Disappearing Whigs and Southern Democrats
The Democrats supported states’ rights, the belief that dominant power should be held by the states rather than by the central, or federal, government. The Democrats supported the traditional view that there were limits to federal power. The Whigs believed in progress and modernization, supporting a strong central government and the expansion of federal power to support internal improvements to strengthen the national economy. The Whigs were strongest among prosperous farmers, manufacturers, and city dwellers, both North and South. The Democrats had strong support among frontiersmen and small farmers, many of whom desired America to expand into western lands not yet owned by the United States. Clearly, the Democratic Party favored the South’s vision of what America should be. Up until 1850, the Whigs and the Democrats maintained balanced constituencies in both the North and South. This balance was essential to the political health of the nation. As long as both parties could rely on both Northern and Southern voters, the system of representative government worked. Once the parties could no longer build support across sectional lines, the system was doomed. The sectional political stakes that arose after the Compromise of 1850 created such dissension within these two parties that neither could maintain its Northern and Southern coalitions. Essentially what happened is this: The Democrats became a pure Southern party, and the Whigs, unable to support a purely sectional party, disappeared.
The Free Soilers
The passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act illustrates how divisive the issue of slavery in new territories had become to the two dominant political parties. Northern Democrats, especially, paid a heavy political price for their support of the Kansas-Nebraska bill. The Northern Democrats who had supported the measure in the House and Senate (and had given the bill the margin of victory to ensure its passage) were roundly defeated in the next congressional elections as outraged Northern voters turned to other parties more in line with their antislavery views. The Democratic Party became more allied with the view of the South alone. The Whigs lost support as Southern members deserted them to join the Democrats. Northern Whigs lost members to other splinter parties that rose up in protest to the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. One such group, the Free Soil Party, which grew to prominence in 1848, supported the Wilmot Proviso (see Chapter 1) that endorsed no extension of slavery into new territories. The new party attracted dissatisfied Democrats, antislavery Whigs, and others generally disaffected with abolitionist radicalism. Free Soilers were closely connected to the free labor ideology (see Chapter 1 also), reflecting an interest in limiting the expansion of slavery into the territories, but not necessarily an interest in offering Blacks any special advantages. In other words, free soil for many in the party was intended for whites only.
The Know-Nothings
Another party was the Know-Nothings, which grew from a secret fraternal organization in New York in 1849. Any member, when asked about his affiliation with this organization, responded with the cryptic phrase “I know nothing.” The Know-Nothings drawing support from Whigs in both the North and the South, peaked in 1855, claiming a million members. The main attraction seemed to be this: If you were tired of listening to arguments over slavery, the Know-Nothings offered their version of 100 percent Americanism by opposing the growing voting power of Irish and German immigrants. With a strong anti-Catholic bent (because many German and nearly all Irish immigrants were Catholic), the Know-Nothings demanded a 15-year naturalization period before being allowed to vote, and limits on the production and sale of alcohol. This, too, was directed at the immigrants, whose consumption of strong drink was part of their culture. Because their pure anti-immigration message had little traction, the Know-Nothings disappeared as a political party in 1856. As political power shifted in the North, the Know Nothings drifted into other parties, most notably in the emerging Republican Party. Ironically, the growth of the Know Nothings, largely as a result of the defection of many voters from the Whig Party, helped to bring about the Whig Party’s final disappearance in 1855.
The Republican Party arrives
By 1856, a new coalition of antislavery Whigs, Free Soil Party members, and Know-Nothings had been formed to become the Republican Party. The catalyst for this action, like that for other new parties, was the Kansas-Nebraska Act. To many observers, the South had won a clear political victory; to forestall any further advances, this new party would base its support on one issue — to keep slavery out of Kansas and all other territories.
One of the most powerful spokesmen for this new party was a former Whig congressman from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln (see Figure 2-1). Lincoln was not an abolitionist; like many Northerners, he felt slavery was the source of all troubles within the country. He expressed it in this way: “The real issue in this controversy — the one pressing upon every mind — is the sentiment on the part of one class that looks upon the institution of slavery as a wrong, and of another class that does not look upon it as a wrong.” Lincoln’s party had no intention of interfering with slavery in the states where it currently existed. The Constitution guaranteed slavery there — it was unquestioned. The Republicans also had no interest in the most radical abolitionist position that demanded Blacks become the social and political equals of whites. In fact, Lincoln expounded the Free Soil Party view that the new territories should be “an outlet for free white people everywhere.”
Hesler, Alexander / The Library of Congress / Public Domain
FIGURE 2-1: Abraham Lincoln, Republican Party spokesman and future presidential candidate.
In the midst of political turmoil, with parties shifting support bases and other political parties disappearing, Lincoln masterfully and most often gave expression to the thoughts and feelings of many moderate Northerners, regardless of party. He soon became the leading spokesman for the Republican Party, traveling throughout the North addressing huge, enthusiastic crowds. By 1856, the year of the presidential election, the Republican Party already dominated most legislatures in the North.
The Republicans and the 1856 Presidential Election
Today, we decry political leaders who are all symbol and no substance, thinking this is a product of our own times. If you take a look at the election of 1856, you’ll find plenty of trends familiar to you. The Republicans nominated John C. Frémont, a famous western explorer known as “The Pathfinder.” He was a former Free Soil Party leader, but it was his youth (43 years old) and his connection to the romance of the West rather than any clear political vision that made him an attractive candidate to many.
The Democrats: Choosing a safe candidate
The Democrats nominated a pro-Southern Pennsylvanian, 65-year-old James Buchanan, whose only real qualification for office seemed to be that he had been out of the country for several years as ambassador, and thus out of the line of fire in the sectional dispute. Stephen A. Douglas, who engineered the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act in part to build political support in the South for his presidential ambitions, was rejected as too controversial.
Millard Fillmore for president
The remnants of the Whigs and Know-Nothings combined to nominate Millard Fillmore, a man who has come to personify the political nonentity in our history. The Know-Nothings refused even to mention slavery, preferring to say only “the Union is in peril.”
THE LINCOLN-DOUGLAS DEBATES
In 1858, Abraham Lincoln, a Whig, ran against incumbent Democratic Senator