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{{Cquote|To describe the last quarter of the nineteenth and the first decade of the twentieth centuries as a golden age of freethought is to suggest not that a majority of Americans were persuaded by rationalist or antireligious arguments but that those arguments reached a much broader public than they ever had in the past. Unlike eighteenth-century [[Deism|deists]], nearly all of whom identified with [[Thomas Jefferson|Jeffersonian]] [[democracy]], American freethinkers of the late nineteenth century were anything but unified in their political views, which ran the gamut from [[anarchism]] to [[Herbert Spencer|Spencerian]] [[conservatism]]. Freethinkers might be Democrats, rock-ribbed Republicans, or, on occasion, socialists with either a capital or a small s.

{{Cquote|To describe the last quarter of the nineteenth and the first decade of the twentieth centuries as a golden age of freethought is to suggest not that a majority of Americans were persuaded by rationalist or antireligious arguments but that those arguments reached a much broader public than they ever had in the past. Unlike eighteenth-century [[Deism|deists]], nearly all of whom identified with [[Thomas Jefferson|Jeffersonian]] [[democracy]], American freethinkers of the late nineteenth century were anything but unified in their political views, which ran the gamut from [[anarchism]] to [[Herbert Spencer|Spencerian]] [[conservatism]]. Freethinkers might be Democrats, rock-ribbed Republicans, or, on occasion, socialists with either a capital or a small s.

The one political concern that did unite all freethinkers was their support for absolute [[separation of church and state]], which translated into opposition to any tax support of religious institutions-especially parochial schools. For the most part, tax support of religious schools had been a nonissue on a national basis before the Civil War-although New York City's Catholic leadership had pushed unsuccessfully in the 1840s for government subsidy, long established in many European countries, of religious education. By the 1870s, when the growth of the older [[Ireland|Irish]] [[Catholicism|Catholic]] community and new immigration from the Catholic countries of [[Europe]] began to transform the ethnic and religious makeup of most large cities, the financing of parochial school education became a divisive issue throughout the country....

The one political concern that did unite all freethinkers was their support for absolute [[separation of church and state]], which translated into opposition to any tax support of religious institutions-especially parochial schools...

Freethought periodicals, which proliferated after the Civil War, were important sources of communication within the freethinking community...

Freethought periodicals, which proliferated after the [[Civil War]], were important sources of communication within the freethinking community...

But the freethought lecture circuit--not the press--was the chief mode of communication between committed agnostics and a larger public that was interested in but did not define itself by religious skepticism. Americans flocked to lectures in every area of the country--whether in great cities where well-off inhabitants could afford to pay the munificent sum of one dollar for a ticket to a lecture by the famous [Robert Green] Ingersoll (scalpers in New York City, the newspapers reported disapprovingly, got up to two dollars) or in towns like Dowagiac, where a citizen might spend a nickel to hear a traveling lecturer at the Universalist Church, the established venue for heretical talks. General circulation newspapers treated the talks--especially the more controversial ones--as legitimate news events. Ingersoll, Stanton, and Anthony made headlines and sold newspapers wherever they went.  

But the freethought lecture circuit--not the press--was the chief mode of communication between committed agnostics and a larger public that was interested in but did not define itself by religious skepticism. Americans flocked to lectures in every area of the country--whether in great cities where well-off inhabitants could afford to pay the munificent sum of one dollar for a ticket to a lecture by the famous [Robert Green] Ingersoll (scalpers in New York City, the newspapers reported disapprovingly, got up to two dollars) or in towns like Dowagiac, where a citizen might spend a nickel to hear a traveling lecturer at the Universalist Church, the established venue for heretical talks. General circulation newspapers treated the talks--especially the more controversial ones--as legitimate news events. Ingersoll, Stanton, and Anthony made headlines and sold newspapers wherever they went.