Local politics in Wisconsin

Nelson returned to Albion and completed his studies as one of the oldest students, graduating at the top of his class. He gave his first campaign speech of record on behalf of Lincoln, and drew praise from the faculty.

Deciding to become a lawyer, Nelson moved to Madison, where he studied law in the office of William F. Vilas, one of the few academically trained attorneys in the area. In the spring of 1867, Judge Philip L. Spooner admitted him to the Wisconsin bar.^[2]

Nelson opened his law practice in Madison, where he appealed to the Norwegian immigrant community, advertising in the Norwegian language newspaper Emigranten. He also became Madison's unofficial representative of the Norwegian community. With Eli A. Spencer's help, he successfully ran for Dane County's seat in the Wisconsin State Assembly, starting its session on January 8, 1868.^[6]

He was reelected to a second term in the Assembly, as he had quickly learned how to get things done in politics. He got involved in a divisive debate about public and parochial schools in Norwegian communities, taking the "liberal" side that promoted public, non-sectarian schools rather than those run by Lutheran clergy. After his second term in the Assembly, Nelson decided not to run for a third.

Minnesota state senator

The so-called "Aaker faction" within the Upper County Republican party found in Nelson a capable politician, with connections to the immigrant community, experience in land-office issues, and political background in Wisconsin. He was put forward as a Republican candidate for the Minnesota Senate in 1874, running against banker Francis Bennett Van Hoesen, who was aligned with the Grange movement and state Anti-Monopoly Party. Though Nelson did not get unanimous support from his Norwegian-American constituency, he carried 59% of the vote and four out of five counties in his constituency.

Nelson's first challenge in the state senate, whether to reelect Alexander Ramsey to a third term in the United States Senate, was contentious, as it was against Governor Cushman Davis's wishes. Nelson was caught between his allegiance to the Douglas County Republicans, who were staunch Davis supporters, and his land office constituency, who favored Ramsey. Nelson voted for Ramsey, the dark-horse candidate William D. Washburn, and finally for the victor, Samuel J. R. McMillan.

Nelson spent more time on the issue of extending the railroad infrastructure into the Upper Country. His constituents elected him in large part to resolve the gridlock that prevented the completion of the railroad extension from St. Cloud west to Alexandria and beyond. The railroad company, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (SP&P), had run out of funds to complete the St. Vincent extension, and the bondholders were unwilling to invest further. The Minnesota legislature agreed on the need for the railroad but were not in a position to pay for its completion.

In 1875, Nelson introduced the Upper Country bill, which gave SP&P added incentives in the form of land to complete the line, but also imposed a deadline after which the rights to build the railroad were forfeited, presumably in favor of Northern Pacific, whose plans would bypass Alexandria. The bill met with controversy from both sides of the issue and was ultimately amended to the point that Nelson first sought to table it and then abstained from voting on it. The bill was enacted and was considered a success in its time, with most of the credit going to Nelson.

It took several years for the various financial and political matters to be sorted out for the railroad, and Nelson played an active role throughout, both as an elected official, attorney, and businessman. He secured rights-of-way for virtually the entire line from Alexandria to Fergus Falls, negotiating with many stakeholders for every tract of land. This proved to be an all-consuming effort for several years, though he ran unsuccessfully for lieutenant governor of Minnesota in 1879.

In May 1877, three of Nelson's five children died during a diphtheria epidemic. The two oldest, Ida and Henry, survived.

In November 1878, the railroad finally reached Alexandria, thanks in large part to Nelson's close working relationship with James J. Hill. Several Minnesota towns were founded as a result of these efforts, including Nelson and Ashby.

National politics

Nelson was invited to deliver the "oration of the day" at the United States Centennial on July 4, 1876, in Alexandria, exactly 27 years after he had immigrated to the United States. The "unimpassioned" speech sought to reinforce an American identity and made no mention of his Norwegian roots. It coincided with his campaign for U.S. representative from Minnesota's third district.

By then, Nelson had developed the strategy of orchestrating a "bottoms-up" campaign in which he would quietly enlist supporters to publicly encourage him to run, while appearing reluctant. His constituency in the Upper Country frontier put him at a disadvantage with respect to the rivaling Twin Cities. After having flexed his political muscle by "bolting" from the campaign for a few weeks, he supported the Republican nomination of Jacob Stewart, a medical doctor from St. Paul, who won the election against Democrat William McNair. This endorsement was not backed by the Norwegian-American community, who were concerned about Stewart's association with the Know Nothing Party and the apparent rise of a ruling class in society.

The battle for the "Bloody Fifth"

As a result of the 1880 census, the United States Congress decided to allocate a new congressional seat to the Upper Country, creating the Fifth Minnesota District. Nelson quietly entered the race for this seat. First he secured a seat on the Board of Regents at the University of Minnesota, where he managed to establish a Department of Scandinavian Studies.

The campaign opened in 1882 and quickly devolved into one of the most contentious elections in history at that point. The contest between Nelson and Charles F. Kindred for the "Bloody Fifth", as it became known, involved widespread graft, intimidation, and election fraud. The Republican convention on July 12 in Detroit Lakes was compared to the historic Battle of the Boyne in Ireland. 150 delegates fought over 80 seats, and after a scuffle in the main conference center, the Kindred and Nelson campaigns nominated their candidates.^[7]

The rivalry between Kindred and Nelson centered to a large extent on the two competing railroads in the Upper Country, the Northern Pacific in Kindred's corner and the Great Northern in Nelson's. Kindred spent between $150,000 and $200,000, but Nelson won handily, overcoming massive election fraud in Northern Pacific counties.

U.S. House of Representatives, 1883–1889

A statue of Nelson stands in front of the Minnesota State Capitol

Nelson served in the United States House of Representatives from March 4, 1883, to March 4, 1889, in the 48th, 49th, and 50th congresses. In keeping with practices of the Gilded Age, his first agenda item in Congress was to ensure patronage for his supporters in Minnesota by doling out the limited number of federal appointments available. Most were made through Paul C. Sletten, the Receiver of the U.S. Land Office in Crookston. In addition to rewarding political support, he replaced pro-Kindred appointees in the forested counties around the Northern Pacific Railroad, the so-called "Pineries." Particularly publicized was the firing of Søren Listoe as Register of the U.S. Land Office in Fergus Falls.

Nelson did not always follow the orthodox Republican line in the House. In 1886, he abandoned the Republican caucus to vote for the Morrison Tariff Bill of 1886, which sought to reduce the tariffs on some imported items.^[8] Two years later, he and three other Republicans voted for the more aggressive tariff reductions in the Mills Tariff Bill of 1888.^[9] Although passed by the House on July 21, 1888, the Mills Bill was so heavily amended by the high-tariff Republicans in the Senate that the House found the result unacceptable, and no changes to the tariff were made in 1888.

Nelson was frustrated by what he perceived as the House's lack of effectiveness. He got involved in long debates about pension issues for Civil War veterans. His most notable legacy as a representative was passing the Nelson Act of 1889. It created the White Earth Indian Reservation in western Minnesota as a place to consolidate Native Americans from other reservations in the state, allocated communal land to heads of households, and opened up sale of the remaining thousands of acres of land to immigrants, at Native Americans' expense.

Considering his time in the House a "personal failure", Nelson decided not to seek reelection in 1888. Some suspect that a narrow escape from a drowning accident on October 11, 1886, also played a role in increasing his ambition.

Governor of Minnesota, 1893–1895

Though Nelson claimed to retire from politics, he remained an active insider in Minnesota Republican politics. In 1890 he started showing interest in running for governor. Meanwhile, he resumed an active law practice from Alexandria, continued running his farm, and opened a hardware store.

Increasing pressure on the Minnesotan agricultural economy gave rise to the Farmers' Alliance, which became a formidable political force in both parties, but especially the Republican Party. In 1890, the alliance voted to run its own candidates, and suggested nominating Nelson. In the Minnesota alliance convention in July 1890, Nelson did not acknowledge interest from the delegates, who ended up nominating Sidney M. Owen. But after the Alliance made a strong showing in the 1890 legislative election, Republicans saw Nelson as a strong alternative to the Alliance in the Upper Country.

Nelson worked to strengthen his candidacy for governor, though historians suggest that his ultimate goal was the U.S. Senate. He arranged to be drafted as a candidate rather than actively pursuing office. Appointed officeholders, fearing the loss of patronage to Alliance political victories, were glad to support him. Appealing to the Republican need for unity at the convention, Nelson maneuvered to gain the support of rivals such as Davis and Washburn, or at least avoid their opposition. He was unanimously nominated by 709 delegates as the Republican candidate for governor on July 28, 1892, at the St. Paul People's Church. His acceptance speech was a libertarian broadside against both Democrats and Populists; it emboldened the delegates for the campaign.^[10]

The ensuing campaign against Democratic nominee Daniel Lawler and Populist Ignatius Donnelly centered on allegations of undue influence by railroad interests, tariffs, and ethnicity and patriotism. When Nelson took the campaign to northwestern Minnesota, he had a minor physical altercation with Tobias Sawby, a local populist. After a grueling campaign, he carried 51 of 80 counties with 42.6% of the vote to Lawler's 37% and Donnelly's 15.6%. He gave a short victory speech in Alexandria, saying, "I go in without having made any promises to any combine, corporation, or person, and shall endeavor to do right, because it is right, and I endeavor to give an administration for the people, for the people, and by the people."

There were significant limitations on Governor Nelson's ability to pursue his agenda. The balance of power in Minnesota was shared among five independently elected officials, the state legislature, and the governor. In his inaugural speech on January 4, 1893, he presented himself as a fiscal conservative with an affinity for education and dwelled on statistics related to various state services and for solutions.

Nelson used his governorship as a bully pulpit for modest Republican reforms intended to provide moderate alternatives to the radical Populist actions. He promoted the "Governor's Grain Bill" as a way to regulate trade in grain, specifically by giving the Railroad and Warehouse Commission the authority to license, inspect, and regulate country grain elevators. Republican members of the legislature supported it as well, going so far as making it a party measure. Opposition to the bill from Democrats and Populists was based on suspicion of the railroad commission. The bill went through two rounds of voting with considerable horse-trading but in the end won narrowly, giving Nelson credibility as a political force.

Nelson also ended up cooperating with his former adversary Donnelly on the "timber ring" investigation; it sought to end land claim fraud in lumber areas. Nelson convened an interstate antitrust Conference in Chicago on June 5, 1893, where he spoke against the lumber trust and in favor of strengthening the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890.

The Panic of 1893 created a crisis for the railroad companies. After a series of wage cuts by the Great Northern, the American Railway Union went on strike on April 13. Nelson suggested the parties engage in arbitration while demanding law and order from the strikers. He left enforcement to federal marshals and arbitration to private business leaders. The strike was resolved largely in favor of the workers, and Nelson survived untarnished.

Nelson was handily renominated in 1894, and ran against Populist Sidney Owen and Democrat George Becker. He projected the image of a systematic and scientific reformer compared to such populist speakers as Mary Ellen Lease and Jerry Simpson. He demonstrated hands-on leadership in the dry summer of 1894, when the Great Hinckley Fire spread across east-central Minnesota on September 1. Although the state did not have the financial means to provide direct support, Nelson used his office to encourage private relief efforts. He won the election with 60,000 more votes than Owen.^[11]

United States Senator, 1895–1923

Nelson vs. Washburn

Sketch portrait of Nelson as Senator-elect

Nelson's campaign for election to the United States Senate was reported to have begun early in 1894. It was conducted quietly and behind the scenes, to avoid the appearance that his bid for governorship was less than genuine, and to avoid an internal Republican feud with incumbent U.S. Senator William D. Washburn. Before the 17th Amendment went into effect in 1914, state legislatures elected their U.S. senators. Nelson's campaign for Senate was a "still hunt," consisting of building support among incoming legislators while letting Washburn think he was running unopposed for the Republican nomination.

Sensing Nelson's rising star in the Republican establishment, Washburn tried to obtain Nelson's unequivocal assurance that he was not running for Senate, while solidifying his own standing as the Minneapolis candidate. On September 21, 1894, the two candidates met at the Freeborn county fair in Albert Lea, where Nelson was asked directly whether he supported Washburn's candidacy or had his own designs on the seat. He reportedly advised the state legislature to "elect your Republican legislative ticket, so as to send my friend Washburn back the United States senate, or if you do not like him, send some other good Republican."

Nelson's strategy was to prevent Washburn from gaining a straightforward majority in either the nomination or the election in the Republican caucus, and to appear as a unifying choice for the Republicans. He had to strike a fine balance between appealing to Scandinavian ethnic pride on the one hand and affirming himself a true American on the other, and between the appearance of treachery against Washburn and maintaining an honest impression.

The campaign came to a head in the so-called "Three Week War" or "Hotel Campaign", which was in full force by January 5, 1895. The confrontations, lobbying, cajoling, and alleged bribery centered on St. Paul's Windsor and Merchants hotels. Legislators were unnerved by the campaign, and the outcome remained uncertain. Return visits to their constituencies in mid-January did little to clarify public opinion. Public meetings with "wirepullers" had similarly little effect.

Nelson's strength became apparent but was not yet decisive on January 18 when the Republicans caucused. Washburn fell well short of reaching the necessary 72 votes, and a number of erstwhile supporters fell to Nelson on the second ballot. By the time the election went to the full legislature, it was clear that Washburn had lost. On January 23 Nelson was elected to the United States Senate, the first Scandinavian-born American to reach this post. Exhausted from the campaign, Washburn called for direct, popular elections of senators. It is remembered as one of the bitterest elections in Minnesota political history.

Washburn was perceived as a wealthy, urban, aristocratic native Yankee from Maine, and Nelson as a hard-working immigrant from the Upper Country. Nelson's victory reinforced the growing influence of areas of Minnesota outside the Twin Cities, and strengthened political awareness among ethnic Scandinavians in the region. Nelson decided early to make this image his platform, asking his constituency to call him "Uncle Knute."

Return to Norway

Nelson in Voss, Norway.

Nelson always took care in public to define himself first and foremost as an American, with no conflicted loyalty to his birth country. But in the background he supported Norway in various ways, notably by inviting Norwegian officers to observe and learn from American tactics in Cuba. He had been planning a trip to Norway for some time, but made sure he would also visit Sweden and Denmark, emphasizing his Scandinavian-American background.

Knute Nelson memorial sign in Evanger

He traveled alone and made his home town of Evanger one of the first stops. He arrived at the village in a horse-drawn buggy with only his luggage and was received as an honored guest. He spoke in his native dialect of Vossemål, slipping into Riksmål only when he felt it necessary to make an important political point. His hosts quickly started addressing him in the familiar "du Knut," which he appeared to enjoy.

From Evanger, Nelson traveled to Kristiania, where he refused official honors, and to Stockholm, where he made even less fuss. He spent a week in Copenhagen, visiting with his own patronage appointees Laurits S. Swenson, U.S. ambassador to Denmark, and Søren Listoe, consul to Rotterdam. He had an audience with King Christian IX and a formal dinner hosted by Swenson. He traveled through the contentious area of Schleswig-Holstein and the site of the Battle of Waterloo.

Nelson traveled home via England and happened to be in the visitors' gallery in the British parliament on October 17 when Queen Victoria convened an extraordinary session to debate the Second Boer War.