|
|
Article: Militia Movement
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 The Gale Group Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
MILITIA MOVEMENT
MILITIA MOVEMENT.
Catapulted into the public eye after the 1995 bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City because early, exaggerated reports linked the bombers to the Michigan Militia, the militia movement combined conspiracy theories with a fascination for paramilitary activity. Ideologically, militias are an offshoot of the Posse Comitatus (roughly 1970
–
1989), a right-wing group whose philosophy combined extreme libertarianism with a conviction that the government was illegitimate. By the 1980s, the Posse's influence had helped create the loosely organized antigovernment "Patriot" movement. In the 1990s, militia groups surfaced as its newest ...