Chapter 2: The 1872 Election
Background:
Deciding that it was time to organize a formal protest movement against the major parties and for Prohibition, the first gathering in Chicago in 1869 was a focus on some progressive measures but mostly revolved around the sins of liquor and it covered a lot of states. They were mostly in the North but in the first map of who sent delegates to the left, the exceptions stand out. It would also put out a public address that only addressed the trafficking of alcohol and avoided all other issues. The next section covers the platform that would be borne from the 1872 convention and it would cover a lot more ground. The 1872 convention was much more explicit as a progressive party. It was run by the same group as before but that group had included Neal Dow and Gerrit Smith, who had been huge abolitionists before the war. The ties to the Yankees that had defined the first wave of the temperance movement (as you can read in Chapter 1 here) continued to linger and in 1872, the only formally Confederate state of Tennessee did not attend the convention. New England’s repeals of the laws, also documented in Chapter 1 and visualized here may have made them less receptive.
Platform:
The platform adopted at the first convention in 1869 covered a wide range of progressive issues, many out of the normal scope of a single issue party. Since they had found a natural ally with the growing women’s rights and women’s temperance groups, the Prohibition Party held a convention where women could be speaking and voting delegates. This would be the first time any US political party had done this. Out of the 17 points in the national platform, 7 of them focused on the abolition of liquor but from different angles. The primary one was a moral focus, where liquor was called, “a dishonor to Christian civilization,” and the party relied on the, “Almighty God,” for success. Another tied beating alcohol to emancipating labor which, when sober, would be able to push for worker’s rights. The rest of the platform was similarly progressive, especially for its time. It called for a crackdown on excessive political appointments and the direct popular vote election for President, VP, and Senators which aligned with the Populist Party. It would take a stance on economic issues, backing a system of both gold and silver and a customs tax. The platform also called for equality with a call for expanded common public schooling, in the right to vote for anyone and everyone but also in a, “liberal and just policy,” to, “promote foreign immigration to our shores, always allowing to the naturalized citizens equal rights.” This, the last point in the platform, was a much different tone than Neal Dow had struck partnering with the Know-Nothings 15 years before and would be contentious again.
Candidates:
President — James Black was born into a well-off family but joined the work force early at 16 as a mule driver. While no record exists, there is a mention that he had a bad experience with alcohol which must have been at a young age because he joined The Washingtonians when he was only seventeen. The Washingtonians were a group of former alcoholics, the vast majority being working class, that began to preach abolition of liquor. Black switched parties around, from Democrat to Republican, and finally deciding that he needed a party free and clear of any influence from the big brewers. He would jump on the bandwagon of the Maine Laws early in 1852 and remained a ground organizer for Temperance, teaming up with Neal Dow (discussed in Chapter 1) in 1865. Together, they would begin a publishing campaign and decide that there needed to be a separate party and he wrote his reasoning in a short pamphlet down here: https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=fEwoAAAAYAAJ&hl=en&pg=GBS.PT4. Black was the first national chairman after the 1869 convention up until he was made the presidential candidate in 1872.
Vice President — Reverend John Russell was a devout Methodist pastor. At the very beginning of 1867, he gathered 40 friends and made a stand for a national Prohibition Party. In addition to his religious duties, he was also an editor of a Detroit magazine. The Peninsular Herald then became the rallying newspaper for the Prohibitionist cause and used to formally organize the cause. This advocacy led to Russell being elevated to the First Chairman status of the national party and eventually its first vice presidential candidate.
Results:
The Black/Russell ticket was on the ballot in 6 states and took in 5,607 total votes for about .1% nationwide. Their best state was Michigan where they received .57%. Unfortunately, the only records I could fin for county results were in Ohio and do not seem to show much of a geographic pattern. Instead there is one county that really stands out: Delaware county, where a whopping 3.6% would vote for the new party. Smack dab in the middle in the middle of the state and just to the north of Columbus, it would not be the first time that Delaware county would give the Prohibition Party a better than average performance. Part of this was due to the double whammy of the Methodist-aligned Otterbein University and the pro women’s suffrage Oberlin college but it was also home to the city of Westerville, Ohio, commonly known as “The Dry Capital of the World.”
Deeper Dive — “The Dry Capital of the World”
Westerville, Ohio was a sleepy suburb just to the northeast of Columbus and was a stop along the Underground Railroad and a hotbed of abolitionist sentiment. Like the national alliance between temperance advocates and anti-slavery advocates, Westerville also would become known for being extremely against liquor, banning it completely in 1859, only one year after incorporation. In the 1870s, several enterprising saloon owners would attempt to open up business in violation of the law but would find their new attractions protested against, vandalized and in a couple of cases, blown up with gunpowder. With the “Whiskey War” at the forefront of people’s minds it should come as no surprise that Westerville soon earned the moniker of the, “dry capital of the world.” It would also become an important part of the history, and eventually, voting patterns.
In 1893, a Prohibitionist organization by the name of the Anti-Saloon League (ASL) popped up in Columbus, Ohio and this was different than the organizations before it. It quickly rose in prominence due to the financial pledges of big backers and vowed to be an efficient push for legislation. While it would find common cause with the Prohibition Party’s allies such as the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, it came in direct conflict with the Party itself. It was single issue focused but also believed that the anti-liquor votes needed to matter and instead of a breakaway party, the ASL would trade its bloc of votes to friendly politicians and mobilize to encourage voting for the most anti-liquor candidate. The ASL would be devastating to the Prohibition Party, and its influence can be seen in Delaware county. While the ASL would eventually move its headquarters straight into Westerville in 1909, its local influence was heavy. The graph below plots the share of the vote the Prohibition Party received on the national scale, on the statewide scale, and in yellow in Delaware county. Data for 1900 could unfortunately not be found.
Delaware county would give the Prohibition Party large amounts of the vote, peaking with 6.9% in 1892. Ohio would also regularly vote for the Prohibition Party with more of the vote than it did nationally. That all changed with the rise of the ASL. After they began to encourage voting for a major party to extract concessions, the splinter Prohibition Party share dropped. The statewide vote starting in 1896 fell under the national vote and stayed there while Delaware county plummeted and wouldn’t be as high in the cycles after.
Westerville would remain dry for a long time. With the exception of a celebratory Bud Light on the repeal of the Prohibition Amendment in 1933, uptown Westerville would not see another beer poured at an establishment until 2006, and only after its first liquor license was granted in 2004, over 70 years later with a referendum passing by a margin of 71%. From militant dryness to a long embrace of alcohol commerce and its history, Westerville’s legacy is celebrated in the town and the influence of the ASL with its museum in town made its mark in 1896 and until this day.
Resources:
https://www.ourcampaigns.com/images/candidates/b20/FullC20073D1884-11-10.jpg
