Anti-Masonic party

Anti-Masonic party American political organization that rose after the disappearance in W New York state in 1826 of William Morgan. A former Mason, Morgan had written a book purporting to reveal Masonic secrets. The Masons were said, without proof, to have murdered him, and in reaction local organizations arose to refuse support to Masons for public office. In New York state Thurlow Weed and William H. Seward attempted unsuccessfully to use the movement, which appealed strongly to the poorer classes, to overthrow Martin Van Buren and the Albany Regency . Anti-Masonry spread from New York to neighboring states and influenced many local and state elections. At Baltimore, in 1831, the Anti-Masons held the first national nominating convention of any party and issued the first written party platform—innovations followed by the older parties. The vote for their presidential candidate, William Wirt , mostly hurt Henry Clay. Usually the Anti-Masons in national politics acted with the National Republican party in opposition to Jacksonian democracy, and in 1834 they helped to form the Whig party .

Bibliography: See W. B. Hesseltine, The Rise and Fall of Third Parties (1948); L. Ratner, Antimasonry (1969).

Anti-Masonic Party A US political party of the 1820s and 1830s opposed to Freemasons. Formed in 1826 in the wake of the disappearance of William Morgan, a New York bricklayer alleged to have divulged lodge secrets, the Anti-Masonic Party was the product of hysteria, cleverly played upon by local politicians. It played an influential part in the politics of New York and surrounding states, and drew sufficient WHIG support away from Henry CLAY in the 1832 presidential election to help sweep President Andrew JACKSON back into office.

Anti‐Masonic Party. This political party arose in New York in response to the 1826 disappearance of William Morgan, a Mason. His lodge was suspected of murdering him in revenge for his publication of the organization's secrets. When state and local officials, mostly proto‐Democrats, procrastinated in the investigation, angry citizens formed a political party and in 1827 won several New York legislative seats. By 1829 Anti‐Masonry had spread throughout much of the Northeast, with its greatest political impact in Pennsylvania. Between 1828 and 1838, Anti‐Masons elected seventy‐six candidates to Congress. In 1832, Anti‐Masonic party candidates won 10 percent of all House races, and the party's Presidential candidate, William Wirt, carried Vermont and won almost 8 percent of the popular vote nationally.

Anti‐Masons owed some of their popularity to the religious revivalism of the 1820s. The role of economic factors is more problematic. While some studies show that the party had the support of the emerging middle class, others indicate that economically declining groups voted for it. By 1836, most Anti‐Masons had joined the Whig party because Democratic President Andrew Jackson had vigorously defended the Masonic order. In addition, Anti‐Masons opposed his Sunday mail transportation policies. Anti‐Masons gave the Whigs an evangelical, populist dimension, as well as gifted leaders and political operatives such as Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania and Thurlow Weed of New York. Anti‐Mason inspired social policies favored by Whigs, such as liquor and sabbatarian legislation, funding of educational and reformatory institutions, and to some extent the antislavery impulse of the party's northern wing.
See also Antebellum Era; Temperance and Prohibition.

Bibliography

Kathleen S. Kutolowski , Antimasonry Reexamined: Social Bases of the Grassroots Party, Journal of American History 71 (1984): 269–93.
Paul Goodman , Towards a Christian Republic: Antimasonry and the Great Transition in New England, 1826–1836, 1988.
Michael F. Holt , Political Parties and American Political Development from the Age of Jackson to the Age of Lincoln, 1992.

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