USA > New York > History of the state of New York, political and governmental, Vol. II 1822-1864 > Part 6
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PHILIP HONE
Philip Hone, merchant; born in New York City, 1781; founder of the Mercantile Library; mayor of New York City, 1826-27; naval officer for New York City under President Taylor; died in New York City, May 4, 1851.
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CLINTON THE CONQUEROR
1826]
Bank of Utica, a most estimable man, was named in his stead.
The State convention of the Bucktails, or regular Democratic party, under the direction of the Albany Regency, was held at Herkimer on October 4, with a similarly large and representative attendance. The Regency was mindful of its understanding with Clin- ton, but found itself practically compelled to nominate a candidate in opposition to him. That was for two reasons. One was that there had arisen in the party, among those not privy to the agreement with Clinton, so strong a demand for such a nomination that to deny it would imperil the integrity of the party. The other was that the Regency deemed it essential for control of the Legislature that there should be a Lieutenant- Governor of its own choosing, and of course it could not nominate a man for that office without also nomi- nating one for the Governorship. To nominate Clin- ton would have caused a revolt in the party. There- fore it was necessary to run some one in opposition to Clinton.
Such was Regency logic, which we may assume to have been sincere. Indeed, its sincerity was appar- ently attested by the manner in which the Herkimer convention acted. It nominated for the Governorship William B. Rochester. He was a man of respectable but not noteworthy ability, little known throughout the State save in the western part, whither his family had removed from Maryland. He had served one term in the Assembly, one as a Representative in Congress, and two years as a Circuit Judge. A warm friend of
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Henry Clay and a strong supporter of the Adams administration, he had been appointed one of the United States envoys to that famous Panama Congress which the United States Congress, under pro-slavery influ- ence, treated so shabbily. From these facts it is obvi- ous that he was not at all persona grata to Van Buren or the Regency, since Van Buren, as United States Senator, was one of the foremost adversaries of the Adams administration and the leader of the opposi- tion to sending any envoys to the Panama Congress.
There can be little doubt that Van Buren would greatly have preferred the reëlection of Clinton to the election of Rochester and that he had the Regency put Rochester in nomination with the expectation and the intention that he should be defeated. But it was also his purpose to secure the election of a Lieutenant-Governor after his own heart. For that office, accordingly, the Herkimer convention nominated Nathaniel Pitcher, who was in all respects satisfactory to the Regency.
In the ensuing campaign Judge Rochester developed more popular strength than the Regency had expected. But there was a widespread division of tickets. Thou- sands of men voted for Clinton and Pitcher, while other thousands voted for Rochester and Huntington. The result was what the Regency had anticipated and de- sired. Clinton was reëlected by a vote of 99,785 to 96,135 for Rochester. On the other hand, Pitcher was elected Lieutenant-Governor over Huntington by a larger majority-4,188. In both houses of the Legis- lature the Regency secured substantial majorities.
CHAPTER V
WILLIAM MORGAN, "AFTER ELECTION"
T HE State campaign of 1826 was attended by a sensational and tragic incident which, while foreign to politics, doubtless had some-though not a decisive-effect upon the electoral result, and which for a number of years exercised a marked influ- ence upon the politics of New York and the nation.
Among the residents of Batavia, New York, was one William Morgan, a stonemason by trade, about fifty or fifty-one years old. He was a native of Culpeper county, Virginia, had served creditably in the battle of New Orleans, and afterward had gone to Canada and engaged in the brewing industry at Toronto, or York. In 1821 he came to this State and settled in Rochester, where he was employed at his trade. For a time he lived and worked at Le Roy near Rochester, then at Rochester again, and finally at Batavia. He had been an active member of the Masonic order, but for some reason had become alienated from it and had deter- mined to disclose its secrets and make what he declared would be damaging exposures of its principles and practices. Being a man of good education and some literary ability he wrote a small book on the subject, and he entered into an agreement with David C. Miller, of Batavia, a printer, to publish it.
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[1826
This work was nearing completion and was naturally the subject of much acrimonious controversy when, on September 11, 1826, a number of citizens of Canan- daigua came to Batavia and had Morgan arrested on a petty criminal charge and taken to Canadaigua for a hearing. There he was brought before a magistrate, who promptly dismissed the case and discharged the prisoner. Scarcely had he left the presence of the magistrate before he was again arrested, this time for a small debt which he seems actually to have owed, and-in those days of imprisonment for debt-was com- mitted to the Canandaigua jail. The next day, Sep- tember 12, at evening, the same men who had procured his arrest returned, 'paid his debt, and had him re- leased from the jail. But he was freed only to be laid hold of and abducted by them. It was about nine o'clock in the evening when he was seized, thrust into a carriage, and hurried away in the direction of Roch- ester. Instead of bringing him to that city, however, his captors took him, with relays of horses, to Fort Niagara at the mouth of the Niagara River. There he was placed in the powder magazine, securely locked up. "The rest is silence." He was never seen again, and his fate was never learned. More than half a century later Thurlow Weed, in his "Autobiography," declared that in 1831 one John Whitney had confessed to him that he and four other men had taken Morgan from the fort and drowned him in Lake Ontario on September 14; but for obvious reasons, and without in the least reflecting upon Mr. Weed's veracity, this statement must be regarded with conservatism.
1
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WILLIAM MORGAN
1826]
The sensation caused by Morgan's disappearance was tremendous. It had been known that he was about to publish his book and that the Freemasons resented his doing so and had striven to prevent him. Not un- naturally the suspicion and the cry arose that he had been abducted and murdered by members of their order. Some went so far as to declare that his "re- moval" had been ordered by the highest officers of the fraternity in a desperate attempt to prevent a pub- lication that would be disastrous to them. On the other hand many Masons declared that Morgan had been hidden by his own friends, or had himself gone into hiding, in order to cast suspicion and reproach upon the Masons.
A public mass-meeting was held at Batavia and a committee was appointed to investigate the case and to detect, if possible, the persons who had done away with Morgan. The committee did not find the cul- prits, but it did report evidence of what it believed to be an elaborate conspiracy, in which many men were concerned and the motives of which were determined and important. Other meetings were held in other places, and in a short time the whole State was con- vulsed with agitation over the affair.
There was not time before the November election to carry the matter very far into politics, though an attempt was made to do so and undoubtedly some effect was produced. Governor Clinton was at that time the highest official in the Masonic order in the United States, and there were those who did not scruple to declare that he had ordered the murder of Morgan.
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[1826
Monstrous as was this libel, it obtained some credence and was the cause of Clinton's losing many votes at Batavia, Rochester, and elsewhere in that part of the State. However, his competitor, Judge Rochester, was also a Mason, and that prevented any very large transfer of Clinton's supporters to his side. Shortly before the election, excitement was raised to the high- est pitch by the discovery of the body of a drowned man in Lake Ontario. The identity of the deceased was unknown, though it was perfectly certain that the body was not that of Morgan, to whose description it did not answer in any distinctive respect. The anti- Masonic agitators, however, seized upon the discovery with avidity. While admitting among themselves that it was not Morgan who had been found, they cynically declared that the corpse was "a good enough Morgan -- until after election," and accordingly in- sisted that here was the corpus delicti, fixing the crime of murder upon the Freemasons. So high did passion run that some of the Masons retorted not only with a denial that the body was Morgan's, or that any Mason had been privy to Morgan's disappearance, but also with the charge that the body was that of some- one whom the anti-Masons had themselves murdered for the sake of procuring a corpse with which to make a showing against the order. Never in the history of the State were factional emotions more intense or more fantastic in their manifestations. The contro- versy over Morgan and the Freemasons not only per- vaded politics but was taken up in the churches, in society, and in family life. The whole being of the
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State was convulsed, and though there were those who intended and expected that the disputation would last only "until after election" it did in fact last much longer than that and extended far beyond the limits of New York.
It was in the midst of the excitement and agitation caused by the Morgan affair that the election was held which returned Clinton to the Governorship, though by a much reduced majority. The Fiftieth Legisla- ture met at Albany on January 2, 1827, with the Re- gency in full control. Lieutenant-Governor Pitcher, a Regency man, presided over the Senate. The As- sembly elected Erastus Root to be Speaker, and con- tinued Edward Livingston in his place as Clerk. Mr. Root received 74 votes to 33 for Francis Granger, of Ontario county, of whom we shall hear more. There was much dissension in the party caucus before Mr. Root was selected, the influence of the canal counties being used against him. On assuming the Speaker- ship he made an extraordinary speech reflecting by intimation upon his predecessor, Samuel Young, for having referred the State Road project to a committee which he knew was hostile to it. "I am not willing," said Mr. Root, "to put a child to nurse to be strangled." He also declared that as he had been elected to the Assembly by a party, and by that same party had been made Speaker, in appointing any committee on a ques- tion which might involve party considerations he would select a majority of its members from his own party. This did not mean, however, that as presiding officer he would not be impartial between the parties.
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[1827
Governor Clinton in his message called attention to the boundary dispute with New Jersey, with the re- sult that the Legislature provided for the appointment of a commission to undertake a settlement. He also devoted much attention to the canals and to the ques- tion of State roads. In order to check reckless and un- sound banking he recommended the placing of a strict limitation upon issues of banknotes. The need of re- vising the criminal code of the State was also urged.
On March 17 the Governor addressed a special mes- sage to the Assembly on the subject of the Morgan outrage, which that body was investigating. He gave the Assembly all the information he had on the sub- ject, and recommended the enactment of a bill offer- ing $5,000 reward for the discovery of Morgan living or for the conviction of his murderers, and the appoint- ment of a committee of two Senators and three As- semblymen to investigate the case and report on it. No such action was taken, but the Governor himself offered a reward. The Legislature authorized the employment of expert lawyers to investigate the case. Two Judges of the Supreme Court were desig- nated to hold special terms of court for the trial of any persons who might be accused of the crime, and a number of men were thus convicted and punished for participation in what had obviously been an exten- sive conspiracy.
The Legislature reelected Martin Van Buren to the United States Senate, and on April 17 adjourned to the second Tuesday in September. From June 27 to July 24 there was a special session of the Senate,
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confined to executive business. On September 11 the whole Legislature reassembled and received a mes- sage from the Governor conveying a communication from John Jacob Astor relating to his claims for lands in Putnam and Dutchess counties which the State had confiscated. This and other matters engaged the atten- tion of the Legislature until December 4, when it adjourned without day.
Meantime the Morgan controversy was violently in- jected into local and State politics. In the spring of 1827 in parts of Genesee and Monroe counties all Free- masons were excluded from the local tickets for Supervisors and Justices of the Peace. In vain did party leaders strive to check the movement. It spread rapidly in all directions. Rochester was its center, where in the fall of 1827 an Anti-Masonic convention was held. A legislative ticket was nominated which swept the county by an overwhelming majority. The next year, 1828, with both a Governor of New York and a President of the United States to be elected, the Anti-Masonic agitation was carried into both State and national politics, the Anti-Masonic faction allying itself with the supporters of President Adams and seek- ing his reelection upon the argument that he was not a Mason. On the other hand the Masons largely went over to Jackson, who was a Freemason of high stand- ing in the order.
The Anti-Masonic movement extended into half the States of the Union, and from it was evolved a regularly organized political party in New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. It
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[1828-32
had comparatively little influence in national politics in the election of 1828, excepting in New York, where it was the dominant issue of the campaign. The fol- lowers of Clinton were much divided by it, those who were Masons voting for Jackson, whom Clinton him- self energetically supported, while those who were not Masons voted for Adams. As the result the Electoral votes of the State were divided, twenty being cast for Jackson and sixteen for Adams.
This achievement so encouraged the Anti-Masons that-to anticipate and slightly diverge from the narra- tive of New York history-in the summer of 1830 they perfected their organization in New York as a politi- cal party, which about as distinctively and emphatically opposed President Jackson as Freemasonry. In .Sep- tember of that year a call was issued by the New York leaders for a national convention of Anti-Masons, which was held in Philadelphia with representatives present from ten States and one Territory. A national organization was formed, with somewhat more busi- ness-like rules and regulations than down to that time had been adopted by any other political party, and it was agreed to hold another national convention at Baltimore on September 26, 1831, for the nomination of Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates to be voted for in 1832. It was ordered that each State should send to the nominating convention a number of delegates equal to the number of its Senators and Representatives in Congress. In pursuance of this rule, 112 delegates representing thirteen States met and nominated for the Presidency the distinguished jurist
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WILLIAM MORGAN
1832]
and publicist William Wirt, of Maryland, who had been for many years Attorney-General of the United States and before that was one of the foremost advo- cates in the prosecution of Aaron Burr for treason. Amos Ellmaker, of Pennsylvania, was nominated for Vice-President. Mr. Wirt was a Mason, and in his speech to the convention reluctantly accepting the nomination he eloquently defended that order from many of the aspersions that had been cast upon it, and made it clear that so far as he was concerned the campaign was to be conducted against Jackson more than against Freemasonry. In fact, he practically allied himself with Henry Clay, who was the chief candidate against Jackson in 1832, and would have withdrawn in Clay's favor if it had been possible for him to do so. As it was, Wirt, or the Anti-Masonic party, won in 1832 only the seven Electoral votes of Vermont and probably did not exercise any material influence upon the result of the polling in any other State.
The Anti-Masonic State convention of New York met at Utica on June 21 and nominated a ticket of Pres- idential Electors without committing them to any can- didate. Their votes should naturally have been given for William Wirt as the national candidate of their party. But there was recognized to be little hope of his election, while there did seem to be a fair chance of Henry Clay's success as the candidate of the National Republicans; and Clay was greatly preferred to Jack- son by most of the Anti-Masons. The understanding was, therefore, that should the New York Electors of
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[1832
the Anti-Masons be chosen by the people they would cast their votes for Clay if by that means he could secure the Presidency, but otherwise for Wirt. The National Republicans held a State convention at Utica on July 26 and adopted resolutions favoring Clay for the Presi- dency. They did not, however, nominate Electors, but recommended the support of those put forward by the Anti-Masons-on the basis, of course, of the under- standing already mentioned. Had the district system of choosing Electors prevailed, a part of this ticket doubt- less would have been elected and the vote of New York would have been divided between Jackson and either Clay or Wirt. But the Electors were now chosen, by virtue of the law of 1829, on a general State ticket, and thus all the Jackson Electors were successful and those named by the Anti-Masons never had occasion to de- termine whether to vote for Wirt or Clay. The popular vote for them is, however, regarded as having been cast for Clay, and the result of the polling is therefore stated as 168,497 for Jackson and 154,896 for Clay.
Thereafter the Anti-Masonic party gradually dis- appeared, chiefly merging into the National Republi- can party, and the combination presently becoming known as the Whig party. In Pennsylvania the sepa- rate Anti-Masonic organization was maintained longer than elsewhere, and as late as 1835 succeeded in elect- ing its candidate for Governor of the State. Its last significant appearance was at Harrisburg, Pennsyl- vania, on December 16, 1835, when in a State conven- tion it nominated William Henry Harrison, of Ohio, for President, to be voted for at the next year's election.
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Harrison was also taken up by the Whigs and was their defeated candidate in 1836 and their successful candi- date in 1840. It will be recalled that Daniel Webster was an aspirant to the Presidency in 1836, that he was much concerned over the Anti-Masonic movement, and that he gave all his influence for complete union between the Anti-Masons and Whigs. He declared himself to be opposed to Free-masonry and to all organizations whose members were bound by secret oaths to "extraordinary obligations," and testified that he had always found the Anti-Masons of Pennsylvania to be "true to the Constitution, to the Union, and to the great interests of the country."
Thus the Anti-Masonic party ran its course and passed away, with just one important and lasting achievement to its credit. It initiated the national convention nominating system on the basis of making the representations of the various States in national con- ventions identical with or proportionate to their rep- resentations in the two houses of Congress.
To return now to the more direct and exclusive his- tory of New York. At this time it was the foremost State of the Union in the three great respects of agri- culture, industries, and commerce, and was therefore naturally much interested in the "American system" advocated by Henry Clay, and particularly in the pro- posal of a protective tariff. In 1827 conventions were held in many of the States for the purpose of urging the protective doctrine upon Congress, culminating in a national convention at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on July 30. A fortnight before the latter date a convention
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[1827
met at Albany, consisting of delegates from many of the counties of New York, among whom were such men as Ambrose Spencer, Samuel Young, Peter Sharpe, and Jacob R. Van Rensselaer. At this convention resolu- tions were adopted to the effect that the laws of Con- gress had from the first assumed that taxes for revenue were to be so levied as most to encourage or least im- pede domestic industry and commerce; that this prin- ciple ought to be more widely and fully extended and applied; and that the prosperity of the country was conditioned upon legislative protection against the "exclusions, monopolies, regulations, and bounties of other nations." It was added that as the great agri- cultural products of the southern States-cotton, to- bacco, and rice-enjoyed free entrance to the ports of Europe without competition, while both competition and prohibitory laws tended to exclude from European markets the chief products of the northern, middle, and western States, it must be deemed unkind on the part of the south to oppose the passage of laws calcu- lated to protect northern products, to create a home market for them, and thus to promote the national wealth and prosperity. Supporters of both Adams and Jackson in national politics attended this Albany con- vention and voted for the resolutions.
Although the election of a President of the United States would not occur until November, 1828, the campaign began in the summer of 1827. On Septem- ber 26 of that year the Democrats of New York City held a convention in Tammany Hall at which were adopted resolutions strongly commending the candi-
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dacy of General Andrew Jackson and urging that at primary elections for the party organization and con- ventions only men favorable to his candidacy should be chosen. The Albany Argus, which had become the State organ of the party, presently took the same ground, and its example was followed by the Demo- cratic press of the State generally. Of course Van Buren and the Albany Regency exerted the power of the party "machine" to the same end. The result was that in the November elections the friends and sup- porters of Jackson swept the State. They carried nearly all the Senate districts and secured a large majority in the Assembly.
The Fifty-first Legislature thus chosen assembled at Albany on January 1, 1828. The Senate, presided over by Lieutenant-Governor Pitcher, reelected its Clerk and other officers. The Assembly reelected Erastus Root as Speaker but replaced Edward Living- ston as Clerk with Francis Seger, who had formerly been Deputy Clerk, this being done in accordance with a personal understanding between the two men. A few days later General Pitcher was taken ill, with a prospect of being for some time unable to attend to his duties, and in consequence Peter R. Livingston was elected President pro tempore of the Senate.
Governor Clinton's message referred to the deplor- able manifestations of partisan, factional, and personal passion that had marred the political life of the nation. These untoward conditions were due, he believed, to the unsatisfactory method of choosing a President and to the reëlection of Presidents to second terms, and he
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urged that New York lend its influence in the direc- tion of a uniform and improved system of Presidential election and the confining of each President to a single term. He paid much attention to the canals and other actual or proposed public works, and to the discovery and use of anthracite coal, and recommended the en- couragement of flax and hemp growing and tobacco culture. A particularly vigorous passage advised leg- islation for the punishment and suppression of the "disgraceful evil and high-handed offense" of duelling, in consequence of which the Legislature presently en- acted a stringent law on the subject. Much attention was also given to the matter of public instruction.
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