered a somewhat obscure document from my studies on the Connecticut ratification debates. Just before the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, Dr. Benjamin Gale, an eccentric physician from Killingworth, wrote a long letter to Erasmus Wolcott.
In this diatribe, Gale complained about the machinations of the Society of the Cincinnati, a veterans organization of officers of the Continental Army. Gale charged that all the talk about the weakness of the Articles of Confederation was merely a smokescreen for the treasonous ambition of the Cincinnati. According to Gale, this society planned to establish a military dictatorship or monarchy and assume the mantle of hereditary nobility for themselves. Gale was obviously an Antifederalist, one who not only attacked the movement for a new Constitution as unnecessary and dangerous, but who felt it was the result of a deliberate conspiracy against American freedom.
I had found my topic. Apparently, a conspiracy theory existed in the 1780s, the very period when the political culture and system of the United States was taking shape, and it accused the leaders of the Continental Army of anti-republican subversion.
Small wonder then that such discourses of radical suspicion surfaced periodically over the course of American history. If some American revolutionaries felt that even George Washington and Henry Knox could be traitors, we should not be surprised that so many Americans question the report of the Warren commission or distrust the federal government and the United Nations. The Deepest Piece of Cunning is a journey to the origins of conspiracy theories in the United States. It should shed some light on the political controversies of the 1780s as well as the persistence of conspiracy theories in American political culture.
Abstract
In May 1783, the officers of the Continental Army of the United States of America organized themselves into the Society of the Cincinnati. Soon after, the veterans organization became the focus of an elaborate conspiracy theory which falsely accused the officers of trying to establish a hereditary nobility and subvert the young republic.
Over the course of the mid-1780s, prominent revolutionary politicans such as John Adams and Elbridge Gerry joined in the outcry. The conspiracy theory became a major political controversy, and even impeded efforts to reform the Articles of Confederation.
However, despite their frantic tone and lack of a factual basis, the accusations were not merely a fringe phenomenon created by political crackpots. Instead, the conspiracy theory was deeply embedded in American political culture. When the political and economic problems of the 1780s threatened to disrupt the republican experiment, many revolutionaries looked for a threat that might explain the crisis. They found that threat in the Cincinnati, whose military background, federal organization, and aristocratic trappings made them suspect.