Antebellum Era (1819-1860)

This little-studied era of Connecticut is dominated by the name of Jarvis M. Morse, who published A Neglected Period in Connecticut History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1933; reprinted by Octagon in 1976). That work emphasizes politics and, for lack of anything better, is the place to start a study of Connecticut during the Antebellum Era. Morse is generally accurate, but the work is a rather plodding recital of the narrative of political events, organized by gubernatorial administrations and legislative sessions. Based on Morse's Yale dissertation (1930), the book is never very analytical and becomes less so as it proceeds. Morse is wrong about the reasons for the Black Law of 1833 and for the legislative debate over the costs of government in the 1830s. Morse also wrote two Tercentenary pamphlets. Number XVI, The Rise of Liberalism in Connecticut, 1828-1850 (1933) outlines the economic and social changes that brought about some modest political and constitutional reform associated with the Jacksonian Democratic movement. In Number XVII, Under the Constitution of 1818: The First Decade (1933), Morse points out how little the new constitution actually changed the operations of government in Connecticut.

Nelson Burr has written "James Dixon: Episcopalian Anti-Slavery Statesman, 1814-1873," Historical Magazine of the Episcopal Church. 50(March, 1981)1:29-72. Dixon was a Whig congressman (1845-49), a Republican senator (1856-69), and a strong supporter of Andrew Johnson. He ran unsuccessfully for the Senate as a Democrat in 1868. "As a friend and advisor, during the Civil War, he stood close to President Lincoln and Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles." (p 71) Burr helped catalog the Lincoln papers in the Library of Congress and is a distinguished bibliographer of Connecticut subjects, among others.

Carroll John Noonan's dissertation under Richard Purcell (Catholic University of America, 1938), published as Nativism in Connecticut, 1829-1860 (Washington: Catholic University, 1938), is primarily a study of the influence of Nativism on politics. The political discussions of the period are at least as good as those by Morse. See also the dissertation by Maria Daily in the section on Catholics, under "Religion," below.

For more recent scholarly studies, one must rely on unpublished dissertations and a few articles arising from them.

Brownsword, Alan William. "Connecticut Political Patterns, 1817-1828" (University of Wisconsin, 1962). This dissertation, supervised by Merle Curti, describes and analyzes the breakdown of the Federalist party and the years of organizational fluidity that followed. Brownsword takes the story up to the point at which a new division into Republican and Jacksonian factions began to form. He has summed up his findings in "The Constitution of 1818 and Political Afterthoughts, 1800-1840," CHS Bulletin 30 (January, 1965) 1:10, noted above.

Parmet, Robert David. "The Know-Nothings in Connecticut" (Columbia, 1966). "In 1855, the Know-Nothings, who nominated candidates under an 'American Party' label, elected Connecticut's Governor and a majority of its General Assembly. They succeeded mainly because the Whig party was now virtually dead, after having ineffectually opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill of 1854, which repealed the Missouri Compromise of 1820. Most non-Democrats in Connecticut then became Know-Nothings." (from the abstract) Parmet has published some of his findings in "Connecticut's Know-Nothings: A Profile," in CHS Bulletin 31 (July, 1966) 3. For the Know-Nothings, see also Robert J. Lane, in the Civil War section, below.

There is additional discussion of the Constitution of 1818 in the section on Government below. Check the index for page reference.

Other useful articles:

Blair, Ruth M. "A Forgotten German Language Newspaper.” CHS Bulletin 40 (July, 1975) 3:95-96. Documents the work of the Hartford Zeitung, set up in 1860 by Douglas Democrats to bring the German vote around.

Burr, Nelson R. "United States Senator James Dixon: 1814-1873 Episcopalian Anti-Slavery Statesman," Historical Magazine of the Protestant Episcopal Church 50 (March, 1981) 1:29-72. Dixon was a Whig and Republican leader, a friend and advisor to Lincoln. He stood by Johnson during Reconstruction and fought the expansion of slavery "when prominent anti-slavery Episcopalians were rare." Liberally educated, Dixon was among those politicians whose "oratory commanded attention, when literate Americans expected their leaders to write their own speeches and discuss public affairs in stately prose." (p. 71) Burr cataloged the Lincoln papers at the Library of Congress and has written about other aspects of antebellum Connecticut.

Grant, Philip A. "The Bank Controversy and Connecticut Politics in 1834." CHS Bulletin 33 (July, 1968) 3.

--“Jacksonian Democracy Triumphs in Connecticut." CHS Bulletin 39 (0ctober, 1968) 4:117-24. The triumph was very short-lived.

O’Connell, Alfred C. "The Birth of the G.O.P. in Connecticut." CHS Bulletin 26 (April, 1961) 2:33-59. Parmet's Know-Nothings, formerly Whigs, now become Republicans. "The road to Republicanism in Connecticut was via the nativist, anti-Roman Catholic Know Nothing Party." (p. 33) By 1858, when the Party had "come of age," it "reflected the conservative free soil views of the state, the economic interests of the Whigs, and the conservative political philosophy characteristic of all parties in the state at the time." (pp. 38-39)

A few nineteenth-century works that attempt a general history of Connecticut are more useful in exposing ideas and attitudes of their own time than in explaining the past to readers of the 1980s. Theodore Dwight's The History of Connecticut From the First Settlement to the Present Time (New York: Harper, 1840 and 1892) is full of geographical information still useful; but his colonial history is derived largely from Benjamin Trumbull. Dwight's work, discussed under L. D. Good, is best in demonstrating the dominant attitudes of the old Federalist elite. Gideon Hiram Hollister's The History of Connecticut From the First Settlement to the Adoption of the Present [1818] Constitution (New Haven: L. Stabbins, 1855) was the standard state history for a long time. It is less revealing of contemporaneous attitudes than is Dwight, and there is little point in consulting it. John Warner Barber's Connecticut Historical Collections (New Haven, 1836, 1837, 1846) is prized for its 180 woodcuts of Connecticut scenes. It is full of marvelous descriptions of towns as they existed in the 1830s.

There are a few other works of contemporary origin that shed light on the politics and society of the era. Especially interesting are:

The Life of P. T Barnum Written by Himself. New York: Redfield, 1855.

Goodrich, Samuel G. Recollections of A Lifetime. New York: Miller, Orton and Mulligan, 1856.

Tarbox, Increase, ed. The Diary of Thomas Robbins, D.D., 1796-1854. Boston: T. Todd, 1886-87.

A work that provides very considerable insight into Connecticut society, though ending as the traditional antebellum dates begin, is Dorothy Ann Lipson's work on Connecticut Freemasonry. Though focused on a discrete subject, J. Eugene Smith's One Hundred Years of Hartford's Courant From Colonial Times Through the Civil War (New Haven, 1949; reprinted by Archon Books in 1970) is jampacked with information incorporated in a breathlessly rapid narrative of politics and culture. It is superficial, but don't miss it. In his dissertation listed in the "Military History" section below, Stewart Lewis Gates shows how the government used the militia to quell the unusually numerous riots of the era.