As we have seen over the last several months on this show, America’s first libertarian movement called Locofocoism was, but one among many reform movements dotting the Jacksonian period. For a century and a half, historians have diligently detailed the stories of abolitionists, working people, feminists, land reformers, prohibitionists, suffragists, and suffragettes, free lovers, communists, industrialists, progressivists, free thinkers, transcendentalists, socialists, and the Young America Artistic Movement that lent credibility to the broad cause of reform. This week, we turn to an example of yet more mixed success in which radical Locofocoism was both implemented and watered down at the same time. New York’s Anti-Rent War and the Revolutionary Constitution of 1846.

Further Reading:

“Charter of Freedoms and Exemptions,” 7 June 1629

Stephen B. Miller, Historical Sketches of Hudson, Embracing the Settlement of the City, City Government, Business Enterprises, Churches, Press, Schools, Libraries, &c. Hudson: Bryan & Webb, Publishers. 1862.

Anna Rossman Bradbury, History of the City of Hudson, New York: With Biographical Sketches of Henry Hudson and Robert Fulton. Hudson, NY: Record Printing and Publishing Company. 1909.

Cheney, Edward P. The Anti-Rent Agitation in the State of New York, 1839-1846. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. 1887.

Huston, Reeve. Land and Freedom: Rural Society, Popular Protest, and Party Politics in Antebellum New York. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2000.

McCurdy, Charles W. The Anti-Rent Era in New York Law and Politics, 1839-1865. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press. 2001.

Music by Kai Engel

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