Opposition Party (United States)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search
This entry describes a particular political group in the 19th century. For the generic term "Opposition party," see Opposition (parliamentary).

The Opposition Party represented a brief but significant transitional period in American politics from approximately 1854 to 1858. For the preceding 80 years, one of the major political issues had been the battle between the pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in the United States, which had been fought more on the basis of regional and class affiliations than strictly along party lines. However, in 1854, the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act fractured the Whig Party along pro- and anti-slavery lines, and led ultimately to the formation of the Republican Party, which strongly attracted the abolitionist Whigs and some Democrats. For many, the Opposition Party served as a successor to, or a continuation of, the Whig Party.

Contents

In the Congressional election of 1854 for the 34th United States Congress, the new Republican Party was not fully formed, and significant numbers of politicians, mostly former Whigs, ran for office under the Opposition label. This label was likely used because the Whig name had been discredited and abandoned, but former Whigs still needed to advertise that they were opposed to the Democrats. Following the election, the Opposition Party actually was the largest party in the U.S. House of Representatives, with the party makeup of the 234 Representatives being 100 Oppositionists, 83 Democrats, and 51 Americans (Know Nothing). That was a very dramatic shift from the makeup of the 33rd United States Congress (157 Democrats, 71 Whigs, 4 Free Soilers, 1 Independent, 1 Independent Democrat). Being the largest party did not lead to control of Congress; the new Speaker of the House was Nathaniel Prentice Banks, a former Democrat from Massachusetts who campaigned as a Know Nothing in 1854 and as a Republican in 1856.

By the 1856 elections, the Republican Party had formally organized itself, and the makeup of the 35th United States Congress was 132 Democrats, 90 Republicans, 14 Americans, 1 Independent Democrat.

In 1858, 19 candidates were elected to the 36th United States Congress as members of the Opposition Party from several states, including North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky. After 1858, the party did not win seats in Congress and effectively ceased to exist.

In North Carolina, a Republican organization did not develop until after the Civil War, and many former Whigs such as John Pool called themselves either the Whig Party or the Opposition Party through the election of 1860. This "new" Whig Party was actually just the state's affiliate of the American (Know-Nothing) Party with a new name, according to Folk and Shaw's W.W. Holden: a Political Biography. This party ceased to exist after the onset of the Civil War, but many of its members joined the loosely organized "Conservative Party" of Zebulon B. Vance.

The following list includes members of the U.S. House of Representatives who were elected as Opposition candidates.[1] Note that some Opposition candidates also ran under the labels of other parties at various times. There were no U.S. Senators officially from the Opposition Party, probably since the party never organized itself enough to gain control of any state legislature.

  1. ^ Source: Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress (search by Opposition party)
  2. ^ Note: the Wikipedia article on Lewis D. Campbell indicates that Campbell ran as an "Opposition" candidate in 1854 but was actually a member of the Know-Nothing movement, which at the time was secretive and not officially organized.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opposition_Party_%28United_States%29"
Advanced Search
Included Web Search Engines


Safe Search

close

Top Matching Results

Occasionally Search.com will highlight specialized results that are based on the context of your query. Examples of specialized results include specific links to news, images, or video.

Top Matching Results may highlight information from other Search.com pages, content from the CNET Network of sites, or third party content. The listings are based purely on relevance. Search.com does not receive payment for listings in this section but our partners that provide this data may get paid for listing these products.

Sponsored Links

This section contains paid listings which have been purchased by companies that want to have their sites appear for specific search terms and related content. These listings are administered, sorted and maintained by a third party and are not endorsed by Search.com.

Search Results

Search.com sends your search query to several search engines at one time and integrates the results into one list which has been sorted by relevance using Search.com's proprietary algorithm. You can customize the list of search engines included in your metasearch from the preferences.

The search engines that are used in your metasearch may allow companies to pay to have their Web sites included within the results. To view the Paid Inclusion policy for a specific search engine, please visit their Web site. Search.com does not accept payment or share revenue with any search engine partner for listings in this section.