New Jersey as a colony and as a state : one of the original thirteen . cal organization the Whigs were practi-cally extinct. The end had come quickly, and hadnot been prolonged as in the death of Compromise of 1850, the deaths of Web-ster and Clay in 1852, the execution of the fugi-tive slave law, the passage of the Kansas-Ne-braska bill, had tended to weaken and finally de-stroy the party. The Democratic party, mean-while, not only in New Jersey, but throughout theeastern portion of the United States, had becomestrong, but unweildy. It had assimilated mosi ofthe large body of e
New Jersey as a colony and as a state : one of the original thirteen . cal organization the Whigs were practi-cally extinct. The end had come quickly, and hadnot been prolonged as in the death of Compromise of 1850, the deaths of Web-ster and Clay in 1852, the execution of the fugi-tive slave law, the passage of the Kansas-Ne-braska bill, had tended to weaken and finally de-stroy the party. The Democratic party, mean-while, not only in New Jersey, but throughout theeastern portion of the United States, had becomestrong, but unweildy. It had assimilated mosi ofthe large body of emigrants. In the North the for-eign element had already arisen to a degree ofpower in the councils of the party, and by enter-prise and special aptitude had obtained partialcontrol of the industrial situation. To the oldline Whigs, this new blood, assertive and ener-getic, was obnoxious. The specious plea wasmade that the nations institutions, liberties,and system of government were at the mercy ofmen from the monarchical countries of Europe. 394 NEW JERSEY AS A COL. There was thus no apparent haven of refuge forthe Whigs. In 1854, in the then distant State of Wisconsin,had been born a new party, which, having taken apart of the old name of its logical opponent, hadswept eastward, and in two short years, by theuse of fusion • ? methods, had absorbed Free-soilers, anti-Nebraska Democrats, Whigs, Aboli-tionists, and Native Americans. Thus it was thatthe Republican party entered the national contest. In the month of June, 1856, upon the 5th, therehad assembled in Trenton men of varying shadesof belief, called, as its platform said, not as a mereparty, but to represent the great body of thepatriotic, enlightened, and conservative peopleof New Jersey opposed to the present State andFederal administration. Of this new party, stillwithout a name, but known as the Oppositionparty, the chairman was William Lewis Dayton,who, as an old line Whig, associate justice ofthe Supreme Court, U
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