Laird Wilcox

Laird Maurice Wilcox is an American researcher specializing in the study of political fringe movements. He is the founder of the "Wilcox Collection of Contemporary Political Movements,"[1] said to be one of the largest collections of American political material in the United States. It is housed in the Kenneth Spencer Research Library at the University of Kansas.[2]

Laird Wilcox

Early life

Wilcox was raised in a family with, as he describes, a high level of "political intensity" and discussion.[3] His aunts, uncles, and grandparents were highly polarized politically, either conservative or very liberal.[3] As a child he would listen to debate and discussion about political issues that grew very heated, often to the point of name-calling, and these experiences created an early desire to understand why political ideologies lead to such conflict, and at times grow to greater importance than relationships with friends and family.[3]

In his teens he began to collect literature and read about radical political movements across the spectrum, from communist groups to the John Birch Society.[3] He continued to pursue this interest when he entered the University of Kansas at twenty years old and won an award for his collection of books on political movements.[3] A few years later he had accumulated roughly four file drawers of material, and the University library reached out to him with a desire to acquire a portion of his collection.[3] An agreement was reached in 1965, and the library paid Wilcox $1000 for the material that would go on to constitute the foundation of the Wilcox Collection as it is known today.[3][2]

While living in Olathe, Kansas, he worked as carpenter, investigator and writer.[4]

Wilcox Collection of Contemporary Political Movements

The Wilcox Collection of Contemporary Political Movements, in the Kansas Collection of Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas, includes coverage of "more than 10,000 individuals and organizations. The bulk of the collection covers 1960 to the present and comprises nearly 10,000 books, pamphlets and periodicals, 800 audio tapes, 73 feet (22 m) of manuscript materials and more than 100,000 pieces of ephemera including flyers, brochures, mailings, clippings and bumper stickers." Wilcox continues to make regular donations.[5]

The collection began in 1963-1964, when Wilcox, then a student at the University of Kansas, kept a scrapbook while he was chair of the Student Union Association Minority Opinions Forum. According to its website, the forum was very active that year, with speakers invited to discuss civil liberties, freedom of expression, apartheid, communism, the American Nazi Party, and the Socialist Labor Party.

Criticism of "Watchdog" groups

In his 1997 self-published book, The Watchdogs,[6] Wilcox criticized an "industry" of such groups "whose identity and livelihood depend upon growth and expansion of their particular kind of victimization." He holds such groups use "links and ties" to imply connections between individuals and groups. And they collect millions of dollars by greatly exaggerating the size and danger of such groups, becoming "a massive extortion racket."

He names groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Anti-Defamation League, Political Research Associates, and the Center for Democratic Renewal. Mark Potok of Southern Poverty Law Center told a reporter that Wilcox "had an ax to grind for a great many years" and engaged in name calling against others doing anti-racist work. Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates told a reporter that "Laird Wilcox is not an accurate or ethical reporter… He simply can't tolerate people who are his competition in this field."[7]

Views

In 1968, Wilcox signed the "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War.[8]

He has been a member of the American Civil Liberties Union since 1961 and a member of Amnesty International since 1970.

Awards and honors

In 1989, Wilcox received the "Kansas City Area Archivists Award of Excellence" for his role in founding and maintaining the Wilcox Collection.[9] In 1993, he was awarded the Myers Center Award for the Study of Human Rights in the United States. In 1994, he was awarded the Freedom of Information Award of the Kansas Library Association/SIRS "For outstanding commitment to intellectual freedom."

In 1995, he received the Mencken Award of the Free Press Association "For outstanding journalism in defense of liberty." In 2005, the University of Kansas honored Wilcox, then 63, in the Spencer library's North Gallery for his role in founding the Wilcox Collection.[4]

Published works

Articles/essays

A more recent (2005?) and shortened version of this essay is available.
"...a finalist for the Free Press Association's prestigious Mencken Award for Best Editorial of 1995."
Originally published 2002. Archived from the original.


Periodicals

  • Guide to the American Right (annual). Kansas City: Editorial Research Service, 1984-.[10]

Books

  • Nazis, Communists, Klansmen, and Others on the Fringe, with John George. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1992. ISBN 0879756802 / ISBN 978-0879756802.
An examination of political extremism of both the far left and far right in the United States.[11]
"This is a unique reference work consisting of provocative quotations meant to challenge tendencies toward censorship an suppression of ideas as well as the stifling effects of 'politically correct' behavior."
"Included are documented instances of illegal spying, theft of police files, fund-raising irregularities, questionable 'hate crime' statistics, irresponsible and fraudulent claims, perjury, harassment and stalking, violence, and deep and longstanding involvements with Marxist–Leninist extremists."[6]

Book contributions

Excerpted from American Extremists: Militias, Supremacists, Klansmen, Communists & Others, with John George. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1996. ISBN 1573920584 / ISBN 978-1573920582.
  • "Who Watches The Watchmen?" (p. 90) The Cultic Milieu: Oppositional Subcultures in an Age of Globalization. Edited by Jeffrey Kaplan and Helene Loow. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press, 2002. ISBN 075910204X / ISBN 978-0759102040.

Selected quotation series

See also

References
  1. Wilcox, Laird (August 1987). Watner, Carl (ed.). "What Is Political Extremism?". Vol. 27. Gramling, South Carolina: The Voluntaryists. pp. 3–4. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 10, 2003. Retrieved December 2, 2016. Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
  2. Free Speech and the Wilcox Collection: Forty Years of Collecting Political Documents Wilcox Collection of Contemporary Political Movements, Kansas Collection, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas.
  3. "The Wilcox Collection." Laird briefly discusses the history of his collection. Video interview created by Laird's daughter Carrie Wilcox and uploaded to YouTube on March 22, 2009.
  4. KU News Release article Wilcox Collection of political literature to celebrate 40 years at KU. University of Kansas. October 12, 2005.
  5. University of Kansas Wilcox Collection of Contemporary Political Movements, Kansas Collection, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas
  6. The Watchdogs, self-published through "Editorial Research Service," available at lairdwilcox.com; extensively footnoted. (ISBN 0-933592-89-2)
  7. McCain, Robert Stacy. "Researcher Says 'Watchdogs' Exaggerate Hate Group Threat", The Washington Times, May 9, 2000.
  8. "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" January 30, 1968 New York Post
  9. KCAA Award of Excellence Recipient.
  10. Kinney, Jay. Review of Guide to the American Right by Laird Wilcox. Whole Earth Review, No. 63, Summer 1989, p. 129.
  11. Published by Prometheus Books in 1992 as a 523-page hardcover (ISBN 0-87975-680-2). Prometheus Books republished it in 1996 as a paperback under the title American Extremists: Militias, Supremacists, Klansmen, Communists and Others, 443 p. (ISBN 1573920584)
  12. The text of 1994 edition is also available online.
  13. Review of American Extremists: Militias, Supremacists, Klansmen, Communists & Others by Laird Wilcox and John George. Nova Religio, Vol. 2, No. 1, October 1, 1998; 2 (1), pp. 147–148. doi:10.1525/nr.1998.2.1.147.

Further reading
"Part-time Commie, part-time Klansman, full-time observer of the far-out."
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