USA > New Hampshire > Coos County > Lancaster > History of Lancaster, New Hampshire > Part 25
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HISTORY OF LANCASTER.
difference during the few years referred to. The events leading up to the embargo act, and the non-intercourse act, had the effect to arouse the Federalists, who were the chief commercialists of New England, to renewed activity in 1808. The excitement did not reach Lancaster, however, that year; but in the following year the town felt the influence of the mighty wave of public sentiment that was sweeping over the entire country. The commerce of the country was being ruined ; and industries of every kind were being paralysed. The commerical prosperity enjoyed for many years by Portsmouth had been completely ruined; and the Federalists believed that the Republican administration and party were responsible for it. The Federalists wanted our marine protected against British and French interference, and the administration had suffered it to be outraged on the very coasts of our own country. A distrust and revulsion of public sentiment favored the chances of the Federalist party coming back into power; and in 1809 there was one of the hottest party contests that have ever . been seen in this country. A Federal delegation to congress had been secured in New Hampshire. This gave the Federalists new hopes, and they put forth most heroic efforts to carry the state, which they did by a majority of a little more than two hundred for Jeremiah Smith as governor. Nearly thirty-one thousand votes were cast, while at the preceding elec- tion not more than fifteen thousand votes were thrown, of which Langdon, Republican, had received thirteen thousand, and Gilman, Federalist, twelve hundred and sixty-one, with a few hundred scat- tering votes for other candidates.
In 1809 Lancaster aroused from her indifference. While she had but thirty-five votes in 1808, in 1809 she cast ninety-five votes, of which Jeremiah Smith, Federalist, received seventy-three, and Langdon, Republican, twenty-two. A renewed interest in politics was taken, and in 1810 one hundred and eight votes were cast, of which Jeremiah Smith received eighty-five and Langdon twenty- three. This marks quite a growth in the Federal party. That party, however, had gained control of the entire state government and the delegation in congress. This tidal wave of political rever- sion turned back in the opposite direction the next year, and as completely put everything in the hands of the Republicans. A compensation for this may be found in the fact that it spared New Hampshire the humiliation that would have inevitably followed the election of a senator and members of congress opposed to the ad- ministration, and such a party representation in congress might have prevented the declaration of war, a calamity that would have been simply incalculable in its effects upon the destiny of the United States. The Federalists of New England were blind to the faults of Great Britain, while they magnified the sins of France against our
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commerce into gigantic proportions. The Republicans, on the con- trary, were bold to denounce the wrongs of England against our commerce. Federalism had a strong hold upon Lancaster voters, who were conservative, and seem to have had less respect for the national government than their otherwise patriotic conduct in the past would lead one to expect. There was a remnant of the people of the state, however, that were moved by the recollection of British wrongs to Americans, and in the election of 181 I gave Langdon a majority of nearly three thousand votes. This called upon him an unmerited amount of abuse from the Federalist party of the state. They forgot his patriotic services in the War of the Revolution, and heaped upon him every imaginable reproach; but the legislature supported his policy, and together they held the state to her duty during that period of crisis. The Federalists boldly talked of sepa- ration from the Union and an alliance with England. While that sentiment was sustained by many voters in this town, there were few who dared openly to advocate it. Much strong feeling existed on the subject.
In 1810, during the period of intense party strife, the question of the revision of the state constitution was voted on. Lancaster gave but one vote in favor of it, and forty against it. This was not a political question, and as party strife ran high, neither party cared to risk any change in the constitution lest it should operate against its future welfare.
In the election of 1812 the full strength of the Federalist party was shown by its vote in this town. All the candidates, among whom was Daniel Webster, candidate for congress, received ninety- one votes, while the opposition only carried twenty-seven. The Republicans-or as they were then beginning to be called, Demo- crats-carried the election, securing the election of William Plumer, Jr., as governor. He had been up to that date a Federalist, but upon the stirring questions of the day he could no longer be classed with the Federalists. Through the campaign of that year Plumer was accused before the public as having been once a zealous Bap- tist preacher, and then an unbeliever. The fact that he was for years a Federalist, and had become a Democrat, was charged against him. Through the sectarian religious prejudice, as well as party prejudice, against him and Judge Smith, the election was thrown into the legislature, where he received one hundred and four votes to eighty-two against him, in favor of Gilman. He made a good governor, and carried New Hampshire proudly through the War of 1812. His Democratic predecessor had kept the state militia in good condition, so that when Plumer came into office he found it no hard task to comply with the demands upon the state for sol- diers for the war then upon the country. Lancaster was not slow in
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responding to that call, for Capt. John W. Weeks raised a company and was attached to Col. Moody Bedel's regiment, the Eleventh United States Infantry, mainly made up of New Hampshire men. A majority of the one hundred and forty-six men in Captain Weeks's company were Democrats; some of them, after their return to civil life, were among the leading local politicians of that party.
Party lines were closely drawn in Lancaster. The excitement and the issues at stake in the war did not change the relative number of votes between the parties. In the election of 1814 the Federal- ists cast ninety-one votes for Gilman, while only twenty-nine were given Plumer. The small vote for the latter is to be accounted for in the absence of so large a number of men in the army who were Democrats, and who, had they been at home would, no doubt, have given Plumer nearly as large a vote as Gilman received. The Fed- eralist party had espoused a bad cause in obstructing certain meas- ures of the war, which was now drawing to a close with a complete vindication of the position taken by the Democrats. The Federalist party had received its death wounds, inflicted by its own hand. Its adherents in Lancaster yielded slowly and with anything but patri- otism and gracefulness. As a condemned party it died hard. Men of prominence continued to vote with it long after its doom was sealed by public sentiment recorded in a vote against it that in- creased every year by a significant majority throughout the country. This general decline of their party had no effect upon Lancaster Federalists; they adhered to the dying party with a devotion that was anything but commendable. As late as 1816, when Joseph Sheafe of Portsmouth was the Federalist candidate for governor, he received seventy-two votes to thirty-nine for Plumer, who was elected by a decisive majority. The Federalists sustained a com- plete defeat, as had been foreseen by Gilman, who refused to be any longer his party's candidate for governor.
Seeing their party was going to its doom, many Federalists voted for Plumer in 1817. He received that year fifty-one votes, the same number that Sheafe did. For state senator, the vote was the same.
In the following year there were only ninety-one votes cast, of which Plumer received fifty-one, and Jeremiah Mason forty. Plumer was elected by about the same relative majority throughout the state that he received in Lancaster. The pace of Federalist decline had been set, and Lancaster was falling into line for a change to the opposite party.
In the election of 1819 the difference had grown still greater, for Samuel Bell, Democratic candidate for governor, received fifty-seven votes, while William Hale, Federalist, only received thirty-nine. The votes for members of congress show a most remarkable depart-
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ure from the party vote for governor. No less than fifteen persons were voted for, with the following results : Josiah Butler, forty-nine ; William Plumer, Jr., forty-three; Nathaniel Upham, forty-eight; Clifton Claggett, forty-four; Joseph Buffum, Jr., forty-one; Arthur Livermore, seventy-six; Joseph Buffum, five; William Plumer, one ; Jeremiah Smith, forty-three; John Haven, forty-two; Stephen Moody, four; Parker Noyes, forty-one; Levi Jackson, forty-one ; Mills Olcott, thirty-six; Jonathan Wilcox, two. This result of vot- ing was partly due to the irregular manner of bringing congres- sional candidates before town elections, but mainly to the spirit of political independence that characterizes people at the time of party decadences when they are readjusting themselves. The voters were disposed to assert some right to select the men of either party most in favor with them. Besides, the so-called "Era of good feeling " was at hand in which everybody was rejoicing at the re- turn of prosperity and peace. Our country had taken her stand on great international questions, and had won the day. The na- tion was honored abroad and loved at home. The Federalists were heartily ashamed of the part they played in that great drama, and the Democratic-Republican party had covered itself with honor by its management of the war and the manner in which national harmony was produced. A spirit of perfect union and concord was now ushered in. Party spirit ran low at the time. Samuel Bell, Democratic-Republican candidate for governor in 1820, received nearly all the votes of the town, one hundred and twelve, with seven recorded as "scattering." No great excitement took place over the election of president. It was a foregone conclusion that Monroe would be elected. At the November election the highest number of votes cast for electors was twenty-three for Ezra Bartlett. William Plumer received twenty, and the other six, from eight to nineteen votes. There was little to indicate party spirit except that a few Federalist votes were cast for Jeremiah Mason and Jeremiah Smith in the election of 1821. The former got one vote, and the latter six, while Samuel Bell was honored with one hundred and fourteen. Ezekiel Webster also got two votes. Bell had proven himself a good executive officer and had won the confidence of the people, and therefore he received the bulk of the votes. Nothing was to be gained by voting him down for another, though any of his rivals that year were his equal in worth and ability as citizens and statesmen.
In the following year Bell received ninety-seven votes, and Mason only three. Not more than three fourths of the people voted, for there must have been not less than one hundred and fifty voters in town at the time. In the election of 1823, party spirit again broke out in something of its old-time fervor. Samuel Dinsmore
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was the Democratic-Republican candidate, with young Levi Wood- bury opposing him. Lancaster gave Dinsmore one hundred and nine votes, and thirty-one to Woodbury. John Wilson was elected representative that year on party issues, as Adino N. Brackett had been two years before. The vote for congressman was much divided. Edmund Parker received fifty-five, Richard Odell thirty, and Arthur Livermore thirty-six. There were that year one hun- dred and fifty-four voters in town, only one hundred and twenty-one of whom exercised the right of franchise. This would seem to indi- cate considerable indifference in the matter of party relations. The next year the country was much stirred over the four candidates for president, and New Hampshire, and Lancaster even, partook of that excitement. The four candidates of that campaign were Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, Henry Clay, and William H. Craw- ford. An effort had been made to secure regular party candidates through the Caucus System, but it failed, and the campaign degen- erated into a personal scramble for the office, giving rise to the designation of the campaign as " The scrub race for the presidency." So far as New Hampshire was concerned the issues of the race lay between Adams and Jackson. The real issue was over the so-called construction of the constitution of the United States. The terms "Loose" and "Close Constructionists" were used to determine whether the candidates favored a close or loose construction of the constitution in regard to matters of "Internal Improvements and a Tariff for the Protection of American Industries." These designa- tions so completely ignored the old party names that they became the forerunners of a new name and new party. Adams was elected as a "Loose Constructionist " by the house of representatives, as the popular vote failed to make a choice. Because of the united oppo- sition to Adams's administration of the "Strict Constructionists,". the Democratic-Republican party, which by this time was struggling to either swallow or drop its tail and go by the designation of Democrats alone, Adams and Clay, led their factions under the name of " National Republicans," which name a few years later was changed to that of "Whigs." Under both those names the party maintained the Loose Construction principles of the Federalist party. In that memorable campaign Lancaster gave Levi Wood- bury, Jacksonian Democrat, one hundred and twelve votes, and David L. Morril, Loose Constructionist, twenty-five votes only. For electors the Adams candidates all received fifty-four votes, except Moses White who received only forty ballots.
Both of the leading parties had lost their distinctive names and had come to accept others not calculated to last long as they simply designated a national policy that would certainly be settled soon. This directed attention to the ability and integrity of the candidates
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POLITICAL HISTORY.
to carry that question of the construction of the constitution to an early issue. In the election of 1825, coming within a week of the inauguration of Adams and Calhoun, the Loose Construction party's candidate, David L. Morril, all but carried the town of Lancaster unanimously, for he received one hundred and twenty-nine votes, with only two against him. In the state he received nearly thirty thousand as against five hundred and sixty-three, set down as " scattering." The elections were conducted with reference to national questions; there were no state or local political questions in this state or town.
Andrew Jackson was growing in popularity, and his name had in it a charm for the old-time Democrats. Adams was losing popu- larity all the time. When Benjamin Pierce was put forward in 1826, as a Jacksonian Democratic candidate for governor, he proved to be the most popular man before the voters. He received one hundred and twenty-nine votes in Lancaster, and Morril, who had been so popular the year before, only got twenty-four votes. The excitement over the two champions-Adams and Jackson-was so great as to call out the heaviest vote ever cast in Lancaster, one hun- dred and fifty-three. So popular had Pierce become that the next year he received an almost unanimous vote throughout the state. This year John W. Weeks was elected to the state senate as a Jacksonian Democrat, and Richard Eastman was elected as representative.
Matters were shaping themselves to involve Lancaster in the hot- test political contest she had ever seen. As politics had turned so largely upon personal leadership, instead of on political questions, the contest that was coming for 1828 was to be a hot one. Jackson's grievances had been preached all over the country so much that the masses began to sympathize with him as a wronged man. His heroism at the battle of New Orleans-his marked personality- appealed to the people strongly; they were anxious to vindicate him.
At the March meeting of that year, John Bell, the Adams can- didate, received one hundred and two votes, while Pierce, the Jacksonian candidate, got eighty-eight. This shows a marked gain of the Jackson party. In the November meeting for choice of presidential electors, the Adams candidates received one hundred and fourteen votes to one hundred for the Jackson men. Jackson was elected president, however, and when another election occurred his influence was visible in the result of the ballot. The Adams candidate, John Bell, only received ninety-five votes for governor, while Pierce carried one hundred and twelve votes. Pierce was badly beaten in the state, but that did not cool the ardor of his party whose hero-leader was in the presidential chair. Of the two
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HISTORY OF LANCASTER.
hundred and ten voters in town, two hundred and seven cast their votes at that election. There was no indifference to stop any one from voting then, as had often been the case before. Party feeling and party zeal were rife that were to crystallize into two strong na- tional parties. The next year, 1830, shows another hot contest be- tween the followers of the two great champions. Matthew Harvey was the Jacksonian candidate for governor, with Timothy Upton arrayed against him as an Adams man. There was a decided Dem- ocratic gain, for Harvey got one hundred and twenty-five votes, and Upton only ninety-six. The Adams party were not holding their own in the contests, while the Jackson party were making rapid gains. It was at this election that Jared W. Williams was first elected rep- resentative as a Jacksonian Democrat. That was the beginning of a bright political career for Williams. He entered public life on the high tide of Jacksonian Democracy, and held his place until his death.
The campaign of 1831 was a hotly contested one, and one of considerable interest to Lancaster. The candidates for governor were Samuel Dinsmore, Democrat, and Ichabod Bartlett, an Adams man, who still held to the Federalist principles. Bartlett was one of the most famous lawyers in the state, ranking with Daniel Web- ster, Levi Woodbury, and Jeremiah Mason. Party ties were strong and could not be broken for even so gifted a man as Bartlett. His devotion to doctrines held by Adams was against him. His op- ponent received one hundred and forty-four votes, while he only secured seventy-nine. The state and town were too much de- voted to Jackson to swerve an inch for even the best men in the state. The vote for members of congress this year was substan- tially the same as that for governor, with the exception of Maj. John W. Weeks of Lancaster, who received a heavier vote than any other candidate. He was one of the most prominent citizens of the town, and as a matter of compliment some of his neighbors crossed the party lines to vote for him. The following year showed no important change in the situation; the same candidates for gov- ernor were up and received substantially the same vote as the year before. Dinsmore received one hundred and thirty-eight, and Bart- lett sixty-six. Nineteen less votes were cast than on the previous year, which was of more interest, as members of congress were elected that year, and in 1832 only state and county officers were elected, which did not call out the full vote.
The year 1833 was of uncommon interest in the history of poli- tics in this state, as in that campaign the Adams party almost entirely disappeared from the political arena. Incredible as it may seem, the party of John Quincy Adams, the lingering relic of Fed- eralism, received almost no votes that year. The party's candidate
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for governor, Arthur Livermore, one of the most noted jurists in the state and a man of unimpeachable character, only received three thousand nine hundred and fifty-nine votes in the entire state, while his competitor, Samuel Dinsmore, received twenty-eight thousand two hundred and seventy-seven. Dinsmore carried one hundred and thirty-seven votes in Lancaster, and Francis Ferrin of Lancas- ter, one.
The following year the vote for governor was almost unanimous. William Badger received one hundred and eleven out of one hun- dred and thirteen cast in this town. Jared W. Williams was elected to the state senate by a handsome majority, as was Richard Eastman to the house of representatives. The Jacksonian Democracy was now dominant throughout the country. Devotion to Jackson's party was about synonynous with patriotism. Jackson had gotten his opponents under his feet, and his party was following his example everywhere.
William Badger of Gilmanton was the Democratic candidate for governor in 1834, and received one hundred and eleven votes in Lancaster, while Ichabod Bartlett could count but two. Badger's vote in the state was twenty-eight thousand five hundred and forty- two, as against one thousand six hundred and thirty-one for Bartlett.
These annual contests were often reversed in a measure, and it happened that in 1835 the Whig candidate carried away from his Democratic competitor many votes. Joseph Healey, Whig candi- date for governor, received about fifteen thousand votes in the state, and seventy-one of them were cast for him in Lancaster, as against one hundred and twelve for Badger, the Democrat.
Until this time New Hampshire had no party leader who was not the shadow of some politician of national prominence; but there was coming the time when one of her own sons was destined to become the controlling spirit in her political contests. That person- ality was Isaac Hill of Concord. Isaac Hill had been in Concord as editor of the American Patriot since 1809; and now, after more than a quarter of a century of devoted service to politics, he had succeeded in moulding public opinion after the fashion of his own mind. He was a man of decided convictions and tireless ener- gies. He wrote with great force and clearness, carrying to others the sincere convictions that prompted him. Naturally, he had be- come the most influential politician in the state, and was destined to be, henceforth, the controlling spirit of the Democratic party ; and so effectually did he dominate it that it was not long before the term "Isaac Hill Democrat" was as current as "Jacksonian Demo- crat" had been. The hero of New Orleans was eclipsed by the editor of the Patriot in New Hampshire. Mr. Hill had been named by President Jackson for a place in the treasury department in 1830,
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but the senate refused to confirm his nomination. Hill's next move was to secure his election to the United States senate, which he easily accomplished.
Isaac Hill was master of the political situation in New Hampshire, for he had the most devoted support of such men as Pierce, Hibbard, Atherton, and others of ability and prominence throughout the state. His will was supreme in the councils of his party; and when he planned one of those annual political contests it always went as he directed. Success attended his leadership, and his friends became evermore devoted to him. When he sought election as governor in 1836, he carried everything before him. In Lancaster he received ninety-eight votes, while Joseph Healey, Whig, secured but one vote. More than one half of the voters did not vote that year, for Lancaster had nearly two hundred and thirty polls at the time. The Whigs, as the successors of the Federalists, were quite numerous in Lancaster; but they lacked leadership to bring them into action against such an organized force as the "Isaac Hill Democrats," with local leaders like Jared W. Williams and Maj. John W. Weeks, and still others younger and more ardent than these.
It is worthy of note, though not of any political or party signifi- cance, that at this election a vote was called for the expediency of erecting an asylum for the insane. The vote was seventy in favor of the measure, with only eight against it in this town. Pretty nearly the same unanimity was expressed by the towns of the state, . and the asylum was erected at Concord. There was no political or organized effort made against this object. The votes cast against it were simply such as are always cast against any public expendi- tures by people too ignorant or selfish to appreciate, or discrimi- nate in regard to such measures.
The election of 1837 was even more perfectly dominated by the Hill party than that of the preceding year. The old governor received every vote cast for that office, unless the town clerk was remiss in his duty of making proper record, for not a vote was recorded as cast for the Whig candidate. Isaac Hill received ninety-nine votes. Jared W. Williams was elected to congress with no votes cast for his rival; but strange as it may seem, Adino N. Brackett, a Whig of pronounced opinions, was elected to the legis- lature. This must be accounted for on the ground of his superior fitness for that office which he had filled a number of terms to the entire satisfaction of all persons regardless of party.
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