Liberty Chronicles

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.

“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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Frances Whipple was born into the quintessential American aristocratic family. On her father’s side, the Whipple line included Rhode Island heroes like Abraham, who led the burning of the British ship Gaspee in 1772, and some of the earliest settlers of the colony. On Frances’ mother’s side, the Scotts included some of Roger Williams’ earliest and closest associates in the foundation of the Rhode Island colony. In 1815, though, nature leveled the Whipple clan. A storm called the Great Gale ravaged Providence, flooding wharves and destroying crops within a 40-mile radius of the city. It was also the year without a summer, thanks to the Tambora volcano in Indonesia, which erupted so violently that the ash clouds actually cooled the planet. With a future of nothing but drought, sooty clouds and gloom, her father sold the family farm in 1816 and Whipple was destitute. Frances supported herself through odd jobs and self-education. She became a very different sort of Whipple, and over her lifetime, she helped make America a very different sort of place.

Sarah O’Dowd, A Rhode Island Original: Frances Harriet Whipple Green McDougall, 2004.

“Elleanor Eldridge: Folk Hero of African American Feminism”

“Let Usurpers Tremble: The Unrepublican Anomaly”

Whipple, Might and Right: By A Rhode Islander, Providence: A.H. Stilwell. 1844.

Music by Kai Engel

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Little is known about the personal life of Ann Parlin, the woman who came up with the idea for clam bakes to raise relief money for the families of imprisoned suffragists. She married Dr. Louis Parlin on July 7th, 1839, in Maine before moving to Providence. In 1841, they appear in the city’s business records through Dr. Parlin’s homeopathy clinic. He’s considered the founder of homeopathy in Rhode Island, and he practiced there for two to three years while participating in the city’s bubbling radical politics. The Parlins were fairly well off and Louis was a landholder or a freeman allowed to vote, but both of them believed fully in the people’s sovereign power to reform their governments at will.

“A Woman of Spunk: Ann Parlin’s Vision for Revolution”

Russell DeSimone, “Lewis and Ann Parlin” in Rhode Island’s Rebellion: A Look at Some Aspects of the Dorr War, Bartlett Press. 2009.

Comegna, “The Dupes of Hope Forever: The Locofoco of Equal Rights Movement, 1820s-1870s,” (PhD Diss.) University of Pittsburgh. 2016.

Zagarri, Rosemarie. Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Earl American Republic. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 2007.

Zboray, Ronald & Mary. Voices Without Votes: Women and Politics in Antebellum New England. Durham, NH: University of New Hampshire Press. 2010.

Music by Kai Engel

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We are celebrating Liberty Chronicles’ one year anniversary with a special Free Thoughts/Liberty Chronicles crossover episode featuring Free Thoughts Podcast host Trevor Burrus. We’ll discuss the Dorr War and its Supreme Court Case Luther v. Borden.

Luther v Borden (1849)—Taney’s Majority Opinion and Woodbury’s Dissenting Opinion

Dennison, George M. The Dorr War: Republicanism on Trial, 1831-1861. Lexington: The University of Kentucky Press. 1976.

Gettleman, Marvin. The Dorr Rebellion: A Study in American Radicalism: 1833-1849. New York: Random House. 1973.

Grimstead, David. American Mobbing, 1828-1861: Toward Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press. 1998.

Music by Kai Engel

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Steve Horwitz is the Distinguished Professor of Free Enterprise in Ball State University’s economics department. He has a PhD in economics from George Mason University, and his most recent book is Hayek’s Modern Family: Classical Liberalism and the Evolution of Social Institutions. In the interest of more clearly identifying the relationship between his highly theoretical discipline and our evolving set of humane histories here on Liberty Chronicles, Professor Horwitz joins us now.

Steve Horwitz’ personal website

His Libertarianism.org author’s page

His FEE author’s page

“Libertarians and ‘Unicorn Governance,’” A Cato Daily Podcast Interview (Jan. 25, 2017)

Music by Kai Engel

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In this episode of Liberty Chronicles, we are joined by Mike Douma and Phil Magness to discuss their new book “What is Classical Liberal History?”  Mike Douma is an Assistant Research Professor at Georgetown University and the Director of the Georgetown Institute for the Study of Markets and Ethics. Phil Magness is a professor at Berry College’s Campbell School of Business and author of Colonization after Emancipation: Lincoln and the Movement for Black Resettlement.

Douma & Magness, eds. What Is Classical Liberal History? Lexington Books. 2017.

“Creative Historical Thinking,” Mike Douma’s blog

Phil Magness’ personal website

Benedetto Croce, Selections from History as the Story of Liberty. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. 2000.

Comegna, ed. Liberty and Power: A Reader. Washington, D.C.: The Cato Institute. 2017.

Music by Kai Engel

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David M. Hart is the Director of Liberty Fund’s Online Library of Liberty. His latest book, Social Class and State Power, is a reader in libertarian class theory including documents from Richard Overton in the English Civil Wars all the way down to Libertarianism.org contributor Roderick Long.

Hart, Chartier, Kenyon, and Long (eds.), Social Class and State Power: Exploring an Alternative Radical Tradition, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018.

David Hart, ed. Tracts on Liberty by the Levellers and their Critics (1638-1660), 7 Vols. Indianapolis: Liberty Fund. 2014.

John Wade, The Extraordinary Black Book: An Exposition of Abuses in Church and State, Courts of Law, Representation, Municipal and Corporate Bodies; with a Precis of the House of Commons, Past, Present, and to Come. London: Effingham Wilson, Royal Exchange. 1832. Republished by Liberty Fund.

Music by Kai Engel

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In July 1842, Rhode Island had two state governments divided into armed camps. The rest of New England watched, wondering if what they called “The Rhode Island Question” would spill into a widespread civil war. The fight was over which of the state’s two dueling authorities was legitimate—the Charter government established in 1663 by King Charles II, or the People’s Constitution which bypassed the legislature with a popular convention and vote.

Dennison, George M. The Dorr War: Republicanism on Trial, 1831-1861. Lexington: The University of Kentucky Press. 1976.

Gettleman, Marvin. The Dorr Rebellion: A Study in American Radicalism: 1833-1849. New York: Random House. 1973.

Frances Whipple & Levi Slamm: “Let Usurpers Tremble: The Unrepublican Anomaly” (1842)

Ann Parlin, Speech at New York’s Shakespeare Hotel (1842)

Marcus Morton’s Clam Bake Letter (1842)

Music by Kai Engel

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Last week on Liberty Chronicles, we left off with May 19, 1842, when Thomas W. Dorr—The People’s Governor of Rhode Island, dressed up like Napoleon and carrying a sword—ordered his makeshift little army to storm the Providence state arsenal.. Most of Dorr’s warriors, though, were young men trying to impress girls in their neighborhoods. It was the furthest thing imaginable from a professional, committed army, and when met with even slight resistance, Dorr’s lines broke and his army scattered.

Chaput, Erik. The People’s Martyr: Thomas Wilson Dorr and His 1842 Rhode Island Rebellion. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press. 2013.

Conley, Patrick T. Democracy in Decline: Rhode Island’s Constitutional Development, 1776-1841. Providence: Rhode Island Historical Society. 1977.

Dennison, George M. The Dorr War: Republicanism on Trial, 1831-1861. Lexington: The University of Kentucky Press. 1976.

Gettleman, Marvin. The Dorr Rebellion: A Study in American Radicalism: 1833-1849. New York: Random House. 1973.

Grimstead, David. American Mobbing, 1828-1861: Toward Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press. 1998.

Music by Kai Engel

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In Rhode Island, 1842, politician Thomas W. Dorr (calling himself “The People’s Governor”) threatened civil war throughout New England. His main target was the famous colonial Charter issued by King Charles II in 1663. In the 19th century the document of world historical importance—the planet’s oldest existing written constitution at the time, and surely the most liberal in its own day. Radical Jacksonian and America’s first professional historian, George Bancroft, declared, “Nowhere in the world have life, LIBERTY, and property been safer than in Rhode Island.”

Chaput, Erik. The People’s Martyr: Thomas Wilson Dorr and His 1842 Rhode Island Rebellion. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press. 2013.

Conley, Patrick T. Democracy in Decline: Rhode Island’s Constitutional Development, 1776-1841. Providence: Rhode Island Historical Society. 1977.

Shalhope, Robert. “The Radicalism of Thomas Dorr,” Reviews in American History 2, No. 3 (Sep., 1974): 383-389.

Dan King, “The Life and Times of Thomas Wilson Dorr” (1859)

Music by Kai Engel

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