B. The New American House

Transcription

1 1 B. The New American House 4. Jacksonian America i. Purpose: Students will learn about the era of Jackson, the man and the time. The market revolution that hit America in the first quarter of the 19 th century will be emphasized, as will the spread of Jacksonian democracy and the social and political ramifications brought by each. In addition, special attention shall be paid to the formation of political parties and the resultant two-party system that has since embedded itself in American political life. ii. Background Website: iii. Key terms: 1. iv. Key Concepts: a. Gibbons vs. Ogden, 1824 b. The Second Great Awakening c. The First Bank of the United States d. The Trail of Tears e. The Liberator 1. What was the Jacksonian Democracy and how did it bring about the Second Party System in the United States? 2. How did the Second Great Awakening impact reform movements during the Jacksonian Era? 3. What legacy did Jackson leave Native Americans? 4. How was the Nullification Crisis a reflection of sectional difference in America? v. Primary Documents: 1. The South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification (Nov. 1832) 2. Selected Passages from President Jackson s Proclamation Regarding Nullification (Dec. 1832) m

2 2 Lecture on Jacksonian America I. A Changing America a. Transportation Improves - Transportation was so slow and difficult before 1815 that it cost as much to send freight over 30 miles of domestic roads as it did to send the same weight of cargo across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe! - Something had to be done about the sorry state of transportation. What might some of the benefits be of improving transportation? o More products could be sold more cheaply to more people o Just as important, political information (i.e. newspapers) could travel more quickly o Travel encouraged cultural exchange o Brought the different points of the country a bit closer together o Facilitated westward expansion - But who would pay for and profit from improved transportation? o Federal, state, or private individuals? o What issues might this question raise? - After 1815, travel by steamboat was a major innovation. By the 1830s, more than 700 steamboats had been swiftly launched into operation on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers - States generally granted monopolies to encourage investment in steam transportation, but the Supreme Court struck down this practice as unconstitutional (Gibbons vs. Ogden, 1824 b/c it was seen as interstate commerce if the river traversed 2 or more states and therefore under the purview of the federal government) - In the 1830s, private railroad companies began to appear on the radar, during which time 3,000 miles of track were laid. Although not yet an efficient distribution system for goods, it was the way forward b. Factories and Labor - The improvements in transportation also complimented rapid advances in industrialization - This increase in the number of factories meant that a lot of women were pulled in to work. Why women? o Cheaper o Could control them more o Leave men to do the real work - This way of doing things came to be called the Waltham System which started in Waltham Massachusetts and soon spread throughout New England - The vast majority of mill workers were women and despite harsh conditions, long hours, and crowded living spaces, young women flocked to textile jobs. Why? o Wanted a sense of independence o Little bit of economic freedom (having their own money) o Female companionship o Self-improvement opportunities - However, women did strike when they felt their rights were being abused, denouncing their factory masters for trying to turn them into slaves! - The strikes weren t necessarily successful, but they proved that women weren t going to be as submissive as the owners hoped

3 3 c. A Fluctuating Economy and Government Intervention - In 1828 Congress passed and President John Quincy Adams signed tariff legislation designed to protect American manufacturing interests and certain sectors of American agriculture. The legislation severely disadvantaged some sectors of the national economy, most notably southern cotton producers. The Tariff of 1828 was known as the "Tariff of Abominations" in many southern states, and it helped fuel the nullification crisis in South Carolina. - The Tariff of 1828 had its origins in the set of economic policies known as the "American System," which were championed by Henry Clay's National Republican faction of the Jeffersonian Republicans. The American System imagined that each section and region of the United States would contribute a different set of raw materials and finished goods, and that, through a system of nationally-funded internal improvements, each section would trade with the other, forming a "home market." For the system to work, certain sectors of the American economy, notably manufacturing, had to be protected from foreign competition. Tariffs kept the prices of foreign manufactured goods artificially high, so that American manufacturers could compete. Southern planters who grew cotton (for which there was only a small American market) felt this system discriminated against them. Southerners succeeded in defeating a small 1827 tariff that would have protected wool producers and woolen manufacturers. Proponents vowed to try again in The Tariff of 1828 came to hurt Adams. In the election of 1828, Andrew Jackson won a great deal of support from voters who did not approve of the Tariff. Jackson had been equivocal in his public statements about tariffs, Adams had signed the "Tariff of Abominations." Anti-tariff forces in South Carolina waited until after Jackson was in the White House before they raised the specter of Nullification. That was a crisis for President Jackson. The Tariff of 1828 did set a larger pattern in American politics southern states would almost uniformly oppose protective tariff legislation through the Civil War. II. The Spread of Democracy a. Politics Becomes Popular - The election of 1828 was the first presidential contest in which popular votes determined the outcome; in 22 out of 24 states, voters now designated electors committed to a particular candidate. Three times as many voters participated in the election. Why? o High stakes of the Adams-Jackson rematch! o In some states, some voter restrictions had been relaxed o Also indicated the increased interest in elections - Beginning with the 1828 election, partisan newspapers defined issues and publicized political personalities as never before - In name, the candidates were still honoring the fiction of Democratic-Republican Party unity, and instead of official party labels they called themselves the Jackson Party or the Adams Party - Eventually, by 1834, the Democratic-Republican Party would evolve into the Whig Party and Jackson s Party into the Democrat Party b. Adams vs. Jackson the Rematch!

4 4 - This election was the first time in American history that scandals and character issues were brought to bear on the electorate - John Quincy Adams was termed a hopeless elitist, out of touch with the common man, and owing his office to the corrupt bargain of Jackson was portrayed by his enemies as the bastard son of a prostitute, a womanizer, and a hot-headed dueler! - These kinds of issues were not smokescreens to hide the real issues, they were the real issues! Why might this be? o Character spoke to larger questions about morality, honor, discipline, and the sanctity of contracts o It was only men that were voting, of course, and so they concluded that the gendered behavior of these candidates foreshadowed their presidential styles and policies o The average voter most likely didn t understand the nuances of tariff issues and the like! - Jackson won a landslide victory c. Jacksonian Democracy - Jackson s general agenda quickly came into focus once he was in office: o Favored a Jeffersonian limited federal government (didn t like intervention in the economy favored some groups at the expense of others) o Opposed federal internal grants of monopolies and charters that privileged wealthy investors o He instituted a federal Indian policy, seeing the interior of the US for white Americans, not natives o He used his presidential veto (12 times all the other presidents together had only used it 9 times) III. Democracy and Religion a. The Second Great Awakening - In the late 1820s and 1830s a religious revival called the Second Great Awakening (a reference to a similar revival that had swept the colonies in the previous century) had a strong impact on antebellum American religion and reform. It grew partly out of evangelical opposition to the deism associated with the French Revolution and gathered strength in 1826, when Charles Grandison Finney, a charismatic lawyer-turned-itinerant preacher, conducted a revival in Utica, New York. Finney argued against the belief that a Calvinist God controlled the destiny of human beings. He told congregations throughout the northern United States that they were "moral free agents" who could obtain salvation through their own efforts but, he admonished, they must hurry because time was short. - Finney achieved his greatest success in New York State's "burned-over district," especially in the winter of in Rochester, where prayer meetings were crowded almost every night, and conversions and confessions of sin were frequent. Finney and other preachers, such as Theodore Weld, tried to be entertaining and to appeal to the average citizen. Their approach and the new techniques of evangelizing protracted meetings, communitywide campaigns, the "anxious bench" for those wrestling with the decision to convert, testimony meetings for the converted worked: in 1831, for example, church membership grew nationally by 100,000.

5 5 - The Second Great Awakening had effects that extended beyond American Protestantism. The period has been called a "shopkeeper's millennium" because nascent capitalists used church membership and the admonition to work and avoid sin as a means of instilling discipline in workers accustomed to being independent artisans. And by spreading the belief that "heaven on earth" was possible, the revival movement inspired or contributed to many secular reform movements, including, temperance, abolition, antidueling, moral reform, public education, and philanthropic endeavors. It especially appealed to women, many of whom were encouraged to become missionaries and lay preachers. b. The Temperance Movement - The religious fervor that took force also manifested itself in a vigorous campaign to define alcohol as an unacceptable and dangerous self-indulgence - Alcohol consumption had been rising steadily. Why might this be? o Increased acreage planted in wheat, corn, and rye resulted in abundant whiskey o Urban growth and the expansion of the wage earning classes - There was a lot of drinking done! - Adopting the methods of evangelical ministers, temperance lecturers traveled the country expounding the damage of drink and encouraging converts to the cause - The American Temperance Society reached a mass audience and achieved a respectable dent in alcohol consumption, which diminished by 1845 to one-quarter of the per capita consumption of 1830 c. The Campaign for Moral Reform - More controversial than evangelical temperance was a social movement called moral reform, which first aimed at public morals in general, but then centered in on a campaign to eradicate sexual sin - Sexual excess was presented as a powerful drain on the bodily economy: A robust man who hoped to retain his vital energies for the world of getting and spending had best not waste his powers in selfish indulgence d. The Abolitionist Movement is Born - Even more radical than moral reform was the effort to eradicate slavery in the 1830s, which evangelicals saw as a national sin of injustice - This was the start of what became the Abolition movement and it excited fierce resistance from white Americans both north and south - In Boston, an antislavery movement developed around William Lloyd Garrison, who started publishing a weekly newspaper called the Liberator in He was an antislavery fanatic no plan of gradual emancipation would do for him. He proclaimed that the Liberator was to be: As harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or speak, or write with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present

6 6 - White southerner s feared Garrison and people like him. Just 8 months after the Liberator started, a charismatic slave named Nat Turner led the largest and most deadly of all slave insurrections, in Southampton County, Virginia. The event left the white South totally paranoid about future slave revolts Garrison s newspaper was banned in many southern states IV. Jackson Defines the Democratic Party a. Indian Policy and the Trail of Tears - At the time Jackson took office, 125,000 Native Americans still lived east of the Mississippi River. Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Creek Indians 60,000 strong held millions of acres in what would become the southern cotton kingdom stretching across Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. The key political issues were whether these Native American peoples would be permitted to block white expansion and whether the U.S. government and its citizens would abide by previously made treaties. - Since Jefferson s presidency, two conflicting policies, assimilation and removal, had governed the treatment of Native Americans. - Assimilation encouraged Indians to adopt the customs and economic practices of white Americans. For example, the Cherokee had demonstrated the ability of Native Americans to adapt to changing conditions while maintaining their tribal heritage: they had developed a written alphabet. Soon the Cherokee opened schools, established churches, built roads, operated printing presses, and even adopted a constitution. - The other policy Indian removal was first suggested by Thomas Jefferson as the only way to ensure the survival of Native American cultures. The goal of this policy was to encourage the voluntary migration of Indians westward to tracts of land where they could live free from white harassment. As early as 1817, James Monroe declared that the nation s security depended on rapid settlement along the Southern coast and that it was in the best interests of Native Americans to move westward. - In 1825 he set before Congress a plan to resettle all eastern Indians on tracts in the West where whites would not be allowed to live. - After initially supporting both policies, Jackson favored removal as the solution to the controversy. This shift in federal Indian policy came partly as a result of a controversy between the Cherokee nation and the state of Georgia. The Cherokee people had adopted a constitution asserting sovereignty over their land. The state responded by abolishing tribal rule and claiming that the Cherokee fell under its jurisdiction. - The discovery of gold on Cherokee land triggered a land rush, and the Cherokee nation sued to keep white settlers from encroaching on their territory. In two important cases, Cherokee Nation v. Georgia in 1831 and Worcester v. Georgia in 1832, the Supreme Court ruled that states could not pass laws conflicting with federal Indian treaties and that the federal government had an obligation to exclude white intruders from Indian lands. Angered, Jackson is said to have exclaimed: John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it. - The primary thrust of Jackson s removal policy was to encourage Native Americans to sell their homelands in exchange for new lands in Oklahoma and Arkansas. Such a policy, the president maintained, would open new farmland to whites while offering Indians a haven where they would be free to develop at their own pace. There, he wrote, your white brothers will not trouble you, they will have no claims to the land, and you can live upon it, you and all your children, as long as the grass grows or the water runs, in peace and plenty.

7 7 - The promised preserve in the West was simply a barren desert. Jackson responded by warning that if the Choctaw refused to move west, he would destroy their nation. - During the winter of 1831, the Choctaw became the first tribe to walk the Trail of Tears westward. Promised government assistance failed to arrive, and malnutrition, exposure, and a cholera epidemic killed many members of the nation. Then, in 1836, the Creek suffered the hardships of removal. About 3500 of the tribe s 15,000 members died along the westward trek. Those who resisted removal were bound in chains and marched in double file. - Emboldened by the Supreme Court decisions declaring that Georgia law had no force on Indian territory, the Cherokees resisted removal. Fifteen thousand Cherokee joined in a protest against Jackson s policy: Little did [we] anticipate that when taught to think and feel as the American citizen... [we] were to be despoiled by [our] guardian, to become strangers and wanderers in the land of [our] fathers, forced to return to the savage life, and to seek a new home in the wilds of the far west, and that without [our] consent. The federal government bribed a faction of the tribe to leave the land in exchange for transportation costs and $5 million, but most Cherokees held out until 1838, when the army evicted them from their land. All told, 4000 of the 15,000 Cherokee died along the trail to Indian territory in what is now Oklahoma. - A number of other tribes also organized resistance against removal. The United States army ended this resistance by wantonly killing men, women, and children. - In Florida, the military spent seven years putting down Seminole resistance at a cost of $20 million and 1500 casualties, and even then succeeding only after the treacherous act of kidnapping the Seminole leader Osceola during peace talks. - By twentieth-century standards, Jackson s Indian policy was both callous and inhumane. Despite the semblance of legality 94 treaties were signed with Indians during Jackson s presidency Native American migrations to the West almost always occurred under the threat of government coercion. Even before Jackson s death in 1845, it was obvious that tribal lands in the West were no more secure than Indian lands had been in the East. In 1851 Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Act, which sought to concentrate the western Native American population on reservations. - Why were such morally indefensible policies adopted? o Because many white Americans regarded Indian control of land and other natural resources as a serious obstacle to their desire for expansion and as a potential threat to the nation s security. o Even had the federal government wanted to, it probably lacked the resources and military means necessary to protect the eastern Indians from encroaching white farmers, squatters, traders, and speculators. o By the 1830s, a growing number of missionaries and humanitarians agreed with Jackson that Indians needed to be resettled westward for their own protection. Removal failed in large part because of the nation s commitment to limited government and its lack of experience with social welfare programs. Contracts for food, clothing, and transportation were awarded to the lowest bidders, many of whom failed to fulfill their contractual responsibilities. Indians were resettled on semi-arid lands, unsuited for intensive farming. The tragic outcome was readily foreseeable. b. Nullification: Federal Power Versus States Rights - There was a new tariff in October , and as such, the South Carolina legislature declared a convention on November 19, to decide whether the state would, according to Calhoun's formula, Nullify the new tariff.

8 8 - The convention did declare the law null in South Carolina, by a vote of 136 to Actually, they said the law will become "null," and "no law" after February 1, allowing two months to work out a compromise. The South Carolina legislature also took Robert Y. Hayne out of the Senate and made him governor, replacing a more radical nullifier, while Calhoun resigned the Vice Presidency to replace Hayne in the Senate. This all suggests they were looking for a way out the tight spot they had put themselves in. - On December 11, 1832, Jackson published a proclamation giving strong constitutional arguments, written by the Secretary of State Livingston, "... I consider then, the power to annul a law of the United States, assumed by one State, incompatible with the existence of the Union, contradicted expressly by the letter of the Constitution, unauthorized by its spirit, inconsistent with every principle on which it was founded, and destructive of the great object for which it was formed". - Most of the nation responded to this with wild enthusiasm. Jackson claimed he could have 100,000 men on the side of the Union in a matter of weeks. Still, the South Carolina legislature authorized its Governor to call a draft, and appropriated $200,000 for arms. Jackson's actual military moves were on a fairly large scale, but careful, and calculated to avoid confrontation while negotiations went on. - Luckily, a compromise was worked out and a tricky situation was avoided, but Jackson was the first and only statesman of the early national period to deny publicly the right of succession. This was not a closed issue. c. The Bank War - The war on the Second Bank of the United States can be described as one of the most controversial aspects of President Andrew Jackson s two terms in the office. President Jackson used his presidency to destroy the Second Bank of the United States and many government powers and institutions were affected by the methods and principles he acted upon - The idea for a Bank of the United States or a National Bank was conceived by Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of Treasury under President George Washington. It was originally supposed to serve as a central fiscal system for the nation where the government would deposit money and appoint five of the twenty five board members, in an attempt to provide some sort of government regulation and representation in this new bank. Most of the bank s business would be private and it would be privately run. - The biggest problem with the banking system of the time was the discrepancy between paper money and hard money, which is the bimetallic system of gold and silver. This led to the challenge of issuing different bank notes at different state branches; the amounts were not always the same and it caused a problem with knowing which medium of exchange was correct. - The charter on the First Bank of the United States expired in 1811 but, due to financial troubles after the War of 1812, James Madison chartered the Second Bank of the United States on May 10, The third and final president of the bank was Nicholas Biddle. He would stay on and fight for the bank until its last days - Biddle served as a strong administrator for the bank and it enjoyed prosperity and financial strength under his direction. However, Andrew Jackson disagreed with the idea of a privately owned national bank and wanted to change or destroy it - The entire Bank War started out as a political battle, that is to say, the bank was exercising political influence over Congressmen as well as discriminating in the way of loans in its state branches.

9 - The issue stayed fairly quiet during most of Jackson s first term until Biddle requested that the bank be rechartered in 1832, four years before its original charter was to expire - Throughout the rest of his presidency, Jackson worked to destroy the Second Bank of the United States. In 1833, Jackson removed the government deposits that comprised one-fifth of the bank s holdings and distributed them to banks in different states that had been previously scouted by Amos Kendall, a supporter of Jackson - He felt that the government money would be better off in a deposit banking system, rather than a central, privately run fiscal system. Biddle did not comply. Instead, he ordered a general curtailment of loans throughout the branches of the B.U.S., an order of such sudden constriction that the country was thrown in to an economic panic reminiscent of At this time, Jackson was also trying to push hard money bill that would ensure all transactions would be done with gold or silver, rather than paper money. This was not popular and was hurtful to Jackson and to the Democratic Party, which was already dividing into different segments, including the Whigs party. - It is during this time that the Bank War was the most disorderly and chaotic. However, the bank was continuing to lose its economic footing and would soon collapse. - The main issue that is prevalent throughout this entire situation is the power struggle between Andrew Jackson and Nicholas Biddle. President Jackson misused the presidency for personal interests and passions, and that misuse infringed upon the powers of other government functions. It is also true, however, that the Second Bank of the United States had privileges that could have led it to encroach on the power of the government which made it necessary to check those powers. - The framers of the Constitution concentrated a great deal on the distrust of power, relating to both people and government. In this case, Jackson highly distrusted the bank and its political power. Since the bank had explicit ties to the government through various Congressmen and through the Treasury itself, it was necessary for Jackson to try to regulate it. However, other than his annual addresses to Congress during his first term, he did nothing to try to control it. In his third annual message to Congress in 1831, he resolved to leave [the issue] for the present to the investigation of an enlightened people and their representatives - It was not until 1832, when he was up for re-election, that he took any action to hinder the activities of the bank. He was aware that that Biddle and the bank had political power and that they might have in fact been able to influence elections. For example, since the bank was popular with many citizens it would be better for Jackson if he did not have to address the issue during his campaign. Also, Congress thus far had not been forced to decide on either the bank or the President and, if the Jackson vetoed the bill, they would be forced to decide. Biddle hoped for enough votes in both Houses to overturn the veto. Although he knew that it could possibly cost the election, Jackson decided to veto the bill. If he had not, he would have left himself open to other power grabs by Biddle. Signing the bill would have given Biddle the power that he wanted over elections and policies in the national government. - The veto is an example of the control mechanisms that were granted to the branches of government by the framers. First of all, it allows the executive branch to be independent of the other branches of government and gives the president a will of his own. Secondly, it gives the president a means to defend himself, which is the primary function of the veto power. Congress also has the means to defend itself, by overriding the veto, however, in this case, there were not enough votes. Lastly, Jackson had the personal motive to actually use the power given to him by his position. In Federalist 51, Madison states that ambition must be made to counteract ambition and that is what Jackson did when vetoing this bill. The bank tried to repress the power of the executive branch by influencing the election in 1832, but Jackson was able to defend himself with the veto power. Congress was also able to protect itself when Jackson was encroaching on there power. He removed the deposits from the Second Bank of the United States and put them in various 9

10 10 banks across the states. Congress acted by censuring his actions and declaring the removal of the deposits a misuse of presidential power. - Because Jackson was so opposed to the institution that was in place, he took it upon himself to change the banking system in the United States from a national system to a deposit system. This decision has legislative aspects and therefore, Congress should have vote in what is done with the banking system. - Overall, the Bank War between Jackson and Biddle should have been avoided and could have been through some sort of compromise that would have changed how the bank was regulated and how it operated. But both men in power were intent upon serving their own personal interests, rather than those of the growing nation, resulting in a war that spanned over several years and that exposed the country to economic unrest and political turmoil. The result was a botched and fairly unsuccessful presidency and a banking system that would continue to change over many years. d. Van Buren s One-Term Presidency - Although it took a number of years for Jackson s opponents to coalesce into an effective national political organization, by the mid-1830s the Whig party, as the opposition came to be known, was able to battle the Democratic party on almost equal terms throughout the country - The Whig party was formed in 1834 as a coalition of National Republicans, Anti-Masons, and disgruntled Democrats, who were united by their hatred of King Andrew Jackson and his usurpations of congressional and judicial authority, came together in 1834 to form the Whig party. The party took its name from the seventeenth-century British Whig group that had defended English liberties against the usurpations of pro-catholic Stuart Kings - In 1836 the Whigs mounted their first presidential campaign, running three regional candidates against Martin Van Buren: Daniel Webster, the senator from Massachusetts who had substantial appeal in New England; Hugh Lawson White, who had appeal in the South; and William Henry Harrison, who fought an Indian alliance at the Battle of Tippecanoe and appealed to the West and to Anti-Masons in Pennsylvania and Vermont. The party strategy was to throw the election into the House of Representatives, where the Whigs would unite behind a single candidate. Van Buren easily defeated all his Whig opponents, winning 170 electoral votes to just 73 for his closest rival. V. Democrats and Whigs - Because Jackson's political opponents had no hope of success so long as they remained at cross purposes, they attempted to bring all the dissatisfied elements together into a common party called the Whigs. Although they organized soon after the election campaign of 1832, it was more than a decade before they reconciled their differences and were able to draw up a platform. Largely through the magnetism of Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, the Whigs' most brilliant statesmen, the party solidified its membership. But in the 1836 election, the Whigs were still too divided to unite behind a single man or upon a common platform. New York's Martin Van Buren, Jackson's vice president, won the contest - An economic depression and the larger-than-life personality of his predecessor obscured Van Buren's merits. His public acts aroused no enthusiasm, for he lacked the compelling qualities of leadership and the dramatic flair that had attended Jackson's every move. The election of 1840 found the country afflicted with hard times and low wages -- and the Democrats on the defensive - The Whig candidate for president was William Henry Harrison of Ohio, vastly popular as a hero of Indian conflicts as well as the War of He was regarded, like Jackson, as a

11 representative of the democratic West. His vice presidential candidate was John Tyler -- a Virginian whose views on states' rights and a low tariff were popular in the South. Harrison won a sweeping victory - Within a month of his inauguration, however, the 68-year-old Harrison died, and Tyler became president. Tyler's beliefs differed sharply from those of Clay and Webster, still the most influential men in the country. Before Tyler's term was over, these differences led to an open break between the president and the party that had elected him - Americans, however, found themselves divided in more complex ways than simple partisan conflicts between Whigs and Democrats. For example, the large number of Catholic immigrants in the first half of the 19th century, primarily Irish and German, triggered a backlash among native-born Protestant Americans - Immigrants brought more than strange new customs and religious practices to American shores. They competed with the native-born for jobs in cities along the Eastern seaboard. Moreover, political changes in the 1820s and 1830s increased the political clout of the foreign born. During those two decades, state constitutions were revised to permit universal whitemale suffrage. This led to the end of rule by patrician politicians, who blamed the immigrants for their fall from power. Finally, the Catholic Church's failure to support the temperance movement gave rise to charges that Rome was trying to subvert the United States through alcohol - The most important of the nativist organizations that sprang up in this period was a secret society, the Order of the Star-Spangled Banner, founded in When its members refused to identify themselves, they were swiftly labeled the "Know-Nothings." In 1853 the Know- Nothings in New York City organized a Grand Council, which devised a new constitution to centralize control over the state organizations - Among the chief aims of the Know-Nothings were an extension in the period required for naturalization from five to 21 years, and the exclusion of the foreign-born and Catholics from public office. In 1855 the organization managed to win control of legislatures in New York and Massachusetts; by 1855, about 90 U.S. congressmen were linked to the party - Disagreements over the slavery issue prevented the party from playing a role in national politics. The Know-Nothings of the South supported slavery while Northern members opposed it. At a convention in 1856 to nominate candidates for president and vice president, 42 Northern delegates walked out when a motion to support the Missouri Compromise was ignored, and the party died as a national force. 11