YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

1942

A Neglected Factor

. iri the

Anti-Slavery Triumph
in Iowa in 1854

A Study of the Part taken by the Foreign-born
in the Preliminaries of the Formation of the
National Republican Party.

BY
F. I. HERRIOTT
Professor of Social Science
DRAKE UNIVERSITY

Reprinted from "Deutsch-Amerikanische Geschichtsblatter,"
Jahrbnch der Deutsch-Amerikanischen Historisehen Gesell-
schaft von Illinois*— Jahrgang 1918 — 19 (Vol. XVIII — XIX),.

A NEGLECTED FACTOR IN THE ANTI-SLAVERY
TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854. *
By F. I. Herriott,
Professor of Social Science,
Drake University.

All signs on the political horizon of Iowa on January 1,
1854 seemed decidedly favorable to the continuance of the
Democratic party in the control of the governmental affairs
of the state. That party's lease of power had been acquired
when the Territorial government was organized in 1838 and,
with slight exceptions, its leaders had maintained control in
local and national matters in the Territory and then in the
State, up to that year. The overwhelming defeats of the
Whigs in the presidential contest of 1852 had produced general
paralysis of the party, and disintegration of that once vigorous
organization instantly became apparent. The confidence of
the Democratic partizans in their continued supremacy was
complete; and opponents substantially conceded the improb
ability of any change. I.
Mr. Wm. H. Merritt, editor of the Daily Miner's Ex
press at Dubuque, was one of the reputed spokesmen of the
national Adminisration in the Northwest. On September 5,
1 The major portion of the study which follows was prepared
by the writer in 1912-1913. In a paper on "Stephen Douglas and the
Germans in 1854" read before the Thirteenth annual meeting of the
Illinois Historical Society at Springfield Illinois, on May 24, 1912,
he referred briefly to the dramatic episode in connection with the
"playful remark" of Senator A. P. Butler of South Carolina in his
speech in the Senate Feb. 24, 1854 in reply to the animadversions of
Senators Chase, Summer and Wade upon the iniquities of slavery
and the important consequences of the episode later in the political
campaign in Iowa (see Trans. III. St. Hist. Society for 1912, pp. 142-
158 — see particularly section VI).

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
1853 he thus charaterized "The Course of Iowa Politics", in
an editorial expression :
"It is a matter of high congratulation that the
State of Iowa from the day of her inception as a
member of the great American Confederacy has
been, so far as the sentiment of her people was con
cerned, thoroughly Democratic. On no marked oc
casion has her faith faltered or wavered. This con
stant unity, this unbroken current has at last borne
down and swept away all regular organized opposi
tion. This fact, existing in no other state, has been
most strikingly manifest in our state elections occur
ring lately .... "
This serene confidence of the Democratic leaders of Iowa
in the certainty and continuance of the status quo in political
control in Iowa was entertained with no less assurance by
national leaders of the party. In the conclusion of his speech
in advocacy of the Kansas-Nebraska bill in the national Senate
at Washington, on February 20, 1854, Senator Hunter of
Virginia gave expression to the assurance of himself and
Southern colleagues in the permanence of Democratic su
premacy in the government of Iowa in the following mag
niloquent language :
"And gallant young Iowa! The gamecock of
the Northwest, with a step that never falters, and a
courage that never flinches, is mustering her sons in
to service at the first roll call for the defenders of
the Constitution and the rights which it has guar
anteed to all."
The distinguished Senator of the Old Dominion knew
whereof he spoke and his assurance was confirmed in a
most convincing manner five days later by a speech of the
senior Senator from Iowa which echoed throughout the land
for many a day thereafter. In announcing his purpose to
vote for Douglas's bill to repeal the Missouri Compromise,
Senator A. C. Dodge said on February 25 :
"I shall vote for the bill as reported by the
committee and amended by the Senate, because it
— 2 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
recognizes the doctrine of Non-intervention as
established by the Compromise of 1850, and
because the people whom I represent have ever re
cognized and acted upon that doctrine. Iowa is the
only Free state which never for a moment gave way
to the "Wilmot Proviso." My colleague [Senator
Geo. W. Jones] who never dodges a responsibility
or fails to perform a duty, voted for every
one of the Compromise measures in all their
phases, stages and conditions, including the
Fugitive Slave law — the late Senator Sturgeon, of
Pennsylvania and ourselves being the only three sena
tors from the entire non-slaveholding section of this
Union who voted for it. Since then my colleague
has been returned to this body without an objection,
so far as I have heard, from either Democrat or
Whig on account of his votes to which I have re
ferred."
Commenting on Senator Dodge's notable utterance The
Daily Delta of New Orleans on April 1, expressed itself as
follows :
"It is singular but most creditable fact to Iowa
that no state in the West or North in which Slavery
does not exist has with equal fidelity to the Federal
compact, maintained the constitutional rights of the
South. On no occasion within our recollection has
this noble Northwestern state disgraced itself through
its legislature by the passage of resolutions intended
to warp Congressional action in relation to Slavery
* * * And it is no exaggeration to assert that to
her more than to any other free state is the South
indebted for whatever of good has sprung from the
national legislation, within that period. * * *"
This reliance of the pro-slavery partizans of the South
upon the staunch support of the electors of Iowa was solemnly
proclaimed, as it were ex cathedra. The Daily Union was the
official organ of the Administration at Washington. On April
29 in a long leader denouncing the tactics of the Anti-Slavery
propagandists of Iowa in the gubernatorial campaign then
getting under way the Union said :
"The Democrats of Iowa may boast, with some
justice, that that state is the soundest Democratic
— 3 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Free State on the compromises of the Constitution.
They have never yet been known to evade the re
sponsibility of accepting the boldest issue on the
slavery question. The consequence has been, that
they have become impregnable to the assaults of the
Whigs, and that no true Democrat of Iowa ever
waits to see how the current runs before taking his
position."
Confidence, more complete and more superbly serene,
cannot be conceived; and verily the perfection of their faith
and trust was justified.
When the final vote on the Repeal of the Missouri Com
promise in the Senate was published in Dubuque the Daily
Miner's Express informs us (May 26) that the event
produced "rejoicing ***** an(j m the evening
ONE HUNDRED GUNS announced the satisfac
tion with which the friends of the measure received
the intelligence ***** The Bill contains no prin
ciple but what is eminently Republican in its char
acter and therefore it addressed itself powerfully to
the reason, justice and acquiescence of every good
citizen in the land."
The ground for such assurance was conceded and as
sumed and reflected in the bitter and contemptuous language
of Anti-Slavery Journals in their references to the course of
Iowa's Senators in the proceedings in the Senate in the Re
peal of the compact of 1820. Greeley's New York Tribune
in analyzing the conditions and factors producing the revolu
tions that so astonished the North, exclaimed (April 1) in
disgust "What gain had freedom in the admission of Iowa
to the Union?"
The complete discouragement, not to say the state of
utter hopelessness of the anti-Slavery agitators and of all
liberals and "progressives" in respect of the people of Iowa
on the eve of the election in 1854 was conclusively shown
in an editorial communication of the militant Quaker poet
of New England, John G. Whittier, in The National Era of
Washington, D- C. for July 27, in which among other observa
tions he declared:
"Iowa — the near neighbor of Kansas — is another
of the Free Slave States. From the hour of its ad-
— ,4 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
mission to the present, its influence and its votes have
been given in favor of slavery. Augustus Caesar
Dodge's vote has always been as certain for any vil
lainous scheme of slavery propagandism, as those
of Butler and Atchinson. Where the special blame
of this state of things lies, we do no pretend to say
— we hope at least that our Quaker friends there
have clean skirts in the matter — but there is no dis
guising the fact that Iowa is now, and has been from
the outset, so far as her action in the Confederacy
is concerned, to all intents and purposes, a Slave
State."
Whittier was not a volatile soul, easily depressed or dis
couraged. He uttered convictions born of careful observa
tions and sober reflection upon events. Had he felt that
there were any grounds for hope he would have stood forth
in confident and explicit fashion. His language was obviously
the issue of what he manifestly regarded as a solid fact.
Aside from the conduct of the Democratic leaders of Iowa
in the national affairs — especially in respect of Slavery —
Whittier does not disclose the premises of his pessimistic feel
ings : but he had substantial reasons therefor. The people of
Iowa, contrary to popular tradition and academic opinion
were predominantly Southern in nativity and ancestral tradi
tions. The national census of 1850 disclosed that there were
but 5,535 New Englanders in Iowa and there were 30,9>4
natives of the states South of Mason and Dixon's line, and of
36-30. The people hailing from Ohio, Indiana and Illinois
likewise were predominantly Southern in their ancestral
traditions.2 The majority of these Southerners in Iowa were in a
large and definite sense An ti- Slavery folk — they had left the
2 The writer has dealt briefly with the predominance of South
erners in the formative days in Iowa in some articles in the Annals
of Iowa (3rd series) ; see "The Transfusion of Political Ideas and
Institutions in Iowa" in vol. VI, pp. 47-54 (April 1903) and "Whence
came the Pioneers of Iowa" in vol. VII, pp 367-379 (April 1906 and
pp 446-465 (July 1906). The latter were reprinted with additions
under the caption "Did Emigrants from New England First Settle
Iowa?" — 5 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
South because they disliked or dreaded the social and in
dustrial consequences of Slave-labor. Nevertheless they had
a very substantial sympathy with the people of the South —
blood-ties alone would produce such sympathy — and they also
had an intense hatred of abolitionism. They would not toler
ate enfranchisement of the slave because of their bitter
antipathies toward emancipated slaves- Their attitude and
course were not always consistent but consistency did not
concern them very much — as it seldom does constrain political
partizans. II.
Within two weeks after Whittier published his despon
dent words the unexpected happened. Slavocrats and abolition
ists alike were amazed to learn that a majority of the voters of
Iowa had routed the Democrats from the seats of authority.
The victory of their opponents was complete and sweeping,
including national as well as state offices. Amazement was
nation-wide and the explanations divergent and confusing.
The Gazette of Cincinnati, Ohio, on August 22 dwelt upon
the event at considerable length, among other observations
saying : "The Election in Iowa — The Lesson it Teaches."
"The recent election of Iowa can only be pro
perly expressed by styling it a revolution- It has no
parallel in elections which have passed, because the
elements which operated to produce the present re
sult have never before been brought into action.
"The State of Iowa has from the beginning been
a fixed star in the Democratic firmament. — Year
after year it has steadily voted as the party leaders
desired it to do, but now a complete change has taken
place, and Iowa elects a Whig, anti-Nebraska
Governor, Legislature and Congressmen, and will,
in the end, elect a United States Senator of the same
faith. "What has produced this change? We hesitate
not to affirm that it has been produced by the repeal
of the Missouri Compromise ***** N0 Free
State has ever attempted to infringe upon the pre
scribed rights of the South and no Free State ever
— 6 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
desired to do so. * * * * * The Repeal of the Mis
souri Compromise was a gratuitous insult to the six
teen Free States which has not been, and which never
will be forgotten.
"What Iowa has done other Northern States will
do, until there shall not be a Nebraska Senator or
Representative in Congress from the North * * * *
"Iowa, the youngest sister of the West, points the
way her elder sisters will follow. All honor to her-"
The anti-Slavery triumph in Iowa in 1854 was a com
plete surprise and to none more than to the Democrats.
Senators Dodge and Jones had apparently entertained no
doubts whatever of the success of the Democratic ticket be
cause neither one left Washington to go to the State to aid
by their personal influence and zeal their partizan associates
in the conduct of the pre-election campaign : and their Demo
cratic confreres at Washington were completely mystified.
The Daily Union at Washington thus announced, August
18, and interpreted the overturn in Iowa :
"The defeat of the gallant democracy of Iowa is
pretty well ascertained. The causes are apparent and
unquestionable. The Whigs took ground against
that clause in the radical constitution of the State
prohibiting all banking in the state, and made that an
issue, while they rallied on the Temperance question
with all their force. Of course the Nebraska bill was
made the pretext of additional excitement, although
that element had less to do with the canvass than is
supposed ***** The Democracy of the Union
will most deeply regret the defeat of Senator A. C.
Dodge who loses his re-election by the temporary
defeat of his political friends at home. Rome never
had a nobler citizen. In the manliness and the cour
age of his character, the orthodoxy of his democracy
and the disinterestedness of his whole career, he
presents an example for the imitation of public men.
We saw him yesterday, full of confidence that a mis
guided public opinion will soon be set right by the
sober second thought."
Senator Geo. W. Jones, Junior Senator from Iowa, re-

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
ceived a lettter written by President Pierce's Postmaster
General, James Campbell, in which an interesting explana
tion of the overthrow of the Democratic party in Iowa is
asserted: "You have had a terrible fight and if yourself and
General Dodge and friend Henn had been on the spot you
would have been successful against the 'isms . . . ."
Senator Jesse D. Bright of Indiana writing Senator Jones of
Iowa under date of September 14, voiced his astonishment
over the result and his perplexity as to the real significance
of the revolution: "Iowa, Oh, Iowa where has she gone?
over to the Whigs and 'Know Nothings'? that cannot be!
What does your late election prove . . . . ?" 3
The epistolary confidences of the An ti- Slavery leaders
indicate decidedly that the Opposition in Iowa did not wage
the contest in 1854 with ardent or substantial hopes of suc
cess and that their victory was as much of a surprise to them
as it was to the Democrats. The correspondence of two of
the foremost champions of the Anti-Slavery cause, each of
whom played prominent roles in the national theatre in that
and the succeeding decade, exhibits this fact unmistakably.
"Allow me to congratulate you on the results in Iowa:"
wrote Senator Salmon P. Chase of Ohio to James W. Grimes,
Governor-elect of Iowa, writing from Cincinnati, September
24. "It far surpasses my hopes, and is due in great measure
to your indefatigable exertions-" 4
"I am astonished" responded Mr. Grimes writing from
Burlington October 3, "at my own success in this state. I
fought the battle nearly alone." 5
The enormous strategic importance of the Anti-Slavery
triumph in Iowa in 1854 was appreciated more and more as
the months passed and the leaders of the forces in opposition
to the pro-slavery Administration at Washington began can
vassing prospects and concerting* plans for the presidential
contest in 1856. Reflecting upon the momentous changes in
3The original letters in the Aldrich Collection of the State Histor
ical Department of Iowa at Des Moines, Iowa.
5 H., p. 54.
4 Salter James W. Grimes, p. 53.
— 8 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
national politics in the interim and the then favorable signs
for the success of the new Republican party, Governor Chase
wrote Governor Grimes from New York City, August 23,
1856, congratulating him on "the redemption of Iowa. Your
election [in 1854] was the morning star. The sun has now
risen." 6
This opinion of Governor Chase enhanced with the years.
In the forepart of 1859 the Republicans of Ohio suddenly
confronted a crisis in the determination of their party policy;
and their decision was made in their state convention of
June 6 and it insured victory at the polls. The Republicans
of Iowa were passing through a similar crisis and Senator
Grimes wrote Governor Chase. In acknowledging its receipt,
Governor Chase, writing June 11 from New York City, in
dicated that his reflections upon 1854 were, the premises of
his hopes for 1860. The following is the initial paragraph of
his letter: "The assurances of friendship and preference in
your last are very gratifying to me. You first un
furled the banner of union for freedom in the West
and it was under your lead that our first really sig
nificant victory was achieved. It is very pleasant to
think over those beginnings of our present strength
and not unpleasant to remember that I contributed
good wishes and a little, though comparatively insig
nificant, aid to that first triumph. Why may not that
victory be accepted as an augury of a greater one
soon to be achieved, and to which, as to that, you
shall contribute not merely a powerful impulse but
such labors as shall make the assurance of it sure." 7
Governor Chase's prediction for 1859 and 1860 was
completely realized. The letters of Messrs. Chase and Grimes,
interesting though they prove to be, do not disclose what our
Doctors of Logic call "the efficient cause" of the astonishing
political revolution in Iowa in 1854. The fact of the unex
pectedness of the defeat of the Democrats is clearly discerned
and much enlarged upon but an adequate explanation of the
s H., p. 53.
7 Original in Chase Correspondence in the Collections of the
Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.
— 9 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
condition or cause producing the event is not given or satis
factorily indicated.
The explanations of the political revolution in Iowa in
1854 given us by latter-day historians — national and local
alike — nearly all consist in major part, either directly or by
implication, of the assertion that the Repeal of the Missouri
Compromise was the sole cause. Or, what is tantamount to
the same effect, they assert that the triumph of the Anti-
Slavery party in Iowa was due to the energy of Mr. Grimes
in waging his canvass for governor: the sum and substance
of his pleas for preferment and protests against the pro-
slavery party in power being "the Nebraska Infamy."
One national historian of note, who discerned and pointed
out the strategic importance of the election in Iowa thus
characterized the canvass and interpreted its significance : "He
(Mr. Grimes) made a thorough and vigorous canvass of the
state, denouncing everywhere the "Nebraska Infamy." The
temperance issue entered slightly into the discussion ....
The Know-Nothing wave had not reached Iowa- *****
No doubt could exist that the meaning of this election was
the condemnation of the Kansas-Nebraska bill." s
A biographer of Senator Dodge, whose career in the na
tional Senate was cut short by the Anti-Slavery triumph at
the polls in August, tells us that Douglas' bill had produced
"a political revolution" in Iowa before Senator Dodge ad
dressed the Senate, February 25 and that "James W. Grimes
was nominated to weld together the various elements opposed
to the doctrine of Stephan A. Douglas:" and the result was
"the triumph of the Whig party in Iowa ***** jn Iowa
the voters saw a new light in 1854, but Senators Dodge and
Jones had not been obedient to the popular vision." 9
The explanations of the Anti-slavery triumph in Iowa
in 1854 do not satisfactorily explain. Neither contemporary
interpretations nor recent scholastic opinion appear to com
prehend the immediate compelling cause ; at least they do not
8 Rhodes History of the United States, 11-59.
9 Pelzer, A. C. Dodge 195. — 10 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
disclose the central, urgent, talking theme of the party leaders
with which they besought the voters in the final clinches cf
the campaign. The correspondence of the Democratic leaders dwells
upon the usual discontent of the "outs" with the conduct of
the "ins" ascribing much or most to petty discontent over the
assignment of official "spoils" or perverse demagogism on the
part of factionists. Postmaster General Campbell concluded
that in the non-participation of the Congressional delegation
in the canvass lay the immediate cause of their party's defeat :
and Senator Bright asked if it was "Whiggery" and "Know
Nothingism." Messrs. Chase and Grimes ascribe the triumph
chiefly to the extraordinary efforts of Mr. Grimes. The
Daily Union, Washington, discerned the chief "issue" in the
discontent of Iowans over their lack of an adequate banking
system and the Cincinnati Gazette saw in the Repeal of the
Missouri Compromise the one great cause for the Opposition's
triumph. Latter-day scholastic explanations do not expand
ar vary the contemporary analyses. The Washington Union
saw great potency in the "temperance question" and Mr-
Rhodes asserts that it "entered slightly into the discussion."
All-in-all we have rather confused lights. Close scrutiny
of both contemporary and latter-day explanations leaves us
still perplexed and curious as to the real major compelling in
terest immediately or generally constraining the "Opposition"
party leaders — editors and speakers and campaign managers —
in their appeals to the voters on the hustings.
The great popular revulsion in the forepart of 1854 pro
duced by Douglas' proposal to repeal the Missouri Compro
mise does not afford us a plenary explanation. Otherwise
Messrs. Chase and Grimes would not have been so astonished
at Grimes' victory. Nearly all of the powder and shot that
could do effective service in respect of the Repeal of the
Missouri Compromise had been spent in the early part of the
year and the public interest had been dulled by the ceaseless
universal din of reiteration thereon in the first five months
of the year. Grimes' letters written during the progress of
his speaking campaign indicate that he was far from sanguine
— 11 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
of scoring success. The fact that he had to, and did, wage
the fight alone affords us no explanation. He was not a
popular idol and had no "drawing" power as a magnetic
speaker ; and even had he possessed great power as a popular
favorite we should still lack an adequate explanation of the
phenomenon in question. The electors of a State do not
en masse change face about politically for merely personal
xeasons, for instance, because of a sudden liking for a new
personality in politics or because he may make some sudden
turn or twist that appears to control popular fancy and de
cision. Electors vote for a candidate on account of immediate
and general considerations that he seems to typify or bids
fair to realize for them.
The discernment of the major currents or drifts in pol
itics, and the interpretation of particular events, or rather the
measurement of their importance in relation to the produc
tion of a general result is no easy and no mean task. A pol
itical event, and especially a political campaign or revolution
is always the resultant of an extensive and intricate complex
of immediate and concurrent causes and antecedent conditions.
One can seldom assert with accuracy that a single act or a
single consideration constitutes the causa causans- A part
icular act or consideration may have been a major fact or
factor in producing or precipitating a certain state of mind:
but various antecedent, and collateral developments concur
to produce the general result. III.
Public interest in political matters in Iowa on January
1, 1854 was not in a state either of marked' concentration or
of high tension. Local and state affairs engaged the public
mind as much as national matters; and lethargy rather than
energy characterized public discussion, so far as one can dis
cern the intensity of feeling in the contemporary expressions
in the press.
Local, state and national financial aid to transportation
companies, canal, railroad, and river improvement schemes ;
land grants, pre-emption and "squatter" rights contra sub-
— 12 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
sequent blanket Congressional grants; the incorporation of
banks and the grant thereto of authority to issue bank notes
to take the place of "wild cat" currency and "red dog" script
then in circulation, coming into the state from remote institu
tions unknown and irresponsible ; the incorporation of ordinary
commercial and manufacturing projects and business promo
tion; and general interest in the marketing of crops, the con
trol of production, prices and efforts at monopoly: — these
and sundry mundane matters of like import absorbed not a
little of the active public interest.
Various other problems concerning matters on "higher
spiritual levels," as our sentimentalists are wont to phrase it,
absorbed the consciousness of most of those who are always
far front in the forum of public discussion. There were three
such general complexes of questions that either had aroused
alert and widespread public interest, or were then beginning
to compel the indifferent and overconfident to bestir them
selves. For two decades the Slavery question had been a matter
of acute concern to all serious lovers of the country. It was
clearly the paramount consideration. The crisis of 1850 had
been barely passed and many had fondly concluded that
the menacing dangers had been composed by Clay's Com
promises; but the arrest of fugitive slaves under the no
torious act passed in pursuance of the compact of 1850 had
aroused the most intense feelings of indignation and produced
furious protests and open, aggressive opposition to the law's
enforcement throughout the North with the inevitable result.
Southern leaders became convinced that the Anti-slavery
leaders of the North would not observe the spirit of the Clay
Compromise but were intent upon aggressive, hostile measures
to extinguish the rights of the Slaveholders, the Federal con
stitution to the contrary notwithstanding. Momentous col
lisions, if not Civil war, became an impending probability.
During the same two decades the agitation against the
unrestricted sale of intoxicating, or alcoholic beverages in
the ordinary commercial or mercantile traffic had steadily
— 13 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
increased. From personal appeals to the characters and feel
ings of individual delinquents, and the arousing of the re
latives, friends and neighbors of such to energetic efforts to
stop their personal and public indulgence in such beverages,
the agitation had advanced to a definite public propaganda
for the enactment of restrictive and prohibitory legislation.
Under the leadership of Mr. Neal Dow the State of Maine
had passed in 1851, a law providing for state-wide prohibi
tion of the manufacture and sale of all intoxicants. The
result was immediately felt in all states of the North. Ad
vocates of "Temperance" legislation generally became aggres
sive and confident of successful promotion of their campaign.
The agitation in Iowa was then approaching its first great
culmination, and this agitation, like the anti-slavery agitation,
was producing the most intense reactions. Its partizans were
irrepressible, relentless and fanatical in their zeal and those
in opposition were bitter, contemptuous and vicious in their
resistance. Coincident with the developments in the complexes of
discussion just referred to, public interest was alert in another
direction. The benefits of unrestricted immigration and the
evils thereof were constantly on the anvils of public debate.
The steady infusion of great number of alien peoples into our
common life had produced many and varied effects in our
industrial, political, religious and social life that had caused
no less serious reactions in public discussion. Utilized in
vast numbers in the building of canals, railroads and sundry
sorts of "Internal Improvements" the foreign-born had
seriously disturbed the ordinary relations of employers to
native-born laborers and correspondingly affected the wage
schedules. These alien laborers came to us not only unfamiliar
with our language and institutions of government, but they
easily became the pawns — not to say the prey — of designing
native demagogues and unscrupulous party leaders in the
furtherance of their schemes of partizan aggrandizement:
with the natural result that those in opposition regarded the
foreign-born as a serious menace to the welfare of the coun
try. This hostility towards the foreign-born was greatly en-

F. I. HERRIOTT
hanced by the further fact that most of the immigrants from
Europe came to us with social customs that caused great
perturbation in the minds of the orthodox religious folk : The
majority of them were Catholics in religious belief and wor
ship; and this fact disturbed the peace of mind of the Pro
testant denominations mightily, particularly the members of
the evangelical churches with energetic missionaries in their
working staffs. The most of them pursued social customs in
regard to the non-observance of Sunday and social diversions
on that day that shocked the sensibilities of Puritans. Many
of them, especially the high-born and highly educated Re
fugees of the Revolutions of 1830 and 1848, were avowedly
atheistic or agnostic, and hence antagonistic towards religion
and religious institutions; and not a few of the peasant class
who came to our shores entertained bitter feelings against all
churches because of oppressive experiences endured in Europe,
the exactions of priests, fees charged by them, tithes or charges
imposed; and these came to us bitterly hostile to all religious
control. All of these considerations and consequences pro
duced developments in public discussion that took form, here
in advocacy of radical sumptuary or "temperance" legislation,
there in direct hostility to the admission of aliens to our
citizen body. For several years aggressive propaganda
against "foreigners" had been gathering headway and but
shortly before the date under consideration had taken specific
and serious form in what was then soon to be generally known
as the "Know-Nothing" movement.
The surface of the political waters was not greatly dis
turbed, so far as the ordinary eye could discern : but close
observers could easily discover currents and drifts and various
signs that would make those in charge of party crafts un
certain and uneasy as to the probable course of things. The
absence of storms gave no warrant whatever for serenity
and cock-sureness as to the outcome in the approaching
campaign of 1854 as the narrative will disclose.
Historians of the period have, for the most part, con
cluded the all-absorbing fact in public discussion to be
the Slavery question. That fact loomed large and loweringly
-— 15 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
on the horizon. It occupied the public mind perhaps as much
as any other fact and it was worthy of their primary concern
for it was ominous indeed. But slavery was not the single
fact that exclusively or generally occupied the minds of the
party leaders and managers in planning for and in prosecuting
the political campaign in Iowa in 1854.
In what follows, sundry complexes of facts exhibiting
the antecedent conditions and the immediate impelling con
siderations and causes producing the partizan manoeuvres in
Iowa in 1854 will be set forth.
So far as feasible, contemporary accounts and expressions
of the state press and state leaders will be offered in verifica
tion to display the facts showing the nature and actual course
of public interest, partizan manoeuvres and party tactics in
the campaign. In order that the cautious and skeptical may
have wide premises for appraisement and criticism, and the
real significance and sweep of the influence of the Neglected
Factor in the Anti-Slavery Triumph in Iowa in that year
which gave the Republican party a lease to the seats of
authority for sitxty years and more, may be completely ap
prehended, the quotations from contemporary documents will
be generous.
IV
The first fact that should be realized in connection with
the momentous campaign of 1854 is the attitude of the
Foreign-born in the United States towards the Democratic
party. Prior to 1854 the great majority of immigrants coming
to us from Europe normally and naturally inclined to join,
or to affiliate with the Democratic party in both state and
national politics as soon as they became capable or were per
mitted to enter into our common public life. It was the party
of Thomas Jefferson that denounced and opposed so vigor
ously the ill-advised and oppressive "Alien and Sedition Law"
of 1798 and bound the newly arrived immigrants to its leaders
with hoops of steel. The "Red Republicans" of continental
Europe, who had to flee so often from the hostile decrees of
— 16 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
royal heads and aristocratic governments of their native lands
and thereafter live in exile, naturally turned to the "Re
publican" party on this side of the Atlantic, as Jefferson's
party was first called, and they heartily threw their fortunes
with those of "the party of the people" which was opposed
to the "Party of property and governmental privilege," as the
old Federalists and their Whig successors were so generously
dubbed by their partizan critics. The lusty, all-embracing
"Democracy" of Andrew Jackson and his ardent partizans
and their reckless populistic appeals on behalf of the rights
of "the masses versus the classes," the direct allurement and
the rapid "Americanization" of the foreigner and his inclusion
by party leaders in the party organizations in the large cities,
attracted the alien to the standards of the Democratic party.
Finally in the many plays and counter plays of demagogues
and politicians for the favor of the foreign-born at the ballot
box the protagonists of Demos on this side of the Atlantic
out-did themselves in officious acts and resolutions proclaim
ing their sympathy with the hopes and plans of the promoters
of "Free government" in Austria, France, Greece, Hungary,
Ireland, Italy, Prussia, Russia and Spain; and in such "plays
to the galleries" the Democrats scored more often than the
Whigs. Under the skillful leadership of such shrewd party
men as De Witt Clinton and Wm. L. Marcy, Thomas H.
Benton and Lewis Cass, European immigrants were wel
comed with open arms by the Democratic party and they
soon became ardent partizans of the party of Jefferson and
Jackson and staunch supporters of its candidates and plat
forms. The general preference of the foreign-born for the
Democratic party is conclusively shown by party affiliations
of the German press in the forepart of 1854. Out of 121
papers only 14 were listed as Whig. 10 These facts must be
kept in mind in measuring the developments in Iowa in 1854.
V.
The State Convention of the Democratic party of Iowa
was called on November 14, 1853 to meet in Iowa City on
10 Burlington Gazette, March 8, 1854.
— 17 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
January 9, 1854. The publication of the call produced more
or less astonishment and some recrimination. The date pre
ceded the election by seven months and the length of this
interval seemed imprudent to some — so many momentous
changes seriously affecting party programs and prospects
might intervene — and wise caution enjoined a later date for
the convention. The particular season of the year with the
normal modes of travel in Iowa at the time and the long and
circuitous routes which most of the delegates would have to
take in order to reach Iowa City enhanced the objection just
given. One signing himself "An Old Democrat" expressed
such sentiments in a letter to the Burlington Gazette and in
addition to the foregoing said "There are whispers about here
of sinister designs to be accomplished and a convention to be
packed to suit them  " "
The Democratic party in Iowa at the outset of 1854 was
suffering the normal disturbances of a party that has had a
long lease of power. There were serious internal disturbances.
Personal animosities, disappointments and jealousies, local dis
content, factional dissention and irruptions had been steadily
increasing within the ranks of the party in power. Senators
A. C. Dodge and Geo. W. Jones and Representative Bernhart
Henn were the objects of much animadversion within their
own party circles. They were criticised and condemned as
"conservatives" and reactionaries. Malcontents among the
Democrats who were discontented over the activities or the
non-action of the Congressional delegation in respect of na
tional land grants, pre-emption rights, railroad franchises and
extensions and "internal improvements" were beginning to
move against them. The Keokuk Dispatch indicated the grow
ing intensity of this discontent in an editorial published in the
latter part of September 1853 entitled "Dynasties and Dis
organizes" and later in October by another editorial expres
sion under the "More Jonesophobia." 12 On November 16,
Mr. Merritt in an editorial entitled "The Progressive Era and
the Disorganizes," dealt at some length with attacks upon the
n Reprinted in Daily Miner's Express of Dubuque, Dec. 3, 1853.
12 Reprinted in Daily Miner's Express of Dubuque, Oct. 3 and Oct.
24, 1853. — 18 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
conduct of Senator A. C. Dodge. The frequency of attacks
and the need for serious rejoinders indicated pretty clearly
that discontent of a hostile sort was rising and might easily
prove menacing.
The utter collapse of the Whig party tended to make the
Democratic leaders in control of their party machinery or
organization indifferent to the ordinary discontent of party
workers; and no doubt it caused them to be less considerate
and more dictatorial in determining their course on public
measures. The Opposition seemed to be in a state of either
hopeless confusion or dull inertness. The Old line Whigs
were arrogant, aloof and contemptuous and the radicals — the
Anti-Slavery propagandists and the "Temperance" agitators
— were contradictory and divergent in demands and pro
cedure. It is just under such conditions that ordinary pol
itical partizans are prone to misread and misjudge the signs
of the time. The heavens may be comparatively clear of
storm clouds and the surface of the waters almost smooth but
it is not safe to conclude that strong currents are not running
heavily underneath that may suddenly converge and boil up
in tremendous commotion.
The delegates to the Democratic State Convention met
under circumstances that might prove very inimical to the
party harmony and solidarity so necessary to success at the
polls. These conditions adverse to maximum party vigor and
concentration of party strength must needs be kept in mind
in estimating the nature and significance of the victory of the
Opposition and especially the purport of the very narrow
margin on which the anti-Slavery triumph in Iowa in 1854
actually rested. Had the Democratic leaders both at Wash
ington and in Iowa not been so over-confident and had they
exercised a little more of personal tact and strategy — for in
stance had the two national Senators come in person to Iowa
and met the electors on the hustings and spoken to their
friends and supporters face to face and thus energized their
partizans to greater personal efforts to get out their party
strength — it is more than probable that the Democrats would
— 19 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
have easily won and retained their hold on the seats of author
ity at least for the remainder of that decade.
When the Democrats of Iowa met in state convention,
at Iowa City, January 9, the political issues in the nation at
large, that were chiefly to effect the course of national politics
and control local campaigns had not yet become sharply de
fined. Indeed, they were then scarcely apprehended. Douglas'
Nebraska bill had not begun seriously to disturb the waters
at Washington. Senator Dixon's amendment thereto that
was to produce a flash of lightning in a clear sky had not
been submitted. The Democrats of Iowa, nevertheless, con
fidently put forth a platform of principles and either luckily
or shrewdly anticipated subsequent events. They so expressed
themselves as almost completely to meet the issues.
After repudiating all party "disaffection on sectional or
personal grounds," and recommending " 'union, harmony, con
cession and compromise' " the platform gives plump expres
sion to views that met with favorable consideration from
Germans. The fourth plank especially commended itself to
the "Forty-eighters." It proclaimed unqualified insistance
upon the doctrine of "Instruction" — a political dogma then
much in debate and use — a dogma familiar to us now-a-days
in a somewhat modified form in the nostrums, known as the
"Initiative" and "Recall." In a much mixed metaphor the
convention announced "the right of Instruction as the sheet
anchor and the main pillar of our freedom" which it was
"determined never to surrender." Germans remembering the
bitter disappointments of their struggles for constitutional
liberty in the Fatherland and the broken promises of rulers
exempt from popular control were ardent advocates of such
methods of the direct exercise of the popular will.
The fifth plank was still more satisfactory to Germans
and more immediately advantageous. It was an explicit
avowal of advocacy and defence of the interests of the
foreign-born. It was timely and decided at the moment when
Germans were beginning to be anxious as to their position in
the American polity. For some time nativistic prejudice
against the foreign born of an aggressive and malevolent sort
had been manifesting itself in various parts of the country.
— 20 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
There were signs of its presence in Iowa. The convention
pronounced against such discrimination as follows :
Resolved, that the liberal principles embodied by
Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence, and
sanctioned in the constitution, which makes ours a
land of liberty, and the asylum of the oppressed of
every nation, have ever been the cardinal principles
in the Democratic faith, and every attempt to abridge
the privileges of becoming citizens, and the owners of
soil among us, ought to be resisted with the same
spirit which swept the Alien and Sedition laws from
our Statute books.
Assertion of a friendly attitude and purpose was here
both ample and definite. Moreover its language was com
prehensive in its range- No specific commendation of the
Free Homestead bill then pending in Congress is ventured
but the language plainly disapproves of the discriminations
against the foreign born in the provisions of the bill defeated
at the previous session of Congress and contained in the
measure resubmitted.
The platform then renews allegiance to "the grand pol
itical truth of the sovereignty of the people and their capacity
for self-government," and it then declares that it is the par
ticular mission of the Democratic party "to sustain and ad
vance among us constitutional 'Liberty, equality and frater
nity'." Popular sovereignty was the essence of the political
demands of the German Radicals and "liberty, equality and
fraternity" constituted the trinity of their political faith and
their party slogan. The next plank demanded the speedy
organization of the Territory of Nebraska.
After the resolutions drafted by the Committee had been
reported and apparently adopted en bloc and without debate,
the chairman of the Committee, Col. J- B. Thomas of Dubuque
introduced the following resolution :
Resolved that the thanks of the Democracy of
Iowa be tendered to Captain Ingraham of the U. S.
Navy for the manly course he took in releasing
Martin Koszta from the hands of the Austrian
Tyrant."
Whether the resolution had been previously submitted
— 21 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
to the committee and rejected, or was an afterthought on
the floor of the convention, we can only surmise. The com
mittee had had a stormy time over the matter of endorsing
their representatives in Congress — concluding not to do so.
The resolution relative to Captain Ingraham might have been
side-tracked in their factional clashes. Whatever the reason,
the resolution was promptly adopted when moved on the floor
of the convention and another strong link was added to the
chain that bound the Germans to the Democratic party.13
There was evidently a tense and dangerous situation.
For the Democratic "Administration" leaders clearly did not
dare to push resolutions commending the Democratic Con
gressional Delegation — Senators Dodge and Jones and Re
presentative Bernhardt Henn — for such resolutions were in
troduced. They induced dissension of a serious and menacing
sort and were either laid on the table or withdrawn. Such
a decision when so much controversy had prevailed in the
preliminaries of the convention can only be interpreted as
proof of the immanence of a serious factional revolt. After
the convention adjourned the Opposition twitted the Demo
crats concerning the matter and the Democrats got some
crumbs of comfort out of the fact that the resolution was
"withdrawn" and not "laid on the table." i4
i3The above plank referring to Capt. Ingraham's notable exploit
in the harbor of Smyrna is taken from the Dubuque Daily Herald of
January 14. Somewhat strangely Fairall's Manual of Iowa Politics,
vol. I. containing the platforms of all political parties in Iowa from
1838 to 1884 does not contain the above. See pages 35-37.
14 See editorial in the Daily Miner's Express, January 25, 1854.
Somewhat of the intense heat in Democratic circles respecting the
conduct of the party's representatives in the national council chamber
at Washington may be inferred from the following taken from the
resolutions passed by the Democratic convention of Jones County on
January 4, 1854.
Resolved 4. "That we deem acquiescence in the decision of
the majority, one of the first principles of the Democracy.
Resolved 5. "That those renegade journals and disappointed
office seekers who have been laboring to cast reproach upon the
Administration and our worthy Democratic delegation deserve
the reprobation of all true Democrats and that they are un
worthy of the confidence of the Democratic party.
Resolved 6. "That our delegates to the State Convention
at Iowa City be instructed to use their influence to procure the
passage of similar resolutions." — 22 —

F. I. HERRIOTT VI.
The Nebraska bill produced hostilities in Iowa about as
soon as in the older states to the east; but they did not at
tain to much vigor until after February 1. One fact should
be borne in mind. At that time newspapers did not and
could not obtain or exploit current events with ease. Dis
patches were expensive. Dailies were found only in the
four large cities on the Mississippi — Dubuque, Davenport,
Burlington and Keokuk — and they seldom exceeded four
pages in size.
The reception accorded Douglas' bill at the outset by
some of the leading Democratic papers was decidedly hostile.
The distinction of first leading off seems to belong to Der
Demokrat of Davenport, easily the foremost German paper
in the state, then under the editorial management of Mr. Theo
dore Guelich. Der Demokrat at the time was a staunch sup
porter of President Pierce and his Administration. Mr. Guelich
informed his readers of the introduction of the Nebraska
bill on January 14 and concluded his brief paragraph with the
significant words: "Kostet so und so viel tausend Stimmen,
Mr. Douglas!" By its next issue (Jan. 21) the unwisdom, if
not the iniquity, of renewing the agitation of the slavery
question had stirred Mr. Guelich considerably. "Es ist nied-
lich was diese Muster-demokraten fur Begriffe von Con-
sequenz haben." He then dwells upon the solemn obligation
assumed by the Southern slaveholders in 1852 to repress all
agitation of the slavery question in and out of Congress" mit
alien Mitteln :" and Stephan Douglas "war bereit, auf diese
Platform fur die Prasidentschaft zu 'laufen';" and in fine
scorn Mr. Guelich concludes: — "und Stephan Douglas ist der
erste, der 'in die Bucht springt', der erste, welcher die Agita
tion der Sklavenf rage aufnimmt ! Demokratie ! Aemter-
jager! Sklavenhalterbedienten !"
Compared with Der Demokrat the English papers were
somewhat laggard both in reporting and in commenting upon
the introduction of the Nebraska bill. The "Administration"
paper at Dubuque, The Miner's Express mentions everything
— 23 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
else but the Nebraska bill. On January 18 its dispatches
contain a meagre mention of Senator Dodge's motion in the
Senate (Jan. 4) to have the Report and the Bill on Nebraska
printed. It was not until February 8 that its editor, Mr. Wm.
H. Merritt, expressed himself editorially- He then did so in
an earnest, almost solemn manner, under the caption : "The
All Absorbing Topic of the Day." After pointing out the
momentous character of the struggle precipitated, and deplor
ing the reckless disregard by "politicians" of the peace se
cured by the compromise measures of 1850, Mr. Merritt
gloomily declared : "we are upon the eve of another terrible
season of angry strife, desolating gloom, and perhaps civil
war and bloodshed. The appearances are portentous for such
a result." Despite his adverse feelings Mr. Merritt came out
in his next issue (Feb. 15) and fully endorsed Douglas' posi
tion and urged support of his bill, being persuaded thereto by
Douglas' speech of January 30. The editor of the Daily
Herald, Mr. D. A. Mahoney, who voiced the feelings of the
"anti-Administration" Democrats, was likewise adverse to
wards the measure at first. He could not see any use in re
opening the subject, the issue of which "may be tumult and
civil war;" and he was inclined to think certain portions of
the Bill "unneccessary and mischievous." But he, too, after
a week's reflection, swung into line and approved Douglas'
course- During the month following, Der Demokrat was ob
livious of the Nebraska bill hardly referring to it. Mr.
Guelich was fighting another Black Beast nearer at hand — the
"Temperenz-Gesetz" or as its advocates then usually par
ticularized it, the "Maine-Gesetz." During January and
February the agitation for this "reform" concentrated with
great vigor. Sundry organizations, such as "The Sons of
Temperance" were especially active in the state; and it was
evident that they would soon force the hands of the parry
leaders in legislation and administration.
The editors of The Iowa Democratic Enquirer, of Mus
catine, Messrs T. W. Williams and J. Carskadden, kept silent
until (Feb. 9) and then they bluntly pronounced that the
— 24 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Nebraska bill "is not such a political measure as we can sup
port." ****** it proposes to annul a solemn compact
***** Let us look at the probable result of this bill, if
passed ****** The tide of emigration will stop short
upon the soil of Iowa and Minnesota- A law by which a
quantity of land will be secured to each settler is anxiously
looked for. Of what avail will be such a law where slavery
can come." Unlike their Democratic brethren at Dubuque,
Burlington and Keokuk, Messrs. Willams and Carskadden
saw no light in Douglas' speech of January 30 and stood
staunch in opposition to the Repeal throughout the ensuing
campaign. The Whig, or Opposition press, as soon as they realized
the purport of the events at Washington at once trained
their guns on the Nebraska bill. Mr. J. B. Howell, editor of
the Des Moines Valley Whig, of Keokuk, (Jan. 19) pro
nounced it "directly in violation of the Missouri Compromise"
and predicted its defeat in Congress and its rejection by the
country at large. The Fairfield Ledger, Mr. A. R. Fulton,
editor, denounced it January 26. Mr- R. H. Warden, editor
of The Des Moines Courier, of Ottumwa, did not speak upon
the matter until February 16.
The party leaders in Iowa first became aware of the
ground for the serious concern of the foreign-born in the
consequences of the proposal for the Repeal of the Missouri
Compromise from the columns of two eastern anti-Slavery
organs — Dr. Gamaliel Bailey's National Era of Washington
D. C, and Horace Greeley's New York Tribune. Both papers
circulated in Iowa among the opponents of slavery. Greeley's
Weekly Tribune had a circulation double that of any single
paper in Iowa and for the purpose of this study must be re
garded as a local paper. 15 Dr. Bailey was an intimate friend
of Senator Salmon P. Chase of Ohio and co-worker with him
and Joshua R. Giddings in the anti-Slavery cause and alto-
15 The Burlington Hawkeye on April 29, 1859 stated "There is no
paper printed in the state of Iowa that has half the circulation of The
Tribune within the State."" Its circulation in Iowa that year was
7,532 [N. Y. Tribune (S. W.) April 29, 1859.]
— 25 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
gether was perhaps the most influential writer on the sub
ject in the country. The National Era on January 19 con
tained an editorial entitled "The Nebraska Affair." Therein
the foreign-born were warned of the adverse significance of
the measure as regards themselves and their interests as fol
lows : "We are glad to see that the Bill & Report on the
subject of Nebraska * * * are beginning to be under
stood. * * *
"Another element will soon be added to the agita
tion. Hitherto the naturalized Germans of this coun
try have generally supported the Administration of
Gen. Pierce, not because they particularly like his
position on the slavery question but because they
deem him and his party favorable to the cause of
freedom in Europe. But they have interests in
America as well as in Europe. They have no fond
ness for slavery, and do not choose to labor with
slaves. They have always considered the 'Far West'
sacred to freedom and felt grateful that there, they
and those whom they love in their fatherland when
driven into exile might find free homes and free in
stitutions. What will they think of this new policy
of the Administration which aims insidiously to de
stroy the bulwarks of Freedom around this mag
nificent domain so as to leave no spot of American
territory sacred against the intrusions of Negro
Slavery. Let them not be deceived. Such is the
policy. The Report and the bill means this, and
nothing else- * * *"
Obviously Dr. Bailey regarded the Germans as major
parties in interest and his attempt to arouse them in opposi
tion indicated that he regarded them as forces of the greatest
strategic and tactical importance in the contest with the pro-
slavery party. The correctness of his conclusion is certainly
a clear inference from the conduct of Senator Douglas. The
occasion of his ferocious attack on Senators Chase and
Summer in his speech in the United States Senate on January
30th was language used by them in "The Appeal of the Inde
pendent Democrats in Congress to the People of the United
States." The first draft of that celebrated document was
— 26 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
made by Joshua R. Giddings of Ohio and it was recast and
put in final form by Senator Chase. Both men knew well the
relations of Germans to anti-slavery success in Ohio. One
of the objectives of the "Appeal" was manifestly the in
citement of the foreign-born to revolt from the Democratic
party — as the subjoined quotations from it suggest:
"Washington, Jan. 22, 1854.
"Fellow citizens:
"We arraign this bill as a gross violation of a sacred
pledge; as a criminal betrayal of precious rights; as
part and parcel of an atrocious plot to exclude from
a vast unoccupied region immigrants from the Old
World and free laborers from own states and convert
it into a dreary region of despotism, inhabited by
masters and slaves.
"Take your maps, fellow citizens, we entreat you,
and see what country it is which this bill, gratuitously
and recklessly, proposes to open to slavery. * * *
"What will be the effect of this measure, should it
unhappily become a law, upon the proposed Pacific
railroads. If slavery be allowed there * * * induce
ments to the immigration of free laborers will be al
most destroyed. * * *
"From the rich lands of this large territory, also,
patriotic statesmen have anticipated that a free, in
dustrious, and enlightened population will extract
abundant treasures of individual and public wealth.
There, it has been expected, that freedom-loving,
emigrants from Europe, and energetic and intelligent
laborers from our own land will find homes of com
fort and fields of useful enterprise- If this bill shall
become a law, all such expectations will turn to
grievous disappointment. The blight of slavery will
» cover the land. The Homestead law, should Con
gress enact one will be worthless there. Freemen,
unless pressed by hard and cruel necessity will not,
and should not, work besides slaves. Labor cannot
be respected where any class of laborers is held in
abject bondage. It is the deplorable necessity of
slavery that to make and keep a single slave there
must be slave law ; and where slave law exists, labor
must necessarily be degraded. — 27 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
"We earnestly request the enlightened conductors
of newspapers printed in the German and other
foreign languages to direct the attention of their
readers to this important matter. * * *"
The Appeal, thus clearly designed for circulation among
Germans, was at once translated and published entire in the
New York Democrat and by January 30th constituted one
of the primary causes of the "tornado" that was sweeping
the North to the amazement of public and politicians alike.
Senator Douglas proclaimed that "this tornado has been raised
by abolitionists and abolitionists alone."
The "Appeal" was printed first in The National Era in
Washington on January 24. It appeared in the columns of
the N. Y. Tribune on January 27. As a result of the violent
attack of Senator Douglas on him for his signature thereto
Senator Chase had the entire document reprinted as an Ad
dendum or Appendix to his speech in rejoinder to Douglas
in the Congressional Globe for January 30, (pp. 281-282).
The Des Moines Courier of Ottumwa reprinted it entire
(March 2). So far as the present writer can discover it was
not reprinted elsewhere in Iowa. But the extensive circula
tion of the first named eastern journals in Iowa brought the
contents of the Appeal immediately to the attention of the
people. They became aware that the foreign-born, no less
than the natives, had a particular, not to say a peculiar in
terest in the consequence of the attempt to repeal the noted
Compact of 1820. VII.
The Opposition in Iowa in 1854, as is usual, comprehended
elements exceedingly heterogeneous, contradictory, divergent
and mutually repellant in character; and there was consider
able commotion among them.
In the foreground the advocates of drastic sumptuary
legislation were especially active. Local and state organiza
tions were conducting energetic and systematic campaigns.
Churches and societies, such as "The Sons of Temperance"
and "Temperance Leagues" were holding "meetings" and
sending out lecturers and committees were circularising and
— 28 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
addressing letters to the public. The Methodist church, easily
foremost in political influence and activity, appointed Rev.
Henry Clay Dean, a conspicuous character in those and later
days, as State Tract Agent. He was either directed or ex
pected, apparently, to enter upon an active campaign of
"temperance" propaganda ; for he at once engaged to deliver
lectures in various parts of the state which he at once pro
ceeded to do.
The agitation for a prohibitory law affected both major
political parties more or less. Some of the Democratic papers
were favorable to the enactment of restrictive legislation of
a drastic sort. The Keokuk Dispatch sought public favor for
the candidates on the plea that the convention at Iowa City
had nominated a "strict Temperance Ticket-" But the friends
and workers for "Temperance" legislation, by a large majority
were Whigs or had been Whigs. Mr. J. B. Howell proudly
acknowledged in the Valley Whig the taunt of his local con
temporary that "every editorial Whig pen in the state has
been at work to write of Temperance and the Maine Law" :
and the fact loomed large in the minds of the Germans in the
state. Another influential element of the Opposition — although
not so numerous and active — was the Free Soil party com
posed largely of Democratic discontented with the pro-slavery
tendencies of their parent party and in part of Abolitionists
who could not affiliate with either of their major parties. In
the matter of state conventions the Free Soilers got an early
start and apparently had three such conventions. The first
one is reported to have taken place, November 30, 1853 at
Salem in Henry county, when they nominated Dr. George
Shedd of Denmark, for the office of Superintendent of Public
Instruction and Professor S. L. Howe, (editor of the True
Democrat) for Congress and report had it that "the Maine
law was adopted as a component part of their platform." 16
Its session was insufficient apparently, for another conven
tion was called and met at the town of Washington January
is Muscatine Journal, December 30, 1853.
— 29 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
11-12. Candidates for state offices were nominated, Mr-
Simeon Waters being named for Governor. " No account
of the proceedings have been discoverable by the present
writer; but we need not doubt that opposition to Slavery and
advocacy of the Maine law were any less decided than it was
at the first and as we shall see it was at the third convention held
a month and a half later. Immediately upon the adjourn
ment at Washington a committee was assembled to consider
the wisdom of calling a convention of all Christian Anti-
Slavery forces. The conclusion was a call, issued at Mus
catine, for a convention to meet at Brighton on February 9,
and "ministers of all denominations" were invited to at
tend. 18 No account of the convention called to meet at
Brighton has been discovered by the present writer.
The Whigs did not hold their convention for six weeks
after the Democratic state convention. As a party they were
so benumbed by their overwhelming defeat in the presidential
election of 1852 that it is doubtful whether at the opening of
1854 they possessed vitality enough to assemble in any con
siderable numbers. In the state elections of 1853 they had
allowed matters to go by default, not calling a convention.
The Kansas-Nebraska bill renewed the virulent animosities
of its "progressive" and "conservative" factions. The "con
science" Whigs and the "Cotton" Whigs and the Silver Grays
again flew apart or at each other's throats. The tremendous
disturbance in the Democratic ranks produced by Douglas'
bill energized the anti-slavery Whigs and they induced a call
for a convention for February 22 at Iowa City. It was
largely attended, we are told, and the delegates were en
thusiastic- Unlike the Democratic platform which was devoted
wholly to national matters the platform of the Whigs was
about equally divided between local and national affairs. A
revision of the state constitution was demanded and a liberal
banking law insisted upon. The Missouri Compromise was
asserted to be a "final settlement of the slavery question."
" Ibid, January 20, 1854.
is Ibid. — 30 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Douglas' bill was "most unqualifiedly and emphatically" dis
approved, and the purpose thereof pronounced a pretense,"
"conceived in bad faith and prompted by an ignoble and most
unworthy ambition for party and personal preferment."
Liberal Federal provision for Internal improvements was
urged; but Douglas' proposal for an interstate tonnage tax
to secure them was opposed as impracticable and unjust. The
concluding planks were
Resolved, That we are in favor of a donation, by
Congress, of public lands, in limited quantities, to
actual settlers.
Resolved, That we believe the people of this State
are prepared for, and their interests require, the pas
sage of a law prohibiting the manufacture and sale
of ardent spirits within the State as a beverage.
The foreign-born in the state were in general favorably
disposed toward all the planks of the Whigs, save one. They
regarded slavery with not friendly eye. The German "Forty-
eighters" and the Hungarian refugees were foremost in anti-
slavery propaganda. In matters affecting industry and com
merce they insisted upon solid and effective methods of busi
ness; and with respect to the disposal of the public domain
they were alertly interested in the furtherance of the liberal
policy urged by the liberal Whigs. The plank quoted, how
ever, it is to be noted, did not specifically disapprove discrimi
nation against aliens as did the Democratic platform.
The last plank, was a mill stone that almost sank the
Whig platform as a sailing craft for the foreign-born to wit,
the one demanding the passage of a law prohibiting the manu
facture and sale of "ardent spirits." During the middle years
of that decade there culminated a "temperance" agitation that
was peculiarly exasperating to Germans. From Maine to Iowa
it was promoted with fanatical zeal by puritanical propagan
dists, who for the most part were liberal Whigs, "progres
sives" or seceders from that party. Moreover they were
nearly always ardent anti-slavery men. But against "the
Maine law" notions of New England zealots the European
emigrants set themselves firm as flint. They opposed
— 31 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
drastic sumptuary laws denying them liberty in personal mat
ters of forms of entertainment and refreshment with the
same fervor and force that they opposed the advance of
slavery. The Maine law was slavery in another form and
in no less degree than was African slavery. More important
politically — it was immediate, at their cross roads and near
their firesides whereas negro slavery was an evil in prospect
and more or less remote — an evil that they would have to
seek : but the slavery of the Maine law was foisted and forced
upon them in their haunts and homes. After their manner
Germans always strike at the evil nearest in front.
Altogether the Democrats seem to have had a decided ad
vantage over the Whigs so far as platforms were to affect the
foreign-born votes. This advantage was partially counterbal
anced by the superior strength of the Whig nominee for
governor, Mr. James W- Grimes of Burlington, over Mr.
Curtis Bates of Des Moines, the Democratic nominee- Mr.
Grimes was by far the strongest man the anti-slavery forces
could have nominated. He had been one of the leading law
yers of the state since almost its organization as a Territory.
He was very effective as a speaker. He was acute, learned
and well trained in the law and was at once outspoken and
straightforward, alert, energetic and shrewd as a party leader
— a better political strategist and tactician Iowa has never
had than James W. Grimes. Nevertheless, the chances for
his election at the time of his nomination were far from
favorable And sundry developments aggravated the unfavor
able prospects.
On March 28 the Free Soil party met in convention at
Crawfordsville, in Washington county. Conferences, prior
to and during the session, of friends of Mr. Grimes with the
Free Soil leaders resulted in the adoption of a recommen
dation to Free Soilers to vote for Mr. Grimes and the sub
sequent withdrawal of the candidate previously placed in
nomination by them. In some brief resolutions they pro
claimed that they "still abide by the Pittsburgh platform of
1851;" that the "great object to be secured" is — lst, Sue1,!
state and national officers as "will resist the extension of
_ 32 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
slavery in any form," and 2nd, "Such as will give the people
of Iowa a Maine law. Therefore" they urged the election
of James W. Grimes because they believe that "if elected, that
he will maintain and carry out these principles" 19
This action of the Free Soil party and the known effort
of Mr. Grimes to secure such endorsement served as a match
to ignite the sullen opposition of the reactionary old line
and Silver Gray Whigs which had been rapidly growing since
the onset of the debates over the Nebraska bill; and it now
blazed out in open aggressive opposition to Mr. Grimes' elec
tion. The leading Whig organ of the state, The Hawkeye,
published in his home city of Burlington, forthwith denounced
him as an abolitionist and unworthy of Whig support. So
pronounced was this sort of discontent that one of the can
didates placed in nomination by the Whigs at Iowa City re
signed his place on the ticket, refusing to run with Mr.
Grimes because he was "too much of a Free Soiler." 20
Besides defections of Whigs and open rebellion within his
own rank because of his alliance with the Free Soilers, he
suffered still further by reason of that alliance. In political
parlance "it cut both ways." Germans were again impressed
by his alignment with the "temperance" forces. The "Maine
law" was co-equal with slavery in the Free Soil platform.
Mr. Grimes was a Congregationalist and an avowed advocate
of restrictive legislation. Asa Turner, "Father Turner" the
great pioneer promoter of Congregationalism in Iowa, foremost
in promoting "moral reforms" chief among which was the
Maine law, was prominent in bringing about the endorsement
of Mr. Grimes by the Free Soilers. Writing some time later
(Oct. 3) to Salmon P. Chase, Grimes says of the two Whig
candidates : "My colleagues on the Congressional ticket were
dead weights." One, (if not both) was a prominent temper
ance worker, Mr. James Thorington. He was a candidate
in the Northern or 2nd District, giving an address on Temper
ance at "a tremendous meeting of the friends of temperance
i9S'ee Des Moines Valley Whig, April 20, 1854. See also Ma-
goun Asa Turner His Times, pp. 286-291.
20 Salters Grimes, p. 54. — 33 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
at Concert Hall," Keokuk, April 19, right in the heat of the
state campaign. Whether Mr. Grimes in his letter to Chase
referred to lack of discretion or ability or feeble activity we
can only conjecture: but certain it is that such zeal in the
cause of Temperance did not enhance Mr. Grimes' chances
among the Germans.
Another fact of primary importance in alienating the
Germans, at least in making them suspicious and indisposed
to accept the guardianship of the anti-slavery party in Iowa,
lay in the growth of Know Nothingism that in Iowa, as else
where, drew its adherents chiefly from the ranks of the
Whigs — from its so-called "liberal" and "progressive" factions
or groups. Both of the candidates for Congress, Messrs. James
Thorington and R. L. B. Clarke, were commonly charged with
affiliations with Know Nothing leaders and membership in
their lodges ; and Mr. Clarke openly asserted his membership,
if not then, at least subsequently. For Germans to vote for
Mr. Grimes and the party he and they represented, ( Know-
No thingism and puritanical fanaticism combined) required
some overwhelming considerations.
These considerations were forthcoming. In order to ap
preciate their nature and urgency we must discern clearly
certain conditions amidst which the campaign in Iowa in
1854 got under headway. We must also follow the course
of events in the national theatre at Washington in the moment
ous debates upon the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise and
realize some particular phases thereof in their bearing upon
the interest and amour propre of the foreign-born in Iowa.
In the national Senate, Sons of New England were breaking
lances with sons of the Old South and the consideration of
sons of Germania was the gauge of battle. The nature of that
contest must be thoroughly realized to understand the course
of developments in Iowa in the ensuing months.
VIII.
In order to measure the intensity of the reaction of the
Germans in 1854 we must appreciate the fact, but little ap
preciated, namely, that those who were conspicuous in Anti-
— 34 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Slavery agitation were, in very considerable part, simul
taneously active and aggressive in "temperance" propaganda.
This particular reform was especially obnoxious to the vast
majority of the Germans and was resented by them with in
tense feelings which were expressed usually in the most em
phatic manner. The developments in Iowa in 1854 were ap
proaching flood tide and it was a primary political fact of the
highest potency.
Mr. Rhode's assertion that "the temperance issue entered
slightly into the discussion" in the campaign preceding the
political revolution in Iowa in 1854 must be taken with grave
doubts, if not with plump dissent, by anyone familiar with
the columns of the newspapers of the state and with the
course of the agitation for drastic legislation suppressing
traffic in alcoholic stimulants. Some surface facts appear
to give color to the assertion quoted. Mr. Grimes did not em
phasize the subject in his address to the people of Iowa on
which he based his campaign. The apparent significance of
this negative fact is enhanced by the additional fact that the
subject was given no mention in the Democratic platform of
1855 and the Whigs hadn't life enough to write a platform
and the remainder of the "Opposition" did not formulate one.
But the subject of "temperance" was much in the minds
of the people and was constantly before the electors during
1854 and 1855. Conclusive proof of the truth of this allega
tion is the fact that in 1855 a state referendum vote was had
upon the proposition to adopt state-wide prohibition of the
manufacture and sale of intoxicating beverages and the
drastic proposal was carried. Such a radical reform in the
public policy of the state was not suddenly presented and
pushed through; its achievement meant that many months,
not to say years, of earnest resistance and systematic agita
tion had preceded such culmination : and this conclusion is
amply sustained by the exhibits of the press of Iowa for 1853
and 1854.
The temperance campaign was nearing its final stages
in 1854- Throughout the state there was general and intense
— 35 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
interest in the restriction of the nefarious traffic. Belligerent
public opinion adverse to unlimited sale was rapidly forming.
Direct efforts to restrict the right of sale — first by local op
tion arrangements and second by direct attacks upon "dog
geries" — as grocery stores, wherein, sales of intoxicants
largely took place, were generally called — had been increasing
noticeably during 1853. The agitation became acute at times
and public demonstrations of various sorts occurred that took
form either in concerted action of the reformers to drive the
"doggeries" out of business by direct personal attacks or by
summary mob action or in like action of the friends of the
traffickers in "spirits" in riotous attacks upon officers and re
formers. 21 The atmosphere was surcharged with electrical
feeling that flashed fire easily and unexpectedly. A few ex
hibits will demonstrate the premises warranting these asser
tions. On November 24, 1853, Mr. J. B. Howell in The Des
Moines Valley Whig announced that the tiime had come for
concerted action by all advocates of restrictive temperance
measures. The action and portions of two paragraphs are
quoted : "Temperance Policy in Iowa.
"The friends of Temperance in Iowa have dis
cussed and argued and advocated the cause, in tracts,
in newspapers, on the stump, in the lecture room,
and in the pulpit. The public mind is ripe, and has
been for years, for the suppression of the business
of drunkard making. But the great mass doubt the
possibility of effecting the object. *****
"The time has now come for the Temperance men
of Iowa to demonstrate to the understanding and
outward senses of the people of the state, the potency
of the law, the overpowering effects of 'legal sua
sion,' enforced upon the liquor seller. Let the
people be once satisfied, convinced by actual obser
vation that the groceries can be rooted out, and the
sale of the intoxicating beverage be suppressed and
_ 21 See The Des Moines Valley Whig. March 16, 1854, p. 1, col. 3
"Liquor Troubles in Davenport" in which a witness "against one of the
forty Dutch Doggery keepers . . . was assailed by a crowd of Ger
mans." — 36 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
they will vote for a prohibitory law by an over
whelming majority."
The next week (Dec. 2) in the Muscatine lournal
Messrs. Orion Clemens and John Mahin, editors, discussing
the same subject under the same title and the then forth
coming state meeting of the State Temperance Society at
Iowa City said:
"They [the convention's delegates] may as well
take the bull by the horns at once and form some
thing like an effective organization for the purpose
of securing the enactment of a law for the prohibi
tion of the sale of intoxicating drinks, except for
medicinal, mechanical and sacramental purposes."
He then quotes various Whig papers of the State in
support of the suggestion — The Iowa Democratic Banner of
Davenport, The Ledger of Fairfield and the Valley Whig of
Keokuk, The Times of Dubuque and an observation of the
latter : "Nearly all of our exchanges in this State have
had some thing to say respecting temperance in
Iowa." A Free Soil convention of Henry County on November
30 endorsed the demand for the enactment of the Maine
Law prohibiting the manufacture and sale of all intoxicant
beverages, particularly beer and wine and all spirituous liquors,
{The Muscatine lournal of December 30 informs us) "was
adopted as a component part of its platform."
In the forepart of December, 1853, there was issued
an extended "Address to the Total Abstinence Societies and
to the Friends of Total Abstinence in the State of Iowa"
urging united action in promoting the cause. It was ex
tensively printed and circulated. The following paragraph
indicates their objective :
"A prohibitory law we demand and nothing but
a prohibitory liquor law, that will suppress its entire
sale as a beverage in Iowa."
The chairman of the Committee signing the Address was
Mr. James Thorington of Davenport who, six months later,
— 37 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
was nominated by the Whigs or Opposition Convention for
Congress and was elected. 22
The State Temperance Society met at Iowa City on
December 21 and in its platform or Resolutions appeared the
following explicit demands and declaration :
[1] "Resolved that the temperance question as
agitated at this day, with reference to a prohibitory
law involves all the best interests of Society, and
while it is not our design to disturb existing political
parties or organizations, yet we do intend to have and
to enforce a law, prohibiting the manufacture and
traffic of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, what
ever may be the consequences to any or all political
parties- [2] "Resolved that as men of all parties and no
party, we will vote for no man to make and execute
laws who is not decidedly and unequivocally in favor
of the passage and enforcement of a law prohibiting
the sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage.
[5] "Resolved that as above intimated, we do not
contemplate the organization of any third or separate
party, and only and simply the enactment and en
forcement of stringent prohibitory liquor laws ; but
if the political organizations of the day turn a deaf
ear to our petitions and remonstrances, and attempt
to force upon us rulers and laws that are opposed to
the legal enactments and enforcements before re
ferred to, we will, relying on the justice of our
cause, rally round the standard of truth, and battle
for the right, in a separate and distinct organiza
tion." 23
The earnestness and working program of the delegates
with respect to plans for promoting their reform were signified
in some addional resolutions adopted on the floor of the Con
vention in which the Executive Committee was directed to
"appoint Committees in all counties to see that meetings are
held . . ."
How substantial, serious and wide spread politically was
this demand, may be realized from a few paragraphs taken
22 Des Moines Valley Whig, Dec. 15, 1853. P. 2, col. 6.
Mlbid, Dec. 29, 1853, p. 2, col. 6.
— 38 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
from The Des Moines Valley Whig for January 19 a month
preceding the Whig Convention at Iowa City :
"Whig Editors the Advocates of Temperance.
"The Editor of the Keokuk Dispatch unwittingly
bears most honorable testimony to the character of
the Whig Editors of Iowa when he alleges that
every editorial Whig pen in the State has been at
work to write of Temperance and the Maine law.
"It is a fact, we believe, that nearly every Whig
Editor in the State has advocated the enactment of
a prohibitory liquor law, and a large majority of the
Democratic editors of the State have written in op
position to it
"The Dispatch also boasts that the Democratic
State Convention have nominated a strict temper
ance ticket."
Such a state of common opinion among the foremost
partisan editors meant one thing — the popular demand for
drastic "temperance" legislation was intense, insistant and
menacing to the political fortunes of the partisan leaders and
party organizations and, whatever they might individually
think of the reform proposed, it had to be espoused by their
party or defeat or discomfiture was certain.
IX.
It was in the presence of such a rising tide of aggres
sive "Puritanism" or radicalism that the Germans looked for
ward to the campaign of 1854. There were numerous earnest
advocates of temperance in the use of alcoholic beverages
among the Germans. They were numerous among their
church-going folk. Thus the Muscatine lournal, Jan. 20, re
cords "A Temperance League Meeting — Lecture to the Ger
mans" by a Mr. Miller in "the German Methodist Church,"
the lecture to be in German. The Iowa Democratic Enquirer
of the same city for Feb. 16, contains a letter headed "The
Germans" which asserts that:
"The Germans, as a mass, are a temperance people ;
but they do not and will not confine themselves to a
narrow, contracted idea, that precludes the moderate
enjoyment of such things as they see fit to enjoy.
— 39 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
They need no Maine Law to control them, nor do
they approve or encourage drunkenness."
The large majority of Germans, however, were outspoken
and belligerent opponents of what they regarded as arbitrary,
fanatical interference with their personal liberties and they
were just as ready to wage battle against all persons, pro
grams and political parties urging restrictive legislation as
were the militant advocates of "teetotahsm" to battle for the
Maine law. Their feelings and views are effectively indicated
by the subjoined resolution adopted at a mass meeting in
Muscatine Feb. 17, taken from the Iowa Democratic Enquirer
of Feb. 23rd. German Meeting.
Proceedings of the German Mass Meeting, held at
Major Hare's Hall, Muscatine, Friday evening, Feb.
17, 1854:
H. Funk, Esq. was called to the chair, and H.
Aeuer, Esq. was appointed secretary — The object
of the meeting was stated by the Chairman. On mo
tion of Mr. Boerstein a committee of seven was ap
pointed to draft resolutions expressive of the sense
of the meeting. The committee withdrew, and during
their absence, Mr- Aeuer was called upon, who favor
ed the convention with an impressive speech, during
which he was frequently interrupted with enthusiastic
applause from the audience. After which the commit
tee reported the following preamble and resolutions :
Whereas, We, contemplate in the existing temper
ance fanaticism, which, though apparently manifest
ing to encourage and promote the morals of commu
nity, yet seeing that actually, and in fact, it only en
genders disorder and confusion among the people,
and converts them into hypocrites and violators of
law; it undermines the foundations of our republican
institutions, and threatens by coalition to deprive us
of our political rights, We, therefore, deeming it
high time to extract from the mouth of this crawling
serpent its venomous tooth, adopt in this convention,
the following resolutions :
Resolved, lst. That we unconditionally condemn
all humbugs, whether they be of a political, social, or
religious character, and therefore deprecate and de
plore the ruinous policy of candidates making polit-
— 40 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
ical capital out of social and religious questions.
That we view the existing legal restraint upon in
temperance as ineffectual and ruinous in its tendency
to any state or organization in this great republic, be
cause it incites men to hypocrisy, and then to be
come secret violators of law.
Resolved, 2d. That we believe that extremely re
strictive compulsory means, which affect personal
liberty, are contemptible to every good republican,
and will only press the evil the more closely to the
innermost centre of our political organization, and
therefore augment its ruinous tendency.
Resolved, 3rd. That we recommend to our disin
terested political philanthropists and statesmen to em
ploy means less dangerous and more effectual for the
improvement of public morality, and for the diminu
tion of inebriation, and that we hereby pledge our
heartfelt willingness to support such measure. Pro
vided, that neither the liberty of the people, nor the
constitution are violated.
Resolved, 4th. That we do not consider any caucus
nomination binding upon us.
Resolved, 5th. That we heartily approve of our
free school system as the main pillar of our moral
improvement, and the perpetuity of our institutions.
Resolved, 6th. That we will support no candidate
in the coming city and state elections, who is not
pledged to defend the principles to which we adhere.
Resolved, 7th. That we cheerfully award our full
est approbation to our present city officers, for the
satisfactory manner in which they have performed
their duties, and we publicly express our deepest re
spect for their indomitable watchfulness over the in
terests of our young city.
Resolved, 8th. That the secretary be instructed to
send a copy of these resolutions to every German
paper in the state, and literally translate a copy there
of for each of the newspapers in this city for their
kind publication.
H. Aeuer, Secy. H- Funk, Prest.
The attitude of The Enquirer towards the resolutions of
the Germans was critical rather than friendly and the fact
— 41 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
is somewhat surprising in view of the obvious importance of
the votes of Germans to the Democratic party workers:
The Germans' Resolutions
We publish to-day what purports to be a literal
translation of the resolutions passed at a recent meet
ing of our German citizens; and on this subject we
have a word to say.
It is the undoubted right of all classes of citizens
to express and give to the world their views upon
the various social and political questions that are
being agitated. But we would say to our German
friends, and say it in all kindness, that they would
do well to remember that they are not the oldest re
publicans in America — on the contrary, they are
among the youngest. And from the nature of the
case they cannot be as well qualified to judge of
what is, or what is not in accordance with the spirit
of our institutions, as the mass of the citizens who
have been born and educated amid purely American
influences. We know that among the extreme temperance men,
and in the measures they adopt to carry out their de
signs, there is much that is extreme and violent; in
separably attends upon the political agitation of a
moral question, and it is too apt to degenerate into
fanaticism. But are these resolutions free from violence ? Free
from a spirit of fanaticism? We think not. They
tend to the other extreme. And in that respect, they
stand precisely upon the same ground, as does the ex
treme policy against which they are aimed.
Between these two extremes lies the golden mean
— the true path to pursuit — and the position occupied
by the great mass of our citizens.
The Enquirer's comments do not appear to be entirely
just. The expressions of the Germans anent the liquor ques
tion were not more extreme than the resolutions adopted at
Iowa City by the State Temperance Society on December
21, 1853. Their refusal to support any candidate or party
that did not repudiate Maine-Lawism was exactly paralleled
by the Anti-slavery and "anti-Doggery" propagandists in their
action at Iowa City. They were frank and downright in
— 42 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
their resolutions, to be sure, but not "violent" by any just use
of terms- Clear and convincing evidence, supporting the foregoing
assertion that "the temperance issue" entered seriously into
the political campaign in Iowa in 1854 is the editorial com
ment thereon in Greeley's New York Tribune (Weekly) for
August 26 : "Iowa
"We observe in some quarters a disposition to re
present the late triumph of the Anti-slavery and Anti-
grog-shop ticket in Iowa as a victory of the Whigs.
This is erroneous and unjust. The Whig Party, as
such, never could have gained that success. It was
achieved by a fusion of all honest parties — by the
combination of men previously entertaining differing
or antagonistic sentiments on political questions who
came together on the common ground of Slavery re
striction and Liquor prohibitions, and fought the
glorious battle of Freedom as one man, with the re
sult at which we now rejoice. It was not done by
either of the old organizations but by that new party
of the People which the Nebraska outrage has brought
to life in all the Northern States and which, we do
not doubt, is destined substantially to triumph every
where."
We must conclude, it is submitted that the "Temperance
question" was one of the preponderant problems in public
estimation and it was in the forefront of public consideration.
It clearly and easily was one of the three or four major con
siderations that aroused and controlled public discussion.
The fact that the Opposition element comprehended the
vast majority of the aggressive advocates of the "Maine Law"
made an alliance of the German with them in opposition to
the extension of Slavery extremely difficult and under normal
circumstances impossible.
In the presence of so much that Germans held anathema
any considerable defection of their numbers from the Demo
cratic camps and columns could only be brought about by
considerations that overwhelmed all immediate personal dis-
— 43 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
approval of particular local public policy adverse to their
personal pleasure and traditions of life.
X.
Mr. Rhode's assertion that "the Know Nothing wave
had not reached Iowa" when the election took place in August
is not exactly true. It did not sweep into the state in flood
tide that year and it did not in later years completely sweep
the party crafts from their moorings as was the case in some
of the older Eastern and Southern states; but nevertheless
it was a very considerable and known factor in all partisan
calculations in Iowa between 1854 and I860-
The local press of Iowa teems with references to nativ-
ism then rapidly displaying itself in Know Nothingism in all
sorts of direct and indirect assertions, all showing that the
editors knew that the public was alert to its possibilities,
probabilities and actualities in their local political decisions.
Editors are usually fairly reliable weather vanes, if nothing
else, and give us unmistakable evidence of the existence,
drifts and intensity of popular currents of political interests
and practical desires.
Mr. W. H. Merritt, editor of The Daily Miner's Express
of Dubuque, who was a staunch supporter with liberal ten
dencies of the national Democratic Administrations at Wash
ington, in an editorial expression September 14, 1853 on
"Native Americanism and its Effectual Opposition" indicated
the average attitude of Democratic partisans towards the in
creasing manifestations of Native Americanism in national and
sectional politics throughout the country.
"Native Americanism like every other faction,
whether it has had for its central point Anti-Masonry,
Abolitionism, Free Soil, of Temperance, has been
put in motion to be used against the Democratic
party. Each one of these in turn, of all combined
have been used by the Whig leaders in a vain en
deavor to divide and destroy the great party of the
people."
All new factional and party formations usually take
strength from the party in power and its defenders are alert
— 44 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
to discern such defections and to denounce all developments
and disturbances that operate to enhance the chances of the
Opposition. They see such disturbances merely as the male
volent designs of unscrupulous partisan foes who are fanning
into flame every prejudice and sign of discontent in order to
make trouble for the party in office and thereby detach sup
porters and votes from the "party of law and order" as the
Administration is fond of calling itself : and such is a major
truth in actual proceedings in ordinary current politics. On
the other hand the outrages perpetrated by the Know Noth
ings in mob actions, in arson and assaults made broad minded
liberals loath to be charged with sympathy with such narrow
views and worse conduct. Such Journals as the New York
Tribune and Evening Post constantly and vigorously opposed
Know Nothingism.
The city of Muscatine in that decade, as ever and anon
in later decades, was one of the storm centres of Iowa wherein
extremists and radicals were wont to assemble and give
forth vigorous expression of public sentiments. The following
from the advertising and editorial columns of The Muscatine
lournal will indicate that anti-foreign sentiments were con
centrating in Iowa in the forepart of 1854 and taking form too
in Know Nothing lodges. The first item was merely a "local ;"
the second was an editorial note ; and the third is the advertise
ment of the Lodge as it appeared in an advertising column :
Local Matters
United Sons of America
"We learn that an association of the above secret
order exists in this place, and now numbers about 150
members. Its principal feature, as indicated by its
title, is Native Americanism. The Association meets
weekly in the third story of Green and Stone's new
building." December 23, 1853.
*****
"U. S. of A. The first and only camp of this
Native American order in the State of Iowa exists
in this place. See notice of regular proceedings."
— 45 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
December 30, 1853.
"God and Our Native Land."
"Iowa Camp No- 1 U.S.A. meets every Friday
evening, in the Hall of the Temple of Honor, Second
Street, Muscatine, in the Third Story above Fay and
Stone's drug store." December 30, 1853— 6m. By the R. S.
The people of Muscatine were thoroughly informed as
to what the "Native Americans" meant by "God and Our
Native Land." They were, for the most part, readers of
Horace Greeley's New York Weekly Tribune that had the
largest circulation of any paper in Iowa, and the progress of
the secret order in the East was constantly noted. On April
8, Greeley's columns contained an extraordinarily strong
editorial deploring the growth of "Nativism" in the form of
secret societies and denouncing the practices of the foreign
born that engendered such, from which the initial and con
cluding paragraphs are given.
National Antagonism.
"All history shows that all organizations of an ex
clusive character, or of selfishly national character,
beget their opposites by the mere law of compensa
tion: hence the anti-slavery party in this country,
and hence the Native American party  • it is
a sad spectacle to behold Nativism taking the form
of a Secret Society, and endeavoring to gain com
plete control over the votes of the country by means
befitting the political darkness of the middle ages in
stead of the light which now gilds the peaks of
Democracy and may descend down the steeps into the
broad valleys.
"We hold equally the scales of justice in this matter
and protest against a secret American society whether
it know everything or know nothing. But we have
no hope that such a society or its equivalent in some
shape, will be uprooted until its cause be eradicated,
namely, the social, political and military combina
tions of foreigners among us — who pretend to be
Americans in fact or in prospect — and are always
looking abroad for comfort, precedent, honor and
— 46 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
love. We are either all American or nothing; and
this piebald arrangement — neither one thing nor the
other among the immigrant population — begets a state
of things among the native-born Americans that we
condemn and deplore."
The readers of the Tri-Weekly Muscatine lournal were
given (April 10) the subjoined particulars as to the exact
objectives of Know Nothings.
"The Know Nothings."
A lodge of the "Know Nothings" has just been
established in Chicago.
"The objects of the "Know Nothings" are two-fold
— part religious, part political ; and the ends aimed
at, the disfranchisement of adopted citizens, and their
exclusion from office, and perpetual war upon the
Catholic religion. With these cardinal principles, the
qualifications for membership and brotherhood are
easily determined.
"lst, The applicant for admission to a "wigwam"
must be a native born citizen of native born parents
and not of the Catholic religion.
"2nd, To renounce all previously entertained polit
ical leanings, and co-operate exclusively with the
new order.
"3rd, To hold neither political, civil nor religious
intercourse with any person who is a Catholic ; but,
on the contrary, to use all available means to abolish
the political and religious privileges he may, at
present enjoy.
"4th, That he will not [vote] for any man for
office who is not a native citizen of the [United]
States, or who may be disposed, if elected, to place
any foreigner, or Catholic in any office of emolu
ment or trust, the latter not being, in the opinion of
"Know Nothings," a "creditable witness" in any case
save where the oath is administered by his priest."
Commencing in the same issue under the caption "The
Guide," The lournal published on its first page a Directory
giving the leading institutions, places and functionaries of
the city, their locus, etc. under the general group headings
County Offices, City Authorities, Churches, Public Schools,
and Orders. Under the latter came Masonic, Odd Fellows
and the following third one :
— 47 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
"United Sons oe America."
Iowa Camp No. 1 U.S-A. meets every Tuesday
Evening, in the Hall over Fay and Stone's drug store.
(Third Story).
That notice appeared in every issue of the Tri-Weekly
lournal on page 1, column 2, near the top of the column
from April 12 to August 11 and later.
In the meantime in the columns of the Muscatine
Democratic Enquirer, the following appeared in the issues of
the Weekly on page 3, column 2.
"God and Our Native Land."
"Iowa camp No. 1 United Sons of America meets
every Tuesday Evening in the Hall of the Temple
of Honor — 3rd story above Fay and Stone's Drug
Store." Dec. 28, 1853. By the R.S.
These continuous advertisements demonstrate that the
officers and members of the "United Sons of America" were
not only alert and active but they wanted the public to know
of their existence and activity as a definite Society. Further
it was clearly considered by the publishers of the lournal as
one of the important and well established public "orders"
of the same status and public favor as the churches and
schools of the city and community, for we may presume that
the Tri-weekly publication of the notice of its name, date
and place of meeting was without cost to the members of
the lodge. Three items taken from the two Democratic papers of
Dubuque enhance the conclusion suggested by the foregoing.
In an editorial enlarging upon the character and significance
of various political meetings in Dubuque on Saturday, (Aug.
lst) preceding the Daily Herald thus described the purpose
of one: "A notice had been given by Col. McHenry that
he would address Pie-bald Democrats, Woolly Heads
and Know Nothings on Saturday afternoon."
The next day The Miner's Express referring to an an
nouncement in the Davenport Gazette that one Dr. F. Ciolina
— 48 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
of Burlington would establish and conduct a newspaper to
be known as "Independent Union" contemptuously asked the
question "Is he a Know Nothing?" In the same issue Mr.
Merritt reprints conspicuously Stephen A Douglas' strong
speech in Independence Square, Philadelphia, on July 4, in
which that statesman denounced Know Nothingism in the
roundest and most unequivocal terms — a speech that Douglas
would not have made had he not felt certain that his political
fortunes in Illinois were menaced by the insidious progress
of the Secret Society and Mr. Merritt would not have re
printed it had he not reason to know that the Mississippi
River did not bar the westward progress of Anti-foreign
propaganda. An editorial in the Iowa Star, published at Ft. Des Moines,
as the present capital city was then called, and formerly
edited by Mr. Curtis Bates, Mr. Grimes' rival for the Governor
ship, affords us another clear illustration of the consciousness
of the partisan leaders of the increasing permeation of Know-
Nothingism into the common thought, and of their alert
awareness as to its political significance. The editorial was
published on July 27, less than two weeks before the contest
for the Governorship was to be decided.
Know Nothingism.
"The Society of Know Nothings are gaining con
siderable strength throughout the country * * * *
"The Whig press of the country by its advocacy
of similar sectionalisms and sectarianisms is giving the
institution encouragement. ****** The old
Whig party must be fought as it was in the days of
the alien and sedition laws.
Democratic partisans very soon discovered that the Ger
mans were much concerned in the ruthless character of the
anti-foreign prejudice, and the rapid spread of the secret
societies for the propagation of their antagonistic doctrines
and plans against the rights and status of the foreign-born
among the people. There was no counterstroke to the anti-
foreign prejudices of the Slavocrats of the South, as exhibited
— 49 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
in their hostility towards the liberal proposals for aliens in
the proposed Homestead law, save the prominence of the
Whigs and of various elements of the Opposition in the Know
Nothing Societies and Councils. Democrats were not slow
to realize this latter fact and to ring the changes on it with
ostentatious emphasis.
The course of events in Iowa that year as we shall ob
serve them, and during the ensuing six years, indicates very
clearly that native Americanism was more or less manifest in
Eastern Iowa in 1854 and it was sufficiently vigorous to justify
no little concern on the part of party guides and managers- 2i
XI.
Somewhat of the state of mind of the foreign-born in
24 After the above section was written the writer came upon the
following in Curtis' The Republican Party: A History of its Fifty
Years' Existence and a Record of its Measures and Leaders 1854 —
1904: "During the year 1854 the party attained its highest effi
ciency, shaping the nominations and deciding the elections in
the Middle States, some Western States, a part of the New
England States, particularly in Massachusetts and Connecticut,
and even in the South. * * * "
[Concerning the establishment of the "brotherhood of the
Order of the American Union" by the delegates to the Council
of the American Party at Cincinnati in November of 1854
Mr. Curtis says:]
"Its membership was soon after estimated at between a
million and a quarter and a million and a half. While as yet
the party was not united upon the Slavery question, yet a pre
ponderance became the exponents of anti-Slavery, and , in
different States, had joined in passing resolutions condemning
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. They had elected
to the Senate of the United States Wilson of Massachusetts,
Harlan of Iowa, Seward of New York, Hale of New Hamp
shire, Bell of Tennessee, Trumbull of Illinois, and many Re
presentatives to the Lower House."
So far as the foregoing relates to Iowa, the writer has been un
able to find anything that warrants the sweeping assertion just quoted.
Native Americanism came into the political discussions of Iowa in the
latter part of 1853 and became aggressive and took form in secret
Societies in 1854, but there is no evidence, so far as an extensive
survey of the available papers for that year justifies opinions, for the
assertion made by the author quoted. Know Nothingism was not the
paramount issue in the minds of the voters, but it was one of the
three of four major factors determining the lines of debate and lead
ing to the anti-Slavery triumph in Iowa in 1854 that sent Mr. James
Harlan to the Senate of the United States as the successor to Senator
A. C. Dodge. — 50 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Eastern Iowa concerning both local and national politics in
the latter part of 1853 and the fore part of 1854 may be
discerned in the actions of some German Democrats in the
city of Burlington in the month of January- The call for
the Democratic State Convention had been issued and the
delegates were to assemble in Iowa City, January 9, 1854. A
county Convention for Des Moines County had assembled in
Marion Hall in Burlington on December 31, 1853 to select
delegates. The method of procedure in the preliminaries of
the County Convention and of those in charge of the pro
ceedings seems to have given great offence to some of the
German Democrats with the result that a mass meeting was
called which convened January 5, in "Temperance Hall" to
express their opinions with reference to the mode of nominat
ing the delegates to the Democratic State Convention. They
adopted resolutions in protest and therein we may have ex
hibited not a little of the feeling and views of German re
fugees with respect to public procedure and public policies.
The resolutions were as given in the Burlington Daily Tele
graph (Jan. 6.) :
"The German Democrats of Des Moines County,
assembled in mass meeting in Temperance Hall in the
City of Burlington, protest against all actions and
resolutions effected by the so-called Democratic Con
vention to be held on January 9th in Iowa City.
Considering all caucus nominations as immoral and
unworthy of true und enlightened Republicans we
can but look with great suspicion at all resolutions
of a Convention, got up by and for such caucus
nominations. "Particularly do we protest against any delegation
of Des Moines County for the above mentioned con
vention, as representing the general sentiments of the
Democrats of said county since the election of these
delegates was effected in such a manner as to prevent
all German Democratic Voters from any participa
tion in it.
"Moreover we publicly declare our intention to
vote but for those candidates who declare themselves
against all Temperance Laws and against all nomina-
— 51 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
tions for any members of Congress, of State As
sembly, or of any other public officers by caucuses.
"We further resolve, that the President and Sec
retary of this meeting shall publish the foregoing re
solutions and forward a copy of the same to each
of the delegates elected at Marion Hall on December
31, to the Convention at Iowa City."
Aug. Th. Garthe, John F. Mueller,
Secy. Pres-
The views of these Burlington Germans indicated clearly
their belligerent feelings and contentious disposition. Their
use of the term "Republican" suggests their European pro
paganda and experiences. Their insistence upon candidates
explicitly subscribing to their views and their announced in
tention of fighting anyone's election to State or National of
fices who did not specifically agree to advocate an advance
to realization of their views and policies, suggest latter-day
developments that have taken form in legislation for con
trolling primaries and party Conventions and for establishing
the initiative, referendum and recall of public officials in
order to insure the subservience of public servants to the
"known will of the people."
The meeting of January 5, it appears, was either not
largely attended, or was deemed by other Germans not to be
thoroughly representative of the best opinion, or the major
ity sentiment among the German Democrats, and another
mass meeting was called that convened on January 16. The
former resolutions were recanvassed and endorsed and the
following additional resolutions were adopted dealing more
particularly with questions then engaging general public dis
cussion. "I. We are in favor of a Free School System,
and oppose the distribution of the Public School
Fund to the different religious denominations- We
wish the attendance of Schools to be made obligatory.
"II. We are in favor of granting public lands
to actual settlers, as recommended by the Home
stead bill.
"III. We consider Banks as facilitating the trans-
.... 52 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
actions of business, and wish them to be introduced
into our State, with regulations, which will secure
the people against loss.
"IV. We oppose slavery, and demand the aboli
tion of the Fugitive Slave Law.
"V. We consider rotation in office as essential
with Republican Institutions.
VI. We wish all the proceedings and resolutions
of the Legislature and of the State Government to
be published in the German language in copies pro
portionate to the German population."
By order, Dr. Scholer, Pres't
Aug. Garthe, Secy.
The two meetings and the proceedings produced not a
little comment, and, we may suspect, commotion among the
discerning and prudent party workers. The Germans were
no mean consideration in the assurance and plans of the Demo
cratic party managers. Their discontent and possible seces
sion naturally was a matter of serious moment to the party
of the "Administration" and it was no less a matter of lively
interest to the leaders of the "Opposition." Their numbers
were sufficient and their activities in state and national pol
itics so alert and emphatic that they easily held the balance
of power in the approaching campaign, should their dis
content become so great as to drive them into open revolt
against the Democratic party program.
From the vantage points of practical politicians, however,
the agitation among the Germans at that particular mo
ment "cut both ways" or "broke even," to use the parlance
of the party caucus. Their demand for the establishment
of a "Free Public School System" was generally concurred
in by all "progressive" folk, by New Englanders and phil
anthropists with "advanced" ideas, by all anti-slavery pro
pagandists and by all "Temperance" workers. The same ob
servations were applicable in respect of their advocacy of
free allotments of land to actual settlers, and to the reforms
of the Banking systems, and of course such was true of
their position respecting Slavery and the Fugitive Slave Law.
But the downright and outright insistence of the Germans on
— 53 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
all of these various contentions produced corresponding
adverse reactions that materially reduced the effect of their
dissent from Democratic measures and possible secession.
The demand for "compulsory education" was too ad
vanced for even the progressives of those days and alienated
as many probably as were attracted by such demand. Their
reference to the non-participation in school funds of re
ligious institutions aroused intense religious animosities then
rapidly concentrating in nativistic circles. Their belligerent
attitude towards all proposals for the restriction of the liquor
traffic drove as many native American Democrats toward ad
vocacy of drastic legislation and thereby counterbalanced the
electoral signifiance or voting strength of the Germans. The
extreme radicalism of the "Forty eighters" and later refugees
from Bohemia, Austria and Hungary was by no means agree
able to the older German stocks that had come to the United
States in prior decades. The older Germans were almost
wholly land owners and holders of large sums of capital and
the radical views of the later refugees produced no little per
turbation among the naturally conservative. Finally the open
declaration of the Germans that they would not submit to
the decisions of convention or of the regular party organiza
tion in respect of delegates or candidates, unless those selected
squared exactly with their particular requirements, ran counter
to the general principle and method of our party system and
with the basic notions of our American representative govern
ment and caused no little irritation, not to say offence, as "Un-
American" and hence undesirable. It was, however, precisely
parallel with like insistence by the "Maine-Law" propagand
ists. The Whig and Democratic papers of Burlington, namely,
The Iowa State Gazette and the Burlington Daily Telegraph
respectively, began immediately sparring anent the significance
of what they were predisposed to call "the so-called German
Democratic Meeting." The Gazette (Jan. 11) very naturally
urged them not "to go off in factious discontent" but to con
form to American ways. In another column in the issue ap
pears an earnest letter from a "German Democrat" who
— 54 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
urges his countrymen "to adopt and to adjust their lives to
the laws and constitution and customs of their new home."
The Telegraph, that reported the proceedings of the first
meeting, had refrained from any editorial expression and its
prudence was evidently suspected by The Gazette to be either
concern about or approval of the resolutions of the Germans
and the Editor of The Telegraph reported (Jan. 8) that "it
did not favor the resolution of the Germans" any more than
did the Gazette. The second meeting of the Germans and its
resolutions again drew forth mild adverse comments and pru
dential advice. The Telegraph (Jan. 20) gave the Germans
sane, solid, and sage advice, urging them to realize what this
"land of the free" means and not to run amuck. "Bide your
time, friends — tarry at least awhile in Jericho — by and by
you will reap the reward of your patience." They were
strongly advised not to strive to create a third party.
The Telegraph's sentiments were not favorably received
by the promoters of or participants in the German meetings
or by the Editor of Das Volksblatt published at Burlington ;
and on January 24 it rejoined to various criticisms and as
serted that its attitude and views were generally endorsed by
those who read English. The writer used "tufts of grass" to
get the boys out of the tree "reserving the virtue of stones"
till later. "We beg them not to provoke a contest with their
fellow citizens." Some then recent riotous disturbances en
gaged in by Germans in Davenport and Muscatine probably
being in the Editor's mind.
The next day (Jan. 25) The Gazette contained an interest
ing letter from a Michael Bohns, who caustically pointed
out that men who came from a country tyrannically governed
to this land of freedom, and swear allegiance to it and
afterwards try to tear to pieces the constitution of the United
States are no better than perjurers. He referred to the
participants in the German Democratic meeting- In its issue
of the same date, The Daily Telegraph published a finely
worded editorial entitled "The Germans Again" in which
Editor W. S. Dwymer replies to an extended letter of a Com
mittee of Germans of the then recent much-discussed meetings
— - 55 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
defending themselves against the many crossfires of criticism
directed against them for their expressions and contentions.
Mr. Dwymer deplores and denounces religious fanaticism and
riotous proceeding then but recently indulged in by over-ardent
Germans and other foreign-born in the Eastern cities in con
nection with the progress of Cardinal Bedini, a Legate or
Nuncio of the Pope of Rome, through various Eastern and
Western States. XII.
The constancy and particular interest of partisan editors
in Iowa in the state of mind of the foreign-born is exhibited
in a most interesting and instructive fashion by the editorial
expressions in Iowa upon the occasion of the visit of Cardinal
Bedini to the United States, and the extraordinary experiences
endured by him while in this country. His progress through
out the country both east and west was attended with violent
denunciations in German and Italian circles which several times
resulted in serious riotous outbreaks jeopardizing his very life.
In the efforts of the Italian patriots to secure their in
dependence from Austria in 1848-1849, Cardinal Bedini was
very active and influential in thwarting their designs. In
1849 at the head, or accompanying the head, of an Austrian
army, he invaded the province of Bologna und invested and
then captured her ancient capital city. During his rule as
"Extraordinary Pontifical Commissary of the Four Legations"
he, or jointly with the Austrian Commandant, is alleged to have
decreed and compassed the death of Ugo Bassi and the execu
tion of numerous other Italians. He was sent to the United
States in the latter part of 1853 on some sort of diplomatic
errand to promote better relations between the Vatican and
the United States and it was further believed that he was
commissioned to visit some of the states of South America.
While in this country, current popular belief had it that
Cardinal Bedini was given not only the usual diplomatic
privileges and immunities but that the chiefs of the Demo
cratic administration at Washington accorded him extra
ordinary courtesies and honors such as placing a government
— 56 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
vessel at his disposal in making some of his journeys between
the cities of the Atlantic sea board and special trains to con
vey him on his western trip. The Government's elaborate
and ostentatious attentions to the Pope's representative created
more than ordinary public interest. Anti-foreign prejudice in
the form of Know Nothingism with its virulent religious
suspicions against all Catholic functionaries was then ap
proaching flood tide; and those state courtesies produced
violent outbursts from the nativistic agitators-
Several facts had produced an acute popular interest in
the efforts of continental European patriots to win for them
selves independence and the blessing of Democratic-Republican
government. The triumphal progress of Louis Kossuth in
this country in 1852, the efforts of Professor Gottfried Kinkel
to raise a million dollar loan to promote free constitutional
Government in Germany; the dramatic rescue of Martin
Koszta, the Hungarian refugee from the hold of the Austrian
warship Huszar in the harbor of Smyrna, (Aug. 23, 1853) and
William L. Marcy's, Secretary of State, ringing lettter in de
fence thereof in reply (Sept. 26, 1853) to Baron Hulsemann's
protest ; a then recent second rescue of Koszta from a renewed
attempt to return him to Austria; Koszta's personal letter
of thanks to the American people for their kindness to him
and the Government's protection, given out in New York City
December 14, 1853, on the occasion of his second escape and
return to the United States ; and the incoming streams of
thousands of refugees from the tyrannically governed coun
tries of continental Europe with whom all liberty-loving per
sons on this side of the Atlantic frankly and freely sympath
ized — all these facts produced a powerful sentiment in favor
of the liberals of Europe and strong antipathy towards the
conservative or reactionary leaders and groups in Europe.
Cardinal Bedini's coming was in truth a match to tinder.
The anti-catholic sentiments of Know Nothings found in
stant expression. Italian refugees blazed out in mass meet
ings and furious protests. In the forepart of December 1853,
there was prepared and published a lengthy manifesto en
titled "An Address of the Italians _of New York to Msgr.
— '57 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Bedini" in which the character and career and the many al
leged brutalities and cruelties of "the Butcher of Bologna"
were set forth and his malign efficiency in opposition to the.
cause of Italian liberties and national efforts to rescue from
the Austrian yoke was given with much particularity and
inter alia the names of the two score or more of Italians
who were either executed, sent to the galleys or otherwise
sacrificed to the cause of Italian freedom. The signers thereto
numbered seventy; and among them appeared such names as
Garibaldi, Felix Foresti and General Avezzana.
Cardinal Bedini visited Cincinnati, Ohio, as the guest of
Archbishop Purcell. His presence in the city produced a
violent commotion among the younger Germans. Under the
inspiration of Frederick Hassaureck's editorials in Der Hoch-
waechter, the organ of the "Society of Freeman" in that city,
a meeting of Germans, or a mob assembled on the evening
of December 25, 1853. Under the excitation of such cries as,
"Whoever has reason for revenge ought to execute it when
ever he can ;" "Do not count upon the Yankee for your re
venge. Yankees possess neither feeling nor principles."
"Do not count on the Patricks. They are grown up in
ignorance and rudeness." "Germans, you are called for thus
far and no farther. On to revenge a murdered nation."
"Down with Bedini." "Is there no ball, no dagger, for a
monster whose equal never was on earth?" "The Wahr-
heitsfreund is right when it trembles for the life of Bedini
in Cincinnati;" — under such impulsion a mob of about eight
hundred formed in procession, four abreast, about ten o'clock
and marched to the Archbishop's residence, hard by the Cathe
dral. Just as they were on the point of concentrating upon then-
objective the police in force stopped the procession; a hand-
to-hand battle ensued: One person was killed; fourteen were
wounded seriously ; and some seventy were taken by the police
and lodged in the city jail. Among those arrested and placed
on trial was Hassaureck himself. The prosecution of the
alleged offenders collapsed for reasons not quite clear. 25
26 See Boston Liberator, January 6, 1854, col. 4 ; and the New York
Daily Herald, Dec. 28, 1853 ; January 8, 1854, p. 8, and January 9, p. 8.
— 58 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
When the Cardinal visited Wheeling that city was pla
carded with posters announcing that should he dare to come
into that city to accomplish his mission, whatever it might be,
that he would be summarily dealt with by the Friends of
Freedom; and when he was about to arrive in New Orleans
her citizens were astounded to read on flaming posters in
four different tongues, English, French, Italian and German,
dire threats in lurid language against the peace of the city
and the person of the Cardinal, should he so far presume as
to enter the city, and undertake to fulfill his mission to
Louisiana. The German portion read in part as follows :
"Lord Cardinal Bedini, The Butcher of Bologna.
This wild beast, who as papal Legate in Bologna,
suffered to be murdered with crudest tortures, hun
dreds of men, women and children of the Republican
party, who allowed the head and hands of the patriot
Ugo Bassi to be skinned before he was beheaded, is
travelling about in the United States, and will, in the
course of the coming week, exhibit himself in New
Orleans. The fists of the brewers of London gave
to Master Hayman, the hyena of Brescia, a proper
token of their sympathy ; shall not the same honors
be awarded here to Master Bedini ?" 26
Needless to say such intense animosity aroused the most
acute public interest. Americans have been celebrated (or
notorious) for their ready and ardent sympathy with the ef
forts of all European liberals — witness their frequent frank
expressions in the past century of approval and tenders of
verbal aid and comfort to the revolutionists of Greece and
Hungary, of France and Germany, of Ireland and Russia.
All of the Liberal and Progressive elements of all political
factions and notably all anti-slavery agitators gave them the
light of a favorable countenance and most of them spoke out
in terms of support. The conservatives and the defenders
of law and order, and thereby of the rights of the South in
slaves, of necessity were astonished at the virulence of the
26 New York Herald, Jan. 18, p. 2, col. 3.
— 59 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
denunciation of the Italian Cardinal and deplored as illegal
and inimical the attacks made upon his person and rights as
an individual and as a public functionary of the Pope to whom
our Government owed plenary protection.
The attitude of conservative editors constrained by sense
of the fitness of things and the necessity of law and order, is
clearly indicated in the columns of the Dubuque Daily Herald
of January 20. The fact that the editor Mr. Mahoney, was
an Irishman and presumably a Catholic, may explain the down
right character of the comments.
"Burning in Eeeigy."
"Monsignor Bedini, the Pope's Nuncio in America,
was burnt in effigy at Cincinnati on the 15th and at
Baltimore on the 16th, in the presence of thousands
of approving witnesses. What would be thought of
Mr. Bedini's countrymen and of the government he
represents if the people of Rome or of any other
Italian city should so insult a Representative of the
U. S. The answer to the question will suggest the
estimation in which such acts should be held at home."
Mr. Mahoney asks a very pertinent question that ardent
American partisans who sympathize with the Revolutionists
of other lands than ours should ask themselves more frequently
than they are wont to do; and they should face the question
squarely and put themselves in the place of our government
when we, or our government for us, resent and protest
against gross action against our own national rights or against
the lives and liberties of our own nationals by fanatical pro
paganda and reckless revolutionists under other flags.
The large amount of space given by the press of the
country to accounts of the vicissitudes through which Car
dinal Bedini proceeded while sojourning in this country in
dicated in unmistakable terms that the feelings, views and
doings of the foreign-born among us were of the very first
order of popular interest, and in consequence of primary con
cern to all political guides and managers. We may clearly
discern the realization of this fact in the columns of the
— 60 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
press of Iowa. The Manifesto of the Italians of New York
City of December 14, 1853 was reprinted entire in The Des
Moines Valley Whig (Feb- 16, 1854). The Whig was per
haps the most influential Opposition paper in Iowa at the
time and its editor, Mr. J. B. Howell, was then, as for years
thereafter, one of the influential men directing the councils
of the opponents of Slavery in the state.
We have already noted Mr. Dwymer's denunciation in
The Daily Telegraph of Burlington of January 25 of the
doings of the extremists among the Germans in the Bedini
demonstrations. His animadversions aroused Mr. Howell to
wrath and on February 23, The Whig contained the following
editorial which is given as an instructive illustration of
current feeling and discussion among Anti-slavery protagon
ists in the west : Tears for Bedini-
The last DISPATCH [of Burlington] has a most
lugubrious Editorial upon the wrongs of the Pope's
Nuncio Archbishop Bedini, whom it represents as
having suffered most atrocious outrages in this coun
try, to the disgrace and shame of the United States
and to the great grief of the writer himself. Bedini
perambulated this country, under the false guise of
an Ambassador to our Government, and the Ad
ministration furnished him steamers and other modes
of conveyance through the country, while he was on
a special mission to enlarge and enforce the Pope's
authority, not only over the conscience, but also over
the property of the citizens of the United States. To
this end Bedini constrained the congregations of
Catholics everywhere, to surrender at discretion the
Temporalities of the Church, into the hands of the
Pope's sworn servants, the Bishops. While thus
pursuing with insolent and domineering haughtiness
his object of reducing the freemen of America to
implicit subjection to the Bishop of Rome his own
countrymen and others suffer for the liberties of
Europe in 1848, who were familiar with his history,
denounced him as the ruthless butcher of their coun
trymen and relatives under the cruel tyranny of
Austria. And in consequence of the indignation thus
excited for his crimes against humanity and liberty,
he was burnt in effigy by these same European friends
— - 61 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
of freedom, who were driven by him, and such as he,
to seek in this country a safe asylum against the
vengeance of these European tyrants.
And now the Dispatch is torn with pangs of regret
for the sufferings and indignities experienced by
Bedini, and its cheek tingles with the blush of shame
for the everlasting disgrace brought upon our country
by these manifestations of foreign immigrants.
When General Scott was burnt in effigy during the
great political campaign, we heard of no pangs of re
gret — of no blush of shame ; yet Scott had poured out
his blood upon many a battlefield in the cause of free
dom, and for the vindication of the rights and the
glory of his country. But now when this foreign emis
sary of the Pope, this willing minister of Austrian
vengeance, who flayed the patriot friend of freedom,
the lamented Bassi, when this butcher of Liberty's
champions is burnt in effigy, a howling wail of re
gret, and a base cry against religious intolerance is
bellowed over the land by the Demagogues who
sacrifice everything in the hope of making Catholic
votes. Such earnestness and such scorching sarcasm meant but
one thing- Mr. Howell clearly felt that the foreign-born in
this country not only had a serious cause for bitter complaint
and protest against the tyranny they had alleged to have
endured in Europe but we may suspect that he dis
cerned also the tremendous importance of the possible in
fluence of the votes of the refugees, but recently arrived from
Europe, on the course of public discussion and on the de
terminations of public policy by the electors at the polls in
the then forthcoming campaign.
Mr. Howell seems to entertain no doubts whatever as
to the justice of the wholesale charges against Cardinal
Bedini — he accepts them and assumes that the Pope's Legate
must be anathema with all lovers of liberty and republican
institutions. As there were few or no Italian settlements in
Iowa that would be stirred by the excitement over Cardinal
Bedini, we may infer that it was the intense interest of Ger
mans in the cause of European liberty and incidentally in
Italian freedom that was before his mind's eye as he penned
— 62 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
the foregoing editorial. He had had reason for some weeks
to know that the Germans were thus concerned in develop
ment of European revolutionary movements.
On November 9, 1853, at a mass meeting in New York
City a "Commission" of Germans was appointed to draw up
an address setting forth the feelings and wishes of Germans
concerning matters of interest to them in the current public
debates. On January 10, 1854, "The Universal Democratic
and Republican Society" met in Stuyvesant Hall, in New
York City, Col. H. Forbes presiding. To this meeting the
foregoing "Commission" made its report which consisted in
part of "An Address to the Germans of America," asking for
financial and moral cooperation with their plans for pro
paganda and promotion of the enfranchisement of Germany.
They recognize, however, and duly so proclaim: "We re
cognize the solidarity of all revolutionary interests." 27
All "Opposition" editors and party leaders were aware
of this solidarity and consciously played upon the pre
judices and passions of the immigrant refugees whom they
wished to allure into the "Opposition" camps. Mr. Howell
on March 16 again exhibited his appreciation of the strategic
importance of the feelings of the foreign-born — and the Ger
mans in particular — by reprinting the following from Karl
Heinzen's paper, Der Pioneer of Louisville, Kentucky. Head
ings and all are given as they appeared in The Valley Whig,
(Mar. 16, 1854). The designation in parenthesis suggests
the latent, not to say the conscious, design in the reprint.
LouisviELE PionEEr (German Paper)
Bedini
This holy wretch has at last sailed for Europe,
on board the steamer Atlantic, after having concealed
himself for several days in the city of New York,
guarded by Irishmen and the police. It thus appears
that the mission to Brazil was either an impudent
fabrication or that he feared to be welcomed in South
America in the manner of his reception here.
Bedini has done a thing, which according to a
27 N. Y. Herald, Jan. 11, 1854, p. 1.
— 63 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
southern phrase, is practised by runaway slaves : "He
stole himself." He was, however, assisted by those
who are the most zealous slave hunters. Mr. Pierce
remained faithful to him up to the last moment,
for in obedience to the orders of the president, this
bloodstained friend of his was taken on board a
government vessel and under the protection of the
star-spangled banner, from New York to Staten Is
land, where he was placed on board the Atlantic.
If Bedini were travelling in Germany with an Amer
ican passport and happening to be molested by the
police, were to call on the American government for
protection, Mr. Pierce would extend it to him more
readily than to the German citizens of this country.
What a lesson did this Bedini impart to the Amer
ican people : and more especially to the German pop
ulation! May they not forget it; may they keep it
in especial remembrance in 1856.
Several facts of immediate importance should be noted.
Heinzen openly pricks anti-catholic prejudice by his pointed
reference to Cardinal Bedini being "guarded by the Irish and
the police" of New York, the latter being at that time highly
Hibernianized. "The police" have always been potent words
with which mordant critics of the established order have ever
been able to evoke the stormy spirits of popular discontent-
Moreover Cardinal Bedini was safeguarded by "slave hunt
ers." President Pierce "remained faithful to him to the last
moment." Had the late events occurred in Germany the
President would have put forth the strong arm of this govern
ment in the Cardinal's protection whereas he would have
been less active on behalf of "German citizens of this coun
try". Heinzen's pen was always a sharply pointed instrument
and he usually dipped it in acidulated ink. The German,
Hungarian and Italian refugees had been the objects of ar
bitrary arrests and kidnappings in Europe. Official hench
men and sleuths had seized them regardless of forms of law,
such as Americans and Englishmen know and can always
invoke to protect them against illegal outrages. The hue and
cry heard in all parts of this country in attempts to capture
— 64 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
or return fugitive slaves to the South made his reference
doubly effective and put barbs and brads along with his
darts that held them firmly in the minds of his compatriots
and their sympathizers, among whom Der Pioneer cir
culated. 28
There was a vicious thrust in the last suggestion of Der
Pioneer that President Pierce probably would not have put
forth the strong arm of our Government very vigorously
in defence had the Cardinal been a naturalized German citizen
travelling in Germany. At the moment the Germans in and
about New York City were keenly interested in the experi
ences of a fellow countryman, one Frederick Wiechel, a
former citizen of Saxony. He had initiated his naturaliza
tion by the declaration of "intention" and had returned to
Saxony where he suffered imprisonment, great distress and
loss of property. On his release he had demanded that our
government require reparation and much of his plea was
based upon Secretary Marcy's position in the Koszta case — ¦
but the government seemed to be slow to acquiesce in his
contention and loath to act — hence the suspicion of Karl
Heinzen and the bitter feelings of the Germans. 29
For these and other reasons, when Der Pioneer closed
its comments upon Cardinal Bedini with the highly significant
words : "What a lesson did this Bedini impart to the
American people: and more especially to the German
population ! May they not forget it ; may they keep it
in especial remembrance in 1856."
Mr. Howell and every Opposition editor in the North
knew that Henzen meant that the Anti-slavery forces might
28 Public estimation (at least among the opposition 1 of the in
fluence of Karl Heinzen at that time is indicated in the following taken
from the Valley Whig for August 22, 1854:
"Mr. Heinzen of Der PionEER, probably the most powerful jour
nalist connected with the German press of this country, in discussing
the question of Benton for the Presidency, intimates that Mr. Seward
would be a better man for his countrymen to unite upon ; but that,
perhaps., if Seward and Benton could agree upon minor points of
political economy they could both be placed upon the same ticket."
2* New York Herald, Jan. 25, 1854, p. 8, col. 1.
— 65 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
include the German voter within their reckoning if thcy
acted wisely and consistently. XIII.
The introduction of the Kansas-Nebraska bill produced an
instant reaction in opposition among the German radicals of the
east and west. Der Anzeiger des Westens of St. Louis and the
Illinois Staats Zeitung of Chicago immediately started a hue
and cry against the bill and its author. 30 There is no reason
to think that the proportion of radicals among the Germans of
Iowa was materially less than in the older communities of Ger
mans in the older states to the south and east. We have seen
that Der Demokrat of Davenport deplored the renewal of the
agitation entailed by the attempt to repeal the Missouri Com
promise; and had Mr. Guelich not been perplexed by the im
manence of the Maine Law, we may safely conclude that he
would have turned his batteries on the Nebraska bill with the
same force and effect. Sundry matters were pending in Con
gress, however, that gradually forced home to Germans in
Iowa as elsewhere in the North, that in national affairs their
immediate interests could be and would be mainly safeguarded
and promoted by the Anti-Slavery party.
We have already noted that the Democratic platform, al
though disapproving discriminations against the foreign-born,
did not advocate a Free Homestead bill and that the Ger
mans of Burlington called for the enactment of such a
measure. On January 4 — the day on which Senator Douglas
filed his report on Nebraska and introduced his bill for its
territorial government — there was printed in extenso in the
Miner's Express of Dubuque a measure that had been
Introduced in the House of Representatives on December 15,
1853 by Mr. Bernard Henn, the Democratic Congressman
from Iowa, entitled: "A Bill— To Grant a Homestead to
actual settlers upon the public lands, etc." The first section
began with the provision : "That any person, who is the head
30 See the writer's "Stephen A. Douglas and the Germans in 1854"
in Transactions of the III. St. Hist. Soc. for 1912, pp. 142—158.
— 66 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
of a family, and is a citizen of the United States [or any
one] who is the head of a family, and who has prior to the
first day of December, 1853, declared his intention to become
a citizen of the United States, shall be entitled to settle upon
and locate, free of cost, one hundred and sixty acres, etc. and
on proof of occupancy and cultivation for five years were en
titled to possession in fee simple.
The reprint of Mr. Henn's bill is interesting for sundry
reasons. Mr. Henn was a native of New York, but his name
suggests German extraction and the fact may have given
him a livelier interest in the welfare of the foreign-born than
otherwise. The reprint of the entire twelve sections of the
bill indicated that the subject was deemed of immediate local
interest to the democratic readers of the Miner's Express and
of course to the population generally. Mr. Henn and Mr.
Merritt both knew that such a bill was a matter of primary
political importance at that juncture : otherwise Mr. Henn
would not have sent the text west for display and Mr. Mer
ritt would not have given it the space- The clause granting
the benefits of the bill only to heads of families and to citizens
of the United States or to those who had declared their in
tention to become citizens prior to December 1, 1853 in
dicated two objects : first, a desire to placate the foreign-born
then resident within the country ; and, second, to prevent those
thereafter emigrating from Europe from flocking to this coun
try and securing the same advantages accorded to landless
natives settling upon the public domain.
There was keen public interest in a Free Homestead bill
in Iowa in 1854. All without distinction of party favored the
policy. It was looked upon as a most effective means of
encouraging emigration from the older states of the east and
south and from Europe. So active was Senator A. C. Dodge
of Iowa in behalf of such a measure that the Iowa Star as
serted (Jan. 26) that he was "recognized as the Father and
most untiring advocate of the Homestead bill in the Senate."
We shall have occasion to note his interest in a later con
nection. The limitations in the bill submitted by Mr. Henn,
as regards aliens were not viewed with satisfaction by the
— 67 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Germans; and in the presence of the rising tide of nativistic
prejudice they produced irritation and suspicion and protest
among the Germans and their friends and promoters.
The restriction to "heads of families" was a discrimina
tion especially grievous to young unmarried Germans anxious
and ambitious to prepare premises for a home. Again its
language might have been so construed as to deny home
steads to fathers of German families, who had come over to
this country without their families, to secure a start, hoping to
save money enough to send for wife and children left be
hind. The denial of the benefits of the law to those who
might come after the first of December 1853 aroused resent
ment to a marked degree. The feeling of kinship, the sol
idarity of interests, among the Germans of that period,
especially among the "forty-eighters," was intense. Filial
affection for the "old Folks" and friends in the Fatherland
was an abiding and powerful fact in their lives and such pro
visions stood athwart the realization of their affections and
loomed up a barrier to relatives and friends securing access
with them to the fertile fields of Iowa and the west. They
had, of course, the same right of purchase as before, but
such right was not satisfying when others were given lands
gratis and their deprivation was due entirely to nativistic
prejudice which had not therefore displayed itself effectually
in national legislation since the repeal of the Alien and Sedi
tion laws. Whether Congressman Henn included such dis
criminating clauses because he personally approved them, or
because he realized that without them his bill would receive no
attention or support in the South, we can not say. But, certain
it is that such limitations were actually inserted in the Home
stead bill that passed the House on March 6 under the leader
ship of Mr. Dawson of Pennsylvania ; and Mr. Henn voted for
it and such restrictions upon the foreign-born.
Germans, who had been alertly following the course of
the agitation for land reform that began to take definite form
in Congress in the latter years of the preceeding decade, had
noticed a decided, constant and increasing opposition thereto
by leaders of the Pro-slavery party of the South. Discrimina-
— 68 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
tions adverse to the foreign-born were urged by its leaders.
Prior to 1854 such discriminations did not seriously affect
the currents of political discussion because the country re
garded most of the proposals for free homestead as socialistic
and the propaganda of agrarian agitators.
Four events, however, caused Germans to take an in
tense interest in the progress of the agitation. They were;
(1) the disastrous conclusion of their Revolution in 1848
that made emigration and flight expedient, if not imperative;
(2) the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave law and the hideous
incidents thereof; (3) the opposition of pro-slavery leaders
to European intervention in "behalf of the refugees and their
revolutionary friends in Germany, Hungary and Italy; and
(4) the Introduction of the Nebraska bill repealing the Mis
souri Compromise. Douglas' bill was a lightning flash that
suddenly made them see whither events were drifting, the
sharp conflict between their interests as freemen and the in
terests of slaveholders.
The radical German press of the country saw the an
tagonistic interests and were first in protesting against the
Repeal. Had they failed to perceive the fact, anti-slavery
leaders would have promptly pointed it out to them- In the
"Appeal of the Independent Democrats of Congress to the
People of the United States" which was issued by Senators
Chase and Summer and Messrs. Giddings and Gerrit Smith
on January 19, Germans were the ones especially appealed to
and besought by particular mention to arouse themselves in
opposition, the signers saying among other things: "We ar
raign this bill .... as part and parcel of an atrocious plot
to exclude from a vast unoccupied region immigrants from the
old world . . . .-and convert it into a dreary region of de
spotism, inhabited by Masters and slaves. ********
The Homestead law, should Congress enact one, will be worth
less there. Freemen, unless pressed by hard and cruel neces
sity, will not and should not work besides slaves *******
And where slave law exists, labor must necessarily be de
graded." The signers particularly asked German editors to
direct attention of "their readers to this important matter."
— 69 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
This Appeal, as has been pointed out, had a powerful effect,
throughout the country.
Such discriminations of the foreign-born, as the Home
stead bills exemplified, became a matter of acute interest with
the Germans because of transactions in the Senate four days
preceding the passage of the Homestead bill in the House.
The debate on the Kansas-Nebraska bill was in its final
throes, Friday, March 2, when Senator Clayton of Delaware
moved an amendment, restricting the right of voting and hold
ing office in the new territories to "citizens of the United
States." The amendment was carried by a narrow margin, the
vote standing 23 to 21 — Senators Douglas of Illinois and
Dodge and Jones of Iowa voting against it. The next morn
ing, after an all-night session, just as the sun was coming
up, all three senators voted for "die vielbesprochene"
bill, which, should it pass the House, would shut the Foreign-
born out of the franchise and deny them the honors and
emoluments of office in the new territories west of Iowa and
Missouri. During these developments in Congress the columns of
Der Demokrat contained nothing indicative of interest in or
appreciation of the discriminations against aliens introduced
into pending legislation ; and it might be inferred that its man
agement was indifferent and the Germans generally were like
wise. The conclusion is not warranted however. Two facts
probably explain its course. The Clayton amendment to the
Douglas bill was adopted in the final clinch over the epoch
making measure and public interest was centred wholly in
the central, all-absorbing fact of the Repeal of the famous
pact of 1820. The public at large scarcely realized, let alone
heeded the minor provisions of the bill. The other fact was
that Mr. Guelich was fighting the Dragon of Puritanism that
filled the nearby cross roads and threatened his own door yard.
He had little time for matters more remote. Moreover both
of the major parties in Congress seemed equally involved in
procuring the passage of the discriminating clauses. Messrs-
Dawson in charge of the Homestead bill and Mr. Clayton,
— 70 ' —

F. I. HERRIOTT
mover of the amendment to the Douglas bill were conspicuous
Whigs; and Democrats and Whigs alike voted for them.
XIV.
Coincident with the increase in the hostility of Der
Democrat of Davenport to the Kansas-Nebraska bill, the Op
position press in Iowa indicated and demonstrated an appre
ciation of the strategic importance of the Germans in the
campaign. Editors began to call attention to the effect of the
Douglas bill upon the Homestead bill, and its chances of pass
age; to point out the discriminations against the foreign-born
in the Homestead and Nebraska bills; and to emphasize and
reiterate with partisan assiduity and amplitude their solicitude
for the interests and sensibilities of the Germans. Whether
it was concern for their welfare or desire to heckle and harrass
the pro-slavery leaders and partisans and design to arouse dis
content and dissension among the Germans and thus weaken
the solidarity of the Democratic party the curious and the
philosophical may decide.
The character, the method and the point of editorial com
ment, and the frequency of reference may perhaps be best ex
hibited by a series of extracts from the columns of the Des
Moines Valley Whig during the month of March and the fore
part of April. They will demonstrate beyond cavil the evident
purpose of one of the most alert editors in the state, Mr. J. B.
Howell, to arouse the Germans by playing upon their sensibil
ities, exciting their alarms and pricking their pride. The ex
cerpts are given with but little excision and no condensation.
Headings or titles are given when they are found in the orig
inal. The writer has had access only to the weekly edition
but the dates given are those on which the article appeared in
the Daily, the Weekly being made up of reprints of the Daily.
Nebraska — Slavery — and the Homestead.
The passage of the Nebraska bill through the
Senate, that Nursery of Aspirants for the President
ial chair, would seem to be ominous to the hopes of
its opponents in the House*******There is yet time
for the people of Iowa .... to influence the result
— 71 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
in Congress, by petitions signed as they would be if
circulated by almost the entire mass of the people
of both parties. Let our Representative, who pro
fesses to be a strong advocate of the Homestead Law,
tack that Bill as an amendment to the Nebraska Bill
in the House, and it will defeat the Nebraska Bill,
or render it utterly ineffective for its object, the ex
tension of slavery. . . . Offer to give each actual set
tler a Homestead of 160 acres in Nebraska, and see
how quick the South will present a united front
against the measure. Why? Because there would
be a rush of freemen into that Territory that would
exclude slavery. But if the Nebraska bill passes,
the whole Territory will be consecrated to slavery and
every single southern man will unite against the
Homestead law, and forever defeat the bill.
Citizens of Lee County, you have often expressed
yourselves in favor of a Homestead law; will you
now stand tamely by and let your Senators and Re
presentatives surrender all this immense region which
you have been looking to, to find free homes for
yourselves and your children, to the slave-holders of
the South, thereby not only closing up all hopes of
free homes to actual settlers, but even effectually ex
cluding you, as freemen and poor men, from settling
there at all . . . March 9.

Slaveholders Heading Off the Foreigners. — -
Douglas' oi iginal bill for Nebraska allowed foreigners
to vote and hold office in that Territory. Many of
the German papers, which are opposed to slavery,
were urging their countrymen to move into that
Territory, in order to vote for a constitution ex
cluding slavery. But the Slavery propagandists,
under the lead of Peirce and Douglas, are too sharp
for them, they amended the bill so as to deprive
foreigners of the right to vote or to hold office in
Kansas or Nebraska. — March 16.

All on an Equality.
The Nebraska bill places the Negroes, the Ger
mans, the Irish, upon the same platform of equality
— 72 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
with reference to the right of self-government and the
formation of a constitution for the future states of
Nebraska and Kansas. None of these classes are
allowed to vote under this grand Democratic bill to
secure the right of free government for the people.
— March 15.

The Germans On the Nebraska Bill.
An immense meeting of Germans was assembled
in New York, a few days since, at which most
earnest and effective speeches were delivered in op
position to the Bill, amidst constant manifestations
of great enthusiasm.
The following resolutions were unanimously adopt
ed by the meeting, and the sentiments are such as will
afford a platform, not only for the German popula
tion of the country, but also for every true man of
the North.
Whereas immense efforts are now making by the
defenders of the principle of human slavery to ex
tend its territory to the injury of the free North;
Resolved, That we hold this Nebraska bill to be
in direct opposition of the principles of Land Reform
and of the Free Homestead Bill, since it opens an
immense territory, now belonging to the non-slave-
holding people, to land monopoly and slavery, and
renders it inaccessible to free labor and free pos
session. Resolved, That we oppose the principles involved
in the Nebraska bill and the consequences of the
same, by all the proper means afforded us by the con
stitution of the land, and especially that we refuse
in any presidential or Congressional election to give
our votes for any man who favors the passage or
continuance of this bill, and furthermore declare
every defender of the said bill and its principles a
traitor to the cause of the people.
************ March 16.

Douglas was burned in effigy, in Chicago, the other
day, amid the largest crowd of people ever assembled

— 73

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
on any public occasion, the proceedings were spirited,
and great enthusiasm among the Germans who were
the chief actors in the affair. March 22.

The Right of Self-Govern ment.
The Democratic Senate of the United States, and
the Democratic advocates of the Nebraska bill, gen
erally, uphold the grand iniquity upon what they de
nominate the great Republican principle — the right
of the people to form their own government. At the
same time the Bill excludes free Negroes, Germans
and Irishmen from having any voice in forming
the constitution and laws of Nebraska. These
Locofocos must therefore, to sustain either their
consistency or their logic, insist that the Irish, the
Dutch and Free Negroes are not the people. For
it is plain that the Nebraska bill puts them all on the
same level, and it would be in flat contradiction to
Locofoco principles to separate what the Democratic
Senate has joined together.
No wonder the Germans are hostile to this bill ;
and if the Irish do not oppose it, the fact can only
be accounted for on the ground that they became so
accustomed to oppression in Ireland from the Eng
lish that they are callous to the insults heaped upon
them in this country, by the Democratic politicians.
—March 23.

"Non-Intervention in Nebraska" seems to mean
that Irish and Germans cannot go there to make a
free territory. — March 24.

Kossuth's Address to the Germans.
************
But America has injured us; the Senate by their
resolutions, gave us a hard blow ************
We have now arrived at that critical period pre
dicted by me ... . Therefore, I address you, Sir,
beseeching you so to exercise your influence and that
of your friends, that by the means of the press as
well as by meetings of distinct tendency, the will
of the people may manifest itself in this affair [the
— 74 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
refusal of the Senate to confirm the appointment of
Geo. Sanders Consul to London] in such a way as
is now so necessary, that the heavy blows which the
Senate has unintentionally dealt out to European
liberty may be remedied, and the scornful ridicules
of the despots be changed into a triumph for the
Republicans of Europe.
I have the honor to sign myself, with high con
sideration Your devoted, L. Kossuth. — April 4.

The Speech of Senator Dodge.
Interests of Iowa at Washington.
Iowa in her capacity as a State has two gentlemen
at Washington City to attend to her business and
advocate her interests.************
************
By this vote then for this bill [Kansas-Nebraska]
he stultifies himself, and ignores and repudiates the
very principle for which he contends. He votes not
only for a bill legislating for the territories, but ab
solutely prohibiting all such people as are known by
the designation of Irish, German or Dutch, from hav
ing any voice or vote in legislation for themselves,
resigning them as it does the Negroes to the kind
care and Government of the rest of the people of
the Territories.
Senator Dodge finds such an insuperable objection
to this one clause of Legislation for the Territories,
that he records his vote, denying the right of suffrage
to the Germans and Irish, rather than to continue
the Missouri Compromise Act upon the Statute, al
though the act simply excludes Slavery from the
Territory. What a consistent friend and advocate
of liberty and equal rights is he who votes to repeal
a law against slavery in the name of the right of
the people of the Territories to self-government, and
at the same time excludes a portion of these same
people to wit, all the Germans and Irish, from any
voice whatever in the affair!
We ask now what interest has Iowa, that should
lead her to annul a solemn, National compact, by
which Slavery was forever excluded from Nebraska ?
Will her free citizens prefer to move there and work
— 75 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
side by side with Slaves? If such is their feelings
why did they come to Iowa? Why not now go to
Missouri? Do they desire to repeal this law in behalf
of freedom? And at the same time deprive the
Germans and Irish of the suffrage in Nebraska? If
the citizens of Iowa do not desire these things, then
have their Senators betrayed their interests, and mis
represented their sentiments, for such were the meas
ure for which they voted in Congress. — April 8.
The conclusion must be obvious that one of the main ob
jectives of the Opposition in partisan political discussion in
Iowa in the forepart of 1854 was the alarm and allurement of
the Germans and the capture of the German vote. This con
clusion will not be controverted in the light of an important
statement given out at Burlington on April 8 by Mr. Grimes.
But in order to realize its point and significance we must re
turn again to the great council chamber at Washington.
XV.
The debate on the Kansas- Nebraska bill was nearing its
culmination in the National Senate. Most of the leaders on
both sides had spoken — Senators Douglas and Chase, Badger
and Wade, Cass and Seward, Everett and Houston, Dixon
and Toombs, Hunter and Sumner — when the distinguished
Senator from South Carolina arose in his place and addressed
the Senate (Feb. 24). It had not been his wish or his purpose
to take part in the discussion but the Senators from Massa
chusetts [Sumner], from New York [Seward], and from
Ohio [Chase and Wade] had uttered "some hard things,"
which he not only resented but would deny and repell. In
order to appreciate the pith and point of Senator Butler's ob
servations we must realize at least two facts in connection with
some of the "hard things" that were the aggravating causes
of his speech.
First, the anti-slavery leaders indulged in adjectives and
epithets that raked and slashed, scorched and blistered South
ern sensibilities, or recklessly threw out innuendo and insinua
tions or bold assertions, the implications of which were like
hot needles arousing to fury and retort in kind. Northern
— 76 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
historians in dealing with the controversies in Congress in
ante bellum days have not always realized that the provoca
tion to harsh and ugly speech was as much on the Northern
side as on the Southern side. Crimination provokes recrim
ination. Second, the anti-slavery champions, notably Chase, Sew
ard and Wade, constantly emphasized the paramount interest
of the foreign-born— and Teutons, Germans and Scandinavians
were usually in mind — in the opposition to the extension of
the domain of slavery. Slavocrats incensed by the biting
speech of the northern critics of their institutions and aroused
by the realization of the antagonistic alien interest in free
territory struck back with animadversions upon the char
acter and conduct of the aliens in the North.
Much of the bitterness and rancor of the debate in the
Senate had been produced by the harsh epithets used by Messrs.
Chase and Sumner, Giddings and Gerritt Smith in "The Ap
peal of the Independent Democrats in Congress to the People
of the United States" (dated Jan. 19), sounding the alarm
against the Nebraska bill. Therein they branded the author
and the abettors thereof as parties to "a gross violation of a
sacred pledge; a criminal betrayal of precious rights; as part
and parcel of an atrocious plot to exclude from a vast un
occupied region immigrants from the old world and free labor
ers from our own states and convert it into a dreary region of
despotism inhabited by masters and slaves." ****** "Not
without the deepest dishonor and crime can the free states
acquiesce in this demand." In his rejoinder to Senator Dou
glas' violent attack upon him for such language Senator Chase
reiterated the sentiments with emphasis (Jan. 30) Senator
Sumner followed and solemnly asserted : ". . . The language
is strong but it is not stronger than the exigency required."
"Such a measure cannot be regarded without emotions too
strong for speech. It cannot be justly described in common
language. It is a soulless, eyeless monster — horrid, unshapely
and vast — fitly pictured in the verse of the poet:
Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademp-
tum.
And this horrid monster is now let loose upon the country."
— 77 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Senator Wade in his speech (Feb. 6) was not less ex
plicit and emphatic. The Kansas-Nebraska bill was "a mon
strous proposition," the work of "a base conspiracy" to force
"the accursed scourge" of slavery into the free North. Indeed
he capped the climax of condemnation : "Sir, in the days of the
Revolution, Major Andre was hung for accepting a proposition
more base than this, which is a gross betrayal of the rights
of the whole North." It is not inconceivable and not im
probable that it was this language of the junior Senator of
Ohio that gave the cue to the Germans of Chicago in their
proceedings in North Market Hall and in Court House Square
on the night of March 16, already related.
The extract from "The Appeal" just given indicates the
second important fact, namely, the insistence of anti-slavery
leaders upon the primary concern of the foreign born in the
proposed Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. Senator Chase
in his defense of his part in putting forth "The Appeal" re
peated and reinforced its assertions. Senator Wade pointed
out the incompatibility of Slavery and Freedom, among other
observations saying: "These two interests are antagonistic;
they cannot both stand together." "Immigration does not go
into Slave States. Immigration cannot abide there." He then,
to the amazement and disgust of Southern senators bluntly
declared himself an Abolitionist and a believer in the general
equality of Negroes and whites.
Senator Seward (Feb. 17) with the assurance so charac
teristic of him, and so aggravating to Southerners, declared
his confidence that the advance of Freedom in the West could
not be stopped, because : "The non-slaveholding states are
teeming with an increase of freemen, educated, vigorous, en
lightened, enterprising freemen ; such freemen as neither Eng
land, nor Rome, nor even Athens ever reared. Half a million
of freemen from Europe annually augment that increase.****
You may obstruct, and so turn the directions of those peace
ful armies away from Nebraska. So long as you shall leave
them room on hill or prairie, by river side or in the mountain
fastnesses, they will dispose of themselves peacefully and law-
— 78 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
fully in the places you shall have left open to them ; and there
they will erect new states upon free soil, to be forever main
tained and defended by free arms, and aggrandized by free
labor. American slavery, I know, has a large and ever-flowing
spring, but it cannot pour forth its blackened tide in volumes
like that I have described. If you are wise these tides of
slaves and freemen will never meet, for they will not voluntar
ily commingle ;****** You may legislate, and abrogate, and
abnegate as you will ; but there is a superior power that over
rules all your actions .... to the distant, but inevitable result
of the equal and universal liberty of all men."
On the afternoon of Tuesday, February 21, Senator Sum
ner spoke his mind on the Nebraska bill. He was a master
craftsman in the art of slashing speech and he was evidently
in fine fettle. He arraigned the bill on two grounds : first, "in
the name of the Public Faith" and second, "in the name of
Freedom" ; and thereupon he thus characterized slavery :
"There is no offense against religion, against morals,
against humanity, which may not, in the license of this insti
tution, stalk "unwhipt of justice." Without a father, without
a mother, almost without a God, the Slave has nothing but a
master. ****** And this is not all. The whole social fabric is
disorganized; labor loses its dignity; industry sickens; educa
tion finds no schools, and all the land of Slavery is impover
ished." "Alone in the company of nations," he continued,
"does our country assume this hateful championship." And
thus he proceeded with sweeping, scorching generalizations
interspersed with contemptuous references to the "curse" and
"evils" of the "nefarious institution."
With the echoes of such sentiments ringing in his ears,
with his nerves tingling from the stinging words of the anti-
slavery champions of the North, the courteous and learned
colleague of Calhoun felt constrained to address the Senate on
the afternoon of Friday, February 24. A fact occurring in the
forepart of the Senate's proceedings that afternoon may have
made his blood run faster although he makes no direct mention '
thereof. Senator Sumner presented sundry petitions remon
strating against the passage of the Nebraska bill, among them
— 79 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
being two from Andover, Massachussetts, a centre of culture
in New England. The first was headed by a clergyman and
signed by 1100 citizens of that community and the other was
headed by Harriet Beecher Stowe and signed by 1100 women
of Andover.
XVI.
Senator Butler, first and last and foremost was a jurist.
The basic facts of the law and the constitution made up the
warp and woof of his thought and constituted the premises of
his utterances and determined the line of his public speech and
action. The legal elements of the problem were at once the
substance and the limits of his duty under his oath. But so
much that he deemed irrelevant and immaterial, perverting
and pestiferous had been dragged or injected into the dis
cussion that he deemed it expedient "to say many things, ap
parently, not connected with the precise question in view, by
way of episode." Much of his speech in consequence dealt thus
with what he deemed irrelevant matters — matters, however,
that immediately and tremendously engaged public interest in
the North. In the speech of Senator Chase (Jan. 30) there was one
remark that struck Senator Butler "with more astonishment
than any" and that was his assertion that the Nebraska bill
ought to be defeated because, as the South Carolinian sum
marized it, "the slaveholder with his laborers in the form of
slaves, would pollute the soil upon which they settled, and
might by such settlement, exclude foreigners as well as citizens
from the non-slaveholding States." To this contention Senat
or Butler rejoined by two historical analogies that went close to
the quick of the argument. It was in connection with the lat
ter of the two that he made a reference that echoed long and
loud on the hustings in Iowa.
If slavery was so obnoxious and its habitat so pestilent
Senator Butler would have the Senators from Ohio recall that
an illustrious son of New England, General Nathaniel Greene
in the critical days of the nation's struggle for liberty, at the
instance of a southern slaveholder, General Washington, had
— 80 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
gone to South Carolina to take command of the troops of that
State, troops officered by slaveholders, and aided and abetted
by masters and their slaves; and he led those troops with
glorious success, without personal dishonor, without public
degradation. More than this, indeed :
"Sir, he met under the banners of CornwaUis the
Hessians, the sordid and mercenary Hessians, who
had been employed by Great Britain to make war
upon her children. They were a class of men who
took pleasure in saying that they washed their mus
kets with the blood of rebels. And yet, according to
the notion of the honorable Senator from Ohio, the
descendants of those bloodthirsty and sordid Hes
sians from abroad could claim the soil of these terri
tories to the exclusion of the descendants of Gen
eral Greene, who was not so far blinded by the bigotry
which now prevails as to prevent him from coming
and settling among us. He settled with us and be
came a slaveholder himself. ****** At that the south
ern General commanded northern troops ; and let the
battles of Princeton and Saratoga suggest their names,
whilst northern Generals commanded southern troops,
and let Eutaw and Charleston suggest their names.
The men of that day, who governed Senates and
commanded armies, never thought of the distinctions
now made by their more sublime and exclusive des
cendants. I will take another case to test the gentleman's
remark. It has become extremely popular to bestow
praises upon my gallant countryman Captain Ingra
ham. Sir, he deserves them. He is a slaveholder ;
I know him well. He is a constituent of mine, and
I respect him; not alone as a brave man and heroic
officer, but as a just man and responsible citizen.***
According to the honorable gentleman from Ohio,
if Captain Ingraham were to take Martin Koszta
tomorrow with him to Nebraska, Koszta would be
come the superior, and drive off Ingraham who had
rescued him from the fetters of European bondage.
"Can such a thing be?" Why, Sir, the slaveholder,
with his slaves well governed, forms a relation that
is innocent enough, and useful enough. I believe that
it is a population which Iowa tomorrow would pre
fer to an inundation of those men coming as emi-
— 81 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
grants from a foreign country, wholly unacquainted
with the institutions of this country — and nearly all
continental comers are of that class. The same re
mark cannot be made of those who, like the Irish
and English, have lived under the Administration of
the common law."
The references to General Greene, the Hessians and
Martin Koszta were thrusts that could not be easily parried or
dodged. Every American school boy's history blazoned the
work of Greene and the Hessians and the country was still
ringing with the exultant huzzas following the dramatic res
cue of Koszta, an Hungarian refugee and partially naturalized
citizen of this country from the hold of the Austrian warship
Hussar in the harbor of Smyrna, by Captain Duncan N. In
graham, commanding the U. S. S. St. Louis. Secretary of
State Marcy, in a notable state paper had not only commended
the rescue of the refugee who had merely an inchoate claim
to American protection but had refused point blank Austria's
demand for an apology and public reprimand of Captain In
graham. At that time a resolution carrying the thanks of
Congress and ordering a gold medal struck as a recognition of
his "judicious and gallant conduct" had already passed the
House and was under consideration in the Senate.
Senator Butler's observation that Iowa would prefer slave
holders "with their slaves well governed" to an inundation of
emigrants from a foreign country evidently produced some
thing of a flurry, if not a commotion, at least among his Dem
ocratic brethern from the North. From its phraseology one
might infer that it was made as an aside to his Democratic
colleagues from Iowa, Messrs. Dodge and Jones; but neither
of them, if present, took exception to the statement, so far as
the records of the proceedings indicate. They, nevertheless,
or other Senators from the North, must have noted the remark
and realized its serious importance, and on adjournment point
ed out to Senator Butler the serious effect his assertion would
produce among their constituents; for on the following day
at the opening of the session when he concluded his speech
— 82 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
he took pains to explain and soften the effect of his statement
as follows :
***** Before I touch, however, upon the subject
which I was discussing at the adjournment of the
Senate yesterday, I wish to make one explanation.
Some of my friends have supposed that, in a play
ful remark which I made yesterday, I assimilated the
Germans coming from Bremen and other ports of
Germany to the black men, and regarded them as
equal. My intention was exactly the reverse. What
I did say, what I intended to say, and what, as a
southern man, I will maintain, is, that an intelligent
and judicious master, having his slaves around him,
in Missouri or Nebraska, would be as acceptable a
neighbor to me, and, as I thought would be to Iowa,
as one of these new emigrants. I hope, now, that
I am understood on that matter."
In politics, as in life generally, it is not so much what is
said, as it is the manner and setting of what is said that pro
duces reaction and resentment. Philosophical truths may be
expressed freely in library and lecture room with little likeli
hood of disturbance resulting; but let them be uttered in the
forum where and when human prejudice and passion con
centrate and upheave and truisms and platitudes produce
lightning flashes and thunder claps and violent disturbances.
Sentiments similar in character, if not in form, had been
uttered many times before by publicists and statesmen, north
and south. But just then nativistic prejudice in the form of
Know Nothingism was beginning to surge in flood tides
throughout the North. The opposition to the Administration
— particularly the Whigs — were chiefly infected by such pre
judice. The Germans constituted one of the most loyal and
numerous corps in the Democratic party. To have one of the
most distinguished members of that party formally declare
in serious speech in the open Senate that a population made
up of slaveholders and their slaves was preferable to one com
posed of sons and daughters of Germania, then seeking our
shores by the thousands annually and settling in the Northern
and Western states — and to have that remark addressed to
— 83 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
the Senators from one of those states wherein Germans were
numerous, highly intelligent and industrious and largely mem
bers of the Democratic party — it is no wonder that northern
colleagues realizing the probable misconstruction and misuse
thereof should have privately protested to Senator Butler that
his remarks might prove troublesome to them in the approach
ing state elections. But his powerful bow had shot his shaft
far beyond his control ; and, as we shall see, it did the damage,
discerning friends had warned him would be the probable
result. XVII.
To understand the collateral effects as well as the direct
bearing of Senator Butler's "playful remark" later on the hust
ings in Iowa we must appreciate another fact respecting cur
rent legislation then pending in Congress that was immediately
affected by the Kansas-Nebraska bill and in which the Ger
mans were keenly interested.
In its editorial summary of "The News" in noting the
events at Washington on the preceding day, the N. Y. Herald
(Feb. 25) devotes a paragraph to the remonstrances with which
the Senate was "flooded" against the repeal of the Missouri
Compromise and the one signed by "Mrs. Uncle Tom Stowe"
(that paper's accustomed name for Mrs. Stowe) and adverse
comment upon the activity and inconsistencies of the abolition
ists ; but merely a line is given to mentioning the speeches of
Senators Hunter and Butler and its summary of current events
in the Senate is concluded as follows : "In the course of the day
Mr. Walker, the chief leader of the land reformers, reported a
bill for the extension of the preemption act, and remarked that
it would probably supersede and render useless the free farm
bill now pending in the House."
On December 6, 1853, the second day of that session of
Congress, Senator Gwin of California in giving notice of a bill
he expected to introduce said : "At the close of the last session
of Congress, I pledged myself to the Senator from Iowa [Mr.
Dodge] that I would assist him in passing the homestead bill
after we got through the discussion and passage of the Pacific
— 84 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
railroad bill. It is well known to the Senate that both bills
failed during that session. I now give notice that I shall, to
morrow, or at some early day thereafter, ask leave to introduce
the bill commony known as the homestead bill." The next
day he introduced a measure "to encourage agriculture, com
merce, manufactures, and all other branches of industry, by
granting to every man who is the head of a family and a
citizen of the United States, a homestead of 160 acres of land
out of the public domain "on condition of occupancy and cul
tivation." A week later he had the bill printed in the pro
ceedings and set forth as one of the special reasons for its
favorable consideration the fact that it gave the benefit "not
only to every citizen of the United States settling upon the
public lands, but to all persons who have declared their inten
tion to become citizens at the date of their settlement." The
first bill on the file of the House of Representatives that ses
sion was a similar one with like title introduced by Mr. W. R.
W. Cobb of Alabama. It was this and other like bills in the
respective Houses that Senator Walker had in mind in his
remarks just before Senator Butler made his speech on Febru
ary 24. The Homestead bill that finally passed the House, as
already pointed out, restricted its privileges to "heads of fam
ilies" and "citizens of the United States." One of the staunch-
est advocates of the more liberal provisions respecting the for
eign born was Senator A. C. Dodge of Iowa.
Another fact has some collateral bearing upon the signi
ficance of subsequent events. At the conclusion of Senator
Butler's speech Senator A. G. Brown of Mississippi obtained
the floor and spoke strongly in behalf of the Kansas-Nebraska
bill. He assailed the doctrine of "squatter sovereignty" a>
held by Senator Cass of Michigan and in the course of his
argument he spoke contemptuously of "certain menial employ
ments" referring to bootblacks et al and their relative social
positions in the North and in the South. Senator Dodge of
Iowa followed. He too advocated the Kansas-Nebraska bill.
His opening remarks, however, were a passionate, almost
melodramatic repudiation of Senator Brown's sentiments
respecting the social position and consideration accorded per-
— 85 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
sons in menial service in the North. He declared with intense
feeling that he (Senator Dodge) had himself engaged in many
of the menial occupations sneeringly referred to and he never
knew and did not then know any sense of degradation. Labor
of all sorts was honorable in Iowa and always had been so far
as his experience and observation went — and his experience
went back to days before Iowa was separated from Michigan
territory — upon this fact he based a very substantial argument
in favor of Douglas' bill.
Free negroes did not, Senator Dodge asserted, and could
not, thrive in industry in the North and West, partly because
they were lazy, and partly because they were untrained to
work as northern and western conditions required. Slavery
in the long run could not thrive effectually in the North be
cause climate and conditions would prove adverse. Further,
he maintained, that the contention of the Free Soilers and
Abolitionists that white labor could not migrate where slavery
existed was fallacious. He pointed out that northern laborers
and farmers were moving into Maryland and Virginia and
prospering in property and increasing in numbers. Slave
holders could not compete with white labor as one might see
"along the banks of the Mississippi, Ohio ,and Missouri, and
in many portions of our country." He might have said, but
did not, that Germans in great swarms had not hesitated to
move into all of the northern slave states and into Texas and
were verifying his assertions. Senator Dodge did not notice or
take any exception to the assertion of Senator Butler that
Iowa would, or might prefer slaveholders and their slaves to
Germans and their ways. In the conclusion of his speech he
exhibited the stout character of his views and his confidence
in the certainty of local support for them when he proclaimed
with exultation : "Iowa is the only free state, which never for
a moment gave way to the "Wilmot Proviso." My colleague
[Senator Jones] . . . voted for every one of the Compromise
measures in all their phases, stages and conditions, including
the Fugitive Slave Law— the late Senator Sturgeon, of Penn
sylvania, and ourselves, being the only three Senators from the
entire non-slaveholding section of the Union who voted for it."
— 86 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Let us follow developments in Iowa as they affected the
foreign-born in the political campaign then getting under way.
XVIII.
So far as the writer can discover, none of the Democratic
papers in Iowa took notice of "the playful remark" of the
Senator from South Carolina in his speech of February 24.
The Miners' Express and The Herald of Dubuque, the En
quirer of Muscatine did not make any mention or reference
to the allegation of the possible preferences of Iowans as re
gards slaveholders with their slaves and Germans from Bre
men. They had correspondents in Washington who were alert
videttes and reporters of current happenings. They were no
doubt good party promoters and saw the "kick back" in the
Southern Senator's observation and either refrained from
giving it wider circulation in their daily or weekly summaries
or if they related the episode the editors used their blue pencils
or scissors. On the other hand none of the correspondents of the
Whig or Opposition papers in Iowa seems to have caught
Senator Butler's "playful remark" and none of them, save
one, related it in their news columns or commented on it edit
orially. This non-mention was due largely to the fact, we may
presume, that few of the prominent eastern anti-Slavery
papers, such as the New York Tribune and the National Era
caught it up and discerned its significance and political import
ance. A correspondent of the Philadelphia Ledger, however,
reported it and enlarged upon its bearings and the editor of
one paper in Iowa noted his letter. General James M. Morgan
became editor of the Burlington Telegraph in February. He
discerned the important consequences of the Southerner's
"aside" should it be hurled into the discussions of the hustings
in Iowa. General Morgan was a Whig with both conservative
and anti-Slavery tendencies — that is, he would respect the
rights of the Southern slaveholders in their own locus but he
wanted no extension of the "peculiar institution" northward
and no promotion of it by the national government. He was
very outspoken in his opposition to the Repeal of the Com-
— 87 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
promise of 1820 and expressed his views and feelings in force
ful and unequivocal language. In his judgment expressed m
the Telegraph on February 18 Douglas' bill and its progress
was the outworkings of "an infamous plot" conceived by an
ambitious and unscrupulous candidate for the Presidency — of
"A Northern Senator with Southern possessions
— a Northern politician with "nigger" necessities has
been found willing, aye, more than willing to bare
himself to northern opprobrium and to Southern
scorn by assuming the initiative in this plot — a plot
to annul the most sacred pacts * * * * to unchain
the demon of discord in the land!"
************
On March 11 the Telegraph contained another ringing
editorial proclaiming a warning to Iowans as to the purport
and probable consequences of the Repeal if accomplished —
some pertinent portions of which are given:
"Why All Iowa Should Oppose the Nebraska Bill."

"***** it requires no prophetic vision to fore
see that Nebraska might soon become to Louisiana
what Maryland and Virginia have for years been to
the Carolinas — a successful breeder and rearer of
slaves. Is not such a purpose a part of the game?"
****** "
In the light of such vigorous feelings and views we may
appreciate his state of mind when he read the Philadelphia
Ledger's report of Senator Butler's speech on February 24.
He expressed himself as follows on March 18:
"The Homestead Bill — A Southern Senator's
Opinion of the Germans."
"Senator Butler, of South Carolina, was one of
the principal champions of the Douglas Nebraska bill
in the Senate — distinguished himself by one or two
set speeches in its favor, and is said to have testified
his zeal still further in its behalf by "celebrating" its
passage. He was prominent among those who went
in so decidedly for EXCLUDING FOREIGNERS
from Nebraska, and ensuring it to the slave holders,

F. I. HERRIOTT
by disfranchising all free white men who have not
gone through the "five years' probation." Recently,
when the Homestead bill came before the Senate, he
took occasion to manifest his determined hostility to
that measure, and, according to the correspondent of
the Philadelphia LEDGER, indicated a mortal hatred
of the Germans, and a disrespect for their character
which none but a slavery propagandist could con
ceive, or a heartless tyrant avow. The correspondent
of the Ledger, speaking of the Homestead bill, says :
T doubt much whether the bill will pass the
Senate, especially after the epithets which have
recently been bestowed in that body by Southern
members on our adopted citizens. Judge Butler,
for instance (Senator from So. Car.) declared
frankly in his seat, that he should prefer negroes
in Nebraska to the "emigrants from the land of
krout". The preference is natural enough. The
negroes may be owned, while the German farmers
in the west generally own enough themselves to
make useful and independent citizens. It is not
on account of any vicious habits that emigrants
from Europe are disliked by the chivalrous Senat
ors from the South, but simply because they bring
down the price of negroes. I have always been a
compromise man, as the readers of the Ledger well
know, and am a compromise man yet — but it is one
of the deplorable features of slavery that it lowers
the estimate of humanity and gives to the word
"Liberty" a technical application at variance with
political or christian philosophy."
"That northern papers should be found willing to
gloss over or to conceal the conduct of such a man,
and join in praises of the "Southern chivalry" — that
northern politicians should shut their eyes to such
displays of Southern arrogance, and bung up their
ears to such gross insults — and that Northern States
men should be found hand-in-hand, in public
measures, with one whose entire policy of legislation
is based upon his love of slave-labor, his hatred of the
poor white man, and his avowed disgust for foreigners
— are facts not less explicable than they are painful
to contemplate. But, we suppose it is all right — at
least the organs will tell us that it is — for it seems
to be their province to tell us "nothing else". We
— 89 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
could wish, most sincerely, that for once at least the
sense of burning shame and the spirit of manly in
dependence might unite in their composition, and in
duce them to hurl back with becoming scorn and in
dignation the vile and ungenerous insults thus heaped
upon their unoffending fellowcitizens."
General Morgan did not rest with that protest and warn
ing. He had read a report of the Washington correspondent of
the St. Louis Republican as to some of the designs of the pro
moters of the Repeal hostile to the foreign-born in the new
territories and he followed the foregoing editorial immediately
with another equally pointed and pertinent to the campaign
here studied. It brings into the foreground the objective of the
anti-Slavery leaders in their direct effort to arouse and allure
the foreign-born voters by insistence upon the inherent host
ility of Slavocrats towards the liberties coveted by the for
eign-born who sought refuge and homes under the American
flag. Slavery vs. Foreigners.
The St. Louis Republican is a strong friend of the
Douglas Nebraska bill — almost the only friend, in
deed which that bill seems to have among the Mis
souri press. It keeps a Washington correspondent
who does not fail to advise it in full of all that re
lates to the great question of the day. — We publish
an extract from one of his late letters for the purpose
of proving to our readers what the South means by
repealing the Missouri Compromise that they intend
thereby to force slavery into Nebraska — that to
"make assurance doubly sure," they have provided
for the virtual exclusion of foreigners from the
Territory: Negroes may go there, but foreigners can
not, unless, like Negroes, they will be content to do
without the privilege of voting ! A splendid affair is
the Nebraska bill ! And wonderfully democratic in
deed! And yet, opposition to the measure embrac
ing such provisions as these, is boldly denounced by
a portion of the party press as "wrong" — "factious"
— and "disorganizing" ! And the whole democratic
party is unblushingly called upon to come up to the
support of this Nebraska scheme and to treat as
enemies of democratic principles all who cannot and
— 90 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
will not swallow its anti-republican provisions ! We
rejoice that the people — who have heads to think and
hearts to feel — resist, in the mass the unhallowed ap
peals which are made to their prejudices — that they
refuse to be made inconsistent with their life long
professions — that they appreciated the full enormity
of this Nebraska proposition and that they esteem
too highly the glorious memories of the past to tar
nish at this late day the proud escutcheon of their
party by giving their support to a measure which
is at war with the progress of liberal principles and
which reduces the free white man to the same polit
ical level as the negro slave. Here is what the Re
publican correspondent says : —
'But another amendment made to the bill se
cured to the South an important advantage. — This
was the striking out of that clause which permitted
foreigners who might have declared their intention
to become citizens, to vote in the elections for Ter
ritorial Legislature. The motion to strike out was
made by Mr. Clayton, who ably advocated it. Mr.
Atchinson addressed the Senate with great earnest
ness and ability on the same side of the question.
He contended that the admission of unnaturalized
foreigners to vote would overcome the voice of the
American settlers, and banish slavery before South
ern men could have a fair expression of the popu
lar feeling on the subject. The first vote was of
the greatest importance. It would decide the whole
question. He wished that issue, to be left to Amer
ican citizens, and not to persons having no stake
in the country. — The amendment was adopted. —
22 yes, noes 20."
We shall have occasion later in analyzing the assertions
and arguments of the Opposition leaders to show the lack of
warrant and the injustice of some of the foregoing utterances.
Here the matter to be realized is that partisan editors in Iowa
were conscious early in the campaign in 1854 that the foreign-
born voters might play an important part in the campaign and
they were openly training their guns on the Democratic strong
holds expressly to dislodge the foreign-born voter.

)1 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
XIX.
Political conditions in Iowa, as we have seen, were chaotic.
The Whigs were in internal clash and confusion ; and the Dem
ocrats more or less were split asunder. The preponderance of
advantage, however, seems clearly to have been with the party
of the national Administration during the first three months of
1854. Mr. Grimes, if he was to win in the race for governor,
must win by hard work and by a direct appeal to the voters
in an aggressive campaign.
For reasons affecting his private affairs, he felt constrain
ed to forego such a personal canvass, as sundry matters called
him to the east. Whether his decision meant perfect assur
ance Of his probable success the curious may consider and the
cynical doubt. In lieu of such personal canvass Mr. Grimes
published on April 8 an Address or Open Letter "To the
People of Iowa." It was a paper of considerable length —
slightly exceeding 16 pages printed in small type in Dr. Salter's
Life; and it became one of the noteworthy documents in the
anti-slavery discussion of Iowa and indeed of the West. A
draft of the Address had been made in the forepart or middle
of March, for Dr. Geo. F. Magoun tells us that he took it to
the Free Soil Convention of Crawfordsville on March 28 and
submitted it to Asa Turner and other leaders there and that
a summary of the Address was publicly read in the convention
and discussed openly as a means of securing the endorsement
of Mr. Grimes' candidacy already referred to.31
Mr. Grimes takes up and discusses the five main questions
touched upon in the Whig platform — but, save the first, he
treats them in the reverse order. In so doing and in the re
lative amount of attention accorded to each he exhibits his
keenness of vision for the main strategic points in the situation
and his shrewdness in party tactics.
First, he emphasizes the need of radical revision in the
state constitution, especially in respect of banks and incorpor
ations, devoting three pages thereto. In a half page he next
touches upon the vexatious "Temperance" question. He
31 Magoun's Asa Turner and His Times, p. 287.
— 92 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
neither dodged, nor hedged : but he was brief and therein was
the soul of political wisdom. A page is devoted to Douglas'
scheme for a tonnage tax for internal improvements. The
balance of the Address discusses national issues : — the Home
stead bill is first briefly touched upon, the Kansas-Nebraska
bill and the complex of issues therewith involved are lucidly
stated and cogently discussed.
Before dealing directly with those portions of the Address
which especially concern us, two facts should be borne in
mind, in order to realize its telling effect. First, few of the
anti-Slavery papers had prior to April 1 dwelt upon the dis
criminations against aliens in the Homestead and Kansas-
Nebraska bills. The Iowa Democratic Enquirer of Muscatine,
the one leading Democratic paper in the state that openly op
posed the Nebraska bill, once (March 16) briefly noted the
Clayton amendment and informed its readers that it was passed
to make the Germans "pay dear" for their opposition to the
bill. Second, so far as the writer can discover, no paper save
the Telegraph made note of Senater Butler's assertion in the
Senate (Feb. 24) as to Iowa's probable preferences in respect
of her population. The Enquirer had an alert correspondent
at Washington who attended the debates but he too failed to
catch either the original observation or the explanation and
modification. The active editor of Der Demokrat, the leading
German paper of Iowa, Mr. Theodore Guillich, likewise missed
catching it.
In order that the fibre and force of Mr. Grimes' Address
may be fully gauged, the drift and effect of his argument ap
prehended, and the significance of subsequent developments
more easily appreciated, generous extracts are given :
4. I regard the homestead bill as beneficent in its
character, and as calculated to greatly advance the
material interests of Iowa. But I cannot give my
assent to all the provisions of the bill recently passed
by the House of Representatives, and now pending in
the Senate. I cannot assent to the principles of dis
criminating against foreigners who come to the coun
try with a bona fide intention to become citizens. I
do not concur in the recent promulgation of southern
— 93 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
politicians, that our institutions are in danger from
foreign immigration, and I abhor the sentiment an
nounced by Senator Butler that Iowa would be more
prosperous with the institution of slavery than with
her industrious and patriotic German population.
I believe that the Homestead bill, now under con
sideration in the Senate should be so amended as to
allow foreigners coming to our shores with the inten
tion to remain, and who declare their intention to be
come citizens, to enjoy the same advantages under the
law as though they were born on American soil.
5. But the most important of all questions now en
grossing the public attention is the attempt to intro
duce slavery into the territories of Nebraka and
Kansas, by the repeal of the Missouri compromise.
He then gives a summary of the major points in the hist
ory of the slavery question, the legislation and the com
promises on which it rested. Thereupon he discusses "squatter
sovereignty" and the attitude of the Senate and its insistence
upon "non-intervention" and remarks:
"One would suppose that the new principles of
'squatter sovereignty' would be comprehensive enough
to allow aliens the same rights of citizenship that they
enjoy in other territories. But the man who imagines
so would be eggregiously mistaken. The bill that
passed the Senate, and for which Mr. Douglas and
all his willing followers voted, denies to the "squat
ters" who happen to have been born on the banks of
the Rhine or the Shannon, and who reside in these
Territories, the privilege of voting for or against the
constitutions of the new States, even after making
declarations of their intention to become citizens. And
this, too, when the uniform practice has been to grant
the elective franchise to foreigners under such cir
cumstances. Five hundred slaveholders from Virg
inia or Southern Carolina may carry slaves into the
Territory and legislate for the protection of slave
property, while five thousand German settlers — free
laborers — who become landholders in the territory,
and have made oath of their intention to become
citizens, shall have no control in its government and
no opportunity to protect themselves against the de
grading competition with slave labor. Another
— 94 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
evidence of the meaning of this doctrine of "squatter
sovereignty" ... ************
It is urged by some that if the Missouri Com
promise is repealed, slavery will not become a per
manent institution in Kansas and Nebraska. So it
was said of Missouri thirty-four years ago. . . . In
stead of this being the case, they have increased from
that time to the present at the rate of three thousand
a year and Missouri now contains more than a
hundred thousand slaves ! Those who are most
familiar with the institution, and with the Territories
of Nebraska and Kansas, entertain no doubt but that
they will become slave states. Senator Atchinson
[of Missouri and President pro-tern., of the U. S.
Senate] who lives near the line of Nebraska, and is
a large slaveholder, expressed the opinion a year ago,
that but for the Missouri Compromise, they would
be extensive slaveholding states. He is said to have
expressed the same opinion at the time of the passage
of the bill by the Senate, provided his amendment dis
franchising the Germans and Irish should be adopted,
and it was accordingly. And why would they not
become slave States? 
[After showing how slavery almost got a foot
hold in the territory of Iowa and how a Court pre
vented it, he continues] :
If there is one state in the Union more interested
than another in the maintenance of the Missouri
Compromise, it is the State of Iowa. With the free
enterprising population on the west, our State will
be vastly benefited by an early organization of Ne
braska. With a slave state on our western border,
I see nothing but trouble and darkness in the future.
Bounded on two sides by slave states, we shall be
intercepted with underground railroads, and continu
ally distracted by slave hunts. Instead of having a
population at the west that will sympathize with us,
we shall find their sympathies and interests constant
ly antagonistic to ours. The energies of our people
will be paralyzed, our works of internal improvement
will languish, and the bright anticipations of the
future greatness of Iowa forever blasted. In the
boastfulness of anticipated triumph, the citizens of
— 95 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Iowa have been told by a southern senator how much
better would be the condition of our state with negro
slaves than with our foreign population. A disting
uished representative from Georgia has announced
that in fifteen years Iowa would be a slave state. I
sincerely believe that, should the Missouri Compro
mise be repealed, there will soon be a contest for
the mastery between freedom and slavery on the soil
of Iowa. The principle of non-intervention so strenu
ously contended for by the South will soon be ex
tended to the free states of the Northwest. It is al
ready contended in some quarters that slaves are mere
appendages and attachments to the person, and that
the owner had the same right to remove them to a
free state that he has to remove his cattle and horses.
Let the Missouri Compromise act be repealed, and
this will be the next question to be met.
Citizens of Iowa, are you ready to meet this issue ?
In penning his Address to the electors Mr. Grimes evident
ly contemplated two classes or groups in general, and one
group in particular. On the whole he sought to hold the doubt
ful Whigs and secure the anti-Nebraska Democrats. But es
pecially he tried to allure the Germans and detach them from
the Democratic party with which up to that time they had
chiefly allied themselves. The first two groups he addressed
with forceful arguments in general terms that all opponents
of the extension of slavery readily accepted. The Germans
he dealt with specifically, appealing to them by direct personal
reference to issues in which they were immensely interested :
and he handled those affecting the Germans with much
adroitness; — by indirection, allaying their discontent on one
moot question and by direct frontal attack alarming them and
attracting them to his standards.
In dealing with the troublesome "Temperance" question
he deftly reduced irritation and opposition, without in any
sense abating his well known views or compromising his repu
tation for straightforward conduct: first, by brevity; second,
by shifting the responsibility for the enactment of restrictive or
prohibitory legislation completely upon the public at large;
and thirdly, by the expression of views to which Germans, and
— 96 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
especially German Radicals, could not logically or practically
object. He reiterated with some amplification his response
to Rev. H. Clay Dean's interrogatory : "It is a cardinal prin
ciple of the Whig party that all questions of expediency be
long legitimately to the people, and should be settled by the
legislative department of the Government. It would be a
violation of my own principles .... to endeavor to thwart in
any degree the wishes of the people of the State as expressed
through their representatives. The friends of both the pro
hibitory and the license systems must bear in mind that the
Executive of the State has nothing whatever to do with the
preparation of laws." 32
Legally minded electors probably asked themselves, if not
Mr. Grimes, as today they have like occasion to do whether his
position relative to the respective spheres and functions of the
Legislature, the Executive and the People's dominion was con
sistent with his caustic comments on "squatter sovereignty" in
subsequent paragraphs; and they doubtless queried what the
constitution and the law expect an Executive to do when "the
people" or their representatives demand and clamorously in
sist upon legislation that may be or actually is obnoxious to
law and order and wise public policy. But, then, as now, the
majority of the electors was not legally minded. He had,
however, avoided the burden of the issue in the canvass. The
Democrats were in a keen quandary. Mr. Dean was
a potent factor in that party and a powerful preacher of
the Methodist church, easily foremost among the churches of
Iowa in numbers and influence. Mr. Bates, the Democratic
candidate for governor had taken a stand, similar to that taken
by Mr. Grimes.33 Germans, consequently, if other matters
weighted the scales, had no particular or pressing reason for
preferring Mr. Bates to Mr. Grimes on the score of the Liquor
question; and other matters did weight the scales.
But if Mr. Grimes was discrete and brief regarding
the liquor question he was direct and clumsy, pugnacious and
pungent in discussing the interest of the Germans in the slav-
32 Salter's Grimes, p. 37.
33 Fairfield Ledger, March 30, 1854.
— 97 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
ery question and the pending Homestead and Kansas- Nebras
ka bills. There is no logical discernment in his appeal to the
Germans on this score ; he addressed them directy and without
equivocation is especially intent upon arousing them. In
four different connections he directly refers to the Germans
and the major part of his argument incident thereto hinges
upon the interest of Germans as such in the matters at
issue: first, in dealing with the Free Homestead bill then be
fore the Senate34 ; second, in applying the doctrine of "Squat
ter Sovereignty"35 ; thirdly, in citing Senator Atchinson's alleg
ed remark36 ; and, fourthly, in predicting the inevitabe struggle
that the Slavocrats would make to secure control in Iowa.37.
He sought to arouse the Germans by precisely the same
sort of appeal and argument that characterized the composi
tion of "The Appeal" issued from Washington January 19,
preceding, by Chase, Sumner, Giddings and Gerrit Smith.
He pointedly appeals to their self-interest in dwelling upon
the discriminations against them in the Free Homestead bill
then before Congress. He enhances the force of his appeal by
his emphasis upon the political deprivation Germans would
suffer under the Douglas bill as amended by Clayton that shut
them out of the franchise and denied them the privileges and
emoluments of public office in the new territories. He ob
viously sought to prick German pride and arouse their resent
ment when he takes pains to exhibit the fact that Germans
would have no higher status politically than Negroes in the
new territories, at least prior to naturalization — a fact that
burnt and scorched the pride of sons of Germania.
XX.
Mr. Grimes' Address was issued in circular and pamphlet
form and sent out broadcast to the press and the voters. Save
in his home city it was generally commended by the oppo
sition press. It was reprinted entire in the Ledger of Fah~-
34 Salter's Grimes, p. 39.
^Ibid, p. 44.
36 Ib id, p. 46.
wibid, p. 47. — 98 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
field, in the Valley Whig of Keokuk, the Courier of Ottumwa ;
and in considerable part in the Gazette of Davenport; and in
the Journal of Muscatine.
The reception accorded the Address by the Democratic
press was somewhat varied. Editors, then as now, suffered
more or less from mental astigmatism and ethical refraction.
They saw nothing or saw only the weak points. Dr. Phillip
Harvey of the State Gazette of Burlington bluntly declared
that the Address was filled with "the grossest falsehoods and
misrepresentations" ; and that "it drags in issues that in no
way are before the people in the present canvass, merely for
the purpose, we suppose, of making "a spread" before them."38
The Miners' Express of Dubuque conceded (May 6) that Mr.
Grimes was a man of force but his Address was a compilation
of fallacies; and Mr. Merritt would have it appear that its
author was an advocate of Wild Cat banks and worthless cur
rency, the popular election of judges, the "Maine Law," and
Abolitionism. Mr. Merritt ignores utterly Mr. Grimes' in
sistence upon the infringement of the interests of Germans in
the Homestead and Nebraska bills. His silence was evidence
of his insight and prudence. The Germans and their interest
in pending national legislation was a hot iron the heat of which
discussion would only enhance.
The columns of the Democratic organ at Burlington,
The Iowa State Gazette, contained but little notice of Mr.
Grimes' address or Manifesto as the Democrats were wont
to call it. Beginning March 18, however, a local cor
respondent signing himself "A Democrat" in a series of
letters addressed "To James W. Grimes, Esq.", takes up his
points seriatim. In his letter "No. 4" after some preliminary
observations respecting the government of the territories the
Correspondent takes up his gauge about "Squatter Sov
ereignty" and Grimes' fling at the consistency of Douglas'
"new born friendship for our adopted citizens" "born on the
banks of the Rhine or the Shannon" and the denial to them
of access to the new territories with the full complement of
electoral privileges thus putting them on the same level with
the negros who had no such rights.
38 Quoted in Miner's Express, April 26, 1854.
— 99 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
" * * * * You know very well, Sir, that Mr.
Douglas' bill, as contended for by him, the Senators
from Iowa, and many others, expressly allowed
aliens who had declared their intention to become
citizens, the right of voting; and that in this respect
it differed from almost all preceding acts to organ
ize territories. The amendment that denies to your
dear friends from "the banks of the Rhine or the
Shannon" the right of voting till they become cit
izens, sprang from your own party ; it was introduced
by Mr. Clayton, a Whig Senator from Delaware,
and was opposed by Mr. Douglas, our Senators and
others; but they were outvoted in the matter; and
in the full knowledge of these facts you seek to
raise a prejudice against them for what they are en
tirely innocent of. Oh shame, where is thy blush?
You further say "the uniform practice has been to
grant the elective franchise to foreigners under such
circumstances." You are a lawyer, Sir, and we may
presume you wrote with a full knowledge of the
fact ; it is your business to know them, and you make
the statement positively. Imagine then our aston
ishment when, upon referring to the statutes of U.
S. we found the almost uniform practice to have
been quite contrary. In the act establishing
the territorial government of Oregon, alone, have we
been able to find that the right of suffrage has been
extended to those who have declared their intention
to become citizens and taken an oath to support the
constitution of the U. S. and the territorial act. In
the acts establishing the territories of Iowa, Wis
consin, Minnesota, Utah and New Mexico which we
have referred to, we find it expressly "provided that
the right of suffrage and of holding office shall be
exercised only by citizens of the United States."
How you could have been so indiscrete, Sir, as to
make the assertions you have, about the "uniform
practice" when you must have known that the author
ity was at hand to confute you, is really astonishing."
The Address attracted attention and met with favor be
yond the borders of the state. Some Olympian Gods
were alertly interested in the success of his candidacy.
Senator Chase of Ohio, as we have seen, was promoting his
chances; and Greeley's Tribune (May 10) approved it in
— 100 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
strong terms. "The Address is marked by great clearness
and ability, and shows Mr. Grimes to be a man of abundant
talent. * * * * It is a plain and manly appeal to the people.
The views he advocates are so undeniably sound, that did
no partisan hindrances exist, one would suppose they could
hardly fail to receive the endorsement of every citizen of the
state." But plaudits were not the only responses the Address
elicited from national leaders in the east. Mr. Grimes went
east as announced. Either for business or political reasons
he visited Washington. There he probably conferred with
Senators Chase, Hale, Seward and Wade, with Giddings and
other anti-slavery leaders — a fact that doubtless was known
and had some influence upon subsequent developments. Mr.
Grimes then went north, going to New Hampshire to attend
to the private affairs that especially called him east. While
in his native hills his peace and his plans were greatly disturbed
by a terrific broadside from the Thunderer of the Administra
tion — The Daily Union of Washington.
XXI.
On Saturday, April 29, The Daily Union published a three
column leader entitled Iowa and Nebraska
A Whig Candidate for Governor Answered.
The editorial begins with flattering encomiums upon Iowa
and the course of Senators A. C. Dodge and Geo. W. Jones
and Representative Bernard Henn in respect of pending legis
lation affecting slavery : — "The democrats of Iowa may boast,
with some justice, that that state is the soundest Democratic
free State on the subject of the compromises of the con
stitution. They have never yet been known to evade the re
sponsibility of accepting the boldest issue on the slavery ques
tion. The consequence has been, that they have become im
pregnable to the assaults of the Whigs, and that no true
Democrat of Iowa ever waits to see how the wind is blowing
before taking his position." — 101 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Because of such staunch support of "the compromises of
the constitution" the senators from Iowa became the objects
of the malevolence of Abolitionists and Anti-slavery Whigs.
Senator Dodge in particular, the editors assert, was especially
marked for punishment because in August the legislature
was to be elected that was to choose his successor. His enemies
and critics perceived "a fine opportunity to resort to clamor
and falsehood" and were energetically proceeding. Evidence
thereof was the recent Address of Mr. James W. Grimes "To
the People of Iowa," which the Union characterizes as "a
production of extraordinary recklessness." However, as it is
typical of the logic and tactics of Whigs generally, both in Iowa
and in the North, they propose "a frank, plain-spoken review"
of its contents.
Whig principles and Whig hypocrisy, the editors aver,
are almost interchangeable terms. Whigs make much of the
rights of the people and pretend to insist upon the rule of the
people, yet they vehemently oppose the Kansas-Nebraska bill
which commits the great question of slavery solely to the
people of those territories. But such an attitude had been
customary with them. They had opposed popular rule in
Massachussetts, in Rhode Island, in North Carolina, in Mary
land, in Louisiana, New Jersey. "In Iowa the same rule held
aiood; and the very individual now nominated by the Whigs
of Iowa for governor was a leader of that party against the
reforms of the Democrats of Iowa in giving the election of
State officers to the people." And among those opposing was
this champion of the people, the Whig candidate for Governor
of Iowa. Nevertheless, this puissant Whig, forgetful of his
past course, new comes forward and demands the popular
election of judges and in the same breath denounces the
grant of popular rule to the people of the new Territories.
'But Mr. Grimes is an adroit political gamester." Recogniz
ing the weakness and palpable hypocrisy of his course he
seeks to distract attention from himself by denouncing the
conduct of Messrs. Dodge and Jones for denying to the people
of Kansas and Nebraska the right to elect their own officers.
But this is unjust, for the editors allege, and assert from per-
— 102 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
sonal knowledge, that both of the Senators from Iowa were
in favor of allowing the people of the territories such rights
with respect to their officers ; but they would not vote for
such amendments when proposed by deadly enemies of the
bill with a view to defeating the major purpose of the bill.
To Mr. Grimes' assertion that the organization of the Ter
ritory was not justified because of paucity of population,
they retort that all of the Whigs of the House of Represent
atives had, the year preceding, voted for such organization.
But Mr. Grimes in this Address to the citizens of Iowa
is greatly stirred up because in the Nebraska bill, as it passed
the Senate, foreigners are placed upon the same footing which
foreigners not yet naturalized occupied in the territories of
Wisconsin, Arkansas, Michigan, and Iowa ! — that is that they
are not to vote until formally invested with the rights of
citizenship." Moreover Messrs. Dodge and Jones are censured
for voting for the bill with such provision therein; "but did
not Mr. Grimes know that their votes were cast against
this objectionable provision: and that they supported the bill
after this provision had been carried, with the fact before
them that its rejection in the House was conceded?"
Our wouldbe governor of Iowa, was doubtless, a
few years ago, if he is not now, with the most of
his party, a native American. Like General Scott,
he has doubtless cursed the foreigners after the elec
tion though he coaxed them most affectionately be
fore the election. The adopted citizens have been a
stumbling block to the Whigs; it is a fact which
Whig history strangely and always verifies, that the
Whigs will flatter the foreign vote, even with a thous
and evidences on record of their deep seated hostility
to it. Mr. Grimes is excessively aroused against
the bill of Judge Douglas because it excludes
foreigners from voting in the Territories complacently
omitting that the author of the amendment which
inhibits them from voting was no less a Whig than
John M. Clayton, of Delaware, and that Senators
Douglas, Jones and Dodge, all voted against it ! Not
content with this, he invents statements to sustain his
reckless assertions, and does not hesitate, in at least
two instances, grossly and deliberately to resort to
— 103 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
falsehood. That this language is by no means too
strong, we propose briefly to show.
The editors then quote Mr. Grimes' assertion : "I abhor
the sentiment announced by Senator Butler that Iowa would
be more prosperous with the institution of slavery than with
her industrious and patriotic German population." As the com-
pletest answer, and the shortest one, to "this extraordinary
declaration" they offer in evidence the correspondence be
tween Messrs. Dodge and Jones with "the venerable and staid
Senator Butler." Under date of April 22, the Senators from
Iowa had written Judge Butler, submitting a copy of the
Des Moines Valley Whig, containing Mr. Grimes' Address
and asking specifically whether he had ever uttered the senti
ment quoted. From his Committee Room at the capitol Senator
Butler replied April 25, declaring that he had "never said
anything which could authorize such a remark." He presumes
that Mr. Grimes did not read his speech of March 25 wherein
he expressly denied that he had "assimilated the Germans
coming from Bremen and other ports of Germany to the
black men, and regarded them as equal. My intention was
exactly the reverse." And he reiterates his assertion and con
cludes : "I never had it in my mind to think of Iowa as a State,
that would allow or introduce the institution of slavery in her
limits." Mr. Grimes' additional averment or "assumption" that
"A distinguished representative from Georgia has announced
that in fifteen years Iowa will be a slave state," was then
considered; to which they rejoin. "What sort of credence
should be attached to any statement of such a man when we
assure the reader and the people of Iowa that every Georgia
representative in Congress unequivocally and indignantly
denies having used the language here put into the mouth of
one of them." Thereupon follows the correspondence be
tween Senators Dodge and Jones and Senators Robert Toombs
and Wm. C. Dawson of Georgia, the latter denying point
blank the allegation as affecting themselves. The entire de
legation from Georgia in the lower House, "we are informed
denies and denounces the assertion of Mr. James W. Grimes."
— 104 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
The editors of the Union then give Mr. Grimes a Roland
for his Oliver.
If the Germans of Iowa can be deceived by false
hoods, such as Mr. Grimes does not hesitate to resort
to, they can be caught by very shallow trickery in
deed. The history of the Whig party discloses to
the adopted citizens of this country one unvarying
rule of opposition, in the first place to liberal em
igration laws and, secondly, to impartial natur
alization laws. — At this moment there is not a
native-American organization in the country that is
not controlled by the Whig leaders — by just such men
as James W. Grimes. Let the Germans of Iowa
look to Philadelphia now, and they will find the whole
Native-American organization there publicly rallied
under the Whig banners. And dare Mr. Grimes
deny that the leader of the Anti-Nebraska forces in
the Senate — W. H. Seward, of New York, the op
ponent also of that popular sovereignty — for asking
which the Germans, the Irishman, the Frenchman,
and the Italian, have been driven from their father
lands — is, with all his pretenses, the worst enemy
the adopted citizens have in that body? We refer
in proof of this remark to his extraordinary offer
to Governor Smith of Virginia made a few years
ago, at Richmond, that he was willing to exchange
the free Negroes of Virginia for the honest Germans
and Irish emigrants of New York! This remarkable
declaration can be established by Gov. Smith, now
an eloquent member in Congress, and cannot be suc
cessfully denied by Senator Seward."
The editors conclude by ridiculing Mr. Grimes' refer
ences to Mormonism as a possible result of the application of
the doctrine of popular sovereignty; by asserting the obvious
and substantial fairness of the South in the matter in contro
versy as signified in the Badger amendment to the Kansas Ne
braska bill ; and by the laudation of "the purity of the motives
and the disinterestedness of the course of that indefatigable
and invincible champion of the constitution," Judge Douglas.
XXII.
Before The Washington Union had turned its batteries
against Mr. Grimes Senator Dodge had forwarded (April
— 105 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
24) to Messrs. Harvey and McKenny, publishers of the State
Gazette of Burlington, copies of the correspondence with
Senator Butler denying that he had used the expression
anent Iowa and the Germans ascribed to him. The Valley
Whig (May 11) in a short, sharp editorial comments caustic
ally upon the course of "our Senators" and in rebuttal of
Senator Butler's denial cited his original assertion in the Senate
(Feb. 24) and submits that if that "did not sustain Mr. Grimes
we do not understand the force of language ;" and thereupon
"commended the correspondence to all continental comers to
Iowa and especially to Germans."
On May 19, Mr. Howell reprinted in the Valley Whig
the article of the Washington Union of April 29; and in a
long editorial, entitled "War of the Slaveholders on Mr.
Grimes," he denounced the course of Senators Dodge and
Jones in the matter in a vigorous fashion. The editorial as
a whole is not very effective. There is more fury than argu
ment, more prejudice than point.
No sooner had Mr. Grimes read the leader of The Daily
Union attacking him than he realized the powerful effect
such a broadside would have in Iowa where he apprehended
it would be given extensive circulation, unless he took prompt
and effective measures to counteract it. He knew that cor
respondence would for the most part be futile, and further
that neither friends nor partisan editors, however able and
well disposed, could effectually conduct his defense or over
come the effect of the broadside from the Administration
organ; because they were not so familiar with the facts, or
so likely to apprehend the subtile points of the Union's argu
ment. He acted with energy and dispatch, deciding at once to
alter his plans, forego the adjustment of his personal af
fairs in New Hampshire and return to Iowa.
On reaching the state Mr. Grimes did three things. He
penned a vigorous rejoinder to the Union's article, issuing it
at Burlington May 23; again publishing it in pamphlet form
and addressing it "To The People Of Iowa." He arranged
an extensive itinerary with a schedule of 31 speeches in as
many different cities and towns, ranging from eastern to west-
— 106 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
ern border, from southern to northern line of the state. And
he challenged his competitor to meet him at "any and all"
the places and jointly to discuss with him the issues before
the electors. In his rejoinder to the Union Mr. Grimes returned blow
for blow. He charged that "the artice was evidently fur
nished by or prepared at the instance of the Iowa Senators."
Such a proceeding, however, he concedes to be "a matter of
taste" : but unwittingly thereby they have forced "a dangerous
issue" that must be decided in August, to wit:
Whether the freemen of this state shall be re
presented in the United States Senate by men who
regard the interest of South Carolina and Mississippi
more than the interests of Iowa. Whether on every
question affecting the rights of free labor and free
territory, the extreme south shall find its most willing
and devoted supporters in the Senators from this free
state.To Senator Butler's charge that he, Grimes, had mis
represented him in respect of the Germans and Iowa, Mr.
Grimes reiterates his original assertion and, to avoid all quibbles,.
he reprints entire the correspondence of Messrs. Dodge, Jones
and Butler, in which the latter denies that he ever "said any
thing which could authorize such a remark," with which he
couples his disclaimer in the Senate of Friday, February 25,
already given.
Mr. Grimes retorts with force — first, with the query : —
Why a disclaimer if he had said nothing which suggested or
warranted such a conclusion from his words! Apparently
his own friends had drawn such an inference. Hence his dis
claimer. And second, he quotes the paragraph of his speech
on Friday afternoon in which he first made reference to
Iowa's possible preference of a population of slaveholders
and their slaves over an inundation of those men coming as
emigrants from a foreign country totally unacquainted with
the institutions of this country — and nearly all comers are
of this class."
There was, and is, Mr. Grimes contends, just one con-
— 107 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
elusion. "The emigrants referred to are Germans." Hfe
takes pains to point out and emphasize that Senator Butler's
"declaration was uttered in the United States Senate, in the
presence of the Iowa senators," and moreover, it was duly
reported in the "Globe" newspaper, the official reporter of
the Senate, that "it has never been denied, questioned, or
rebuked by those Senators." In fine he submits that the
language of Senator Butler was stronger than his (Grimes)
Address had alleged.
Then follows the correspondence between Messrs. Dodge
and Jones with Messrs. Toombs and Dawson in which the
latter deny positively that they had ever asserted that within
fifteen years, Slavery would prevail in Iowa. Mr. Grimes re
peats his first statement and counters by saying that he did
not say that "a Senator of Georgia" had made the declaration
but that a "Representative" of that state had so stated. "The
opinion was expressed by the Hon. Alexander H. Stephens
in the presence of and to the Hon. Charles Mason, Com
missioner of Patents. It was publicly expressed, and I doubt
not, conscientiously believed. The remark was repeated by
Judge Mason to several citizens of Burlington." Thereupon
follows a specific denial that he was or that he had recently
been opposed to the organization of the Territory of Nebraska
as the Union had alleged. Mr. Grimes then delivers two
body blows. The "Union" attempts to excuse Messrs. Dodge
and Jones for voting for the bill with the anti-alien
clause, because they knew it would be stricken out
in the House. How did they know it? How could
they know it? The only question for them to decide
was, is the bill just and right as it stands? Was it
proper for them to vote for a bill containing a man
ifestly inequitable provision with the expectation that
that a coordinate branch of the government would
correct their wrong ? Is this the way Senators would
shirk the responsibility? Is a wrong to be justified
in one man because another may possibly rectify
that wrong?
The "Union" or the Iowa Senators in the "Union"
— 108 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
very softly attempt to change the responsibility of
the Clayton amendment from Mr. Atchinson and to
fasten it entirely upon Mr. Clayton. Is it possible
that they suppose that they can deceive any one in
relation to the history of the amendment? Is it pos
sible they imagine that the people of Iowa do not
know who was the prime mover and principal ad
vocate of this anti-alien restriction ? Do they suppose
that there is a German in the country who does not
know that it originated with Mr. Atchinson of Mis
souri, the President pro tem. of the Senate? The
amendment was drafted, as is well known, by Mr.
Atchinson, and was carried by slaveholders votes in
the Senate against non-slaveholding votes, and after
it was incorporated in the bill was supported and en
dorsed by the Iowa Senators, but under the supposi
tion, they say, that another body would strike it out.
As to Mr. Atchinson's authorship of the Clayton
amendment, the "Missouri Democrat" says :
We have in type the speech of Mr. Atchinson,
pending the amendment of Mr. Clayton, which Mr.
A. says he wrote out and gave to him to offer, ex
cluding foreigners, who have declared their inten
tion of becoming citizens, and taken oath to sup
port the constitution of the United States, from
voting or holding office in the Territories of Ne
braska and Kansas, and shall lay it before our
readers, next week, in order that the people may
understand the motive which influenced Mr. A.'s
course. He says, in his remarks, that he objects
to foreigners moulding and forming the institutions
of those territories. Hear him:
'The first Legislature may decide the question
of slavery forever in these territories, (Nebraska
and Kansas) and decide as to the right of the
people of one half of the states of the Union to
go there or not.'
A correspondent of the "Missouri Republican" a
journal favorable to the Nebraska bill, thus speaks
of Mr. Atchinson's support of this amendment:
Atchinson addressed the Senate with great earn
estness and ability on the same side of the ques
tion. He contended that the admission of un
naturalized foreigners to vote would overcome the
— 109 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
voice of American settlers, and banish slavery be
fore southern men could have a fair expression of
the popular feeling on the subject. The first vote
was of the greatest importance. It would decide
the whole question. He wished that issue to be
left to American citizens, and not to persons having
no stake in the country. The amendment was
adopted — yeas 22, nays 20.
The Address closes with an acknowledgment that he had
changed his mind respecting the wisdom of electing j'udges,
"the only true allegation," in the Union's attack and he in
dulges in some strong comments adverse to the bench of that
day that strongly ressemble the present day comment upon
the bench. A telling quotation from Colonel Benton's then
recent speech on Kansas-Nebraska bill concludes his arraign
ment of the Senator from Iowa. XXIII.
A close scrutiny of the argument of Mr. Grimes' Ad
dress to the People of Iowa in 1854, of the Rejoinder and the
counter argument of his rebuttal produces a split conclusion.
The leader of the Opposition clearly had the advantage at
the outset and he scored easily and heavily in defense, and,
as the event demonstrated, won the goal he sought. His
plea, however, was made on grounds that in part either mis
apprehended, or misrepresented the assertion of the Senator
from South Carolina that was the causa causans of the ren
contre ; in part upon a questionable citation of a remark made
in a private conversation; and in part upon non-appreciation
of the constitutional or legal premises on which the Kansas-
Nebraska bill was founded in the pleas of its advocates.
In the rationale of citizenship and in the principles that
guide statesmen in determining the conditions of political
status, especially in conceding non-natives access thereto, the
presumption, both in law and in ethics is always in favor of
the native citizen and against the alien immigrant. Other
things being equal our own citizens, resident and rooted in
our soil and life, are to be preferred to outsiders unfamiliar
with our institutions, and perhaps ill adapted to or ill dis-
— 110 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
posed towards our public policy and methods of govern
ment. Under the constitution and the law antecedent thereto,
and in sound ethics thereunder, slaveholders enjoyed complete
equality with their non-slaveholding brethren of the North
in such presumption. The fact that hideous barbarities were
often incident to the institution of slavery did not abrogate,
nor contract by a hair's breadth, this presumption of the law,
although the canons of absolute ethics might declare the in
stitution obnoxious. The owners of dumb brutes often mis
treat them abominably, the possessors of wealth frequently
put it to unspeakable uses, but the fact when and however
often it may be, in no wise disturbs the status or the rights,
or the presumptions of the law in favor of the possessors of
such property.
Stated in gross, no man in his right mind, or in cool
judgment, would for a moment dispute the assertion that in
telligent, educated, law-abiding, well-to-do natives are un
qualifiedly preferable in our national life and polity to the
vicious and vitiated classes, the criminals and paupers, the
"riff-raff and offscourings" of the old world. Nor does any
sane man deny or doubt that with universal suffrage and easy
access to the ballot box inundations of such classes, or of
the ignorant, untutored and undisciplined of the lower strata
of Europe, would soon place life and property, liberty and
law, in jeopardy, and eventually overwhelm our institutions.
On the other hand, few statesmen and fewer publicists, dis
pute that a constant infusion of new blood from foreign
lands, when the integrity of the stock is properly safeguarded,
is desirable — nay necessary — in order to invigorate native
stocks and counteract the normal deterioration that results
from inbreeding or from lack of competition with livelier
stocks. Such sentiments had been uttered in countless forums by
innumerable statesmen before 1854 and they have been re
peated in learned and popular phrase ad infinitum since that
epoch-making year. In what Judge Butler said in the Senate
on February 24, there was nothing at variance with them.
His assertion was neither extravagant, nor indefensible. He
— Ill —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
and nearly one half of the senators represented slaveholding
constituencies (fifteen states had slavery and sixteen were Free
States) He and nearly all those Senators owned slaves them
selves, or were served by slaves in their own domestic estab
lishments, whether living in their respective states or in the
city of Washington. They, and the dominant classes of the
South which they particularly represented, were men of culture
and refinement, as well as of achievement in industry and the
arts : indeed for the most part they were educated in northern
colleges notably at Harvard and Princeton. His remark, it
should not be forgotten, was made in just resentment of the
stinging criticisms of Chase and the insulting speech of
Sumner. Furthermore it was as a part of an irrefutable argu
ment in which he said that Washington and Greene and Cap
tain Ingraham, the rescuer of Martin Koszta, would have to
give precedence to the newly arrived alien in the new ter
ritories of Kansas and Nebraska, if the logic of Senator
Chase was valid.
Moreover Senator Butler in his original statement qual
ified it, in such wise as to anticipate and bar most of the
ensuing objections. He did not include, or rather he specific
ally excluded, the English and the Irish, because they had
lived under the Common law and were familiar with our in
stitutions. Even with this exclusion his statement was further
qualified : he referred only to those "totally unacquainted" with
the institutions of this country. Thus limited none could ob
ject to it. Controversy could arise only with the declaration
following, to wit; " — and nearly all continental comers are of
this class." The language at first flush is sweeping and all-
inclusive as to immigrants from the continent of Europe; but
a second scrutiny discovers that he says "nearly all" ; not all-
Further Senator Butler did not compare or assimilate
Germans to Negroes, bond or free. He spoke only of "the
Slaveholder with his slaves well-governed" — precisely as one
might refer to a householder with his family — children,
servants and live-stock — well-governed. He referred to the
Slaveholder and he was the person in comparison with the
Germans — not Negroes with the Germans. Slaves were then
— 112 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
mere chattels, just as horses were the chattels of the Western
pioneers. Furthermore Senator Butler in his initial statement did
not particularize Germans by name, and there was no warrant
for such a broad or particular inference that he himself had
Germans in mind. It was either heedless or malevolent de
duction from his statement. He said "Emigrants from a
foreign country" and "continental comers." Those descriptives
neither imply nor suggest Germans; and it was a violent in
ference for any one so to assert. Bulgarians, Czechs, Danes,
French, Greeks, 'Hungarians, 'Italians, Norwegians, Slavs,
Spaniards, Swedes, indeed any and all nationalities no less
than Germans were equally comprehended in Senator Butler's
actual words. Only the fears of partisans or the unjust and
selfish designs of partisan opponents could conceive of in
jecting "German" into or substituting in lieu of his actual
words. Such substitution, unwarranted as it was, meant that
the party leaders, both in Washington and in Iowa, were
keenly alive to the fact that the Germans held the strategic
political centres in the campaign then progressing.
Senator Butler, as most men are wont to do, in the heat
and rush of angry discussion, expressed himself in terms that
swept wide and clear. In the fervor of flowing speech,
and especially in an effort to counteract unjust aspersions on
himself and his constituents which he properly resented, he
used terms that comprehended more than he intended. He
was thinking of continental immigrants in the mass. Part
icular peoples, or certain classes thereof, he would not decry
because of their intelligence, industry and integrity. As soon
as friends called his attention to the adverse implications of
his first utterance, he immediately took pains to guard him
self against invidious criticism, and therefore added his sup
plemental statement that he did not mean to reflect upon the
character of Germans hailing from such ports as Bremen.
Ordinarily in normal private relationships his explanation
would have sufficed to close the incident : but among partisans
pressing towards a political goal and seizing upon any and
all coignes of vantage, it did not suffice.
— 113 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
In the highly charged atmophere of the day Senator
Butler's "playful remark" acted as an electric spark that
produced a lurid zigzag flash of light through the prosaic argu
ments for and against the Repeal of the celebrated pact of
1820. In particular it seemed to signalize the antagonism
between free and slave labor. Calhoun's "venerable and
staid" colleague, had, apparently, in the open senate, de
liberately placed Bohemians, Danes, Finlanders, Frenchmen,
Germans, Hungarian, Italians Poles, Norwegians, Swedes and
Swiss, below the bound slaves of the South in intelligence and
social character; at least no more desirable. His letter to
Senator Dodge, denying that he had ever said anything that
warranted the interpretation put upon his original statement
by Mr. Grimes, seemed upon superficial examination — the
extent usually of partisan scrutiny — little else than the ter
giversation of the pettifogger; and at best a "confession and
avoidance", as lawyers would phrase it.
However intended "by way of episode" Judge Butler's
initial remark was not, from any point of view very flattering,
or even tolerable to the amour propre of Germans which trad
itionally is intense and easily disturbed. Germans were, as
we have seen, just then becoming very sensitive to adverse
criticism. Nativistic prejudice was already running rampant
in the North, and was a rapiijh/ growing force in political
discussion and decision in I^wa. The remark seemed to
smack of that prejudice. Southern Senators, with few excep
tions had steadily and systematically thwarted the hopes of
Germans in the matter of European intervention and in liberal
land legislation; Judge Butler's remark seemed but part and
parcel of the slaveholder's prejudice against the Germans.
Within two weeks this prejudice was incorporated into bom
the Kansas-Nebraska and the Homestead bills. Partisans
naturally suspected concerted action; and in the heated state
of the public mind it was difficult to overcome this presump
tion. XXIV.
The condemnation of Senators Dodge and Jones for their
votes on the Clayton amendment, or rather for the Douglas
— 114 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
bill with that amendment attached, while natural by partisan
opponents and "good politics" was not fair as the situation
and the result proved. Those Senators voted their real senti
ments on the amendment when they voted "No" against its
adoption. When it was adopted, nevertheless, they did what
statesmen must, ever and anon do when major matters, which
they sanction, comprehend minor matters which they disprove :
they sought to accomplished what they conceived to be the
major good, regretting the minor evil involved. At first glance
Mr. Grimes would seem to have struck without possibility of
a return in condemning them for voting for a provision, ex
pecting or hoping that the obnoxious section would meet with
a negative in the lower House. If Senators cast their votes
wholly as pawns in a game, merely as moves in partisan
maneuvers, condemnation should, of course, ensue: but such
is not necessarily the case. The exigencies antecedent to and
collateral with legislation involve much strategy and end
less and intricate tactics that exact generous presumptions
of honest purpose to promote the public welfare. And Senators
Dodge and Jones were entitled to these presumptions.
Again Mr. Grimes in attempting to shift the responsibility
for the Clayton amendment affecting aliens from the Whigs
to the Democrats, achieved a very doubtful point, if any.
In asserting that Senator Atchinson was the Mephistopheles,
or Devil's Advocate, operating behind the scenes to secure its
passage, he placed a distinguished Whig in an unenviable
position, of necessity assigning him to the class of statesmen
known as puppets. Senator John M. Clayton was a man of
character and reputation and high achievement. His distin
guished career entitled him to protection against such a charge.
Moreover, his views on the question of the privileges of aliens
in our polity had been a matter of notoriety for some time.
The evidence which Mr. Grimes offers in proof of his
charge, namely his citations from the Missouri Democrat and
the Missouri Republican, seems substantial prima facie. He
might have cited in further proof similar evidence from the
Anzeiger des Westens wherein the same charge was asserted
and animadverted upon. Nevertheless, the charge is not there-
— 115 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
by conclusively demonstrated. Senators Atchinson and Clay
ton took notice, May 24, of the current rumors when the
Kansas-Nebraska bill was on its final passage in the senate,
the Senator from Missouri bluntly and unqualifiedly and
specifically denied the allegation: and the senator from
Delaware no less explicitly and emphatically denied the charge.
The latter declared: "I never had any communication with
him [Senator Atchinson] in reference to the subject before
I moved the amendment in the Senate, nor do I remember to
have spent a moment in conversation about it while it was
under consideration."
Curiosity will persist doubtless as to the warrant for the
assertions of the Democrat and the Republican that their re
spective editors had seen, or were cognizant of a speech or
proposition in writing of Senator Atchinson proposing such
an amendment excluding aliens from the franchise in the new
territories and declaring his purpose to introduce and secure
the passage of such a provision. There is no necessary con
tradiction between their allegations and the denials of col
lusion or conference made by Senators Atchinson and Clay
ton in the Senate. The probabilities are that it was with the
anti-alien clause, as it was with the Repeal of the Missouri
Compromise itself, with which he is now-a-days charged with
plotting and forcing, that he had such a measure in contempla
tion before he started to Washington before the opening of
that session of Congress, that he conferred with friends and
party associates respecting the matter, exhibiting his argu
ments and proposals to them to ascertain to what extent they
were satisfactory to them and advantageous to them in the
pending struggle between him and ex-Senator Benton for
supremacy in the politics of Missouri. That he did not pro
ceed with the matter as planned when he reached Washing
ton was probably the result of the rapid developments after
he reached the city; it was not necessary for him to take the
initiative, others were ready and willing and already active
in promoting what he wanted. Any one familiar with the
maneuvers of the lobbies and committee rooms of legislatures
knows that such a conclusion does no violence to facts of
— 116 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
common occurence in the politics of legislative halls and pre
cincts. The critics of Mr. Grimes in The Union — be they Senators
Dodge and Jones, or Attorney General Cushing, or the editors
proper — had him on the hip in the matter of the established
practice of Congress in providing for the franchise and con
ditions of office-holding in newly organized territories. Be
ginning with the organization of the Northwest Territory and
with the celebrated Ordinance of 1787 Congress had confined
the exercise of the franchise to citizens of the United States
and with the exception of Oregon, had not deviated from that
policy up until the introduction of Douglas' bill January 4,
1854. Under the Ordinance of 1787 and collateral acts pro
viding for the government of the Northwest, an elector had to
be a freeholder in possession of 50 acres and a resident for
at least two years preceding, as well as a citizen of the
United States ; and in case of a representative he had to qual
ify with three years' residence and 200 acres of land. These
provisions were applied to the territories of Indiana and Il
linois. When Missouri was organized in 1812 the require
ment was lessened slightly, electors had to be residents of the
region at least one year, taxpayers non-delinquent and cit
izens of the United States. On the organization of Arkansas
in 1819 the same provision was applied. In the act organizing
Wisconsin in 1836, and in the act creating the territory of
Iowa it was declared that the suffrage "shall be exercised
only by citizens of the United States." The first exception
in the case of Oregon was due to two facts ; first, aliens were
given the ballot who had declared their intention to become
citizens as an inducement to their emigration to that far off
region ; and second, as a reflex of the more liberal policy pur
sued with the foreign-born in the states of the Northwest
and trans-Mississippi states, between 1840 and 1850. The
liberal provisions in Douglas' first Nebraska bill likewise re
flected this then widespread liberal attitude towards the
foreign-born in the local legislation of the states of the middle
west and an index of their enormous political influence
at that time. It could not, however, be truthfully said that
— 117 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Oregon had established a liberal Congressional policy towards
aliens. Senator Clayton's amendment consequently did no
violence to our national practice. The hue and cry raised
against it by Mr. Grimes and the anti-slavery champions of
the North was not, therefore, provoked by any just cause of
complaint, but primarily upon the fact that it seemed to
signalize the success of nativistic propagandists who were
then making exorbitant demands adverse to the interests of the
foreign-born; and the latter held the ballot and could punish
their adversaries and unhorse the party in power if they could
be aroused to the proper pitch of resentment.
XXV.
Mr. Grimes found himself, almost if not wholly in the
lurch by reason of his citation of a private remark current
on the streets of Burlington when he said that a "distinguished
representative from Georgia has announced that in fifteen
years Iowa will be a slave state." The canons of public de
bate do not permit indiscriminate, and especially adverse, use
of remarks made in the course of private conversation.
Practiced lawyer that he was, he might have anticipated that
his Address would produce sharp debate, hot retorts and blunt
demands for the authority for his assertions. Further his
mode of statement involved every one of the Congressional
delegation from Georgia in both the Senate and the House of
Representatives; if they resented the implication, they would
have a grievance and if assailed therefor they would deny and
berate the one so misrepresenting them. Moreover if, truly re
ported, its public use involved one of his fellow citizens and
neighbors in Burlington to his detriment, as he (Mr. Grimes)
would be compelled to display his source of information in
self-defence. His fellow-townsman was soon left in a sorry
predicament. One very interesting fact in Mr. Grimes' rejoinder to
the broadside of The Union is his utter omission of any com
ment or note upon the assertion that Senator Seward, while
Governor of the State of New York, had told Governor
Smith of Virginia, that he, Seward would gladly swap the
— 118 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
German and Irish emigrants that hovered in New York for
the free Negroes of Virginia — a remark that reverberated long
and loud in the career of Senator Seward. If the "playful
remark" of Senator Butler, qualified and deodorized as it was
by Senator Butler himself was properly to influence the Ger
mans of Iowa in determining how they should vote on
Governor, how much more influence should the alleged remark
of Senator Seward exert in such determination !
Consideration of the substantial merits of Mr. Grimes'
argument save as they might involve the interests and in
clinations of the Germans as aliens, ambitious to secure the
status and the benefits of citizenship through naturalization,
would take us farther afield than the limits of this paper per
mit. His contemporaries, partisans and the public, so far
as they speak via a majority of the voters, pronounced his ar
gument solid and convincing. Historians, since his day have
recorded like opinions. A critical examination of the case
for and against Douglas' Kansas-Nebraska bill makes one
hesitate to accept such conclusion as always fair or as final.
The pleas of the pro-slavery men and the protests of the
anti-slavery leaders all comprehended matters that directly
affected the welfare of Germans.
XXVI.
In the way of a counter blast to Mr. Grimes' second Ad
dress to the People of Iowa, Congressman Bernhardt Henn
forwarded to the papers of Dubuque and Burlington copies
of the responses of the eight Representatives of Georgia to
his inquiry of April 26 in which after quoting Mr. Grimes'
first address and the alleged quotation of "a distinguished Re
presentative of Georgia", he asked ; "I desire to know whether
either of you ever so expressed yourself, or in any other way
whereby such an inference might be drawn from your language
as would convey the idea attributed to one of your number by
Mr. Grimes." Mr. Alexander H. Stephens writing for him
self and two colleagues replied on the same date in part as
follows :
***** we have only to say that we are utterly
— 119 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
at a loss upon what grounds Mr. Grimes could have
founded the assertion made in the extract of his Ad
dress to which you have called our attention. No
such idea certainly was ever advanced, or any one
from which such inference could be drawn, in any
speech made by either of us. We can but regard the
statement therefore as part of that general system
of wholesale misrepresentation which so many of
the enemies of the equal, just and republican prin
ciples of the Nebraska and Kansas bills have resorted
to for the purpose of misleading the minds of the
Northern peoples upon them — that indeed must be
a weak as well as a bad cause which has to be
sustained and bolstered up by such unfair and in
iquitous means." 39
The critical observer will have noted that Mr. Stephens
refers in his denial only to "speeches" and thus technically
may have shielded himself against an admission. In view of
Mr. Stephens' high reputation and the specific and com
prehensive interrogatory of Mr. Henn that included private
as well as public remarks, it is difficult to believe that Mr.
Stephens would thus hedge or dodge. Nevertheless Mr.
Howell abruptly and instantly charged him with "falsehood"
and "cowardly chicanery and shuffling deceit."
In his speech in Keokuk on the night of July 5 Mr.
Grimes apparently clinched his case by reading a letter from
Judge Mason reaffirming the truth of his original assertion
that he heard Mr. Stephens make such a prediction concern
ing Iowa. In view of the bitterness engendered one wonders
why Judge Mason's letter was not published in the press, if
it was read from the stump by Mr. Grimes.
Despite the reported letter of Judge Mason the question
of the reliability of the report and the veracity of Mr. Stephens
was merely pushed away from Mr. Grimes. Mr. Howell's
charge did not necessarily follow. Southerners as a rule
seldom lacked the courage to back up their convictions. His
alleged remark, if made at all, might have been made months
or even years previously and have been forgotten. Or it might
39 Dubuque. — 120 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
easily have been a hypothetical observation, made upon a
contingent event. i0

40 After the above paragraph was written, the writer came upon the
following letter from Congressman Stephens, dated at Washington,
July 28, addressed to Congressman Henn. The letter apparently was
delayed in transmission or misdirected or miscarried for it was not
given out at Fairfield, Iowa, until September 13. It did not effect the
immediate purpose for which Congressman Henn wrote Mr. Stephens,
but he gave it out, nevertheless, it appearing in the columns of The
Fairfield Sentinel. The letter is so frankly put and the considerations
so acutely and completely stated that it is given entire. In view of
the use made of the original charge by Mr. Grimes, it is but simple
justice to reproduce the letter on this ground alone — but it will be
agreed that the letter is worth perusal on its own merits for many
other reasons. Fairfield, Sept, 13, '54.
Mr. Sheward : —
Dear Sir: — In justice to the Hon. A. H. Stephens and my
self — both of us having been misrepresented by certain aboli
tion newspapers and by the abolition candidate for Governor
 1 desire you to publish the enclosed letter.
Yours truly, B. Henn.
Washington, D. C, 28th July, '54.
Dear Sir : — I am obliged to you for calling my attention to
an article in the "Iowa Observer" [of Dubuque] of the 15th
of June, commenting upon my reply to your note of inquiry
of the 26th of April, touching the correctness of a statement
made by Mr. James W. Grimes in an address to the people
of Iowa; and also to an article in the "Ledger" published at
Fairfield on the same subject. It is a matter of regret to me
that these articles, owing to my absence from Washington
City on a visit to Georgia, were not brought to my attention
earlier; but even late as it now is, I deem it proper that I
should not let them pass without notice. The writers of both
these articles affect to treat my answer to your inquiry of
April as evasive on my part, and not fully meeting the state
ment of Mr. Grimes to which your note referred. Now I
wish briefly to say to you, and to all whom it may concern,
that no evasion was intended by me. My answer was intended
to be full, positive and explicit, and was so considered by me
at the time.
"The allegation of Mr. Grimes was that "a distinguished
Representative from Georgia has announced that in fifteen
years Iowa will be a slave state." To this I said on the part
of myself and colleagues of the House, who joined me in the
reply, "we are utterly at a loss to imagine upon what ground
Mr. Grimes could have founded the assertion made in the
extract from his address to which you have called our atten
tion  No such idea certainly was ever advanced, or any
one from which such an inference could be drawn in any
speech made by either of us. We can but regard the state
ment, therefore, as part of the general system of misrepresen-
— 121 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Mr. Wm. B. W. Dent in his reply, although he must have
realized that Mr. Henn wanted a response that would aid his
party friends in Iowa and enable them to hold the favor of
the German voters, could not resist shying a rock at the Op
position that struck Germans : he said ; "The friends of the

tation which so many of the enemies of the equal, just and
republican principles of the Nebraska and Kansas bill have
resorted to for the purpose of misleading the minds of the
people of the Northern States upon them.
"The allegation was that an announcement had been made
by some Georgia representatives ; no name was mentioned, nor
any particulars given. Upon inquiry from us whether the
statement was true, myself and colleagues answered in lang
uage which I deemed distinctly emphatic and quite pointed
enough, that no such announcement had ever been made by
either of us. How we, or either of us, could have been con
sidered as having made an "announcement" of such a propo
sition in any way less formal than in a speech, did not occur
to me at any time, and may now be left for Mr. Grimes to
explain and the public to determine.
"But the writer in the Observer says :
'Mr. Grimes does not accuse him (Mr. Stephens) of mak
ing the assertion in a speech, — it was in a private conversa
tion with Judge Mason ; yet Mr. Stephens wished to quibble
out of it in this way etc., etc., etc.'
"Now, in reply to this, I wish to say that the allegation
of Mr. Grimes, to which I was replying was not that which
this writer states. It made no references to me, personally
at all. It made no allusion that [it] had been said 'in a private
conversation' by any of the Georgia representatives, with Judge
Mason, or any body else. It simply asserted that an an
nouncement had been made, etc. This 'private conversation'
version of the matter seems to have been an afterthought.
Whether this is a quibble or not I will not say, but it is cer
tainly a modification of the first statement. It is in Mr.
Grimes' second address which you have handed me, that I see
this turn is given to the matter. And to this qualification of
the 'charge' I have but a word or two to say. Mr. Grimes
gives no statement from Judge Mason. The writer in the
"Ledger" assumes that Mr. Grimes has shifted the onus of any
issues that may arise from his own shoulders to those of
Judge Mason. He also assures that as between Judge Mason
and myself the people of Iowa will have little difficulty in
determining. They know him, says he, to be an "honorable
man", they know me, "to be one of the most rabid milliners
of the South, who, on all occasions has delighted in insulting
the freemen of the North."
"I shall say nothing iri disparagement of the "honor" or
integrity of Judge Mason: my acquaintance with that gentle
man is limited. The people of Iowa doubtless know him
much better than I do, and a great deal better, I am well aware,
than they know me ; but this I will say, from my acquaintance
with him, limited as it is, I cannot allow myself to believe
— 122 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
late bill for the organization of the Territories of Nebraska
and Kansas in the Free States, will be persecuted and misre
presented by that heterogeneous mass, who burn honorable
Senators in effigy and preach Abolition sermons on the Sab
bath day." The reference included and perhaps intended the
that he ever authorized Mr. Grimes to make the allegation
which he did ; — and until I have some evidence to the con
trary, therefore, I shall forbear all further remarks upon that
point. This, however, I will say, in most emphatical and un
equivocal terms that if Judge Mason, or anybody else heard
me say in conversation, either private or public, at the dinner
table or elsewhere, anything from which he even drew the
inference that I entertained the opinion, or intended to an
nounce it as my opinion that Iowa would be a slave state in
fifteen years, or even at any time, he or any other such person
was entirely mistaken in drawing any such inference. I never
entertained such an opinion and never intended by anything
that I ever said to anybody to convey the idea or to make
the impression that I did. With the domestic affairs of Iowa
I have no concern and take no interest further than to in
dulge the desire to see that young state advance in power and
prosperity with her older sisters of a common Republic. The
statement in the "Ledger" that I am known "to be one of the
most rabid nullifiers of the South, who on all occasions has
delighted in insulting the freemen of the North" is alto
gether gratuitous, ungenerous and unjust. And if it is in this
character that I am to the people of Iowa, it is only because
I have been sadly misrepresented to them., — or rather it is
because I am not known to them at all. And though this
writer speaks of me as one who delights to insult the people
of the North on all occasions, yet I think it would be a
difficult matter for him to make good his accusation by show
ing a single instance in which I have ever indulged in this
favorite propensity, — whatever may have been my political, or
the errors of the nullifiers it is well known by those who know
me, that I have never been subject to the charge of being
attached to their sect, or of being a believer in their doctrines.
Whoever accuses me of sectional hostility to any portion of
this Union, does injustice to himself as well as a great wrong
to me. These are feelings I have never indulged in. If an un
kind word toward the people of the North generally ever
escaped me, I am not aware of it. That I have felt it my
duty to denounce a certain class of men in the North is true ;
hut it is only that class who have arrayed themselves
in sectional hostility against the South and her institutions,
in violation of the constitution of our common country. I
have been and am willing for the people of the North to take
care of their own right and interests and manage their own
internal affairs as they please, and I claim nothing more for
the South. It was with these views and opinions I voted for
the admission of Iowa as a State notwithstanding by her
constitution slavery was excluded from her limits. That was
her business, not mine. I had no disposition to interfere with
— 123 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
sensational episode in the Public Square at Chicago on the
night of March 16 when the Germans of that city burned
Senator Douglas in effigy. 41XXVII.
Interest in what we may call the ghost of the Clayton
amendment became acute again in the middle of June. The
Washington correspondent of the N. Y. Times under date of
June 13, sent that journal a dispatch which announced "an
astounding fraud" : — namely that notwithstanding the excision
of the clause denying the franchise to aliens in the new ter
ritories, that Ex-senator Benton had produced a sensation
by the announcement that the Douglas bill as it finally passed
had a clause that excluded foreigners after the first election
and that the law further worked a virtual exclusion of
aliens in the clause requiring them to take a special oath to
support the provisions of that particular law. The cor
respondent informed his readers that these provisions were
"inserted" or rather that it was charged that they were in
serted after the House had rejected the Clayton amendment.
The announcement produced no end of curious and contempt-

her institutions then, I have just as little now.
Yours most respectfully, Alexander H. Stephens.
Hon. Beinhart Henn,
House of Representatives,
Washington, D. C.
The present writer submits that it is very curious that Judge
Mason's letter to Mr. Grimes, reported to have been read or referred
to by Mr. Grimes in his speech at Keokuk, July 5, was not given out
to the Opposition press and given the extensive circulation accorded
Mr. Grimes' original allegation and the correspondence of the Georg
ian Congressional delegation.
The incident illustrates again the aggressions and injustice of so
much partizan political discussion. The rules of fair dealing among
men are constantly infringed and often grossly violated and the victims
are helpless and unable to recover. Senator Dodge and his associates
in Congress suffered unjustly and Mr. Grimes obtained improperly an
ill-gotten benefit.
41 The writer has described at some length the incidents connected
with the burning of Senator Douglas in effigy in Chicago in an article
entitled "The Germans of Chicago and Stephen A. Douglas in 1854."
See Deutsch-Amerikanische Geschichtsblatter, Jahrbuch der Deutsch-
Amerikanischen Historischen Gesellschaft von Illinois, .... Jahrgang
1912 (Vol. XII), pp. 381 — 404. — 124 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
uous comment throughout the North. The Washington Union
denounced the story as pure fabrication and stupid collusion;
and set out the original provisions, the Clayton amendment
and the facts as to the actual law then on the statute books.
The Davenport Gazette and the The Hawkeye of Burlington
accepted the announcement of the Times as correct and dis
cussed the matter as indubitable. The Journal of Muscatine
did not accept the assertion and gave no countenance to the
notion. The editors showed that a close reading of the law
worked no such exclusion as alleged. They might have added
that the provision exacting an oath to support the provisions
of the territorial act was a clause repeated from previous
territorial acts.
Placation of the Germans and design to counteract the
effect of Mr. Grimes' Address was clearly in Mr. Henn's
mind in the conclusion of his speech on Douglas' bill on its
passage in the House which he delivered on May 20 and which
was reprinted in the Democratic papers in Iowa in the latter
weeks of June. His Whig colleague, Mr. J. P. Cook, had
four days before given to the public printer the draft of a
speech which he had "intended to have spoken in the House
of Representatives on May 16" and which he "published to
communicate his views to his constituents." It was an "Old
Line Whig" speech: He praised the Compromise of 1850;
he lauded President Fillmore and his administration ; and
denounced the disturbance of the adjustment of the Slavery
question which that statesman had achieved. He had no word
of disapproval for Senator Clayton's amendment — although he
was prudent if he approved for he said nothing respecting the
amendment. His attitude towards matters in issue as in
dicated in his speech probably accounted for his not being
renominated for Congress at Oskaloosa.
Mr. Henn's speech had considerable salt and some pepper
in its composition ; and the conduct of the Opposition in Iowa
was constantly in his mind's eye. After tartly denouncing
the hypocritical pretenses of the Whigs of Iowa in asserting
respect for the constitutional guarantees of the owners of
— 125 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
slaves when on three different occasions they had combined
with "Abolitionists" in political campaigns in Iowa and hold
ing up to scorn the conduct of "the Abolition Conclave" that
started the agitation against the Nebraska bill by their "Ap
peal" to the country, Mr. Henn concludes with denunciation
of the "odious" Clayton Amendment "introduced into the
Senate by a Whig from Delaware, and intended to be in
troduced into this House by the Whig Representative from
the fourth district of North Carolina [Mr. Rogers] an amend
ment that would, if adopted, destroy the virtue of the bill
and make an odious discrimination against those who have
made this country and our institutions theirs by choice and
not by accident."
Mr. Henn thereupon launches into a panegyric of the
European emigrant — of whom the first were the Pilgrim
Fathers "once foreigners." "We, ourselves, are but the sons,
or grandsons, at farthest, of foreigners. ***** Sir, I want
the industrious, the persevering, the frugal German, I want
the hightoned and chivalric Irishman, I want the staid and
honest Scot, to settle in our frontier territories; yes, Sir,
and I want their aid and assistance in framing the laws that
are to be made for the government of these territories.
Would I disfranchise them ? No, never ! Let us pass the bill
without this odious 'amendment.' Let us do justice though
the Heavens fall." Our Congressional leaders usually do
not become so intense and magniloquent unless the exigencies
of the hustings arouse their energies and stir their imagination
and sharpen their wits, and enhance their fears.
There was more or less breaking of lances by the Demo
cratic and the Opposition editors in Iowa over the attitudes
of their respective parties toward the aliens in theory and
in practice. Thus Mr. T. B. Cuming, editor of The Dispatch
of Keokuk, flaunted the slashing speech of Senator Thompson
of Kentucky, decrying the favor shown the foreign-born in
our legislation and political programs, in his speech in the
Senate at Washington on April 19 on the Homesead bill, as
a characteristic utterance of the Whig leaders who were then
— 126 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
pretending to so much love for the alien and concern for his
welfare. Mr. Howell under the caption "The Nebrascals on
Foreigners" retorted (June 30) first, with a citation of Senator
Butler's much quoted remark, second, with a quotation from
the National Democrat, an "Administration" organ with pro
nounced "Americanistic" tendencies, that excoriated the Irish,
and thirdly, with an extract from the Richmond Enquirer (Va..) ,
exalting Slavery as "the main safeguard against foreign blight."
The endless changeability of the discussion is admirably
illustrated by this reference to the Irish. The Hibernians'
fondness for the Democratic party was well known, and among
the Opposition, it usually produced top-lofty contempt and
blistering comments. The confluence in discussion of the
problem of the "Foreigners" and of the "Nigger" question is
effectively illuminated in Mr. Howell's editorial, a portion
of which is given.
"But as a whole, the Irish are always insincere,
always corrupt, always ungrateful, ignorant, bigotted,
despotic. They are unfit for freedom and cannot
properly appreciate it * * * * From such elements of
mischief we say, with the Ritual, Good Lord deliver
us! "And the Richmond Enquirer, a Virginian organ
of Locofocoism, exalts the Negroes infinitely above
the Foreigners, declaring that 'Slavery fends off the
stream of vicious emigration from the South. In a
few years, the blasphemous reformers who curse the
constitution for legalizing, and the Bible for con
secrating Slavery, will curse Heaven that did not
bless the North with Slavery— the only antidote to
a crowded motley, foreign and native population'.
***** jja{j thgy (t^e immigrants) feudal lords
and masters like Russians, Hungarians, and Turks,
to furnish them with homes, houses, and subsistence,
not one would quit."
Such expressions, Mr. Howell insisted, were thoroughly
typical of Pro-slavery sentiments; and he utterly repudiated
the views of Senator Thompson of Kentucky, denied him
the right to be further called a Whig and classed him with
— 127 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Pierce and Douglas, Dodge and Jones, who had plotted to
"perpetrate a great wrong, and justified the ground that
Negroes were a better population for Kansas and Nebraska
than Foreigners." And thus they clashed with and slashed
at each other up and down the river until election day.
XXVIII.
A political campaign is a kaleidoscopic affair in its in
numerable phases and constant variation. The campaign of
1854 in Iowa affords us many instructive illustrations of the
interaction and by-play of clashing interests within the Op
position forces.
The personal character and conduct of the Germans in
normal social life in this country was one complex of popular
interest among natives. It formed the base line from which
much sharp discussion was formed and proceeded to the con
fusion later of the very critics who indulged in the caustic
comments and harsh observations. Native critics were seldom
considerate in their characterizations, to say nothing of caution
and prudence from the standpoint of the party worker de
sirous of holding all of his forces together and of attracting
to his standards the dissentients and discontented of the party
in power. Some illustrations of the course of discussion and
the perplexities of the Opposition leaders are briefly noted.
The Germans were frequently — and, one might fairly
say, generally — the objects of animadversions by scornful
native American editors who were advocates of drastic legis
lation prohibiting the liquor traffic because of the well known
opposition of Germans to such legislation. The animadver
sions were usually of such a character as to make any sort
of a political alliance with their critics almost impossible.
Germans in the main, were Democrats ; and Germans stood
for entire freedom from particular restraints in the traffic
in stimulants. They were wont to speak out plainly and
bluntly their intense feelings in opposition to proposed pro
hibitory measures. This outspokenness brought back upon their
heads harsh and contemptuous comments with regard to their
characters and allegations of their fondness for low or ques-
— 128 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
tionable indulgences that were exceedingly hard to endure with
sweet temper. The following excerpt from an editorial in the
Chicago Tribune in January and a brief editorial comment
thereon by Mr. Howell in the Valley Whig January 26, dis
play a common feeling in the first part of 1854 :
"for FREE rum."
'The German Democrats of Iowa held a conven
tion in Iowa and resolved to support no person for
any office, who is not unequivocally pledged against
all liquor laws and in favor of perfect freedom in the
liquor traffic. At Peoria in this state a similar deter
mination has been manifested. Here in Chicago, al
so, we believe the Germans are almost unanimously
opposed to all laws restraining the sale of ardent
spirits." Chicago Tribune.
"And for these same Dutch votes politicians are
willing to consign legions of their fellow citizens to
the miseries of a drunkard's life and a drunkard's
grave and thousands of innocent children to want
and wretchedness."
Assuming that there is no counter argument possible, that
the business in question is an abomination such language con
signs all dissentients to the bottomless pit. It was language
that indicated an attitude of condemnation and contempt that
could not easily be forgiven or forgotten. It scorched and
it scarred. Those who use such language were heedless of
the future; they did not anticipate any turn in the tide that
might make them desire the good will and support of those
of whom they spoke or wrote so contemptuously. It was not
many months before the editor of the Valley Whig found his
harsh words embarrassing for he discovered that he very much
coveted those same "Dutch votes" which he referred to with
such scorn in January.
At the close of the campaign, when the Opposition
leaders were striving to their very uttermost to shake the
loyalty of the Germans to the Democratic party, Mr. Howell
indulged in entirely different sentiments. When Mr. Merritt
of the Daily Miner's Express of Dubuque in an article entitled
"An Appeal to the Germans" in which they later are urged
— 129 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
to vote for ex-Governor Hempstead for Congress because his
Whig opponent was a "Maine-Law-ite" Mr. Howell gave forth
(July — ) the following:
"How must the cheeks of intelligent Germans
tingle with shame to see such an appeal addressed
to their countrymen with the accompanying implica
tion as to their habits."
It is a wonder the Valley Whig did not praise "the sweet
German accent" that had given General Winfield Scott such
distinction among the Germans in his efforts to capture the
German votes in his disastrous canvass for the presidency
in 1852. The crass contradiction so common in politics is effect
ually illustrated in the attitude of the Opposition press for
the respective stands taken by the candidates for Governor
upon the Temperance question. To the pointblank inquiry
of the Reverend Henry Clay Dean as to whether he would
approve or veto a prohibitory law should he be elected
Governor, he replied that he would not veto it because he
deemed it a matter appropriate for the Legislature to decide.
And that he would not encroach upon the perogative of the
Legislature. Mr. Curtis Bates, the Democratic candidate for
Governor replied to the same effect, that he would interpose
no official act "to defeat the will of the people" in respect
to prohibition. The Opposition press very generally and very
generously approved, not to say praised, Mr. Grimmes' explicit
declaration, but curiously enough some of them spoke con
temptuously of Mr. Bates' position that exactly paralleled Mr.
Grimes'. 42 On the eve of the election Mr. Howell of the
Valley Whig thus expressed himself :
"we are all a — dodging"
So might sing a large number of the Democratic
candidates in the present canvass. They are either
for Dodge, or against Dodge, or making desperate
attempts to dodge some of the most important ques
tions ever agitated by a people.
42 Failfield Ledger, March 30, 1854.
— 130 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Ask Mr. Curtis Bates whether he will favor a law
prohibiting liquor, and instead of giving his opinion
on the subject, and defining his position in a straight
forward manly way, he dodges behind a sneaking ex
pression in regard to the will of the people. *****
Verily, verily it depends on whose ox is gored as to the
state of our feelings and the nature of our views on men
and measures.
The forwardness of the "temperance" question in public
debate and its obtrusion into the very centre of the arena in
practical decisions of the day is suggested in a letter to the
Tri-Weekly Muscatine Journal printed April 19 under the
invidious title "The Germans and the Whisky Traffic." The
writer who hid behind the signature "A" denounces the Ger
mans for their undue prominence in "the nefarious business"
and declared that "nine tenths of our Doggeries are kept by
Germans" ; and he demands that Germans declare them
selves upon the issue of their abolition and prohibition. His
language, as is usual in such pleas on such burning issues, was
blunt, harsh and without reservation; it virtually classed all
who did not instantly denounce both the traffic and the traf
fickers therein to be unworthy of public respect, as unfit and
untrustworthy. The writer was oblivious of the fact, or he
ignores the fact that Germans, according to the returns of
the national census in 1850, constituted but 7152 out of a
total population of 192,214 in the entire state; that "Amer
icans", sons of the soil here, patronized those "doggeries";
and "grocery stores" in nearly every town in the state sold
"spirits" and they were owned and operated for the most
part by natives — not by Germans; and it was a gratuitous
insult to particularize the Germans as the major offenders
because in Muscatine they happened to be numerous in con
ducting the business. The writer furthermore was oblivious
of another important fact. He no doubt was no less ardent
against the institution of slavery : and he seems to have been
unaware of the possible serious adverse effects his harsh and
ruthless observations and blunt demands would have upon
the alignments of the Germans in the approaching election.
The comments and demand of "A" did not go unheeded.
They evoked (May 8) a sharp rejoinder from a German who
— 131 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
signed himself "B". One caustic observation made by him
shows the course of the feelings and thinking of the Germans :
"We have been oppressed by tyrants, who made
us leave our homes * * * * but we will try to have
in this free republican land, the same individual free
dom we had when under the government of tyrant
monarchs." The militant advocates of the Maine-Law could see no
connection between the abominations of slavery and the de
mands of the "Forty Eighters" for personal liberty that to
the Puritanical mind and conscience meant license that usually,
as they saw it, proceeded down the runways into licentious
ness and lawlessness and gross crime. They gave short shrift
to the contenders for such alleged personal liberty and tower
ing contempt and summary intolerance of all such pleas were
accorded them.
XXIX.
The methods, objectives and dire perplexities of the Op
position party leaders and campaign managers in respect of
the Germans in the campaign of 1854 are constantly exhibited
in the columns of the contemporary press. The party managers
were aware of the need of German speakers. They knew
that the majority of the editors of the German press through
out the North was outspoken against the Repeal of the Mis
souri Compromise: and the candidates and their campaign
committees and managers were keenly alive to the increase
of strength they would secure if they could discover and en
list some effective German speakers on their behalf in the
active campaign. They soon discovered and secured the co
operation of one who was able to promote the anti-Slavery
cause with no little energy and effect on the business — Dr. F.
Ciolina of Burlington. He seems to have been a learned and
well travelled man and withal very eloquent if we may be
lieve contemporary accounts. He spoke in various parts of
the State. ,
The dilemma in which both party managers and Germans
found themselves in the course of the campaign is illustrated
— 132 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
in the account of his speech on Monday evening, June
26 at Muscatine — a city constantly rent assunder by violent
discussion between the "Maine-Law-ites" and the alleged de
fenders of the "Doggeries." Dr. Ciolina was evidently highly
esteemed by the Germans and his importance was apparently
conceded by Messrs. Mahin and Clemens of the Journal,
for the Germans took pains to report in formal manner an
account of his meeting and speech duly authenticated by the
President and Secretary of the meeting. The following ac
count is interesting both for what it recites and for what it
evidently omits : ADDRESS OF DR. CIOLINA.
Dr. F. Ciolina was introduced to the audience and
proceeded to address the meeting upon the subjects
of the Nebraska Bill and the Ohio Liquor law.
"The Doctor spoke open and strong in his address
in opposition to the former measure and advocating
the liquor law.
"His unquestionable ability and fine oratorical
power enabled him to do justice to the important sub
jects and drew from his hearers repeated rounds of
applause. "The unanimity of sentiment and enthusiasm which
prevailed at the meeting proved conclusively that
the German citizens of this city are awake to their
interests and determined to use all honorable efforts
in favor of freedom and for the promotion of the
happiness of mankind." John G. Stein, Pres.
C. H. Mannhardt, Sec.
The emphasis of Dr. Ciolina and his reporters is clearly
upon the infringement of human liberty and both slavery and
the Maine law were in contemplation in their characterization.
The Journal could not ignore the occasion and the speaker and
it could not refuse space to their formal account of the meet
ing and the editors did not feel it prudent to display indiffer
ence to the event or to the speaker's sentiment. The Journal
did the prudent thing. It gave a fair editorial resume of
Dr. Ciolina's speech without hint of criticism or dissent.
— 133 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
"THE GERMANS."
"On Monday Dr. F. Ciolina of Burlington, ad
dressed our Whig German fellow citizens at Hare's
Hall, advocating the election of the Whig candidates
to the offices for which they have been severally
nominated. He showed the importance of voting so
as to manifest the true anti-Slavery extension senti
ment of the people of Iowa, and thus rebuke the pre
sumption of those who have misrepresented her in
the national councils, and encourage those in other
states, who are in favor of free territory. He op
posed the addition of any more slave territory on the
ground that free labor should be no more forced into
competition with slave labor ; and particularly opposed
the Nebraska bill as a breach of plighted faith.
"The Doctor expressed himself in favor of the
Ohio Liquor Law, permitting, as he informed the
audience, the use and sale of beer, wine and cider
manufactured within the state, and prohibiting the
sale of all important liquors, and suppressing the
manufacture and sale of all fiery liquors such as
whisky, brandy, gin, etc."
The title of Mr. Mahin's editorial "The Germans" is
suggestive. It was adroit and it might — or might not — be
without prejudice in being thus used as the caption of the
account of the meeting. The forepart of the editorial dealt
with the advocacy of views in which all factions of the Op
position concurred ; the latter portion, Mr. Mahin knew would
produce instant and decisive disagreement among the num
erous propagandists of the Maine-Law.
XXX.
One may discern both desire and design to allure the Ger
man voter in sundry resolutions passed by some of the local
or county conventions in June and July — particularly in the
Congressional conventions in the First or Southern District
of the State. The convention that nominated Mr. R. L. B.
Clarke for Congress at Oskaloosa June 7, included the follow
ing in the Resolutions adopted:
5. Resolved, That we welcome to our broad
prairies and free homes all of the oppressed of every
— 134 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
nation and clime, and claim for the oppressed
foreigner declaring an intention to become a citizen,
all of the rights and privileges of an American citizen,
Senators Dodge, Jones and Butler to the contrary
notwithstanding. 6. Resolved, That the declaration of a Southern
Democratic Senator, lately made in the Senate of the
United States, that the People of Iowa would prefer
a population of slaveholders with their slaves to Ger
mans and other immigrants from Continental Europe,
is false and meets with our unqualified disapproba
tion."The Democrats assembled in a similar convention at
Chariton, and they too felt constrained to give expression of
concern for the foreign-born seeking a home among us. For
obvious reasons they could not take as strong a position
favorable to them as the Opposition. They gave no expres
sion as to the Grimes-Butler controversy, although then-
Senators had secured Judge Butler's disavowal of ill-natured
purpose or invidious suggestion. But they did speak out
strongly on one matter, repudiating the course taken by the
majority of their party at Washington, namely on the na
tional land policy, as follows :
Resolved, That the Democratic party of Iowa are
in favor of the immediate passage of the Homestead
Bill, giving 160 acres of land to every person who is
now a citizen of the United States, or who has de
clared his intention of becoming such.
The Whigs of Lee county, in which the city of Keokuk
and Fort Madison are located, in their county convention
denounced the alleged remarks of Senator Butler and Mr.
Alexander H. Stephens, affecting Iowa, as "both libels on
the intelligence and the morals and the republican sentiments
of the people of this state." This pronouncement produced
a sharp interchange of comments between Messrs. Cuming
and Howell.
The party managers and candidates found that the Ger
mans were a two-edged sword and not at all indisposed to
— 135 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
"cut both ways." The consequence was that party programs
faced both ways : or rather the candidates found it expedient
and wise to face but one way at a time according to the locality
and the preponderant sentiment of the community in which
they happened to operate in the course of their canvass.
Thus in and about Dubuque there was much hedging and
taking to cover and masterly silence anent matters in moot
among the Germans, who were numerous and powerful pol
itically in Dubuque county. Mr. Jas. Thorington, who was
prominent in the "Temperance League", who was the can
didate of the Whigs for Congress, was reported to be exert
ing "an anti-Nebraska influence among the Germans in
Dubuque." The Dubuque Tribune dwelt with great feeling
and emphasis upon the Nebraska bill and urges them to defeat
Governor Hempstead, the Democratic candidate for Congress
because he favors that iniquitous measure, because Senator
Douglas, its author was an owner of slaves, and because
slavery was hostile to the interests of the Germans. Mr.
Merritt retorted in force in The Miner's Express (July 19)
under the caption "An Appeal to the Germans." After deny
ing that Douglas lived in the South or operated slave labor
and denying that the Nebraska bill "legislated" slavery into
the new Territories he countered with the following:
But while Gov. Hempstead is in favor of the
Nebraska bill, which perhaps may not be pleasing to
a portion of our German population, is he not opposed
to another measure which as deeply interests this
class as does the Nebraska bill, and that is the Maine
Liquor law? Mr. Thorington, the governor's op
ponent for Congress, belongs to the "Temperance
League" and goes for the adoption of the Maine
Liquor law in Iowa, while the Governor is opposed
to all such fanaticism. Now, the question arises,
which of these men represents the true feelings and
interests of the Germans, the one who despises their
habits and attempts by every expedient which his in
genuity can suggest, to deprive them of the means of
social enjoyment or the one who is liberal and ra
tional in his views and is not to be controlled by every
— 136 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
breeze of fanatical reform which happens to pass
over the land?
This is an important and interesting question for
our German people to settle.
Mr. Howell, at Keokuk took notice (July 21) of and
quoted the sentiment just quoted and as we have seen with
top-lofty indignation and scorn repelled the idea that Ger
mans could be charged with "habits" with which the article
in the Express by insinuation and implication ascribed to
them. The critical may doubt greatly whether Mr. Merritt
by indirection or otherwise hinted at habits that the proper
or the pius frown upon and even if he did whether Mr. Howell
exactly hit or realized the point of Mr. Merritt's plea.
XXXI.
It is perhaps a bootless undertaking to try to determine
precisely what moot problem or question was foremost or
uppermost in the consciousness of the electors of Iowa in the
momentous campaign of 1854. The major number, if not
all, of latter-day historians assume and assert without any
hesitation or qualification that Slavery was the one single and
sole issue about which discussion concentrated and collided;
and that neither "Temperance" nor "Know-Nothingism" was
an appreciable or considerable factor in the formation or
concentration of the Anti-slavery forces. Sufficient has been
given to disturb such notions : they have no foundation. The
local press of Iowa teems with accounts of political expres
sions that leave one utterly perplexed as to which of the
three issues named was foremost.
The old-line Democrats of Lee and Dubuque counties
saw but httle else than the question of Slavery worth con
sideration or pressing for decision. Thus a considerable body
of them addressed some very specific interrogatories to
their legislative candidates in Lee county demanding responses
from them as to their attitude towards the course of their
party at Washington on the Repeal of the Missouri com
promise and they would have no hedging or tergiversation:
they insisted upon downright and public approval of the "Ad-
— 137 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
ministration's course. In a "Political Catechism" issued by
the Dubuque Daily Herald (Aug. 5) for the instruction of
the faithful and the doubtful alike just on the eve of the elec
tion, the initial interrogatories and responses were concerned
with and emphasized and particularized the primary import
ance of the Democratic party's course upon the Kansas-Ne
braska law: then followed questions and answers relative to
the interests of the foreign-born therein.
But a mass convention in Van Buren county late in July
declared that the paramount question was the Prohibition of
the traffic in alcoholic liquors. 43 Temperance lecturers, re
presenting various churches and organizations, were energet
ically promoting the agitation for restrictive legislation here
and there throughout the state in the last days of the canvass.
Mr. Henry Clay Dean, State lecturer of the Methodist Church,
a Mr. G. W. Levi Leland, Lecturer of the Temperance League,
were conspicuous. In the latter part of June Mr Hiram Price,
President of the "Maine-Law Alliance for Iowa" issued a
long Address "To the Friends of Temperance in Iowa," in
which that reform is placed formost in public importance. 44
In Muscatine county the Central Committee for that county
issued a long and strong Address to the voters in which the
first great measure demand was lst a Prohibition law, 2nd
the restoration of the Missouri Compromise. 45 In April we
read of a "Maine Law League Meeting" in Burlington in
which the Rev. W. F. Cowles offered the following resolution
"lst Resolved, That we need a Prohibitory Liquor
Law in Iowa.
2nd Resolved, THAT WE WILL HAVE IT"
and in the latter part of the same month we read of "a
tremendous meeting of the friends of Temperance at Concert
Hall" at Keokuk which was addressed by Mr. James Thor
ington, the Whig candidate for Congress in the north half
of the state, by Mr Leland and, the account adds, by a "Mr.
43 Quoted in Des Moines Valley Whig, Aug 2 1854
44 Ibid, June 28, 1854.
45 Tri-Weekly Muscatine Journal, June 28, 1854.
M Burlington Daily Telegraph, April 7, 1854.
— 138 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Starkey of the "Harry Nation" who was going it on the loud
when we left at ten o'clock." 4T And much more to this
same effect might be offered to show that "Maine-Law-ism"
was the real head and front of public discussion on the hust
ings in Iowa in 1854.
We see the person and things we are looking for as a
rule; and as our concern or interests may prompt we are
alert to discern that which engages our feelings and hopes
and to see such simply and largely in the endless criss cross
of men and things. Men and measures in the usual confusion
and flux of life are inextricably intermingled and interfused;
and it is absurd often to endeavor to insist that this or that
person or matter in issue was or is the one paramount concern
of the electors. Nevertheless we can usually discern that
which chiefly engages the attention or the anxiety of those
charged with the major responsibility of achieving success
and we may detect those matters upon which they lay stress
as, in their judgment at least, more important than other
matters crowding forward. Party managers, especially in the
final clinches of a hard fought campaign, concentrate upon
those matters, upon that interest or issue, in which they be
lieve the doubful or unknown factor in the situation, namely,
"the thinking third" is chiefly concerned, and to that they
address their arguments or pleas and direct their partisan
maneuvres. Tested by these considerations there is a considerable
body of evidence to justify the conclusion that the interests
of the foreign-born, and of the Germans in particular, were
largely in the forefront of the consciousness of the Opposi
tion managers in the latter days of the campaign in Iowa in
1854. Such concentration was clearly discerned by them to
be necessary, as the event proved. More than this, the Demo
crats perceived the strategic importance of the German voter
in the contest and equally with the Opposition addressed their
arguments to him in the final days of the campaign.
The forwardness of the foreign-born and his concern
41 Des Moines Valley Whig, April 27, 1854.
— 139 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
in the discussions during the campaign has been demonstrated
and to offer further evidence may be needlessly piling Ossa
upon Pelion ad nauseam; but the particular purpose in sub
mitting additional evidence in conclusion is to demonstrate
that the foreign-born constituted the major objective of the
party managers' tactics in the final days of the campaign. Again
as throughout the preceding pages contemporary documents
will be generously drawn upon to make clear the justice of
the assertion just made. XXXII.
On July 13, there was held at Charleston in Lee County,
a Whig Convention. It was a delegate convention and all
parts of the county were fairly represented. Among the
delegates were Mr. J. B. Howell, editor of the Valley Whig,
Mr Phillip Viele and Dr. John Claypoole of Ft. Madison,
influential party leaders in that part of the state. In ad
dition to the nomination of candidates for the state legislature
and various county offices they appointed a committee of five
on Resolutions, of which Mr. Viele, Chairman, and Mr.
Howell were members. The resolutions which they reported
were unanimously adopted by the convention. In accordance
with section seven (7) thereof, the resolutions were not only
to be printed in the Valley Whig but the Campaign Com
mittee were directed to reprint the resolutions on handbills
for general distribution among the voters.
The Campaign Committee pursuant to instructions, had
a large broadside or poster printed that virtually reproduced
the minutes of the Proceedings of the Conventions at Char
leston. Their handbill entitled "The Proceedings of the Lee
County Whig Convention" gave first the names of the
delegates — the Resolutions adopted — the names of the places
and dates for the meetings in the county beginning Monday,
July 24, at Ft. Madison, to Monday, July 31, at Keokuk— the
names of the candidates for state and local offices and some
additional matter. It closed with some addenda in the way
of comparisons showing the obvious virtue of the course of
the Whig in contrast with the unrighteousness of the Demo-
— 140 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
cratic procedure. The Handbill was of noticeable size — about
18 by 30 inches in dimensions. *8
The resolutions are reproduced entire — save the last two
— six and seven.
1 — Resolved, That the remark of Senator Butler,
of South Carolina, to the purport that the people
of Iowa would prefer the existence of Slavery and
the residence of negro slaves in their midst, to the
residence of the immigrants of Continental Europe....
and the remark of Hon. A. H. Stephens of Georgia,
that in a few years the people of Iowa would in
troduce and adopt Slavery, are both libels on the in
telhgence and the moral and republican sentiments
of the people of this State.
2 — Resolved, That the repeal of the Missouri Com
promise and the admissibility of Slavery into Kansas
and Nebraska, which had been dedicated to Freedom
and free labor by that Compromise more than thirty
years ago, was an outrageous attack upon the rights
of the free white men of the United States ;
that no man ought to be elected by the Freemen of
Iowa for either our State Legislature or our Na
tional Congress who does not prefer Freedom to
Slavery, and who will not, if elected, endeavor to
have said Compromise reenacted.
3 — Resolved, That the thanks of this convention
are hereby given to Col. Benton, Hon John Bell,
and the other opponents of the Nebraska bill in the
Congress of the United States, for the zealous and
able efiorts they made to prevent the repeal of the
Missouri-Compromise. 4 — Resolved, That we are in favor of such an al
teration of our State Constitution as will secure to
the people a sound and safe domestic currency, and
expel from our state the small notes and shinplaster
currency sent in from other states, over which our
state has no control, and from which our people
frequently suffer.
5 — Resolved, That we hold the use, manufacture
48 Original in the Aldrich collections of the Historical Department
of Iowa in a Folio of old newspapers, No. 4.
— 141 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
of and traffic in intoxicating liquors as a beverage, to
be a political as well as moral evil, and as such believe
it is a legitimate subject for legislation, and that we
desire such efficient legislation as will drive out the
evil from our midst.
6 — (Exacts pledges of candidates on above.)
7 — (Provides that above be printed in handbill
form and distributed over county.)
An examination of the Handbill justifies several sub
stantial inferences and conclusions.
Party managers who are experienced in practical pol
itical campaigns, seldom deal with abstractions or "remote
eventualities" as diplomats are wont to phrase contingent
future events ; and they know too, that as a rule, it is im
perative, in effective campaigning to deal with those matters
which immediately engage the minds of the electors whose
votes are essential to success. Otherwise they can neither
attract nor hold their attention nor secure their favorable dis
position and allure them to their standards.
If this is the general rule of practice, then the concern
of the Foreign-born and their interest in the course of our
government in respect of Slavery were esteemed the most
important objective for the Opposition to achieve. The second
in order of importance was the Reenactment of the Missouri
Compromise. The third was the reform of the Banking
system and the fourth was the Prohibition of the traffic in
alcoholic stimulants.
The incitement of the foreign-born in the country to de
sert their Democratic partisans because of Senator Butler's
alleged invidious remark is apparent; and the correlative de
sign to frighten the anti-Slavery fears of the Southern folk
who were preponderant in Lee County is no less clear. The
reference to Senator Butler obviously killed two birds with
one stone; but the projection of that remark into the first re
solution obviously indicated that the convention was of the
opinion that defections of the Germans were thereby to be
increased or insured and thus victory made more certain.
— 142 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Another fact supporting this conclusion is that Mr.
Grimes had made Senator Butler's "playful remark" and Mr.
Stephen's alleged prophecy, a major contention in his "Address
to the People of Iowa" three months before and the Ad
ministration and Opposition press had been ringing the
changes on their meanings and import during those three
months — Mr. Grimes himself not allowing the public to forget
the Southern Senator's observation and the Georgian's pre
diction. It is evident that the two items were not spent
rockets but very live coals and the practical party workers
in the Charleston convention manifestly deemed them the
most effective war materials at their command at the time.
The constant reiteration of the charges and countercharges
respecting the Clayton Amendment; its alleged restoration;
and the controversy over Senator Atchinson's relation there
to — all these enhanced the emphasis upon the conscious con
centration upon the foreign-born as the major strategic ob
jective in the campaign. XXXIII.
The last appeals of party candidates and editors just on
the eve of the electoral decision are invariably unmistakable
signs of what the chief concern is and what is the major
point of partisan concentration. Here we may easily discern
anxiety relative to the Germans and the emphasis upon their
interests in the pending decision.
We have seen that the Dubuque Tribune in the middle
of July, addressed an editorial direct to the Germans, urging
them to vote for Mr. Grimes for Governor and Mr. Thoring
ton for Congressman because of the course of the Democracy
on the Missouri Compromise and the Homestead bill. On
July 19, the Daily Miner's Express, under the heading "An
Appeal to the Germans", assailed that editorial as both fal
lacious and pretentious and retorted with a vigorous counter
stroke anent the Maine-lawism of the Opposition candidate
for Congress. On Aug. 2, Mr. Merritt had another editorial
entitled "How do the Germans Stand on Nebraska?"
In many respects the most daring editorial in the Demo-
— 143 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
cratic press was the "Political Catechism" prepared for the
instruction of the voters by Editor D. A. Mahoney in the
Dubuque Daily Herald for August 5- It bluntly declares the
right of the people to establish Slavery in any State or ter
ritory as they might decide to do and it no less bluntly de
clared the restriction of the right of suffrage to citizens
of the United States and the exclusion of aliens. The char
acter and contents of the editorial were of such a sort as to
imply the firmest assurance of the continued loyalty of the
Germans to the Democratic party standards. Mr. Mahoney
apparently entertained no doubts whatever.
The Keokuk Dispatch for August 2 contains two in
structive expressions addressed directly to the foreign-born
voters. The first is a frank word of warning. The second is
a suggestion of a similar sort.
A WORD TO ADOPTED CITIZENS.
"It is well enough on the eve of the election to
ask the question, what is the relation existing be
tween the whig party and "Native American" alias
"Know-Nothingism?" "We adduce a few facts that establish conclusively
that a coalition exists between the whigs and "Know-
Nothings" wherever the latter have showed their
head in local elections.
"In Philadelphia Know-Nothingism carried the
election triumphantly for the whigs.
"In Washington City the same result followed a
union of the whigs and Know-Nothings.
"In Norfolk Virginia they were found working
side by side, and so in Memphis, Tenn.
"These are significant facts **********
COALITION.
"Strenuous efforts are being put forth at this time
by the Whigs of Iowa and I might add of the whole
North, to coalesce or bring together the atomic prin
ciples of the WHIG the FREESOIL, the ABOLI
TION, and the Native American parties, and upon
the coalition being completely effected, it is proposed
to baptize the offspring with the name "Republican"
Horace Greeley standing as its godfather." *****
— 144 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
The point of the caution is obvious. All foreign-born
voters had reason to fear the anti- foreign prejudices then
rapidly rising and surging in heavier tides throughout the
country and which had come over into Iowa in no uncertain
fashion. 49 The Opposition contained or were striving to
allure to their camps all of the anti-foreign propagandists
Ergo, Germans beware.
Equally pointed and suggestive are sundry articles,
editorial and others, appearing in the columns of the Valley
Whig on the same date in the same city. The first one is a
summary of the chief contentions of Mr. Orestes A. Brown-
son in a then recent article in the Catholic Review which had
been printed in the Newark (N. J.) Mercury giving that
writer's views of the need of remedial action within circles
of the Catholic Church.
"nativism in the catholic church."

"1 — Native Americanism is in itself but the ex
pressing of that spirit of nationality essential to every
government. "2 — The exclusion of all foreigners from the right
of suffrage would be desirable.
"3 — Native Americanism, as it exists in the party
49 The following is a reprint of a foot-note that appears in a
Monograph by the writer, published in 1907, entitled "Iowa and the
first Nomination of Abraham Lincoln", page 52.
"Col. Joseph Eiboeck, editor since 1874 of Der Iowa Staats-An-
s'eiger of Des Moines, spent his youth in Dubuque between 1849 and
1859. In a statement (MSS.) given the writer, August 12, 1907, after
describing a physical encounter between the editor of The Express
aud Herald and the postmaster of Dubuque, also editor of The Ob
server, a paper devoted to Know-Nothingism Colonel Eiboeck says of
developments in that city: "But the Know Nothing days were stormy
ones. In 1853 and '4 there was scarcely a day but fist fights and rows
between Know Nothing rowdies and German and Irish born citizens
took place. Every house in which a foreign born citizen lived was
Ciialked with an X and thus marked for espionage and 'persecution,
those of Irish and German Catholics in particular."
Colonel Eiboeck who has since died had the most vivid recollections
or the bitter experiences of his countrymen with the malevolence of
Know Nothingism in Dubuque in the years 1853-4.
— 145 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
form in this country is objectionable, because it aims
its opposition at only Catholic.
"4 — Foreigners in this country are too officious,
intermeddling, riotous and factious. They generally
follow men and not principles.
"5 — This country is essentially Anglo-Saxon, and
foreigners must have notice of the fact forthwith.
"6 — The Catholic Church and Catholic Press is the
true conservative element in this country, and the
opposition waged against it has been in consequence
of the disreputable conduct of so many of its foreign
ers." "We have already said that the article was written
with great force, and we may add to this that it is
characterized by fairness. It states correctly and
forcibly the evils which have grown out of the
foreign elements of our population, and the reasons
which have produced the present excited state of
public feeling against them. It has no sneers for
Americanism, but regards it as a proper sentiment
of nationality, and the writer is confident that it will
absorb all other elements." *********
Mr. Howell was clearly casting an anchor to windward.
The bitterness produced by anti-foreign and anti-Catholic
propagandism was so intense and outspoken that editors
anxious for their party's success had no easy task in pre
serving a just balance and pursuing the via media of the
golden mean.
It must have been with huge delight that Mr. Howell
was able to print the following editorial. It was the result
of evidence formally communicated to the Valley Whig and
also gathered independently by its reporters.
AFRAID OF THE GERMAN VOTE.
"After a general consultation and full discussion
of the matter in solemn conclave of the Locofoco
leaders on Saturday last, it has decided that Augus
tus Hall, the Democratic candidate for Congress
would not speak at Fort Madison in accordance with
his appointment.
"The trouble arose on account of the position of
— 146 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Hall on the Nebraska question. Dr. Eads, Sample
and others insisted, that as the Germans of Ft.
Madison were all opposed to the Nebraska bill, it
would be bad policy and might endanger the German
vote for Hall to make a rabid speech in its favor,
such as he made in this place. They therefore urged
him to discuss other topics at Ft. Madison and say
nothing upon this subject; but he objected to that
course, and the matter was finally compromised by
an arrangement not to speak at Ft. Madison, but
to hold a meeting at Montrose instead.
"Thus it appears that the principles of the Demo
cratic candidate for Congress are so odious, and so
inconsistent with German ideas of freedom and
equality, that the leaders of the party dare not let him
speak in Fort Madison at all, lest he should drive
the Germans to forsake the ticket.
Mr. Augustus C. Hall, the Democratic candidate for
Congress, was a man of conviction and courage. In his
canvass he had been tackling the black beast of Slavery
without gloves in the open. For such a doughty champion
to forego speaking at Ft. Madison for the reason assigned
above, his decision must have been compassed and con
strained by the unanimous and consolidated opinions of all
the influential party leaders of that part of the county who
must have been overwhelmingly convinced that the Germans
of Ft. Madison would not tolerate a plea in justification of
the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise or any collateral
pleas defending the course of the Administration in matters
affecting the interests of the Germans.
The precise nature of the situation at Ft. Madison that
produced so much dread of the German vote, should the
Democratic candidate for Congress deliver his usual cam
paign sentiments in that community, we probably cannot now
discover because of the loss of the contemporary Ft. Madison
papers. But we may be certain that the party leaders deemed
the situation critical and had concluded that the dangers of dis
astrous discussion were more important to escape than the de
triment resulting from the chagrin and discomfiture over
suddenly cancelling the speech and avoidance of a normal
— 147 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
demonstration. Unless matters are either desperate or the
party morale has been completely broken there is nothing
more galling to active party leaders and ardent partisans than
such a discomfiture, for it seems to be tantamount to public
admission that their courage is lacking or their cause is lost
or confusion reigns in their party councils and defeat is prob
able. Let us conclude our study of the campaign by following
Senator Dodge at Washington and Mr. Grimes in the last days
of his speaking tour from Dubuque down the river.
XXXIV.
A political campaign in one of the states of the Amer
ican Commonwealth is seldom or never a purely local or state
matter. In the very nature of things its developments and
determinations affect and react upon national affairs or they
are the resultants of actions in the national theatre. This
interdependence and interaction are sometimes vaguely and
generally noticeable and sometimes the phenomena are sharply
defined and intense and clearcut in their manifestations.
Congress always reflects the course of local contentions.
Its members in their conferences and collisions in discussion
and parliamentary maneuvres have their weather eyes on the
fences and factions in their home states the major part of
the time — particularly when a Congressional or Presidential
campaign is nearing its culmination. One may easily discern
this fact in the debates in the national Senate in 1854.
The debate upon the pending House bill to grant Free
Homesteads to actual settlers upon the public domain was
renewed on July 10 in the Senate. An amendment of Senator
Wade of Ohio was under consideration. It struck out the
limitation of the privileges of grants to citizens of the United
States and allowed all aliens to avail themselves thereof if
they had declared their intention to become citizens. The
opponents of the proposed law were apparently resorting to
dilatory tactics in view of the lateness of the session ; and the
friends of the measure were anxious to get to a vote. Senator
— 148 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Dodge of Iowa thus expressed his feelings and views upon
some of the moot points in issue:
"Mr. President, I trust that the Senate will not
agree to the motion of the Senator from Pennsyl
vania. In my humble judgment, in the whole history
of the proceedings of this body, there never has been
a bill treated with so much neglect if not indignity
as this homestead bill *********** por one;
sir, I declare before God and the Senate, that I am
willing to lose the entire appropriation bills, every
one of them, if that issue is to be made with me,
and I will sit here in my seat, day in and day out,
up to that time which has been arbitrarily fixed for
adjournment, rather than lose this bill. ******

I am not, at this time, prepared, sir, to answer
the speech which was made on this bill when it
was last under consideration, by the Senator from
Kentucky [Mr. Thompson], a speech to which I
listened with greater pain and regret than to any I
ever heard on the floor of the American Senate. I
know something of those foreigners whom it has be
come so common to assail. I know them as neigh
bors and friends ; and with few exceptions, better
citizens or truer men, I have never known. They
are industrious, law-abiding, and patriotic. In every
war that we have had, from that of the Revolution
down, they have ever been among the first to enlist or
volunteer. I have been personally acquainted with
hundreds who have done so in the Indian wars in the
Northwest, and that too, long before they had ever
become citizens of the United States, or had ever
signified their intention to become such. This bill,
in its present shape, notwithstanding the manner in
which it is attacked for its alleged liberality to
foreigners, is the least so, in fact, of all the previous
land bills which have ever been passed. I should
willingly have voted for the amendment of the Sen
ator from Ohio [Mr. Wade] for I believe it to be
right.
Various Senators followed in a running cross-fire —
Messers Cass, Petit, Bayard, Stuart, Clay, Walker, Dixon
and Clayton participating — the sixth section of the bill and
— 149 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
a proposed amendment of Senator Clayton being the matter
immediately under consideration. Some of Senator Clayton's
views upon the unwisdom, as he viewed the issue, of giving
the alien the same privileges in acquiring land that the native
born or naturalized citizen enjoyed, induced Senator Dodge
again to take part in the debate and he delivered some very
vigorous and effective strokes. He reviewed the history of
previous legislation affecting land allotments to the pioneers
and settlers upon the public domain. He showed that the
Democratic party through their leaders such as Robt. G.
Walker of Mississippi, Thos H. Benton of Missouri and
James Buchanan of Pennsylvania, had steadily stood for
liberal provisions for aliens, with little or no discrimination
against them in favor of the native born. He dealt at length
with the bill of 1841 (the first of its kind) and the attempt
of Senator Merrick of Maryland to secure certain restrictions
in the preemption rights confining them to citizens. Among
other observations he said:
Sir, have any of the gloomy predictions of Mr.
Merrick, or those who voted and spoke with him,
been realized by the passage of those laws which they
resisted so determinedly, especially their lugubrious
vaticinations respecting the "foreign paupers," with
revolutionary designs, which these laws were to
throw upon the new states? No, not one; but, on
the contrary, these laws have been most beneficent
in their operation. They have contributed to bring
us that hardy, industrious, and law-abiding popula
tion with which the new states are filled up. The
foreign element is a respectable, but not a controlling
one. We are anxious in the new states for its in
crease. We are those who are to be most affected by
this population, and should be glad that the views
and the feelings of the people of the new states and
territories should be allowed to govern in the enact
ment of such laws as are calculated above all others
to bring us that which we most want — population.
I ask you, sir, if these foreigners can be allowed
in any number to go and settle upon, and buy the
public domain, and that, too, under the rights of pre
emption, which means preference over every other
— 150 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
person in the world, at a $1.25 per acre, what ad
ditional evil can result from granting them the home
stead privileges in common with our own citizen?
The homestead bill is not so liberal towards this class
as are the preemption laws, and as the latter have
been found to work well in practice, I think we should
be willing to try the former. To those who are op
posed to the bill as applied to native born Americans,
hostile to it in any shape, it is quite unnecessary, it
seems to me, that they should wage this merciless
warfare upon the section for the benefit of foreigners.
Mr. President, I should like to know of the Senator
from Delaware [Mr. Clayton] or any of those who
cooperate with him, when, and upon what occasion,
this much abused foreign population has shown any
disloyality to the institutions of this country? When
and where, have they ever raised the standard of
rebellion against its constitution or its laws? At no
time or place, do I believe they have ever done either ;
nor have I the most distant idea that they contemp
lated either or any of these things. I remember that
my friend from Mississippi [Mr. Adams] during
the last winter alluded to some ebullition of feeling
on the part of some of the German population, I
think, of Cincinnati, which I myself regretted, but
which I attributed to others — to native born-citizens,
Abolitionists, — such as those of the Old Bay State
and others who were so much disposed on a recent
occasion to give way to mob violence. I repeat my
solemn belief that there are no more loyal and
patriotic people than those foreigners who have found
their way to Iowa, Wisconsin and other western
states. When the Senator from Kentucky [Mr.
Thompson] was ridiculing the persons and bodily
formation of these men who happened to be born
on the opposite side of the ocean, I think, if the scenes
of the American revolution could have been brought
fresh to his memory, if he could have contemplated
the Irish foreigner, Montgomery, in his winding
sheet1— one of the very first to strike and fall in the
cause of our then struggling and feeble country; had
he remembered the services of Pulaski, Kosciusko,
De Kalb, LaFayette, and that host of other noble
spirits who flocked around our revolutionary stand
ards and shed their blood upon almost every battle-
— 151 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
field from Massachusetts to Georgia, he could not
have found it in his heart to oppose, denounce, and
ridicule their countrymen in the manner he did. The
person of the Baron Steuben may not have been such
in all particulars as would command the admiration
of the senator from Kentucky, but it was one that
faced the front of war — one from whom the father
of his country was willing to receive that instruc
tion in military tactics which his early and imperfect
education had not given him an opportunity to ac
quire.Senator Dodge then asked those who doubted his asser
tions to examine the reports of the Adjutant General's office
and discover the nativity of the soldiers of the various volun
teer and regular armies of the United States. He then spoke
of his high personal regard for the Senator from Delaware,
Mr. Clayton, his old time friendship and referred to the fact
that one of Iowa's counties had been named for him. There
upon he paid his respects to "Native- Americanism" and
"Know-Nothingism" then so seriously disturbing the public
mind and perverting public discussion. He concluded by
showing that the returns of the Land Commissioner's office
did not warrant any anxiety about the undue influence or pre
ponderance of the foreign-born either in the agriculture or
in the general political life of the people. He then put the
pertinent and pointed question:
I ask Senators, as American citizens, as those who
are disposed to keep the country together, and to
sustain all its institutions, whether it is better — no
one proposing to repeal the naturalization laws of
the United States — that you should keep the foreign-
born population confined to the cities, discourage them
from going to the frontier, or allow them to spread
out, and fuse in with, and become a part of the pop
ulation of the country.
During the ensuing week the debate waxed in acrimony
and vigor. Senators Wade and Clayton became involved in
a bitter clash on Wednesday July 17, which blew up in violent
charges and countercharges, the Senator from Ohio denounc
ing the Senator from Delaware with skulking and deliberately
— 152 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
perverting the Senate Record of his, (the latter's) speech and
the Senator from Delaware branding his utterance as "a lie."
At that juncture Senator Dodge, again intervened in the
debate and asked, if indeed one might not say, demanded,
that Senator Clayton explain some dubious observations in his
speech that seemed to assert that the Senator from Iowa was
given to "eating his words." Upon a frank denial of adverse
meaning by the Senator from Delaware Senator Dodge again
gave utterance to his strong feelings upon the subject of the
Native American party and its propaganda and insisted upon
the absolute justice of his strong words of condemnation in
his first speech already quoted. He concluded with the fol
lowing sentiments:
Mr. President, we should all bear in mind that if
today we are called upon to persecute the Catholics
for opinion's sake, we may tomorrow be called upon
for the same reason to persecute the Baptists or the
Presbyterians. It is an atrocious sentiment. It is
especially atrocious when we remember that, with
patriotic devotion, our Catholic fellow citizens rallied
around our country's standards and helped bear our
banner aloft to the Halls of the Montezumas, where
it was planted in triumph. Ostracize the Catholic
and no sect will escape, even while we profess
universal toleration. ********
Of proscriptive native Americanism I know enough
to lead me to oppose it. If, as is represented of the
Know-Nothing organization, it requires its members
to war upon a man because of his religion, that re
ligion may be my father's; or the place of his birth,
which we all know is accidental, it would require
me to proscribe my colleague because his father was
born in Wales; such a society I denounce as miser
able and contemptible.
Senator Dodge in all that he said in that debate, as was
his wont, was direct and explicit, pointed and unequivocal,
downright and outright. He never sought to get behind
quibbles or slip through between sophistries and sinuous argu
mentation or appeals to the galleries. In that debate as in
all others in which he participated he spoke invariably to th<>
— 153 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
merits of the question in issue, dealing with basic and per
manent considerations rather than with the fleeting and super
ficial considerations of the time or place. Moreover neither
personal, nor partisan affiliations nor sectional interest con
trolled his thoughts or his public utterances.
The directness and earnestness of Senator Dodge in that
heated discussion in mid-July 1854 may have been due wholly
to the urgency and seriousness of the subject as he viewed
the matter in the forum of the Senate; but we may suspect
that direct and bitter attacks made upon him by Mr. Grimes
and his partisan co-workers in Iowa in the three months pre-
ceeding greatly enhanced his interest in the attacks upon the
foreign-born by the foremost leaders of the Democratic and
Whig parties of the South in their steady opposition to the
passage of the proposed Homestead law. He had not taken
a direct part in the canvass in Iowa, remaining (save for a
flying visit to his home city of Burlington) steadfastly at his
post in the Senate; and he had suffered in silence the many
and ugly attacks upon him and his course at Washington by
Mr. Grimes and his co-partisans on the hustings. He was
not, we may be sure, unmindful of the possible and probable
effects of such constant bombardment upon the party's align
ments in Iowa; and that he had the voters west of the Mis
sissippi before his mind's eye as much as Senators Adams,
Butler, Clay, Clayton, Dixon and Thompson we may safely
conclude. The fact in no sense whatever lessens the pith or
the point of his contentions. He was not the sort of shifty,
time-serving politician who assembles, or constructs his views
on the spur of the moment as the sudden shifts and twists
of party fortune seem to make expedient. For fifteen years
he had stood staunchly for such a liberal public policy in the
allotment or disposal of the public domain ; and he spoke out
strongly in defense of the foreign-born when it was "quite
the thing" to assail their characters, conduct and manners in
the course of public discussion and legislative enactment.
XXXV.
The course of Mr. Grimes in his canvass of the state
— 154 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
in the latter days of the canvass, no less than in the first
days of the campaign, illustrates admirably not only his ap
preciation of the strategic importance of the Germans in the
final decision, and his anxiety to win the German votes and
his strenuous purpose and effort to capture them, but also his
shrewdness and skill as a party tactician.
In many of the places in eastern Iowa, and probably in
all throughout the state where be spoke, his controversy with
Senators Butler, Dodge and the Washington Union constituted
a prominent, if not the chief part of his speeches; and neces
sarily so because his critics at Washington and in Iowa had
made an attack upon him directly and had charged him with
perversion and mendacity in connection with his use of Senator
Butler's observation in the national senate and in the nature
of the case Germans and their interests constituted the central
fact in that controversy. His discussion of Judge Butler's
remark and his self defense are among the matters noted by
the local press in comment. Not only was his personal char
acter thereby defended ; but also the controversy comprehended
all of the major elements in the great question of slavery and
its extension against which there was such an universal protest
throughout the North. Personal defense and the promotion
of the public weal made him doubly energetic in denouncing
the course of the pro-slavery party at Washington with re
spect to the Germans in discriminating against them in the
Homestead bills and in the Kansas-Nebraska bill.
The situation politically could hardly have been im
proved for Mr Grimes — save in one matter — for making an
aggressive campaign. Pitted against high potentialities at
Washington his self defense had many elements of dramatic
interest to attract and hold the multitude always anxious for
a fray; and in his defense he easily got at the very quick of
the matter in which the general public was primarily in
terested; and he could successfully without going out of his
way prick the pride of the Germans who could not easily make
themselves relish what at first flush appeared to be an ex
pression of utter contempt for them and their character by
a distinguished Senator under circumstances when the entire
— 15-5 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Democratic party and the Administration itself seemed to
concur therein.
Friday night, July 21, Mr. Grimes spoke at Dubuque "the
Gibraltar of the Democracy of Iowa" as ardent Democrats
were wont to describe it. A correspondent who was keeping
the U. S. Marshall, Mr. Laurel Summers, informed as to
the progress of the campaign, wrote a few days thereafter:
"Grimes when here spoke of the Nebraska question alone,
never touching on any other point. This was done for the
German vote. Maine law would not have helped him." 50
The occasion and the speech and its consequences were ap
parently interesting beyond the ordinary, if we may accept
the account in The Miner's Express which devotes a solid
column to an analysis of Mr. Grimes' argument, its refutation,
and the occurrences which enlivened the close of the meeting.
The account is careful in statement, considerate and fair, and
evidently written with a desire to deal decently with the
speaker and summarize and represent correctly the major
points of his argument — the narrative lacking all of those
qualities that mar so much of the partisan editorial writing
of those days — and not unknown in later days.
Mr. Grimes evidently dealt with the Kansas Nebraska
bill, not only at great length but in great detail, tracing its
origin, animadverting upon the manner of its introduction,
the partisan pressure brought to bear to force its passage and
the gross disturbance of prior pacts and of popular prejudice
and confidence wrought by the measure, and the unwisdom
and iniquity of the Repeal. Mr. Merritt takes up each of his
major arguments and in concise, comprehensive, but courteous
terms, now and then tinged with sarcasm, counters with facts
and arguments that must make the reader, whether friend
or critic, pause.
Apparently Mr. Grimes accepted the story given out by
the N. Y. Times and the conclusion of the National Era that
the principle of the Clayton amendment, although formally
50 J. D. Evans to Laurel Summers dated at Dubuque, July 3, 1854.
Original mss. in Aldrich Collections of the Historical Department of
Iowa. — 156 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
defeated in the passage of the Nebraska bill in the lower
house was virtually incorporated in the law; for the Express
says: "Mr. Grimes undertook to discredit the democratic
party, for that provision in the Kansas-Nebraska bill, de
scribing what shall be the qualifications of men for voting and
holding office. He appealed confidently to foreigners, to re
pudiate a party, which had attempted to rob them of rights."
In the way of comment Mr. Merritt asserted that the facts
flatly contradicted his contention. Indeed the Nebraska bill,
as passed was "more liberal than any which has ever before
passed." The statement while a trifle excessive was essentially
true. Douglas' bill was not more liberal than the acts
establishing the territories of Minnesota in 1849 and of Oregon
in 1848. He was correct in saying that the act establishing the
Territory of Iowa was much more adverse towards foreigners,
excluding them entirely from the franchise until they had been
naturalized. And he could not be gainsaid in his summary
disposition of the allegation that the oath required of those
who desired to exercise the franchise was an ordinary pro
vision, common and traditional in organic acts creating ter
ritorial establishments. Mr. Merritt thus concludes his re
view of the speech :
But, who is responsible for the introduction of an
amendment to exclude foreigners from any par
ticipation in the elections and the benefit of office ?
Mr. Clayton, one of the leaders of the Whig party !
This amendment was killed by democratic votes and
Mr Grimes would make our foreign population be
lieve that a great wrong has been perpetrated upon
them by the democratic party. We trust few are
sufficiently verdant, to swallow this sugar-coated pill,
prepared by the skillful hand of Dr. Grimes.
The remarks of Mr. Grimes, touching Senator
Butler, the Georgia Delegation, and the Democratic
Delegation of this State are worthy of no comment.
The persistent hammering upon the Clayton amendment
by Mr. Grimes during June and July, when the amendment
had been struck out in the House of Representatives — and
when the fact was notorious that it was so struck out to
— 157 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
placate the indignant Germans — can only be explained upon
one or both of two grounds : either that, as already suggested,
the principle was actually believed to be incorporate in the
law, or it was deemed "good politics" thus to hammer.
So far as primary partisan responsibility was placeable
the Democrats had the burden to carry for the passage of
the Clayton Amendment through the Senate and they could
not slip from under by getting behind the fact that Senator
Clayton, a Whig, had introduced it and chiefly urged its
adoption. The Whigs, on the other hand, of whom Mr. Grimes
was both nominally and substantially the candidate and
spokesman, certainly had no right to throw stones at the
Democrats. The militant enemies of the foreign-born, then
increasingly energetic and aggressive and operating cland
estinely and extensively under the guise of Know Nothings
were notoriously made up chiefly of Whigs or those of Whig-
gish antecedents or affiliations, Free Soilers, "Teetotalers",
and out-and-out Abolitionists, and the whole tribe of radicals,
now-a-days as then, known as "reformers."
Points, such as these, would constitute estoppel against
insistent complainants in a court of equity : but, however
binding in good conscience, they seldom stay tongue or pen
when ardent patriots meet in the political forum to save the
country. And perhaps it is too much to ask of frail human
nature to insist that partisans refrain from harrying opponents
when they seem to have a superficial advantage.
The Opposition to the Administration while not com
posed entirely of what was currently called "Anti-slavery"
elements, the Old Line Whigs and the Silver Grays being
"Pro-slavery" in the same usage, was denounced by the par
tisans in power as the "Abolition" or anti-slavery party. From
this party in opposition came almost all the antagonism to
the Clayton amendment. Although it was proposed and pro
moted by a Pro-slavery Whig, it was the Democratic party,
the party that theretofore had posed, and in fact had been,
the staunch friend and supporter of the immigrant from
Europe, the party that had the working majority in the Senate,
— 158 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
and was therefore accountable, which had forced the adoption
of the clause excluding aliens from the privileges of the
franchise and the emoluments and honors of office in the new
territories. Even such stout friends of the foreign-born as
Senator Dodge and Douglas, while thoroughly opposed to the
principle of the amendment and voting against it as an original
proposition, voted for it in the final clinch over Douglas' bill
for the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise. Moreover it
was a distinguished spokesman of the Pro-slavery party who,
as the debate on "the great iniquity" was nearing its culmina
tion, had delivered himself of that "playful remark" anent
the innundating flood of continental Europeans then surging
in our ports of entry that seemed to class the Germans with
the ignorant, sodden slaves of the cotton fields, — a remark
that was made solemnly, and subsequently confirmed with an
explanation in reaffirmation. With the freemen of the North
so generally aroused and sensitive respecting what seemed the
aggressions and grasping policy of the slaveholders and their
representatives, it is not strange at all that ardent, keen eyed
partisans should seize such an opportunity to harass the party
in power. In the hands of such a skillful advocate, as Mr.
Grimes, the remark of Judge Butler anent the Germans be
came a hot iron that scorched and scarred, that deadened
loyalty to the Democratic standards and aroused distrust and
suspicion and produced protest, revolt and secession.
XXXVI.
Mr Grimes' speech at Dubuque was immediately followed
by what approximated a disorderly assembly. According to
the Express, he had no sooner finished than Mr. Ben M.
Samuels, one of the leading lawyers of Dubuque and of the
State, then a candidate for representative in the State Legis
lature, (two years later the Democratic candidate for
Governor,) mounted the platform "according to previous ar
rangement" to debate the issues with Mr. Grimes.
An uproar ensued. Hisses greeted him in such volume
that he could not proceed and he had to "appeal to the crowd,
to permit him to go on, according to mutual agreement." He
— 159 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
was allowed to proceed but not without frequent interruptions
and subjecting himself to vulgar, abusive and insulting
epithets. One cried pull him down, drag him out, another
cried fool, while others were chattering and hallooing in order
to confuse the speaker, and if possible drive him from the
stand. But they did not succeed in this. Mr. Samuels
claimed and vindicated his right to speak to the people of
Dubuque. "We are informed that Mr. Samuels refuted Mr. Grimes"
in a forceful fashion so as to "demolish the men of straw
erected by Mr Grimes, for the Whigs of Dubuque to wor
ship." Mr. Merritt concludes his account of the meeting
by asserting that he had never been "more disgusted with
the treatment of a speaker", especially in view of the respect
ful treatment accorded Mr. Grimes for a "full hour and a
half": during which time "not a murmur was uttered by a
democrat . . ." In the way of a cracker to his whip he adds :
"But we must do the citizens of Dubuque the justice to say,
that the most active and noisy in attempting to cry down Mr.
Samuels, were those who have but recently come to the place
— who have scarcely made their track in the soil. ******
We could call the names of these persons, but forbear ....
We admonish them to be a little more careful hereafter."
The significance of the latter observation is not quite
clear. It may refer to the ordinary "newcomers" in the com
munity who often seek fame rapidly by indulging in ostenta
tious noisy demonstration. Or it may refer to the foreign-
born, as such, who were then numerous and preponderant
in Dubuque. We cannot conclude as to the nature or the significance
of the postlude to Mr. Grimes' speech at Dubuque from the
ex parte statement of the Express. Mr. Grimes had chal
lenged his competitor, Mr. Bates, to debate the issues in con
troversy with him at any or all the places listed in his extensive
itinerary; but he had not issued a general challenge contra
mundum; and the "arrangement" for Mr. Samuels to break
lances with him, may or may not have been assented to by
— 160 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
him. It may have been customary at that time to regard all
political meetings as "public" in the English and technical
sense, whereat all and sundry might shy their castors into
the ring. It was common rather than uncommon for "de
bates" pre-arranged and spontaneous, to enliven public dis
cussion on the hustings that year. Indeed the next day at
Dubuque just such a clash at arms occurred at a meeting
initiated apparently by the Democrats : Resolutions were in
troduced, English fashion, Democratic orators held forth in
their support, Whig and opposition speakers assailed each
other and Justice was triumphantly achieved.
XXXVII.
On Saturday evening, August 5, Mr. Grimes addressed
the electors of Muscatine and vicinity. The summary of his
speech as given in The Tri-Weekly Muscatine lournal (Aug.
7) again discloses his concentration upon the Germans and
their transcendant interest in the resistance of the Opposition
to the extension of Slavery. Some phases of the report are
worthy of note.
If there was one particular abomination to the radical
anti-slavery agitator at that time it was the Fugitive Slave
law: yet the Journal took pains to state that Mr. Grimes
"denies that he was in favor of repealing the Fugitive Slave
Law." And further "Mr Grimes vehemently denied that he
was an abolitionist, though he was opposed to the further ex
tension of slavery over free territory." Latter-day historians
and eulogists of the anti-slavery leaders of ante bellum days
flounder in much ignorance or confusion in their comments
and characterization of the men and events of those days;
and not least in respect of the actual hostility of the Opposi
tion leaders to slavery. The Democrats constantly assailed
Mr. Grimes and the entire Opposition as "Mad-dog Abolition
ists." There was just enough in the confused and divergent,
not to say contradictory logic of the Opposition to give con
siderable color to the charge; and Mr. Grimes knew the in
tense feelings of the Southern folk in Iowa well enough to
know that such a conclusion on the part of any considerable
— 161 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
number of the Free Soil Democrats and conscience Whigs
would be fatal to him and his colleagues of the Opposition
ticket. Hence his "vehement denial" of "Abolitionism" and
of any desire to repeal the notorious Fugitive Slave Law.
In dealing with the concern of the foreign-born in the
campaign he charged against the ghost of the Clayton Amend
ment with much vigor, and ostentatious virtue. His exact
line of argument is not fully disclosed; but he apparently
undertook to create adverse feelings towards the law govern
ing Kansas and Nebraska by his insistence that the lav/ dis
played prejudice against the interests of the foreign-born.
The Journal enlarges upon the fact that he stated that "under
an act of the first Territorial legislature of Iowa foreigners
who had declared their intention to become citizens were
given the privilege of voting "but they were not required to
swear to support the provisions of the organic act, or call
God or man to witness their adhesion to the doctrine of the
Slavery-propagandism as the Nebraska bill requires of foreign
ers." This latter assertion, as we have seen, was a direct at
tempt to incite prejudice against the Administration, and
was, as we have tried to show, wholly fallacious.
The irrepressible "Temperance" question could not be
ignored in such a hotbed of radicalism as Muscatine; and he
"paid his respects" to the subject; but he did so with marked
delicacy and deftness, not to say gingerliness. He was in
favor of Temperance, of course, as all right-minded persons
were; but it was not a subject as to which he would have
as Governor any particular jurisdiction. In relation to "Pro
hibition" he said that he would sign "whatever kind of liquor
law was passed"; but that "he would confine himself to the
Executive office strictly." He thus continued up to the last
to confine himself to narrow quarters on the vexatious ques
tion- It was the supremest wisdom on his part to do so with
the belligerent Germans in his audience and constituting the
major part of his premises for success in the election to take
place on the Tuesday following. — 162 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
XXXVIII.
When Mr. Grimes reached his home city of Burlington
he found his partisan opponents were vigorously countering
his pleas addressed to the Germans. The Gazette, August 2,
sought to create prejudice on the score of "Mr Grimes'
Abolitionism" because of his subservience to the Free Soil
Convention at Crawfordsville on March 28 and the course
of the convention at Fairfield on June 24. In the same issue
Gen. Dodge's recent utterance on the Homestead Bill in the
Senate at Washington and editorial laudation of the senior
Senator from Iowa and his sentiments by the Daily Union of
Washington were given at length to counteract the Opposition
candidates' attacks on the pro-Slavery opposition's to the
Homestead bill. The praise of Senator Dodge was noted
but its justice did not overcome the fact that Southern
Slavocrats in the national Senate had, a few days preceding,
defeated the measure.
On August 9, the Gazette contained two editorial ex
pressions designed specifically to hold the Germans in line
for the Democrats. The first was entitled "Free Homes and
the Territories." It denounced the "anti-Nebraska hue und
cry" about the defeat of the Homestead bill as ill founded,
on the ground that section two of the act for the survey of
New Mexico, Kansas and Nebraska granted free homesteads
of a quarter of a section (160 Acres) of land to any male
citizen 21 years of age, or to any alien who had declared his
intention to become a citizen between 1853 and 1858 and
agreed to remain thereon four years. Opposition critics, while
conceding the fact alleged, could retort that it was partial
concession that enhanced the discontent of the public that
such Homestead rights were not generally granted instead of
being partially given.
The second editorial was in the nature of an eleventh-
hour "roarback", as modern parlance would put it, intended
to prick the pride of the Germans. It disclosed unmistakably
that the Democrats, no less than the Opposition editors and
party managers, regarded the German votes as those more
— 163 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
important to secure and those towards which partisan effort
was directed largely in the last days just before the issues
were decided. "THE GAULANT GRIMES."
« * * * stj]j jove an(j murder will leak out; and
so have Mr. Grimes' plans to get the German vote
of Des Moines. We have it on good authority that
he employed and paid a certain German physician,
who formerly figured quite extensively in Whig pol
itical circles about Iowa City, to remove to Burling
ton and electioneer for him among his countrymen
here. The Dr. being a leaky individual told this to a
national Whig, under the impression that he was a
Grimes man. The Dr. also said that he had called
on a certain banker here — an extensive dealer in
pork in old times — and was informed that he — said
banker, alias pork-dealer — did not care much about
Whig principles, but that if he — the Dr. would preach
up abolition principles there was a hundred dollars
at his service. The authority for this can be forth
coming if it is denied. How say you, ye honest,
manly German voters : do you consent to be bought
up by proxy, and paid for by money by Grimes or
anybody else? We pause till the 7th of August for
a reply."
In politics, as in love and war, all things are fair ap
parently. The probability or improbability of the truth of the
allegation, to say nothing of its importance if true, did not
concern the writer in the Gazette. The fact asserted seems
of doubtful likelihood just as it is stated. Even if true, a
very ordinary prosaic transaction was seen through jaundiced
eyes. The significance of the editorial for us, however, is that
as a last argument just on the edge of the public's decision,
such an appeal or argument should be deemed important and
should be made, signifies again what has been obvious through
out preceding sections that the partisan leaders discerned in
the German voters the major strategic complex of the cam
paign in 1854. Des Moines county had approximately 2700
— 164- —

F. I. HERRIOTT
German residents in that year and 75 percent lived in the
city of Burlington. 51
In the voting population, the foreign-born or naturalized
voters amounted to about 18 per cent of the total or nearly
two out of every ten voters. Needless to say, the Germans
clearly held the balance of power and could easily determine
the tilt of the scales in the decision on August 7. It is not
strange therefore that Democrats and Opposition leaders alike
kept their weather eyes on the Germans and sought by direct
appeal and all sorts of partizan manoeuvers to influence their
course in the campaign.
Let us now examine the returns of the election on August
7 and discover, if we may, their significance in the light of
the antecedent discussion of the campaign. .
XXXIX.
The returns from the election in Iowa on August 7, 1854
gave Mr. Curtis Bates, the Democratic nominee for Governor,
21202 votes, and Mr. James W. Grimes, the Whig or Op
position candidate 23322 with 10 scattering votes. Mr.
Grimes' majority was 2110. 52
The Democratic party suffered almost a complete over
turn. The Opposition captured the majority of the House
and Senate of the General Assembly of the State, thus secur
ing to them, henceforth, control in the national representation
in the Senate chamber at Washington.
51 The State Census of 1856 states that Des Moines County had
2935 all told of what we now know as Germans and 1092 Irish. —
Of these numbers 2238 Germans and 873 Irish lived in Burlington.
To these should be added 268 Scandinavians — Danes, Norwegians and
Swedes — of whom 199 lived in Burlington. The Native voters numbered
2880 in the county and the Naturalized voters 652 — of these numbers
1124 Native and 414 Naturalized voters lived in Burlington. See the
Census Returns of the Different Counties of the State of Iowa for 1856.
P. 118 and p. 111. The ratio of the native and foreign born voters
was 82 per cent native and 18 per cent foreign.
The figures given in the narrative above are gross estimates merely.
62 There are slight differences in the totals in various reports —
The figures in the Senate Journal for Dec. 9, 1854, give Bates 21,192
votes and Grimes 23,312 — and 10 scattered. The figures ahove are.
taken from the official reports in the Hall of Archives.
— 165 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
There was nation-wide surprise at the over-turn in Iowa
in 1854. Few or none expected it and they had little reason to
expect it. Its occurrence vastly enhanced the hopes and energies
of the anti-Slavery leaders and partisans and momentous con
sequences followed. From that year down to the present year,
the State government of Iowa has been continuously within the
grip of the Republican party which was the immediate result
of the ensuing consolidation of the various elements of the
Opposition in 1854.
The tremendous on-rush of colliding issues in the remain
ing years of that crucial mid-century decade and their cul
mination in the Civil War in the next decade, has tended to ob
scure the significance of the electoral decision in Iowa in 1854.
One fact in particular has been obscured and wholly over
looked in the academic and popular commentaries and eulog
istic references to the event — namely, the very narrow margin
of the Opposition's victory. The most casual scrutiny of the
election returns discloses this fact and it should be thoroughly
realized. Mr. Grimes' victory and his majority were definite and
uncontested : but they rested upon a margin which signified that
he but barely got over the thin edge of defeat. His advantage
of 2100 votes means that had 1056 voters voted
for his opponent, Mr. Grimes would have been defeated — a
victory that experienced politicians know full well meant
merely a slight surplus of luck in the local voting and defeat in
the future unless they could materially change the major con
ditions of the struggle. A cursory examination of some of the
returns will convince any one of the precarious character of the
Opposition victory.
The official returns of the state election for 1854 are avail
able for only 65 counties — the records of two or more counties
appear to have been lost, or no returns were made therefor, so
far as the files in the office of the Keeper of the Archives of
the State show.
The significance of the returns is not easy to discern or to
appreciate correctly because the differences, or margins, are so
— 166 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
slight. This observation applies from whatever point of view
we may scrutinize or analyse the returns — be it from the point
of view of the entire state, or from that of particular counties
or groups of counties, or from that of considerable sections of
the state, such as the eastern or western, the southern or north
ern halves of the state, or the several quarters of the state, or
by comparison of the returns of the Congressional and state
elections. The candidates for Governor divided the counties; Mr.
Bates carried 32 and Mr. Grimes 33. Mr. Bates won in 14
counties and Mr. Grimes in 26 counties of the east half of the
state; and in the west half Mr. Bates had the lead in 13 an-. I
Mr. Grimes in 7 counties. In the north half of the state Mr.
Bates carried 10 counties and Mr. Grimes 15 counties
whereas in the south half Mr. Bates was successful in 22 and
Mr. Grimes in 18 counties.
Taking the actual votes by Quarter sections of the state
the returns are balanced in about the same way. In the North
East Quarter Mr. Bates obtained 5,346 votes and Mr. Grimes
6021 votes; in the southeast quarter, Mr. Bates received 12,742
votes and his opponent 14,579; in the southwest quarter Mr.
Bates obtained 2748 votes and Mr. Grimes 2525 votes ; and
in the northwest quarter Mr. Bates headed the poll with 366
and Mr. Grimes obtained only 197 votes.
Taking the majorities by halves of the state: Mr. Grimes
carried the north half of the state by 506 votes and the south
half by 1614 votes. He carried the east half by a majority of
2512 votes and Mr. Bates the west half by 392 votes.
The part which the foreign-born or naturalized voters
played in the formation of those majorities which gave the Op
position its success in Iowa in 1854 is not easy to determine.
Indeed, we may say it cannot be determined with any sub
stantial fullness or satisfaction for various reasons. First, the
votes of the naturalized voters were not separately received and
recorded and they cannot, as such, be discriminated and
measured. Second, the immigration into Iowa for the four
years preceding had been rapidly changing the character of
— 167 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
the. electorate. It was then in flood tide. While no inconsider
able proportion of this incoming tide, came from the Southern,
or Slave states, the major portion by far came from the North
ern states — from the six states of New England, from New
York and New Jersey, from Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan.
Contemporary opinion as to the nativity and character of much,
or most of that incoming tide is suggested in the columns of
the Dubuque Reporter: "Day by day the endless procession
moves on ... . They come by hundreds and thousands from
the hills and valleys of New England, bringing with them that
same untiring energy and perserverance that made their native
states the admiration of the world." 53 Coincidently thousands
had been leaving the state— emigrating either to California and
Oregon or to Kansas and Nebraska. Concurrently with the in
flow of Northerners there came also thousands of Europeans,
chiefly Germans and not a few Scandinavians. The Northern
ers settled mainly in the northern half of the states and the
foreign-born chiefly in the eastern portions, particularly along
the River counties, although by no means exclusively.
Comparison of the votes for governor with the votes given
the candidates for Congress in the two districts of the state dis
closed that Mr. Grimes was clearly stronger than his major as
sociates in the contest that year : and from this fact we may
have warrant for the inference that his position on the ques
tions affecting the foreign-born exerted a decided influence in
turning the voters toward him.
In the first or Southern district of the state Mr. Grimes
fell below Mr. R. L. B. Clarke, the Opposition candidate in
but four counties : — in Des Moines, Guthrie, Polk and Union
counties. The first named was the home county of Mr Grimes
and of Senator A. C. Dodge. The latter and his friends had
particular reasons for exerting themselves beyond the usual and
this may explain the vote in Des Moines. The majority of Mr.
Bates over Mr. Grimes was 168 and of Mr. A. C. Hall over
Mr. Clarke was only 140. In other words Mr. Clarke ran
ahead of Mr. Grimes hy 28 votes. In six counties Adair,
53 Quoted in N. H. Parker's Iowa As It Is in 1855, PP- 55—56.
— 168 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
Adams, Cass, Fremont, Montgomery and Page — Mr. Grimes'
vote was equal to that received by Mr. Clarke. In twenty-four
counties, of that district, however Mr. Grimes ran ahead of
his associate — namely, in Appanoose, Clarke, Dallas, Davis,
Decatur, Harrison, Henry, Jasper, Jefferson, Keokuk, Lee,
Lucas, Madison, Mahaska, Marion, Mills, Monroe, Pottawat
tamie, Shelby, Taylor, VanBuren, Wapello, Warren and
Wayne. In the Second or Northern Congressional District Mr.
Grimes' vote was just the same as Mr. Thorington's vote, in
two counties, Blackhawk and Buchanan: less than Mr. Thor
ington's in eight counties, Bremer, Cedar, Clayton, Clinton,
Delaware, Jones, Scott and Tama ; and in fifteen counties Mr.
Grimes ran ahead of Mr. Thorington, namely in Allamakee,
Benton, Boone, Dubuque, Iowa, Jackson, Johnson, Linn,
Louisa, Marshall, Muscatine, Story, Washington, Webster
and Winneshiek. Mr. Grimes' preponderant strength is further disclosed if
we compare the ratios of the votes for both Congressmen with
the votes cast for Governor. Messrs. Clarke and Thoring
ton together received 20,191 votes, or 47.2 percent of the total
vote cast ; and Mr. Grimes received 23,250, or 52.3 percent of
the aggregate vote.
If we examine the returns from the ten counties bordering
upon the Mississippi river — namely, Allamakee, Clayton,
Dubuque, Jackson, Clinton, Scott, Muscatine, Louisa, Des
Moines and Lee — we have additional evidence of the fact just
indicated. Mr. Grimes' vote and the proportion of his vote
to that of his opponent was higher than received by Mr. Thor
ington in five counties out of nine — in Allamakee, Dubuque,
Jackson, Muscatine and Louisa. In the first district in Lee
county Mr. Grimes received 1425 votes and Mr. Clarke, 1378 :
the former being 45.9 per cent and the latter 44.8 per cent of
the total vote cast.
The returns for Clayton and Scott counties are somewhat
perplexing — -in both of those counties Mr Grimes fell below
Mr. Thorington's vote and in both the foreign-born, and in par-
— 169 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
ticular the Germans were numerous. Peculiar local conditions,
particular personal interests or affiliations may account for the
returns from those two counties. The "American" party and
the promoters of "temperance" legislation were especially
active and aggressive in both Clayton and Scott counties : and
hence possibly Mr. Thorington's superior strength.
On the face of the returns Mr. Grimes appears to have
had some grounds for his deprecatory observations upon the
adverse influence of his Congressional running mates upon the
canvass made in his post-election letter to Senate Chase of
Ohio (Oct. 3.)54
The returns, also, seem to warrant the conclusion that Mr.
Grimes' particular appeal to the Germans was sound in strategy
and effective in field tactics and they seem to suggest the con
clusion that but for the German vote the Opposition would
not have achieved a victory in Iowa in 1854.
XL.
The post-election comment as to the causes of the "re
volution" in Iowa in 1854 as we have already seen is interest
ing, but confusing. 55 The explanations were almost as various
as the writers.
The Opposition papers for the most part declared the
causa causans to be the revulsion of the people against the
pro-Slavery aggressions of the Administration at Washing
ton as shown by the ruthless Repeal of the Missouri Com
promise, e. g. in the case of the Cincinnati Gazette (Aug. 22) .
Some linked the "Grog-shop" issue with the Slavery Ques
tion as Greeley's N. Y. Tribune (Aug. 26) as the joint causes.
Others included general normal discontent of the people with
the Democratic officeholders and their ordinary administra
tion of national and state affairs that had slowly accumulated
and both divided the Democrats themselves and aroused the
animosities of the Opposition to belligerent activity.
The Democratic papers for the most part admitted the
b4 Salter's Life of James W. Grimes, p. 54.
55 See Section 1 Ante. — 170 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
explanation put forth by the Opposition. The Iowa Demo
cratic Enquirer of Muscatine, which paper had been an out
spoken critic of its party's Repeal of the Missouri Compro
mise, declared, with italics for emphasis, (Aug. 31), that
"The leaders of the Democratic party abandoned the Balti
more platform of 1852; and violated the fundamental prin
ciples of Democracy." Other journals such as the Daily
Union of Washington D. C. scouted that interpretation and
expressed the opinion that discontent of the people over local
matters — particularly the attitude of the Democratic party in
Iowa upon the revision of the State constitution of 1846 as
regards the prohibition of Banks of note-issuing power — was
the primary cause of the political revolution.
All of the explanations, however, leave us in considerable
perplexity. The election returns when closely analyzed do
not warrant the confident opinion that Iowans were partic
ularly aroused over the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise.
In the northern Congressional District, the Democratic Con
gressional convention was, according to the Iowa Democratic
Enquirer (Aug. 31) "studiously silent" on the Kansas-Ne
braska bill — but the Opposition merely held its own in the
victory they won. In the Southern Congressional District the
Democratic Congressional Convention frankly defended the
Repeal of the Missouri Compromise and won.
Had Senators Dodge and Jones been less confident of a
favorable decision and had come to Iowa and entered per
sonally into a vigorous campaign as did Mr. Grimes, it is
not at all unlikely that the Opposition would have failed.
With the result hinging on a possible turn of 1056 votes this
surmise is not a violent supposition.
Some of the state papers disclose that their editors looked
upon the considerations affecting the foreign-born as material
factors in producing the result. The Iowa Democratic En
quirer of Muscatine (Aug. 31) after reviewing the general
conditions and causes observes :
One more element entered actively into the con
test in some localities. The old Native American
— 171 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
party, newly revived, and freshly organized, has ex
tended its influence to Iowa, and in some portions of
the state wields considerable power. The support of
this proscriptive faction was of course given to the
Whigs. If the Enquirer's assertions were substantially true, it by
no means follows that the activity of that newly energized
faction greatly increased the strength of the Opposition.. If
the fact of their aggressive propaganda on behalf of the
Whigs or Opposition would not particularly attract the Ger
man vote to the standards they followed or supported-—
then the Germans and foreign-born generally were constrained
by considerations that overcame their immediate dislike of
and dissent from native propaganda.
In view of the extraordinary consideration given the
interests of the Foreign-born, and the Germans in particular,
in the pre-election maneuvres, it is somewhat strange that
the press did not enlarge upon the part their inclinations and
votes played in the final result which overturned the entire
state administration and revolutionized the principles and
policies of the state's career in both state and national pol
itics from that year down to the present year (1920). The
larger interests and the new, however, are wont to absorb the
public mind and this fact may explain the absence of ex
tensive comment upon the part played by the foreign-born
in the electoral decision of Iowa on August 7, 1854.
Senator Dodge's champion in his home city of Burling
ton in Des Moines County, The Iowa State Gazette, had dis
closed an alert appreciation of the important influence of the
Germans in the canvass and on August 10 it gave expression
to the following: What Was The. Issue In Des Moines?
********** thgj-g. were Some underhanded
attempts made, on the part of the Woolies, to per
suade the Germans that they (the Woolies) were
in favor of the wine and beer shops, and that the
Democrats were for the Maine Law; on the other
— 172 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
hand the Democrats made no appeals to the Ger
mans, or to anybody else on the subject of temper
ance or the license law considering it foreign to the
issue. The Germans we know are anti-slavery men
and in favor of free labor, and we respect them for
it; but they are also in favor of equality and there
fore they sustained the Nebraska bill. They could
not be persuaded that it favored the extension of
slavery : on this matter the Anties failed to "pull the
wool over their eyes;" the Germans had too much
intelhgence for them; they understood the question;
and were found in the Democratic ranks ;*****
The Gazette's assertions apparently, so far as Burling
ton and Des Moines county were concerned, appear to have
been justified. The campaign was substantially a contest
between Senator Dodge, who in a very solid sense was both
the representative and the spokesman of the national Demo
cratic administration at Washington and an acknowledged
candidate for re-election to the national Senate, and Mr.
Grimes, the leader of the Whigs and the entire Opposition.
As we have already seen the course of The Daily Union, the
national Democratic organ at Washington, during the cam
paign recognized this fact in the course which its editors
pursued in dealing with Mr. Grimes' "Address to the People
of Iowa" issued at the outset of his canvass.
The earnest, extensive and particular efforts of the
Union to counteract the use made of Senator Butler's "play
ful remark" about the Germans and the extraordinary amount
of space given to the campaign in Iowa afford us very sub
stantial proof of the fact here suggested— namely that Ger
mans were esteemed to be the key of the situation. The non-
attention to them — or non-reference to them, in post-election
comment — does not disturb the truth of this assertion. The
interests of the Germans were involved in the fringes of the
Slavery question. The Repeal of the Compromise of 1820
was the conspicuous central fact in public consciousness and
in the discussions that followed the election, the major matter
of immediate general interest was the subject mainly enlarged
upon. The decisive influence of the Germans and their votes
— 173 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
were not regarded as nil in influence but the immediate sub
ject arousing the entire public was the one referred to and
discussed. XLI.
Our study of the Neglected Factor in the Anti-slavery
Triumph in Iowa in 1854 has disclosed a number of facts
that may be profitably summed up in conclusion.
On January 1, 1854 the Democrats of Iowa, and the
Democrats in the nation at large had many reasons to an
ticipate the continuance of their party in control of the ad
ministration of the affairs of Iowa. Their confidence was
generally conceded to be warranted by the public. There was
considerable rancorous internal discontent in the Democratic
party but not such as to create any dangerous dissension or
desertions. All general signs on the horizon were favorable
to their supremacy which they had enjoyed since 1838.
The Whigs had been almost completely routed and utterly
demoralized by the Presidential campaign of 1852. In the
first days of 1854 it hardly possessed sufficient energy as a
party organization to arouse its membership to serious pur
pose, concentration and concert of action.
The other elements of the Opposition consisted of a
miscellaneous collection of more or less repellant particles — -
Abolitionists, Communists, Free-Soilers, Democrats, Labor
leaders, Land Reformers, Socialists, Temperance propagand
ists and various sorts of philanthropists and philosophical
radicals who generally find it difficult to amalgamate or to
cooperate, save when constrained by some overwhelming, com
pelling consideration, such as an impending, indisputable
menace to their personal and the public welfare. And there
was no such central controlling fact, or menace on January
1, 1854. Although there was smouldering discontent anent the
slavery question, especially with the barbarities incident to
the enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law, the public seemed
to be in the main content with the adjustment arranged and
authorized by the Clay Compromises of 1850. +
— 174 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
The introduction of Senator Douglas' Kansas-Nebraska
bill in the national Senate in January 1854 and the in
clusion therein of Senator Dixon's amendment repealing the
Missouri Compromise of 1820 confining Slavery below the
line 36 — 30, was a bolt out of a clear sky. It shocked the
entire North and electrified the various elements of the Op
position and suddenly brought them together in a common
consciousness of furious antagonism to the program of the
Pro-slavery propagandists.
Among the elements of the Opposition not the least
energetic and potent were the then — recent revolutionary re
fugees from Continental Europe, who had attempted unsuc
cessfully to overthrow the established monarchical govern
ments that grievously oppressed their peoples — especially,
Austrians, Bohemians, French, Germans, Greeks, Hungarians,
Italians and Slavs — all of whom abominated all forms and
procedure of human oppression, incident to the administration
of any form of autocratic government. In the decades of
the first half of the past century the foreign immigrants had
largely affiliated with and supported the Democratic party,
as their leaders and party programs were for the most part
uniformly favorable to considerate, not to say lenient treat
ment of the foreign-born in the distribution of public
benefits. The ruthless revival and promotion of the pro-slavery
propaganda by Senator Douglas startled the liberty-loving
foreign-born, especially Germans. They became fearful and
soon convinced that the extension of the area of slavery would
ultimately, if not immediately lead to a curtailment of their
opportunities in this new land of freedom and eventually
would obliterate their newly acquired and dearly prized
liberties. The bitter clash of the Anti-slavery leaders-
Messrs. Chase, Fessenden, Hamlin, Seward, Sumner and
and Wade — with the Pro-Slavery champions — Messrs. Adams,
Badger, Butler, Brown, Dixon, Hunter, Mason, and Thomp
son — disclosed a clear-cut antagonism towards legislation
— 175 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
favorable to the foreign-born among the dominant leaders of
the Southern Democratic and Whig leaders.
This antagonism of the Proslavery leaders of the South
towards favorable treatment of the foreign born manifested
itself in various directions. The Southerners generally were
adverse towards the efforts of the friends of European
Freedom, and especially those seeking to overthrow some of
the arbitrary, autocratic monarchies and establish free Re
publics in their stead, opposing some of their propaganda in
this country, as in the case of Louis Kossuth and Professor
Gottfried Kinkel's efforts to raise a large loan to finance the
attempt to establish a Republic in Germany. The Southern
leaders almost uniformly opposed, effectually opposed, the
passage of the bill authorizing free homesteads and land en
tries. They further refused to support provisions therein
permitting aliens to make entries for homesteads, restricting
the benefits entirely to natives and naturalized citizens. The
foreign-born, and Germans in particular, were especially
anxious to secure such beneficial legislation.
The diplomatic courtesies and privileges accorded by
President Peirce to Cardinal Bedini, a Legate or Nuncio of
the Pope to this country, an Austrian Prelate, intimately as
sociated with the Austrian General in charge of the siege and
capture of Bologna when an attempt at revolution was
thwarted in 1848, caused the bitter memories of the "Forty
Eighters" and their successors to blaze out in riotous pro
ceedings and alienated many from the Democratic standards.
The methods of the South in the apprehension of fugitive
slaves, under the notorious act of the Clay Compromise, also
reanimated the memories of European refugees of the methods
of the henchmen of monarchical governments in the arrest
and seizure of refugees or those who had incurred the ill-will
of autocratic governments in the old World — and this fact
aroused animosity and alienated foreign-born Republicans from
the Democratic party on this side of the Atlantic.
The popular amazement and indignation over Senator
Douglas' proposed repeal of the Missouri Compromise re-
— 176 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
stricting the northern boundaries of Slavery so energized
the various opponents of the national Democratic Administra
tion that the Whigs of Iowa assembled in convention at Iowa
City on February 22, 1854 and nominated a state ticket,
choosing James W. Grimes as their candidate for governor.
The various groups "of the Opposition, Free Soilers and ad
vocates of Temperance workers readily and soon joined forces
with the Whigs. Discontent, inertia and revolt among the
Whigs however, did not create the most favorable anticipa
tions of a victory for the Opposition.
The speech of Senator A. P. Butler of South Carolina
in the national Senate on February 24 in rejoinder to the
attacks of Senators Chase, Sumner and Wade in which the
Senator from South Carolina asserted that the people of Iowa
would prefer a population made up of Southern Slave-owners
and their slaves to a flood of European immigrants became
a major point of attack in Mr. Grimes' Address to the People
of Iowa in the opening of his campaign for governor.
Contrary to academic opinion the "Americanistic" pro
paganda which was then taking form in secret societies,
called Know- Nothings, began to affect public discussion in the
forepart of 1854 and as the major number engaged therein
were either whigs or radicals in political and social reforms,
the fact tended to alienate the foreign-born voters from Op
position forces.
Agitation for the enactment of drastic legislation re
stricting, and usually entirely prohibiting the manufacture
and sale of intoxicating liquors, was then rapidly approaching
culmination and this propaganda was carried on chiefly by
either Whigs or those radicals who had been more associated
with the Opposition — and this fact likewise tended to make
the foreign-born regard the Opposition with disfavor.
In their party platforms both Democrats and Opposition
declared in favor of Free Homesteads. The Democrats, were
silent on the "Temperance" question and the Opposition de
clared in favor of total Prohibition of traffic in alcoholic
stimulants. Both candidates for Governor, Messrs. Bates
— 177 —

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
and Grimes took substantially the same position with respect
to their future official relations to a prohibitory enactment
by the legislature.
In his canvass Mr. Grimes dwelt upon three questions:
(1) the Repeal of the Missouri Compromise, (2) the Temper
ance or Prohibition question, and (3) the hostility, or alleged
antagonism of the Democratic party towards the foreign-born,
particularizing Senator Butler's speech and the course of the
Southern Slavocrats in opposition to the Homestead bill. The
Opposition press in the main pursued the same course. Em
phasis upon the interests of the foreign-born — and particularly
the Germans — in the controversy involved in the Repeal of
the Missouri Compromise and the propaganda of the Pro-
slavery leader were earnest, constant and systematic; and in
many respects seemed to be the major objective of party
tactics. The Democrats, no less than the Opposition, put
forth special efforts to attract, or to hold the German voters.
Contrary to general expectation the Opposition in Iowa
in 1854 won almost a complete victory: Mr. Grimes won the
governorship by a majority of 2110 votes; they captured the
state legislature on joint session by a majority of ten votes;
thus insuring control of the Senatorial succession at Wash
ington; they almost prevailed in the First or southern Con
gressional district and prevailed in the Second or northern
district. Although the Opposition won clearly and almost achieved
a sweeping victory, a close scrutiny of the election returns
discloses that Mr. Grimes' victory rested upon a very narrow
margin — so narrow indeed that one is lead to suspect that
it was due chiefly to the fact that the national leaders of the
Democratic party suffered from overconfidence and did not
come out from Washington and engage personally in the pre
election campaign in Iowa.
Analysis of the returns further seems to warrant the
conclusion that the appeals of the Opposition to the foreign-
— 178 —

F. I. HERRIOTT
born voters and the pronounced discontent of the Germans
with the course of the Democratic party on matters affecting
their status and welfare constituted the major factor in secur
ing Mr. Grimes' notable success which gave the Anti-slavery
party a sixty-year lease on the seats of authority in the state
of Iowa.

179

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854

APPENDIX.
Table No. 1. Votes for Governor in Iowa in 1854 by Quarter and Half
Sections of the State.

Number Vote Majority Ratio
Counties Bates Grimes Bates Grimes Bates Grimes

No. East Quarter.  20 5346 6021
So. East Quarter  20 12742 14579

No. West Quarter  5 366
So. West Quarter  20 2748

Total  40 18088 20600

197
2525

Total  25 3114 2722
East Half  40 18088 20600
West Half  25 3114 2722

Total  65 21202 23322
North Half  25 5712 6218
South Half  40 15490 17104

169
223 392

392

675
1837
2512

23322

25122512 2120 506
1614
2120

46.1

53.9

46.6

53.3

46.8

53.2

65.1

34.9

52.1

47.9

53.3

46.7

46.8

53.2

53.3

46.7

47.7

52.3

48.2

51.8

47.6

52.4

47.6 52.4

Total  65 21202
N. B. — 10 votes scattering.
Table No. 2. Votes for Governor and Congressmen in Iowa in 1854 in
the Counties along the Mississippi River.
I. — For Governor.

Vote Majority Ratio
Bates Grimes Bates Grimes Bates Grimes

Allamakee  197 299 
Clayton  332 687 
Dubuque  1101 669 432
Jackson  717 618 99
Clinton  465 443 22
Scott  583 773 
Muscatine  619 739 
Louisa  459 645 
Des Moines   1213 1045 168
Lee  1676 1425 251

102
355

190 120186

39.7

60.3

32.5

67.5

63.0

37.0

53.8

46.2

51.3

48.7

42.9

57.1

45.5

S4.5

41.5

58.5

53.8

46.2

Total..

7362 7343 972

54.1 45.9
953 50.1 49.9

180 —

F. I. HERRIOTT

II. — For Congressmen.

A — Second or Northern Congressional District
Hemp- Thoring- Hemp- Thoring- Hemp- Thoring-
stead ton stead ton stead ton

Allamakee  199 296
Clayton  329 694
Dubuque  1120 645
Jackson  704 605
Clinton  447 456
Scott  534 790
Muscatine  620 709
Louisa  462 627
Des Moines - 1203 1063

475 99

140

97

40.2

59.7

365

32.1

67.9

63.5

36.5

53.9

46.1

9

49.5

50.0

256

40.3

59.7

89

46.6

53.4

165

42.6

57.3

53.3

46.9

Total.

5618

5885

714

981

48.8

B. — First or Southern Congressional District.

Lee

Hall 1692

Clarke 1378

Hall 314

Total  7310

7263

1028

Clarke 981

Hall 55.2

50.1

51.2

Clarke 44.8

49.9

III — Votes for Governor in 1854; for Presidential Electors in 1852;
for Governor in 1854; the majorities therefor, and the Ratios
of the Votes.

and

Allamakee Governor
PresidentGovernor
Clayton GovernorPresident Governor
Dubuque Governor PresidentGovernor
Jackson Governor
President Governor

Vote Maj ority
Demo- Opposi- Dem. Opp.
cratic tion

Ratio

(1850)  30 27 8  52.7 47.3
(1852)  123 142  _ 19 53.6 46.4
(1854)  197 299  102 39,7 60.3
(1850)  315 235 80  57.4 42.6
(1852)  462 508  46 47.6 52.4
(1854)  332 687  355 32.5 67.5
(1850)  721 353 368  67.1 32.9
(1852)  1150 606 544  65.5 34.5
(1854)  1101 669 432  63.0 37.0
(1850)  523 338 185  60.8 39.2
(1852)  739 566  56.7 43.3
(1854)  717 618 99  53.8 46.2

181

ANTI-SLAVERY TRIUMPH IN IOWA IN 1854
Clinton Governor (1850)  245 138 107  64.0 36.0
President (1852)  398 278 120  58.9 41.1
Governor (1854)  465 443 22  51.3 48.7
Scott Governor (1850)  418 355 63  54.1 45.9
President (1852)  641 598 43  51.8 48.2
Governor (1854)  583 773  190 42.9 57.1
Muscatine Governor (1850)  430 394 36  52.1 47.9
President (1854)  605 594 11  50.7 49.3
Governor (1854)  619 739  120 45.5 54.5
Vote Majority Ratio
Demo- Opposi- Dem. Opp.
cratic tion
Louisa Governor (1850)  299 373  74 44.4 55.6
President (1852)  368 573  205 38. 62.
Governor (1854)  459 645  186 41.5 58.5
Des Moines
Governor (1850)  812 682 130  54.4 45.6
President (1852)  1154 1064 90  52.1 47.9
Governor (1854)  1213 1045 168  53.8 46.2
Lee Governor (1852)  1473 1034 439  58.8 41.2
President (1852(  1708 1580 128  52.0 48.0
Governor (1854)  1676 1425 251  54.1 45.9
River Counties
Governor (1850)  5266 3929 1336  57.5 42.5
President (1852)  7348 6509 839  53.1 46.9
Governor (1854)  7362 7343 19  50.1 49 9

— 182 —