Aaron Ross Powell, Trevor Burrus, and Eric Mack Smith continues his explanation of why so many abolitionists supported the compulsory prohibition of alcohol by linking them to the ideology of the Whig Party.George H. Smith was formerly Senior Research Fellow for the Institute for Humane Studies, a lecturer on American History for Cato Summer Seminars, and Executive Editor of Knowledge Products.

Many of their national policies-fostering strong banks and protective tariffs, promoting industrial development-were of little interest to the citizens of an agrarian state such as North Carolina. The American Whig Party and Slavery by Mitchell Rocklin Advisor: James Oakes This dissertation explains why the American Whig Party consisted of the most anti-slavery and pro-slavery segments of American politics during the Second Party System (1834 to 1854), as well as why it broke up. It should be noted that not all abolitionists, including ex‐​Whigs, accepted the economic policies of the Whig Party. Alongside the slightly larger Democratic Party, it was one of the two major parties in the United States during the late 1830s, the 1840s, and the early 1850s, part of the Second Party System. Of course, some historians will chastise me for interjecting my own values into a culture that existed nearly two centuries ago.
If the Democratic Party of the time saw itself as the party of liberty, the Whig Party saw itself as the party of morality.For the religious crusaders who led the temperance, peace, antislavery, missionary, and other benevolent societies, it was not enough to win individual souls to Christ; society as a whole must respond to His call. With this egregious and inexcusable exception, Democrats were far more libertarian than their Whig rivals, but the defense of slavery so tainted the Democratic Party that it is difficult to view the party in hindsight with any degree of sympathy. With the advent of the Whig Party America entered what is called the Second Electoral System.

The new Whig Party found many supporters in North Carolina, especially in the west and the Albemarle Sound region. The decade and a half of Whig control had permanently changed North Carolina, turning …

Other influential party leaders include Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, William Seward, John J. Crittenden, and Truman Smith.

In the spring of 1710, Anne dismissed Godolphin and the Junto ministers, replacing them with Tories. The historian is far more than just a historian, or at least he should be.My purpose in this essay is not to engage in the slavery controversy. Modern readers may feel that they have gone down the rabbit hole when they read comments like this, but they were very common in their day.It is one of the great tragedies in American history that most antislavery advocates were members (or ex‐​members) of the Whig Party, whereas the Democratic Party was dominated by defenders of slavery, mainly from the South. Rather, the preceding summary of the Whig Party is meant to explain, in part, why leading abolitionists, almost all of whom came from the Whig Party, were active in the temperance crusade and campaigned for compulsory prohibition.

And this, as one Southerner put it, would be a serious violation of the individual freedom so precious to Americans. Although southern Whigs did not oppose slavery, the Democrats were much more emphatic in actively supporting slavery and resisting abolition.The Whig Party disintegrated during the 1850s. And though nearly every abolitionist had quit the Whig Party before the 1850s, it is important to understand that most abolitionists had formerly been Whigs and had brought into the antislavery movement much of the Whig way of thinking about society and government. For the federal government to restrict or abolish slavery would violate the slave owner’s property rights in his slaves. Gerrit Smith, Lysander Spooner, and Dio Lewis on Prohibition ty1 / ˈpärtē/ • n. (pl. In the North, its remnants formed much of the foundation of the new Republican Party. It was with this kind of hypocrisy in mind that many abolitionists repudiated both parties and refused to participate in the political system, or voted only for antislavery candidates regardless of party affiliation, or “scattered” their votes by refusing to vote for any major party candidate, or joined the abolitionist Liberty Party.