Anti-Masonic Party

Anti-Masonic Party, American political organization founded in 1827-1828, chiefly as a result of the mysterious disappearance of William Morgan of Batavia, New York, a Freemason, who was planning to publish a book revealing the secrets of the order. Morgan, an itinerant worker, was arrested in 1826 and charged with stealing and indebtedness, apparently as a pretext for seizing him. Convicted and jailed, he was reportedly kidnapped shortly afterward. Although his actual fate was never learned, it was widely believed that he had been abducted and murdered by Masons. This incident touched off a wave of anti-Masonic sentiment.

Opponents of Freemasonry, including sections of the press, churches, and antislavery elements, joined in the condemnation of the order. Thurlow Weed, publisher of the Rochester (New York) Telegraph and later of the Anti-Masonic Enquirer, led the press attack on Freemasonry and endorsed anti-Masonic candidates for New York State offices in the election of 1827. When 15 of these candidates were elected to the state Assembly, an Anti-Masonic Party was formed and in 1828 held its first state convention. National conventions were held in Philadelphia in 1830 and in Baltimore in 1831. At the latter, William Wirt, who had served as U.S. attorney general under Presidents James Monroe and John Quincy Adams, was nominated for president in opposition to Andrew Jackson, who supported Masonry. Wirt himself was a Freemason. The convention required a three-fourths majority to nominate, thereby setting a precedent for the two-thirds rule used by the Democrats in subsequent national conventions for more than 100 years. In the 1832 elections, however, the Anti-Masonic Party carried only the state of Vermont. It did win a considerable number of seats in the 23rd Congress (1833-1835). The party survived until about 1834, when several prominent leaders founded the Whig Party or shifted to the Democratic Party.