A Field Guide to the Labels: Supremacy, Separatism, Nazism, Socialism and Communism

The most common error in writing about extremism in Idaho is to use one word for everything. A reader who sees "Nazi" for a Klan march, "white supremacist" for a group that says it wants its own country, and "Communist" for a labor union has learned nothing about any of them. This lesson sets out the vocabulary the rest of the module depends on. Read it first and come back to it.

Why distinctions matter

There are three practical reasons. The first is accuracy: groups differ in what they want, how they justify it and what they do. The second is legal: a reporter who attaches a label the group does not use, and that a court or agency has not applied, risks a defamation claim and an error of fact. The third is usefulness: a school board, a sheriff or a pastor deciding how to respond to a group needs to know what the group is trying to achieve. A group that wants to dominate its neighbors poses a different problem from one that wants to leave, and a group that wants to kill a particular people poses a different problem still.

The working definitions

These are working definitions for this module. They come from how the terms are commonly used by historians, courts and watchdog groups, and they are stated so that readers can see exactly what each lesson means. Where outside organizations define the terms differently, the difference is noted.

White supremacy

The belief that white people are superior to other races and should dominate them, in law, in society or by force. Slavery, Jim Crow segregation and apartheid were systems built on it. The goal is a hierarchy.

White separatism

The aim of separating white people from people of other races, for example by creating a white ethnostate, by removing non-white people from existing communities or by forming new communities elsewhere. The defining goal is separation, not rule over others. Some separatists reject a return to segregation as impossible or undesirable; others combine separatism with a belief in white superiority.¹

White nationalism

The aim of a nation or state defined by white identity. It is related to separatism, and writers often use the two terms side by side. A court or a news report that calls a group "white nationalist" is applying a political label; it is not applying either of the others automatically.

Nazism and neo-Nazism

Nazism is the ideology of Hitler's National Socialist German Workers' Party. The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's Holocaust Encyclopedia, in its article "Nazi Racism," lays out the core: a racial hierarchy with a so-called Aryan "master race" at the top, racial antisemitism, the Nuremberg Laws, a drive for "living space" (Lebensraum) and, in the end, the Holocaust.² A neo-Nazi group is one that adopts that ideology or its symbols, such as the swastika or the Hitler salute. Wikipedia's article on white separatism describes Nazi Germany's white supremacy as combining eugenics with extermination, and treats Nazism as a more extreme form of supremacy; the term is much narrower than white supremacy and is not a synonym for it.¹ The definition of Nazism here rests on the museum's article; the definitions of socialism and communism are general reference knowledge, stated as this module's working definitions.

Christian Identity

A religious theology that some white-separatist and white-supremacist groups adopt. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), an advocacy organization, traces it to British-Israelism and to the preacher Wesley Swift in the 1940s, calls Richard Butler of Aryan Nations a disciple of Swift, and names historian Michael Barkun as the leading scholar of the movement.³ It is a doctrine, not a political party, and it is not the same as Nazism or the Klan. Nothing in the sources used here ties mainstream or conservative Christian churches to it, and this module does not group them with it.

Socialism

An economic and political idea that the means of production should be owned or controlled by the public or by workers. Socialist parties in the United States, such as the Socialist Party of America of Eugene Debs, ran candidates in elections. Democratic socialists accept elections and civil liberties; the idea is not tied to any racial doctrine.

Communism

The Marxist-Leninist movement, in power in the Soviet Union, China and elsewhere, that seeks a classless society through party-led revolution and state ownership. The Communist Party USA was a political party; membership has to be proved person by person (lesson 4).

A caution about the borders

These categories are not sealed. The Anti-Defamation League calls white separatism "a form of white supremacy," and the Southern Poverty Law Center calls white separatism and white nationalism "ideologies based on white supremacy," according to Wikipedia's article on white separatism; Facebook said they "cannot be meaningfully separated." Scholars Betty Dobratz and Stephanie Shanks-Meile, quoted in the same article, distinguish the supremacist desire to dominate (as in apartheid or segregation) from complete separation by race, and say that contemporary separatists reject a return to segregation as possible or desirable in the United States.¹

This module takes the careful position: the two ideas are different goals even where they overlap in a particular group. A group's goal (to rule, to separate or to exterminate) is a fact about it that a writer can usually document from what it said and did. The label that an organization like the ADL or SPLC applies is a second fact, and the module reports it as that organization's judgment. Both organizations are advocacy groups whose classifications have been disputed, so the module also checks them against court records and the groups' own words.

Nazism, as the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum describes it

The museum's Holocaust Encyclopedia is a neutral reference source and is the module's anchor for the word "Nazi." Its article on Nazi racism does not treat Nazism as general prejudice. It describes a specific system: a ranked scheme of races, racial antisemitism that blamed Jews as a race, laws such as the 1935 Nuremberg Laws that wrote the ranking into German law, a program of territorial expansion for "living space," and a state that carried the ideology to the murder of six million Jews.² The museum's text is copyrighted and linked here, not reproduced.

That description sets a high bar for the word. A group that is racist, or that wants separation, or that burns a cross, has not become Nazi by those acts. A group that displays the swastika as its symbol, borrows Nazi ritual or says it follows Nazi doctrine has adopted the vocabulary, and a reporter can say so with the evidence beside it. That is the reason the module keeps three questions apart: who is to rule (supremacy), who is to leave (separatism) and who is to be destroyed (the Nazi program in power).

Three tests for any label

1. What does the group say it wants? Use its own publications, speeches and filings. A group that says it wants a homeland is described as seeking one.
2. What does it display and do? Swastikas on a chapel are evidence of neo-Nazi identification. Cross burnings and white hoods are evidence of Klan identification. An armed march in matching masks is evidence of a paramilitary style and nothing more.
3. Who else has labeled it, and on what authority? A federal indictment, a jury verdict or a published watchdog report is an authority. A politician's insult is not.

How the groups in this module are classified

The table below classifies each group by what the sources used in this module document. A blank means the sources gathered do not say, not that the group lacks the trait.

Group (period)	Stated or displayed goal	Label used in the sources
Idaho Socialist Party voters, 1912	Elections and public ownership	Socialist; not Communist; no racial doctrine
IWW (Wobblies), 1917	One Big Union, eight-hour day	Union; prosecuted under criminal syndicalism law
Ku Klux Klan, 1920s	Hostility to minority residents, documented here for Black residents (hierarchy and exclusion); other targets not detailed in the sources gathered	Nativist, white supremacist; not Nazi
Aryan Nations, 1973 to 2001	A white homeland in the Pacific Northwest (separatism); Christian Identity theology	Neo-Nazi (swastikas are described in accounts of the compound, and the ADL applies the same label), described by NPR as seeking a white homeland. The church itself says it is "separatist" and "nationalist," not neo-Nazi (Seattle Weekly, 1999)
The Order, 1983 to 1984	Armed revolution; robbery to fund it. Founder Robert Mathews also spoke of a "White American Bastion," a separatist aim tied to the Northwest Territorial Imperative idea (Wikipedia)	"White supremacist group" (Wikipedia). A federal appeals court, in United States v. Yarbrough, describes the Order the same way and treats the case as about conduct, not belief
Patriot Front, 2022	Street presence; conspiracy to riot at a Pride event	"White nationalist hate group" (NBC News); not described as Nazi in the sources used
Iron March and Atomwaffen-linked defendants with Idaho ties, 2017 to 2020	Attacks on the power grid	The U.S. Attorney's release describes the Iron March forum as a gathering point for young neo-Nazis and describes a video with Atomwaffen masks and a "Heil Hitler" salute; the defendants pleaded to firearms and energy-facility offenses

The Aryan Nations row illustrates why one word is not enough. The group's stated aim was a white homeland, which is a separatist goal. It displayed Nazi symbols, which identifies it as neo-Nazi. It taught Christian Identity, which is a theology. Calling it any one of these is partly right, and calling it only one leaves out the others. A careful sentence names the aim and the symbols separately.

In their own words and in the record

A label is easier to defend when the movement's own text and an official record sit beside it. The items below are sorted by who wrote them. Texts that movements wrote about themselves are described, not reproduced, and several were not opened for this lesson; each item says what was and was not read. Two things the research could not find are stated plainly: a movement-written definition of "white nationalism," and the original text of two documents that are often quoted second hand.

Written by the movements (self-published)

• The church on itself. Seattle Weekly (1999), a news weekly, reports that the Church of Jesus Christ Christian, the religious arm of Aryan Nations, calls itself "separatist" and "nationalist" and rejects the label neo-Nazi.⁴ The ADL, by contrast, calls the group neo-Nazi, and the swastika appears in accounts of the Hayden Lake compound. The disagreement is itself a fact a writer can report: the group's description and the watchdog's description differ, and the symbols are evidence for the second.
• Butler's headquarters claim. An ADL profile of Aryan Nations quotes Richard Butler as calling Hayden Lake the "international headquarters of the White race."⁵ The ADL is an advocacy group and the quote is second hand here; the profile was read through a summary, so confirm it against the original before reprinting it.
• David Lane's "14 Words." David Lane, later convicted as a member of the Order (lesson 8), wrote the slogan "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children." The SPLC and the ADL both quote it, and the SPLC also describes Lane's "88 Precepts" and says Lane's wife, Katja, ran a small press, 14 Word Press, from her home in St. Maries, Idaho.⁶ The slogan is a separatist-and-supremacist statement of purpose in the movement's own voice. Do not treat the SPLC's account as the whole record on Lane; his convictions are in court files (lesson 8).
• The Northwest Territorial Imperative. Wikipedia and a 1994 Coalition for Human Dignity study (Crawford and others, The Northwest Imperative) describe a separatist plan to set aside the Pacific Northwest as a white homeland, associated with Robert E. Miles, Butler and Mathews, with Mathews's phrase "White American Bastion."⁷ The archive.org copy of the study was not opened for this lesson. This is the clearest documented source for the claim that the stated aim was separatist.
• Mathews's own phrase. Wikipedia attributes to Mathews the line about wanting to "quit being the hunted and become the hunter." That is a single-source quotation, and the original document was not located. It is useful because it shows the Order's method, armed action, and not only its beliefs.
• Wesley Swift's sermon. The sermon "Christian Identity: Race and Origins in the Bible" is posted on archive.org (1950s to 1960s). It was not opened for this lesson and is not reproduced.
• The Turner Diaries (1978). William L. Pierce, writing as "Andrew Macdonald," published this novel. It was not opened for this lesson; the module quotes nothing from it and draws no claim from it. This Pierce is a different person from Bruce Pierce of the Order (lesson 8).
• The "Declaration of Independence" parody. The ADL describes an Aryan Nations text of this kind. The original text was not located, so the module does not quote it.
• "White nationalism" in the movement's words. A search for how white-nationalist writers define their own term returned only SPLC and CNN descriptions, which describe the term from outside. Until a movement text is found, this module attributes the label to whoever applies it.

Written by scholars and reporters who studied the movements

• James Aho (Idaho State University). Aho's The Politics of Righteousness: Idaho Christian Patriotism (University of Washington Press, 1990) is the standard academic study of the Idaho milieu. An Idaho State University news article reports that Aho interviewed Aryan Nations church members from the mid-1980s, wrote to prisoners, and found members to be "ordinary, religious people."⁸ His interview recordings are in the ISU library's special collections. That finding cuts against caricature and does not excuse the group's conduct; it is a reason to describe members by what they said and did.
• Michael Barkun. Religion and the Racist Right: The Origins of the Christian Identity Movement (University of North Carolina Press, 1997) is the history the ADL itself points to. It was cited here through the ADL and Wikipedia and not opened.
• Betty Dobratz and Stephanie Shanks-Meile. Their 1997 study of the white separatist movement is where the distinction between wanting to dominate and wanting to be apart is drawn. The module uses it through the Wikipedia article and the European Center for Populism Studies glossary (populismstudies.org, white separatism entry), which cites them.¹
• Further reading, not used for any claim. Kathleen Belew's Bring the War Home (2018) appeared in searches and was not opened.

In the court record

• United States v. Yarbrough, 852 F.2d 1522 (9th Cir. 1988). The Ninth Circuit opinion on the Order's racketeering convictions describes the group as a white-supremacist organization and treats the case as one about acts: the racketeering law punishes conduct, and the court did not decide the case on the defendants' beliefs.⁹ The opinion was read through the research summary only. This is the model for the second of the module's three tests: what the group did.
• The Fort Smith sedition trial (1988). The Encyclopedia of Arkansas records that Richard Butler was among the defendants tried in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and that he was acquitted on April 7, 1988, before Judge Morris Arnold.¹⁰ The acquittal stays in the record beside the allegations; a group's beliefs, however repugnant, were not what the government had to prove, and the jury did not convict. Details are in lesson 8.

People and personalities

These are the people whose words and acts define the labels in this lesson. Each profile uses only what the sources gathered support. Mention here is not membership in anything, and a person who attended an event or bought a book has not joined a movement. Later lessons treat the same people at length.

Richard Girnt Butler (February 23, 1918 to September 8, 2004)

Founder of the Church of Jesus Christ Christian and Aryan Nations, an engineer by trade, and a disciple of Swift according to the ADL. The sources disagree on whether the church moved to north Idaho in 1973 or 1974; this lesson says "in the 1970s." In the group's own account it was separatist and nationalist; the ADL calls it neo-Nazi. His wife Betty is quoted in 1998 SPLC reporting as describing him as someone who "wouldn't spank a puppy dog." Reporters who met him in 1999 describe a man in a lawn chair quoting Margaret Mead (Salon). The picture is of a person whose public manner and public teaching did not match, which is why the module asks for acts and statements, not impressions. He was acquitted at Fort Smith (above) and lost a civil judgment in 2000 (lesson 9).

Wesley Swift (1913 to 1970)

A Christian Identity preacher in Lancaster, California. Butler began attending his services in 1961 according to the Spokesman-Review's obituary of Butler. The same obituary says William Potter Gale introduced Butler to Posse Comitatus and Identity ideas. Swift's sermons were not read for this lesson.

Robert Jay Mathews (January 16, 1953 to December 1984)

Founder of the Order. Born in Marfa, Texas; moved to Metaline Falls, Washington, in July 1974 and bought 60 acres; worked at the Bunker Hill mine and at a cement plant; joined the National Alliance in 1980; founded the Order in September 1983 (Wikipedia and a 1994 Seattle Times profile). The Seattle Times and Wikipedia describe him as impatient with the "talk" of the Hayden Lake circle and drawn to action. An FBI agent, Tom McDaniel, called him charismatic in a 2017 CNN piece (single source). He died in a standoff on Whidbey Island (date dispute in lesson 8).

David Eden Lane (1938 to May 28, 2007)

Author of the "14 Words" and the "88 Precepts" (SPLC). The government's theory at the Berg civil-rights trial was that he drove the car in the Alan Berg killing (Jewish Telegraphic Agency); he received 40 years in Seattle and a further 150 in Denver according to the SPLC. At a sentencing the JTA reports him saying he had given everything to "awaken my people" (single source).

William L. Pierce

Author of The Turner Diaries (1978) under the name Andrew Macdonald; the SPLC publishes a profile that was not opened for this lesson.

Robert E. Miles

Associated with the Northwest Territorial Imperative; a defendant in the Fort Smith trial (Wikipedia). His acquittal status is covered in lesson 8, not assumed here.

The scholars

James Aho of Idaho State University interviewed church members in person; Michael Barkun wrote the history of Christian Identity; Betty Dobratz and Stephanie Shanks-Meile separated domination from separation. Their work is the second-hand frame for everything above.

Not in this lesson, on purpose: Christian conservatives and the American Redoubt are not grouped with the movements above, and Democratic Socialists of America, 50501 and No Kings are lawful political and protest organizations treated in their own lessons (11 to 13), not as extremist groups.

Rules this module follows

• "Nazi" or "neo-Nazi" is used only where the group adopted Nazi symbols or ideology itself, or where a court or agency applied the label.
• "White supremacist" is used for groups that advocate or practice racial domination, with the evidence stated.
• "White separatist" or "seeking a white homeland" is used where the group's stated aim is separation, with the statement cited.
• "White nationalist" is used where a source applies it, and is attributed to that source.
• "Socialist" and "Communist" are not used as synonyms, and neither is used for a person without documentary proof of membership or self-identification.
• Where a group fits more than one category, the lesson names each trait and its evidence separately.

Practice

Read each sentence and decide whether it survives the rules.

1. "The Idaho Klan was a Nazi organization." Fails. The Klan predates Nazi rule and used its own symbols.
2. "Aryan Nations displayed swastikas and said it wanted a white homeland in North Idaho." Survives, if each clause is sourced.
3. "Debs voters were Communists." Fails. Debs ran as a Socialist in 1912, before the Communist movement existed.
4. "Idaho courts have convicted members of Patriot Front of conspiracy to riot." Survives with the details in lesson 10, but it says nothing about Nazism or about the group's beliefs.

Source notes for reporters

• Read the ADL's Hate on Display symbol database and the SPLC's group profiles for how each organization labels a given group, and cite them as their opinions.
• Check federal indictments and press releases for the label the government used, and quote the sentence.
• Ask a group's spokesperson for the group's own description, and quote it, before applying any label.
• Use the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum's Holocaust Encyclopedia as the reference for the word "Nazi."

Learn more

• ADL Hate on Display: Symbols used by white supremacist groups and movements.
• SPLC: Extremist-group profiles; attribute classifications to the SPLC.
• Keenan v. Aryan Nations (SPLC): A court case that names the group and describes its conduct.

Notes

1. "White separatism," Wikipedia, summarizing the ADL's and SPLC's classifications and the scholarship of Dobratz and Shanks-Meile. Read it online. Check the original ADL and SPLC statements before quoting them. ↩
2. "Nazi Racism," Holocaust Encyclopedia, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Read it online. Museum content is copyrighted; summarized, not quoted at length. ↩
3. "Christian Identity," ADL backgrounder, on British-Israelism, Wesley Swift, Butler and Barkun. Read it online. Advocacy source; confirm against Barkun. ↩
4. "He Was Not Following Orders," Seattle Weekly, 1999, on the church's own description of itself. Read it online. ↩
5. ADL, Aryan Nations profile (Center on Extremism, archived PDF). Read it online. Advocacy source. ↩
6. "David Lane," SPLC Extremist Files, on the 14 Words, the 88 Precepts and 14 Word Press in St. Maries. Read it online. Advocacy source; its Brink's robbery date differs from other sources and is not repeated here. ↩
7. "Northwest Territorial Imperative," Wikipedia, citing Crawford and others, The Northwest Imperative (Coalition for Human Dignity, 1994). Read it online. ↩
8. "A lifetime of study in extremism with James Aho," Idaho State University news, fall 2013. Read it online. ↩
9. United States v. Yarbrough, 852 F.2d 1522 (9th Cir. 1988). Read it online. Confirm the wording against the opinion before quoting. ↩
10. "Fort Smith Sedition Trial of 1988," Encyclopedia of Arkansas. Read it online. ↩