USA > New York > Franklin County > Historical sketches of Franklin county and its several towns > Part 11
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85
90
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
food direct from China. The actual cost for their board was under a dollar per week per head, so that the county cleared two dollars and more on its contract with the federal government. Its receipts from this source ranged from $296 to $4,196 a year; but the business began to fall off after a time, and practically disappeared in 1911. The rail- road company doubtless found that with so many deported it was not profitable to continue bringing them here, or perhaps the Chinese them- selves concluded that the price they had to pay for coming when most of them were denied a right to remain was more than the trip was worth.
The sessions of the board of supervisors naturally increased in length as the county grew and its business became greater and more compli- cated, so that whereas formerly the sessions had continued only for one week they extended in 1898 to seventeen days, in 1903 to twenty-three days, and in 1917 to twenty-eight days exclusive of two extra sessions, at a cost of $4,320.39.
COST OF SUPPORTING THE POOR
In 1904 the expense of relieving the poor and supporting the poor house was $16,395.67 plus $500 voted for expenditure by Grand Army posts on account of indigent veterans. For 1917 this expense had increased to $29,695.10 without counting products of the farm (valued at $4,003.79) consumed by inmates of the poor house, the increase having been due in part to a larger number of paupers, but more to the higher prices for food, clothing, etc. The superintendent of the poor informs me that the showing for 1918 will be better because of the suppression of the liquor traffic in a number of towns. Many families which formerly have had to have poor relief every winter supported themselves in 1918.
TOWN MEETINGS IN THE FALL
In 1902 the town meetings were held for the first time concurrently with the general election in November, but the next year the super- visors voted unanimously that the arrangement had not worked satis- factorily, and provided for a return to the plan of holding them in the spring. In 1917, however, it was ordered that thereafter they be held at the general election in odd-numbered years, which seems to me a mistaken policy. There is no institution under our form of government that is so educative in regard to public affairs as the old-fashioned town meeting, where all taxpayers can assemble, thresh out their town
91
FRANKLIN COUNTY OFFICIAL ACTS
problems and business, and determine expenditures after full discussion. At a general election, however, there can be no opportunity for explana- tions, and the taxpayers must simply accept or reject rather blindly the propositions which a town board may submit. Thus home rule goes practically out of the control of the taxpayers as a body, and almost entirely into the hands of a few town officials.
IMPROVEMENT OF HIGHWAYS
By 1903 public sentiment on the highway question was becoming aroused, and there was earnest demand for road improvement. In that year the supervisors recommended that the all-money plan of caring for the highways be made mandatory, and that the practice of commut- ing road taxes by labor be abolished. In addition, a number of towns had previously taken up this question, and had bonded themselves in considerable amounts for the improvement of particular roads and for building bridges. A beginning along right lines having been made, there was no halting it, and two or three years later the supervisors voted, eighteen to one, to apply for the county's full share of road con- struction under the fifty million dollar State bond issue. In 1906 peti- tion was formally made for improvement by the State of 133 miles of roads in the county, with specification of the roads, so that every town should have its equitable mileage, and with assumption by the towns and the county of the proportionate part of the cost to be borne by each. This interest, late in developing, continued and extended until in 1911 the supervisors determined to bond the county for half a million dol- lars for the improvement of highways, which now cost $60,000 a year to maintain - the county providing two-thirds and the State one- third. The county is paying, besides, $10,000 a year on the debt, and over $20,000 for interest. Our highway expenditures thus total annually more than the entire county tax of 1910.
BREACHES OF TRUST
From earliest times down to 1897 the duties of each of the county officials had been discharged, if not always with the highest efficiency, at least without default or embezzlement. But upon the death of the then county treasurer in 1898 it was discovered that he was short $3,542.99 in his accounts, and some years later a successor was found to have appropriated to his own use $15,051.80 of county moneys, and a superintendent of the poor also went wrong. The shortages of both
92
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
were replaced, and the county lost nothing except the moneys which it had to spend in investigation. Both officials were indicted and convicted.
INCREASE IN COUNTY EXPENSES
The items in the County budget for 1910 aggregated $60,253.03, but appear in the printed record as totaling $61,183.33 - a discrep- ancy of $930.30. The budgets have been increasing almost continuously ever since 1910, and in 1917 amounted to $227,146.94. The figures for the intermediate years are :
In 1911
$108,158 43
In 1912
123, 438 68
In 1913.
145, 719 90
In 1914.
195, 897 89
In 1915.
240,259 20
In 1916.
189,822 08
The explanation of the very large amount in 1915 is that highway expenses that year were $18,000 in excess of those for 1917, the State tax also was more, and the purchase of a jail farm cost $5,300. The budgets for 1910 and 1917 are herewith shown :
1910
State tax
None
1917 $24,552 33 526 91
State tax for stenographer ..
$837 79
Justices, constables and coroners' accounts.
1,240 55
2,069 34
School commissioners' expenses*
600 00
Miscellaneous county accounts .
9,373 31
2,386 92
County Clerk
1,874 14
700 00
Poor fund ..
14,000 00
28,000 00
Armory fund.
3,601 25
3,405 69
Court fund;
None
6,000 00
Bills of charitable institutions.
7,241 11
16, 756 22
Bills of reform schools and penal institutions ;.
600 00
1,400 00
Erroneous assessment
134 28
23 49
Highways
4,266 39
79,252 51
Printing#
1,256 00
Debentures of the board of supervisors.
3,287 68
4,000 00
Contingent fund
None
870 72
Investigation of treasurer's and superintendent of the poor's accounts
933 03
None
Miscellaneous
667 50
None
Supplies for jail;
7,000 00
Repairs, coal, etc., for county buildingst.
7,863 78
Society Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
None
150 00
* The office of school commissioner has been abolished, and the expenses of the district superintendents of schools are now paid by the State.
¿ Payment of court expenses, and apparently for supplies for the jail and also for fuel, was made In 1910 from surplus moneys in the treasury.
I The items for reform schools and penal institutions and for printing were included in miscellaneous county accounts in 1910; the amount of the printing bills in that year was $2,713.84, and the like item of $2,256 for 1917 Includes only a part of the printing charges for that year.
1,804 27
Repairs, etc., at poor honse
93
FRANKLIN COUNTY OFFICIAL ACTS
1910
1917
Tuberculosis poor fund.
None
$1,000 00
Salary and expenses of visting nurse.
None
1,300 00
Soldiers and Sailors' relief . .
805 00
Home defense company.
Nonc
5,596 56
Board of elections, salaries and expenses.
None
3,444 60
Purchase of land for enlargement of armory.
None
6,683 11
Salary county judge and surrogate ..
$2,000 00
3,200 00
Supplies and office expenses of surrogate.
700 00
1,000 00
Salary of surrogate's clerk
720 00
1,000 00
Salary of district attorney
1,500 00
1,800 00
Office expenses of district attorney .
1,200 00
1,700 00
Salary of superintendent of the poor.
700 00
900 00
Salary of keeper of the poor house.
500 00
600 00
Salary of matron of the poor house.
200 00
200 00
Salary of janitor of county buildings
600 00
900 00
Salary of sheriff and help §
2,806 00
3,606 00
Salary of poor house physician
100 00
100 00
Salary and expenses measures .
of sealer of
weights and
600 00
850 00
Salary and expenses of probation officer
None
791 72
Salary and expenses of farm bureau manager
None
2,500 00
$60,253 03
$227, 146 94
The board of elections was created in 1911, a revision of the election law having required a transfer from the county clerk to such body of the duties of administering the law and of providing ballots, etc. So far as can be judged, the only additional expense thereby imposed is the difference in salaries, amounting to a few hundred dollars, between the amounts formerly paid and those now allowed.
The farm bureau was established in 1912, and the expense of main- taining it is shared by the federal, State and county governments and by its individual members. The State contributes $600 yearly, and the United States $1,200. Membership is voluntary, but must include at least 1,000 in order to make the federal part of the fund available. A manager of the bureau gives all of his time to the work, and aims to be of practical assistance to the farmers in procuring help and seed for them, in testing soils, in advising as to methods to be employed, and in a score or more of other ways. It is believed to be one of the best investments that the county ever made.
In 1917 the State appropriated $40,000 for an enlargement of the armory in Malone, and the county had to purchase the land on which to build the extension - paying $6,683.11 for it.
§ This item for 1917 includes $800 for help and supplies for the jail farm.
126 77
Salary of county treasurer and assistant
725 00
Supplies and bond for county treasurer
300 00
Salary of surrogate's stenographer
CHAPTER III FRANKLIN COUNTY POLITICALLY
Though the writer does not purpose to venture into the field of general history except as it may seem essential to make understandable the recital of local affairs, it will not, I hope, be thought pedantic if a brief statement be given concerning the conditions and causes that led to the formation, rise and fall of the important political parties that the county has known.
Originally the political groupings of voters in the United States were as Federalists and anti-Federalists; the former the followers of Alexander Hamilton, or at least believers with him in a form of govern- ment which should possess in itself sufficient powers and resources to maintain the character and defend the integrity of the nation, and the latter, professing with Thomas Jefferson a fear that centralization of power at Washington might endanger popular liberty, opposed to a strong government and in favor of State sovereignty. The anti-Fed- eralists came to be known in New York about 1790 as Republicans, which designation continued until about 1830, when the name Demo- cratic was adopted, and has since continued. Thus the Democratic party of to-day may trace its lineage almost unbroken from the merging of the Colonies into States to the present, even if as much may not be said concerning its consistent and steadfast adherence to the principles and policies that distinguished it in the beginning. While the Federal party was strong enough in New York to elect a Governor twice prior to 1800, it never afterward was able to command under that title a majority of the votes in any distinctively State contest, though in a number of years it did control the Legislature and Council of Appoint- ment (thus enjoying in such years control of appointment of all county officials), and for a long time made itself a considerable factor in deter- mining general election results by allying itself quietly with one or another of the factions into which the Republicans split. This split was in large measure over the question of the party leadership of DeWitt Clinton as a Republican, Tammany being bitterly inimical to him, which enmity increased and extended to other parts of the State as he came to be suspected of secret leanings to Federalism and of friendliness to the appointment of Federalists to public office. Beginning in 1816,
[94]
95
. FRANKLIN COUNTY POLITICALLY
political conditions and party alignments in New York became very confused, if not actually chaotic, and so continued for a dozen years or more, and the straight Republican of one day was found not infre- quently to have gone over to the Clintonians the next, or vice versa, without any clearly explained or even conjectured reason. The Federal- ists as an organization utterly disappeared, and no compact and dis- tinetive party succeeded them until in 1832, when the Whig party was organized and named, though it continued nevertheless for a few years to be called at times National Republican also.
The anti-Masonie party sprang into existence, made its campaigns of venomous bitterness, and disappeared in this same period. It grew out of the kidnapping of William Morgan at Canandaigua in 1826, and his alleged murder a few weeks later near Niagara Falls, because he was about to publish a book revealing the secrets of Masonry. The feeling engendered was intense and widespread. Here in Franklin county those Masons who adhered to the order (and they were good citizens) naturally felt that the men who attacked their organization in general, and in particular fought against the election of any member of it to publie office, were making a wholly gratuitous and unjustifiable assault upon them personally, as well as doing injustice to the order itself. Upon the other hand, the anti-Masons complained that the Masons, in their resentment, were retaliating in an unfair manner by attempting social ostracism and by establishing what in these days we should call a boycott of their business. The warfare continued actively for a number of years, and men of the highest character, including clergymen, renounced their affiliation with Masonry, some of them inveighing against it, while others, simply disavowing belief that the order was evil, announced that they abandoned connection with it solely in order to avoid giving offense to others. The charter of the lodge in Malone was lost, though its jewels were preserved, and it was not until 1854 that the lodge was revived and a new charter obtained. Even as late as forty years after the organized political movement had disap- peared there remained individuals in Franklin county who would not in any circumstances vote for a Mason for any office, no matter how high his qualifications otherwise might be.
At about the time of the disappearance of the anti-Masonic party, the Abolition party sprang into existence, composed of restless spirits possessing brilliant intellectual powers, unbounded moral and physical courage, and a profound conviction that slavery was a erime against the
96
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
moral and divine commandment. Its members were a proscribed and persecuted class, denounced unsparingly by both of the great political parties, condemned even by many of the churches, and subjected to mob demonstrations almost everywhere that they carried their agita- tion. They were devoted to the utter destruction of slavery by every instrumentality which they could lawfully employ. In Franklin county they apparently never had a party organization, and never polled more than about one hundred votes. The county did have, however, as early as 1835 an anti-slavery society without political character or par- tisan activity. Its membership was not large, nor did it include more than a few of the more prominent and influential men of the period. Its purpose was solely to oppose slavery by protest and by education of public opinion against it.
Interest attaching to elections in Franklin county in early years was necessarily almost entirely general, with little individual or personal significance in any of the contests, for the reason that until 1822 all county officials were appointed by the Governor and Council and all members of Assembly except two, all State Senators and all members of Congress elected until the year stated were residents of other coun- ties, and practically unknown by the local electorate. Until 1842 gen- eral elections were continued from day to day and from place to place, at first through a period of five days, and afterward for three days, the idea being in those times of sparse and widely scattered settlement to take the polls as near as practicable to the voters instead of requiring the electors to travel long distances, or multiplying election districts. There was a property qualification for voters until 1822, and for a long time elections for State officials and members of the Legislature were held in April instead of in the fall.
PARTY ALIGNMENTS
Official records of Franklin county election returns are not pro- curable in complete form prior to 1822, but such fragmentary reports as I have been able to gather appear to justify the statement that from the date of the county's erection until 1843, a period of thirty-five years, it was almost uniformly anti-Republican, or, to use the less confusing description, anti-Democratic. In 1822, 1823, 1829, 1830, and 1831, however, the Republicans (Democrats) carried. the county, while in every other year the Federalists, Clintonian Federalists, anti- Masons or Whigs were in the majority. The majorities were usually
97
FRANKLIN COUNTY POLITICALLY
under three hundred, though in 182? the Clintonians had eight hundred and forty votes in a total vote of eleven hundred and twenty-six.
That the county was Federal in its political proclivities for so many years does not seem strange when it is remembered that the people were so largely of New England stock, where anti-Republican sentiment was strongly predominant. Originally the Federalists had included most of the statesmen of prominence and wealth in New York, and thus the party came in time to be regarded as representative of aris- tocracy, which of itself naturally tended to alienate the " plain people."
A CAMPAIGN STORY
As bearing upon this point, a campaign story is pertinent. William A. Wheeler had addressed a Whig political meeting at Bombay, where his position as the agent of a non-resident who had large land interests there had given him a close acquaintance with many of the people, and won for him their favorable regard. A few days later Joseph R. Flanders followed him at a Democratic meeting, and, speaking highly of Mr. Wheeler as a man and neighbor, yet proceeded to urge his hear- ers not to vote for him because, however estimable he might be per- sonally, his habits of life and of thought unfitted him to represent the county sympathetically and understandingly of the wants, needs and convictions of the great body of the people. Mr. Flanders characterized Mr. Wheeler as an aristocrat, whereupon one of the auditors, a settler with whom Mr. Wheeler had dealt considerately and forbearingly, arose, and shouted - " It's a domned lie, sor, for he has drank whiskey with me in my own kitchen ont of a taycup."
AN EXTRAORDINARY CAMPAIGN
An extraordinary campaign for representative in Congress occurred in 1836. The Democratic candidate was Captain James B. Spencer of Fort Covington, and Asa Hascall of Malone the Whig nominee. Mr. Hascall looms as the biggest and most esteemed citizen of the county for many years, with the possible exception of Luther Bradish. Mr. Hascall's character appears to have been reproachless, his standing at the bar very high, his aptitude for public service remarkable, and his popularity and the esteem in which he was held great. In only a single instance ont of many does he appear to have failed to carry his town and the county whenever he was a candidate for office. He was District Attorney by appointment by the Governor from 1818 to 1841 4
98
HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
and again from 1843 to 1847. He was also a Member of Assembly in 1825, 1826, 1835 and 1839; supervisor of Malone from 1818 to 1835, and from 1840 to 1842, besides having served four terms of four years each as justice of the peace. He was once defeated for the Assembly, and was at least twice an unsuccessful candidate for Congress and once for Senator - being beaten, however, not by an adverse vote in Franklin county, but by majorities against him in the other counties comprising the district. Mr. Hascall died January 5, 1852, aged sixty-six years. The Palladium said of him that he " was a great and good man," and that " members of the bar were accustomed to look to him with a feeling bordering on reverence, as a pattern of integrity and worth in their profession. *
* His influence was great and unbounded, and employed to good account." The remarkable character of the cam- paign of 1836 consisted in the fact that it was waged by the Whigs not merely as a matter of partisan opposition to Captain Spencer, but also upon the grounds of crime alleged to have been committed by him, a most unusual course in this county. Indeed, I recall only one other instance in the county's history where a like attack was made openly and venomously against a candidate. By circulars and newspaper pub- lication it was charged against Captain Spencer that he had been a participant in the attempts to defraud the government through under- taking to collect raised and fictitious claims growing out of war losses in 1813, and had also been arrested for passing counterfeit money in Vermont before coming to Franklin county to make his home. The story of these war claims is told in another chapter, but will bear recital of additional details. The man behind them was one David Jones, who resided at Fort Covington, and was a brother-in-law of Captain Spen- cer. According to a public document comprising a part of the record of Congress in 1817, the government had sent a special agent to Fort Covington in that year to investigate, and that agent reported that Jones had offered him $10,000 for a few weeks' work, if he would join in getting the claims allowed. Jones said that he had $20,000 lying idle, and would buy all the claims for a small sum, increase the amount of each, prove them by fictitious witnesses, and make from $100,000 to $150,000 out of the venture. The special agent found in his investiga- tion that many of the claimants who appeared to have made affidavits covering their cases had in fact either not sworn to anything definite beyond the fact that they had received no pay for their losses, or else that they denied having any knowledge of what the affidavits con-
99
FRANKLIN COUNTY POLITICALLY
tained. One of these claims was by Benjamin Sanborn, a former resi- dent of Chateaugay, who represented that when the British visited that place in 1814 they seized property of his worth $180 (a claim for which the United States government was not liable anyway), while his claim as it reached Washington was for $5,100. It appeared to be attested by affidavit of Captain Spencer to the effect that the latter knew it to be correct and just, and Captain Spencer appeared also to have taken the affidavits of " paper " witnesses to this and other claims (called " paper " witnesses because there were no such persons). Captain Spencer's defense was a denial that he had made the false affidavit or taken affidavits of non-existent men, insisting that these were all for- geries. In regard to the charge of having passed counterfeit money, I have been unable to ascertain what defense was made, but in view of the fact that, after having left Vermont and forfeited his bail there, he voluntarily returned, and does not appear to have had any proceed- ings pressed against him, it may be conjectured that a satisfactory explanation was forthcoming. It was also charged against Captain Spencer that he had smuggled broadcloth for a cape from Dundee, and that when the garment had been seized he induced his tailor to commit perjury by swearing that the garment had been purchased from him on this side of the line. Captain Spencer was a judge of the court of common pleas, postmaster at Fort Covington, and also a deputy col- lector of customs. He had borne a good reputation generally in the county, and was regarded as a respectable citizen. While Mr. Hascall carried Franklin county against him by one hundred and fifty-nine, Captain Spencer received about eight hundred majority in St. Lawrence, and was elected.
THE EXCITING CAMPAIGN OF 1840
The campaign of 1840 was the most enthusiastic and exciting ever known up to that year, and was the first characterized by spectacular features. The Van Buren administration, charged with responsibility for the financial panic in 1837, attacked for tyranny and extravagance, and for indulging the most expensive and luxurious living in office, had inflamed the Whigs, and such Democrats as repudiated General Jackson and Van Buren, to the degree that they were profoundly con- vinced that patriotism even more than partisanship required the elec- tion of General Harrison, popularly known as "Tippecanoe." Public feeling was yet further inflamed by the sneer of Democrats to the effect that General Harrison lived in a log cabin and drank hard cider, for
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.