Chemung County NY
History of Tompkins, Schuyler, Chemung, Tioga 1879
Chapter 38
Chapter XXXVIII  - Political History
Political History
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1879 Four County History - Table of Contents
Typed for Tri-Counties by John Campbell
Formatted by Joyce M. Tice
CHAPTER XXXVIII.

POLITICAL HISTORY.

Political Divisions of the People – Presidential Preferences and Gubernatorial Gatherings – Popular Questions – Constitutional Amendments – Free Schools and a Pure Judiciary – Anti-Slavery Agitation, and what cause of it.

POLITICAL DIVISIONS.

The division of the people of Chemung on political issues since the organization of the county is best shown by the way they cast their ballots for candidates for Presidential electors and Governor.

The first election was in 1836, when the Presidential electors resulted as follows:
 

Dem. Whig. Total.
Big Flats
126
45
Catharine
157
235
Catlin
92
36
Cayuta
100
11
Chemung
187
69
Dix
169
91
Elmira
422
283
Erin
120
3
Southport
175
91
Veteran
184
136

Subsequent elections have resulted as follows.
 

    Dem. Whig. Abolit’n. Temp. Total.
1838 Governor
2064
1835
   
3449
1840 President
2296
1698
9
 
4003
1842 Governor
2304
1534
35
 
3873
1844 President
2592
1791
106
 
4489
1846 Governor
2044
1666
71
 
3781
1848 President
2165
1943
   
4836
1850 Governor
2611
1976
   
4587
1852 President
3189
2326
339
 
5854
       
Amer.
   
1854 Governor
1467
1613
1067
98
4245
             
1856 President
1789
2664
766
 
5219
       
Abolit’n.
Amer.
 
1858 Governor
2533
2369
29
148
1860 President
2476
2949
   
1862 Governor
2631
2589
   
1864 President
3109
3292
   
1866 Governor
3382
3467
   
1868 President
3708
3709
   
1870 Governor
4082
3502
178
 
1872 President
3728
4350
   
8084
1874 Governor
4226
3453
247
 
7936
1876 President
5228
4732
36
 
9996

The election in 1876, by towns, was as follows:
 

 
Dem.
 
Rep.
 
Scattering
 
Total
Ashland
142
 
114
 
1
 
257
Baldwin
129
 
127
     
256
Big Flats
254
 
252
     
506
Catlin
181
 
196
     
377
Chemung
259
 
247
     
506
Erin
136
 
261
 
1
 
398
Elmira Township
180
 
198
 
1
 
379
Elmira City, 1st Ward
259
 
182
 
2
   
" " 2nd
234
 
403
 
2
   
" " 3rd
385
 
311
 
2
   
" " 4th
338
2125
464
2290
8
18
4433
" " 5th
349
 
381
 
1
   
" " 6th
394
 
317
 
3
   
" " 7th
166
 
232
       
Horseheads
405
 
472
     
877
Southport
347
 
525
 
5
 
877
Veteran
358
 
269
     
627
Van Etten
214
 
277
     
494

Popular Questions submitted to the people have been disposed of as follows:
 

1845 For Constitutional Convention
2060
  Against same
88
  For abrogation of the property qualification for office
1155
  Against same  
1846 For the amended constitution
2568
  Against same
180
  For equal suffrage
686
  Against same
2082
1849 For free-school law
2799
  Against same
312
1850 For repeal of free-school law
2315
  Against same
2135
1853 For proposed amendment relating to canals
1636
  Against amendment
133
1865 For bounty law of State
4549
  Against same
496
1866 For Constitutional Convention
3420
  Against Convention
3265
1969 For constitutional amendments
3250
  Against same
2049
  For property qualification for colored voters
3205
  Against same
2357
1870 For act to fund canal debt
2643
  Against same
3701
1872 For act relating to general deficiency
426
  Against same
1922
  For amendment respecting court appeals
2940
  Against same
53
1873 For appointment of Judges of Supreme Court
1370
  Against appointment
2905
  For appointment of County and City Judges
1299
  Against appointment
2171
1874 The average majority for 11 constitutional amendments 

submitted this year was about

2600

ANTI-SLAVERY SENTIMENT.

While there was no regularly-organized anti-slavery society in Chemung County, yet the agitation was none the less marked, and in its beginning excited quite as much opposition as elsewhere. The first movement was begun in 1836, by Rev. John Frost, John Selover, and Dr. Norman Smith, the former and latter being original "dyed-in-the-wool" abolitionists, while Elder Selover began as a colonizationist with Gerrit Smith. When the Utica people drove the anti-slavery men and women from their city to Peterboro’, Gerrit Smith was no longer a colonizationist, but a zealous emancipationist, and Elder Selover experienced his change of hear on that subject about the time. In 1837 the Annual Conference of the Methodist Churches of Western or Central New York was held at Elmira, and in that Conference was an organized anti-slavery society, composed chiefly of the ministers of that Conference. They desired to hold their annual meeting for the election of officers and the transaction of other business, and applied to the trustees of the Methodist Episcopal Church for permission to hold their meeting in it, and were refused. A like application to the other churches met the same refusal. In this strait, the ministers applied to Messrs, Selover, Frost, and Smith for aid to get a place to meet in, and they applied to Mr. Davis, the proprietor of the island, - then a beautiful place of resort for all public gatherings, - for permission to meet there, which was readily and cheerfully granted. To this island the ministers and others, to the number of 300 or 400, repaired; but just before organizing the meeting, a deputation from the village trustees waited on the clergymen, and in the name of the trustees forbade the gathering, on the plea of creating a disturbance. The jurisdiction of the trustees over the island was nil, and the clergymen refused to abandon their meeting. Thereupon another deputation of worthy and respectable citizens appeared, and proceeded to read a paper emanating from the trustees of the Presbyterian Church, also forbidding the meeting; but the jurisdiction of the Presbyterian Church over the ministers of the Methodist Conference was of a slighter tenure than that of the trustees of the village over Davis Island, and the second deputation was laughed at for their pains. The fathers of the village and of the church failing in their mission, a less respectable and more noisy rabble – "fellows of a baser sort" – took up the task of dispersing the abolitionists, and with tin horns and pans, and rattles, and implements of rowdyism and riot, they so deafened the atmosphere that the words of the speakers could not be heard by the audience, and the meeting was broken up and left the island.

Application was then made to Mr. T.S. Day for permission to meet on his farm at the foot of what is now Washington Street, in Elmira City, which being granted, the meeting assembled, some 200 strong, about half being the ministers of the Conference and strangers in the village, and the exercises were peaceably conducted. This was the only anti-slavery meeting seriously disturbed by a mob in Elmira. Rev. Mr. Frost was the marshal who conducted the procession to Davis Island, and for his antislavery sentiments, which he would preach at every opportunity, he was finally forced to withdraw from the pastorate of the Presbyterian Church, to make way for one whose political sentiments were more in harmony with those of the financial pillars of the church. Subsequently, discussions were held by Mr. Selover and S.G. Andrews wit certain attorneys, and a brother-in-law of the Presbyterian pastor, one Woolsey Hopkins, on the ends and aims of the Colonization Society, the latter gentleman taking the affirmative side of the question, upholding the society as the true ameliorator of the slave, and the former the negative, showing the society to be an aider and abettor of slavery, and that emancipation was the only true amelioration of the slave. Dr. Tracy Beadie, John W. Wisner, and Simeon L. Rood were the chosen umpires of the disputation, and derided that the negative had the best of argument. Six months later the discussion was repeated, with the same result substantially.

From the time when Elmira refused a hearing to the abolitionists, in 1837, the sentiments it sought to repress grew, slowly for a time, but steadily and surely, until it divided and broke into the ranks of the great parties, and swept over the country like a rising, irresistible flood in 1856, and the party founded on the principle of emancipation at that time have held sway at every Presidential election since.

The early apostles of abolition, aside from those already named, were J.M. Robinson, now of Elmira; Jervis Langdon, now deceased; T.S. and Erastus Day, of Horseheads; S.G.Andrews, now of Williamsport; Iru Gould, G.A. Gridley, of Water Street, Elmira; and Frank Hall. Mr. Selover seems to have been the most aggressive spirit in the early part of the contest, and he has lived to see the principles, the avowal of which brought upon their holders ebloquy, persecution, and reproach, become triumphant in the nation, and accepted by all political parties of the land, of whatever faith or sect. His recital of the above facts was not the least interesting hour passed by the compiler in old Chemung.

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