Antislavery as pragmatic politics : the formation of the Republican party in the Western Reserve, 1854-1856

Abstract

During 1854, the introduction of the Douglas Bill and, subsequently, the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act shattered the brief interlude of sectional peace that had prevailed since the celebration Compromise of 1850. Scholars have explored in voluminous detail the profound changes in national politics that resulted from the enactment of this legislation. Unfortunately, few historians have examined the consequences of the renewal of slavery issue within local northern communities. The Western Reserve represents a classic example of such oversight. Relying exclusively upon the region's reputation for radicalism and abolitionism, commentators have attempted to explain the Reserve's adverse reaction to the Nebraska affair by citing the inhabitants' hatred for slavery and their determination to prevent its expansion into the western territories. Without question, this superficial analysis is partially accurate, for the majority of Reserve citizen viewed the slave society of the South as an aggressive and expansive foe. At the same time, by failing to look beyond these stereotypes, analysts have ignored a vital dimension of mid-nineteenth century Reserve political protest.

Indisputably, the Western Reserve served as a vanguard for the political antislavery movement between 1854 and 1856. The region's penchant for radicalism resulted not only from the moral sentiments of the citizenry but also from a fierce power struggle that had thrown the usually stable Reserve political system into a state of crisis by the first weeks of 1854. Since the 1820's, the political power in northeastern Ohio had been concentrated in the hands of a small, homogeneous group of politicians and editors who were affiliated initially with the National Republicans and, later, with the Whigs. During the tumultuous presidential campaign of 1848, a disgruntled faction of Whigs bolted and formed the Reserve's Free Soil Party. Six years of division weakened both groups, and, in 1853, the Democratic Party, previously an impotent organization within the Reserve, captured a plurality of the vote in seven of the twelve counties. By the beginning of 1854, Reserve Free Soil and Whig politicians at least recognized their precarious position and vowed to suppress their new rival.

The renewal of the sectional controversy provided the old Reserve elite with the ideal mechanism with which they could restore their eroded power. Sharing with their constituents a firm belief in the treacherous intentions of Southerners, the Reserve's Free Soil and Whig officials were also acutely aware of the potential value of the Nebraska question as a political issue. Consequently, leaders from both parties engineered much of the anti-Nebraska protest within the Western Reserve. Attributing to the Democratic Peirce Administration full responsibility for the Douglas measure Whig and Free Soil politicians, with the assistance of their allied newspaper editors, deftly converted the anger that Reserve inhabitants harbored for this Bill into hostility toward the local Democratic forces. Initially, leaders in both campus, although they frequently cooperate during the protest, retained independent organizations. However, after the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Free Soil and Whig decision-makers became convinced that the slaveholders and their Democratic allies could be halted only by a unified party. Abandoning their old affiliations, partisans established chapters of a new "Republican" Party in most communities within the Reserve.

The Republican Party in northeastern Ohio began as a heterogeneous coalition of dissidents who were united only in their hostility to the extension of slavery. Anxious to placate all elements within their party, Reserve Republicans officials constructed the 1855 and 1856 campaigns around antislavery, the only principle that all factions within their constituency held in common. This blend of radical antislavery and political expediency proved to be a profitable combination for the Reserve's old political elite. The power of this group within state party circles was substantially enhanced in 1855 when the antislavery opportunist, Salmon Chase, backed by widespread support within the Reserve, was elected Ohio's first Republican governor. In 1856, the stature of the region's part leaders within the national Republican hierarchy increased after Western Reserve had supplied presidential candidate John C. Fremont with his margin of victory in Ohio.

The influence of Reserve Republicans steadily declined between 1856 and the Civil War as a new breed of moderate politicians rose to positions of promise in the national party. Nevertheless, the old Reserve political elite had, within the brief span of two years, achieved their primary goals. By 1856, the new party and routed their Democratic adversaries within all Reserve counties, and the energetic Republican politicians had constructed the stable local organizations that enabled them to retain political preeminence in northeaster Ohio for many decades.