THE AMERICAN CAUCUS

SYSTEM

ITS ORIGIN, PURPOSE AND UTILITY

BY

GEORGE W. LAWTON

NEW YORK & LONDON

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

The Knickerbocker Press

1885

THE

American Caucus System.

CHAPTER I.

THE ORIGIN AND ADOPTION OF THE WORD

"CAUCUS."

CHARLES SUMNER states he was asked by Brougham in the presence of Lord Lyndhurst, the origin and meaning of 'caucus,' and replied, "It is difficult to assign any elementary to the word, but the most approved one referred its origin to the very town, and about the time (1772), of his lordship's birth."

It is a tradition of the town' of Boston that 'caucus' was a common word there before the Revolutionary War broke out, and that it originated in a feud between the British troops on the one side and the rope-walkers and calkers on the other. Bloody collisions, it is said, occurred between them. The latter held meetings in the calkers' hall in the lower part of the city, at which resolutions were adopted and speeches made denouncing the soldiers, who on their part deriding

the wordy war offered, sneeringly dubbed their opponents The Calkers,' which by an easy corruption became the caucus,' and finally a term to denote the meetings.

But the word was in use prior to 1770, the time to which the tradition refers, as may be seen in a passage from the diary of John Adams, bearing date February, 1764, and reading as follows: "This day learned that the Caucus Club meets at certain times in the garret of Tom Dawes, the adjutant of the Boston regiment. He has a large house and he has a movable partition in his garret which he takes down and the whole club meets in one room. There they smoke tobacco till you cannot see from one end of the garret to the other. There they drink flip, I suppose, and there they choose a moderator, who puts questions to the vote regularly. And selectmen, assessors, collectors, wardens of fire-wards and representatives are chosen before they are chosen at the town. Fairfield, Story, Ruddock, Adams, Cooper, and a 'rudis indigestaque moles' of others are members. They send committees to wait on the Merchants' Club, and propose and join in the choice of men and measures. Captain Cunningham says they have solicited him to these caucuses. They have assured him benefit to his business."

Uncle

Also the historian Gordon, who possessed ample opportunity for investigation, in giving the proceed

ings of the General Court of Massachusetts in June, 1774, says: "Mr. Sam'l Adams observed that

some of the committee were for mild measures which he judged no ways suited to the present emergency. He conferred with Mr. Warren, of Plymouth, upon the necessity of going into spirited measures and then said: 'Do you keep the committee in play and I will go and make a caucus against the evening and do you meet me.'

In a note upon the passage the historian says: "The word caucus and its derivative, caucusing, are often used in Boston. The last answers much to what we (English) style parliamenteering. All my repeated applications to different gentlemen have not furnished me with a satisfactory account of the origin of caucus. It seems to mean a number of persons, whether more or less, met together to consult upon adopting and prosecuting some scheme of policy for carrying a favorite point. The word is not a novel invention. More than fifty years ago Mr. Sam'l Adams' father and twenty others, one or two from the north side of town where all the ship business is carried on, used to meet and make a caucus and lay plans for introducing certain persons into places of trust and power. When they had settled it they separated and used each their particular influence within his own circle. He and his friends would furnish themselves with ballots including the names of