Moses Harman, 'Lucifer, The Light Bearer,' and the trials of Kansas free thought at the end of the nineteenth century

Kansas has long been a creation ground for radical political and social movements in America. Populism, Prohibition, Eugenics, and the Free-thought movement have all found places in this state at one time or another. Current decades have shown a shift away from this radicalism. An almost ingrained political, social, religious, and economic conservatism has come to dominate the state landscape. I have chosen to examine the course of the free-thought movement in Kansas at the turn of the twentieth century through an examination of the battle of one free-thought newspaper editor against censorship, society, and the establishment This is not an exhaustive study of the free thought movement in its entirety - just a glimpse at a tumultuous figure and his plight.;During the latter half of the 1800s, numerous free thought newspapers and journals were printed in Kansas. These writings have disappeared over the decades. Why? What has become of this revolutionary thought process? This paper will focus on the impact of Moses Harman's paper (Valley Falls Liberal - Kansas Liberal - Lucifer the Light Bearer) on Kansas free thought as well as the reaction he triggered. In addition, his trial on charges of obscenity and subsequent imprisonments, as well as the trial and imprisonment of his daughter (Lillian) and her autonomistic husband E.C. Walker, will be highlighted. Moses Harman was primarily defended by two extraordinary individuals, Lawyers David Overmyer and G.C. Clemens. The paper will examine the importance of these two men to Kansas, Kansas politics and thought, as well as why they chose to align themselves with Harman and his free thought ideas.