Michael Scanlan (10 November 1833 – 6 March 1917) was an Irish nationalist, editor, poet and writer. Known as the "Fenian poet" or the "poet laureate of American Fenianism",^[1] he was the author of a number of Irish ballads such as the "Bold Fenian Men" and "The Jackets Green".^[2]

Scanlan was born in Castlemahon, County Limerick in November 1833.^[3] He emigrated to the United States at fifteen years of age and with his brothers, John and Mortimer, settled in Chicago. They started a sweets (candy) business which became successful. Scanlan joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) and wrote articles and poems for a number of newspapers.^[4]

He supported the Fenian invasion of Canada (31 May 1866), following the leadership of William R. Roberts, and was a member of a body known as the Senate.^[5] After the failure of that enterprise, he became editor of a new newspaper, the Irish Republic.^[1] He edited the Irish Republic, described in its masthead as a "journal of liberty, literature, and social progress",^[2] together with Patrick William Dunne and fellow IRB exile David Bell.^[6]

In the Irish Republic, Scanlon and Bell promoted physical-force Fenianism, while disparaging the general clericalism and pro-Democratic-Party leanings of rival Irish-American papers.^[7] The Irish Republic supported the Radical Republican agenda for Reconstruction, black suffrage and equal rights.^[8]

After the Irish Republic ceased publication in 1873, Scanlon continued writing for Irish and American newspapers. He later became a senior official in the American administration in Washington. In 1887 he was appointed chief of the Bureau of Statistics in the State Department. He retired in 1912.

He had a son and three daughters.^[4] He died, aged eighty-four years, in the hospital of St. Mary of Nazareth in Chicago.