Abolitionist Org - Free Soil Party — Civil War Encyclopedia

Free Soil Party

Encyclopedic Biographies of Free Soil Party Members and Supporters

See below for links to biographies of Free Soil Party leaders, members and supporters from Scribner’s Dictionary of American Biography and Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography.

Free Soil Party, founded August 9-10, 1848, in Buffalo, New York. It included members of the “Conscience Whigs” Party, Democrats and members of the Liberty Party. The motto was, “Free Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor and Free Men.” It was a third party, whose main purpose was opposing the expansion of slavery into the Western territories acquired after the war with Mexico. The party argued that free men on free soil was a morally and economically superior system to slavery. The party agreed with the Wilmot Proviso, and tried to remove existing laws that discriminated against freed African Americans. The party was active from 1848 to 1852. The party’s support came largely from the areas of upstate New York. The party membership was absorbed by the Republican Party at its founding in 1854. It sent two senators and fourteen members of the U.S. House of Representatives to the Thirty-First congress in 1849.

(Blue, 1987; Blue, 1973; Blue, 2005, pp. 3, 4, 7, 9-13, 35, 54-55, 66, 68-75, 121, 123, 139, 142, 144-145, 146, 170-171, 184, 198-205, 212, 214, 218-219, 236, 245; Duberman, 1968; Dumond, 1961; Earle, 2004; Filler, 1960, pp. 108, 122, 132, 182, 187, 189, 200, 213, 219, 223, 228, 233, 237, 253; Foner, 1970, 1995; Maybee, 1970, pp. 98, 110, 161, 173, 178, 247, 253, 261, 278, 279, 391n29; Mitchell, 2007, pp. 4, 7, 9, 19, 22, 26, 35, 44-47, 53-56, 60-73; Rayback, 1970, Rodriguez, 2007, pp. 50, 133-136, 173, 225, 297-298, 354, 514, 650-651; Sernett, 2002, pp. 124-127, 152; Sewell, 1976; Smith, 1897 Biographical Directory of the American Congress, 1774-1927 (1928))

Members and Supporters of the Free Soil Party

Click on the entries below to view an annotated list of biographies of Free Soil Party leaders, members and supporters. Sources: Scribner’s Dictionary of American Biography; Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography. See also below for index.

Click HERE for biographies of Free Soil Party members and supporters from Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography on our American Abolitionists website.

Introduction to Free Soil Party

Introduction

Officers and Co-Founders

John P. Hale
Charles Francis Adams
Gamaliel Bailey
Martin Van Buren
Salmon Portland Chase
George W. Julian

Allen through Atkinson

Babcock through Butler

Carter through Cutler

Dana through Dwight

Earle through Ewing

Farley through French

I-K

M-N

O-Q

Sanborn through Swisshelm

T-V

Tabor through Vaughn

W-Z

Wade through Wright

Index

Following is an index of the 196 leaders, members and supporters of the Free Soil Party for whom Scribner’s encyclopedic biographies are available. First you will find a list of officers and co-founders, followed by a list of members and supporters in alphabetical order, then by lists of US Senators and US Congressional Representatives. To read the biographies, click on the links below for each letter of the alphabet (or see links above).

Officers and Co-Founders

HALE, John P., 1806-1873, New Hampshire, statesman, diplomat, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator. In 1852, he was nominated for President of the United States, representing the Free Soil Party.

ADAMS, Charles Francis, 1807-1886, newspaper publisher and editor. Opposed annexation of Texas, on opposition to expansion of slavery in new territories. Free Soil Party nominee for Vice President of the U.S. (lost), 1848.

BAILEY, Gamaliel, 1807-1859, Maryland, abolitionist leader, journalist, newspaper publisher and editor. Publisher and editor of National Era (founded 1847), of the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. Co-founder of the Free Soil Party.

VAN BUREN, Martin, 1782-1862, Kinderhook, New York, lawyer, political leader. Eighth President of the United States. During his presidency, he opposed the annexation of Texas and the extension of slavery to the territory. Free Soil Party nominee for President of the U.S. (lost), 1848.

CHASE, Salmon Portland, 1808-1873, statesman, Governor of Ohio, U.S. Senator, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, 1864-1873. Abolitionist, member of the Liberty Party, co-founder of the Free Soil Party, and member of the Anti-Slavery Republican Party.

JULIAN, George W., 1817-1899, Indiana, Society of Friends, Quaker, statesman, lawyer, radical abolitionist leader from Indiana. Free Soil Party nominee for Vice President of the U.S. (lost), 1852.

BABCOCK, James Francis, 1809-1874, journalist. Joined Free-Soil Party in 1854.

BACON, Reverend Leonard 1802-1881, clergyman, newspaper editor, author, abolitionist leader. In 1848 Leonard Bacon was one of the founders and the senior editor of the Independent, which asserted as a motto, "We stand for free soil.”

BALDWIN, John Denison, 1809-1883, journalist, clergyman, Republican Member of the U.S. House of Representatives 1863-1867. Owner, editor of Free-Soil Charter Oak at Hartford, Connecticut.

BANKS, Nathanial Prentiss, 1816-1894, Waltham, Massachusetts, statesman, Union general, anti-slavery political leader. Governor of Massachusetts. Speaker of the House of Representatives, Member of the Free Soil and, later, Republican parties. Banks was called, “the very bone and sinew of Free-soilism”

BEATTY, John, 1828- soldier. He took an active part in public affairs, and was identified with Free-Soil Party until it was merged with the Republican party

BERRY, Nathaniel Springer, 1796- governor of New Hampshire. He became one of the organizers of the Free-Soil Party in New Hampshire.

BIRD, Francis William, 1809-1894, anti-slavery political leader, radical reformer. Member of the anti-slavery “Conscience Whigs,” and leader of the Massachusetts Free Soil Party.

BLAIR, Francis Preston, 1821-1875, Union soldier, statesman. In 1848 he joined the Free-Soil branch of the Democratic Party, was for a time editor of the “Missouri Democrat.” In 1856 he joined the newly organized Republican, Party, and was elected to Congress.

BLANCHARD, Jonathan, 1811-1892, clergyman, educator, abolitionist, theologian, lecturer. Worked for more than thirty years for the abolition of slavery.

BLISS, Philemon, 1813-1889, lawyer, U.S. Congressman, 1854, Chief Justice, Dakota Territory in 1861, elected Supreme Court of Missouri, 1868. Helped found anti-slavery Free Soil Party.

BOLES, John, Massachusetts Anti-slavery political leader, in the Massachusetts Free-Soil Party.

BOOTH, Sherman M., 1812-1904, Wisconsin, abolitionist leader, orator, politician, temperance activist. Member, Free Soil Party, and helped found the Liberty Party. Published Liberty Party newspaper, American Freedman.

BOOTH, Walter, 1791-1870, Woodbridge, Conn., soldier, jurist, U.S. Congressman from Connecticut, Free Soil Party.

BOUTWELL, George Sewall, 1818-1905, statesman, lawyer. Governor of Massachusetts. Member of the U.S. House of Representatives, 1862-1868 and U.S. Senator.

BRADBURN, George, 1806-1880, Nantucket, Massachusetts, politician, US Congressman, newspaper editor, Unitarian clergyman, abolitionist, women’s rights activist, lecturer.

BRAINERD, Lawrence, 1794-1870, anti-slavery activist, temperance activist, capitalist, statesman. U.S. Senator, elected 1854, member of the Liberty and Free Soil Parties.

BRINKERHOFF, James, 1810-1880, Anti-slavery U.S. Congressman author of the Wilmot Proviso. Member anti-slavery Free-Soil Party,

BRODERICK, David Colbert, 1820-1859, Washington, DC, forty-niner, political leader. Elected U.S. Senator from California in 1857. Member of the Free Soil Party. He was opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854 and the admission of Kansas as a slave state.

BROWN, Benjamin Gratz, 1826-1885, lawyer, soldier, U.S. Senator. Anti-slavery activist in Missouri legislature from 1852-1859.

BRYANT, William Cullen, 1794-1874, author, poet, editor, abolitionist. Wrote antislavery poetry. Free Soil Party. Editor of the Evening Post, which supported Congressman John Quincy Adams’ advocacy for the right to petition Congress against slavery, and was against the annexation of Texas. After 1848, the Evening Post took a strong anti-slavery editorial policy and supported the Free Soil Party.

BUCKINGHAM, Joseph T., Co-founder of the Free Soil Party.

BURLINGAME, Anson, Anson, 1820-1870, New Berlin, New York, diplomat, lawyer, orator. Was a member of the Free Soil Party and an early co-founder of the Republican Party in Massachusetts. Anti-slavery activist in the House of Representatives.

BUTLER, Benjamin Franklin, 1795 – 1858 was a prominent lawyer from the state of New York. A professional and political ally of Martin Van Buren, among the elective and appointive positions he held were Attorney General of the United States and United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He was also a founder of New York University Actively supported the Free-Soil Movement.

BUTLER, Ovid, 1801-1881, Augusta, New York, lawyer, newspaper publisher, university founder, abolitionist. Founded abolitionist newspaper, Free Soil Banner, in 1849.

CARTER, Robert, 1819-1879, Albany, New York, newspaper editor. Member of the Free Soil Party. Edited the Boston Commonwealth, a paper of the Free Soilers.

CHANDLER, Zachariah, 1813-1879, statesman. Helped organize the Republican Party in 1854. Introduced Confiscation Bill in Senate, July 1861. Was a leading Radical Republican Senator. Chandler was a vigorous opponent of slavery.

CHASE, Salmon Portland, 1808-1873, statesman, Governor of Ohio, U.S. Senator, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, 1864-1873, abolitionist, member of the Liberty Party, co-founder of the Free Soil Party, and member of the Anti-Slavery Republican Party.

CHENEY, Oren Burbank, 1816-1903, Maine, Free Will Baptist clergyman, state legislator in Maine, educator, newspaper editor, abolitionist. Free-Soil Party. Editor of The Morning Star.

CHRISTIANCY, Isaac Peckham, born 1812, Johnstown, New York. U. S. Senator. In 1848 was a delegate to the Buffalo Free-Soil Convention. He was a member of the N. Y. State senate from 1850 till 1852, and in the latter year was the Free-Soil candidate for governor.

CIST, Charles, Cincinnati, Ohio, Active in Free-Soil Party.

CLAFLIN, William H., 1818-1903, Newton, Massachusetts, Church Anti-Slavery Society.

CLARKE, George L., 1813-1890, Massachusetts, abolitionist. Mayor of Providence, Rhode Island. Member of Free-Soil and Liberty Parties.

CLEVELAND, Chauncy Fitch, 1799-1887, Hampton, Connecticut, lawyer, Governor, U.S. Congressman, reformer. Elected Congressman in 1842. Opposed the Missouri Compromise of 1850 and the Fugitive Slave Law.

COLLAMER, Jacob, 1791-1865, lawyer, jurist, U.S. Senator. Supported the Free Soil-Party and the non-extension of slavery into the new territories. Voted for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery.

CONWAY, Martin Franklin, 1829-1882, Hartford County, Maryland. U.S. Congressman, diplomat, abolitionist. Supported Kansas Free-State Movement.

CORWIN, Thomas, 1794-1865, statesman, U.S. Congressman, Governor of Ohio, U.S. Senator, Secretary of the Treasury, diplomat. Opposed the annexation of Texas while he was in in the senate, and the extension of slavery into the new territories.

COWLES, EDWIN 1825-1890), journalist. Published the Forest City Democrat, a Free-Soil Whig newspaper. In 1854, the name was changed to the Cleveland Leader.

COX, JACOB DOLSON (October 1828-1900), Union general, governor of Ohio, secretary of the interior, author. Cox took a prominent part in bringing about the fusion of Whigs and Free-Soiler parties.

CUSHMAN, Lt. Governor of Massachusetts, Member of the Free-Soil Party.

CUTLER, Hannah Tracy, 1815-1896, Becket, Massachusetts, abolitionist, physician. Helped found Women’s Anti-Slavery Society, member of the Free Soil Party, organizer of the Woman’s Kansas Aid Convention in 1856.

DANA, Richard Henry, Jr., 1815-1882, author, lawyer. Co-founder of the Free Soil Party and delegate to its convention in Buffalo, New York, in 1848. He was the lawyer who represented the Fugitive Slave Shadrack in Boston in 1851 and Anthony Burns in Boston in 1854.

DAYTON, William Lewis, 1807-1864, lawyer, statesman, diplomat, U.S. Senator. Member of the Free Soil and Whig Party. Opposed slavery and its expansion into the new territories. Opposed the Fugitive Slave bill of 1850, the admission of California as a free state and the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. First vice presidential nominee of Republican Party in 1856, on the ticket with John C. Frémont.

DEITZLER, George Washington, 1826-1884, abolitionist. Anti-slavery leader in Kansas. He was elected a member of the free-state territorial legislature of 1857-58 and was chosen speaker of the House of Representatives. He was also a member of the Kansas Senate under the Topeka constitution.

DENNISON, William, 1815-1882, Civil War governor of Ohio, lawyer. Founding member of Republican Party, state Senator, opposed admission of Texas and the extension of slavery into the new territories.

DE WHITT, Alexander, 1798-1879, Massachusetts, Free-Soil U.S. Congressman, elected in 1853. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act. In 1854 he was reelected to congress representing the anti-slavery American Party. Later joined the Republican Party. Strong supporter of the Union during the Civil War.

DIX, John Adams 1798-1879, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Governor of New York, Railroad president, Union Major-General of volunteers. Free-Soil Party candidate for Governor of New York in 1848 (Lost).

DOOLITTLE, James Rood, 1815-1897, lawyer, jurist, statesman. Democratic and Republican U.S. Senator from Wisconsin. In 1847 he wrote the "corner-stone resolution" in which "the democracy of New York ... declare ... their uncompromising hostility to the extension of slavery into territory now free…This became the essential plank in the Free-Soil platform of 1848 and, in modified phraseology, in the Republican platform of 1856.

DURKEE, Charles, c. 1805-1870, Royalton, Vermont, merchant, territorial legislature in Wisconsin, U.S. Congressman, Senator, Territorial Governor of Utah. Two-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the Free Soil Party, serving March 1849 to March 1853.

DWIGHT, Theodore, 1796-1866, Connecticut, abolitionist, author, reformer. Supported Free-Soil movement in Kansas.

EARLE, John Milton, 1794-1874, Leicester, Massachusetts, businessman, abolitionist, statesman, political leader, newspaper publisher. Member of Whig and Free Soil parties.

EDGERTON, Sidney, 1818-1900, U.S. Congressman from Ohio, Chief Justice of the Idaho Territorial Supreme Court, and Territorial Governor of Montana, abolitionist. Delegate to the Free Soil Convention in Buffalo, 1848.

ELIOT, Thomas Dawes, 1808-1870, lawyer. Member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill as a member of Congress. Voted for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery. Active in the Free-Soil Party.

EMERSON, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882, author, poet, essayist, transcendentalist, abolitionist. Emerson opposed the annexation of Texas. Called for emancipation, aiding and defending of fugitive slaves.

ENDICOTT, William, 1826-1914, abolitionist, of Beverly, Massachusetts, financial manager for abolitionist leader William Lloyd Garrison.

EWING, THOMAS (1829-1896), soldier, lawyer, congressman from Ohio. helped to prevent the admission of Kansas as a slave-state.

FARLEY, George F., Middlesex County, Massachusetts, political leader, Free Soil Party.

FAULK, ANDREW JACKSON, 1814-1898, third governor of Dakota Territory. Opposed the further extension of slavery in the new territories,

FENTON, REUBEN EATON, 1819-1885, United States senator, governor of New York, banker. As a congressman he opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. In 1856 he was elected as a Republican, serving until 1864, when he resigned to become governor of New York.

FESSENDEN, William Pitt, 1806-1869, lawyer, statesman, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury. Elected to Congress in 1840 as a member of the Whig Party opposing slavery. Moved to repeal rule that excluded anti-slavery petitions before Congress. Elected to the Senate in 1854. He opposed the Kansas-Nebraska bill as well as the Dred Scott Supreme Court Case. Co-founder of the Republican Party.

FIELD, DAVID DUDLEY, 1805-1894, lawyer, law reformer. In 1847 he was a delegate to the Democratic convention in Syracuse, where he introduced the ‘Corner-Stone" resolution, declaring "uncompromising hostility to the extension of slavery into territory now free…”.

FISH, HAMILTON, 1808-1893, anti-slavery statesman, opposed the opening of California and New Mexico territories to slavery and the repeal of the Missouri Compromise.

FLAGG, Azriah, 1790-1873, Orwell, Addison County, Vermont, newspaper editor, painter, political leader. Member of the Free Soil Party. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Later active in Republican Party.

FLETCHER, Calvin, 1798-1866, Indianapolis, Indiana, banker, farmer, state legislator. State legislator the member of the Whig, Free Soil and, later, Republican parties.

FLETCHER, Ryland, Free-Soil governor of Vermont. Was chosen to the state senate, and lieutenant-governor of Vermont from 1854 till 1856, when he was elected governor of the state by the Free-Soil Party, serving until 1858.

FOGG, GEORGE GILMAN, 1813-1881, lawyer, editor, diplomat. He was active in the Free-Soil movement, and in 1846 was appointed secretary of state for a term of one year. Later he took an active part in the organization of the new Republican party.

FOLGER, CHARLES JAMES, 1818- 1884, jurist, secretary of the treasury. Originally a Democrat, Folger joined the anti-slavery Republicans from the Free-Soil Party in 1854.

FOOT, SOLOMON, 1802-1866, lawyer, politician. He opposed the war in 1846, with Mexico, and extension of slavery to the new territories.

FOSTER, Lafayette Sabine, 1806-1880, statesman, Connecticut State Representative, Mayor, U.S. Senator 1854-1867. He was against the repeal of the Missouri compromise, and opposed the Lecompton Constitution for Kansas in 1858. He was a member of the Republican Party from its organization in 1856, and in 1860 was again elected to the Senate.

FOWLER, Orin, 1791-1852, Connecticut, clergyman, temperance activist, strong opponent of slavery. Free-Soil U.S. Congressman. Opposed the Fugitive-Slave Act of 1850.

FRANCIS, JOHN MORGAN, 1823-1897, newspaper editor, publisher, diplomat, member Free-Soil and Republican Parties.

FRÉMONT, John C., 1813-1890, California, Army officer, explorer, anti-slavery political leader. In 1856, was first candidate for President from the anti-slavery Republican Party.

FREMONT, JESSIE BENTON, 1824-1902, writer, abolitionist, daughter of Senator Thomas Hart Benton and wife of John Charles Fremont.

FRISBY, Leander F., Wisconsin Attorney General, Free Soil Party.

FRENCH, Robert, 1802-1882, politician, abolitionist, Temperance activist. Member of the Whig and Free Soil parties. Opposed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and successfully passed legislation to oppose it in New Bedford, Mass.

GAGE, Francis Dana Barker, 1808-1884, journalist, poet, reformer, temperance leader, women’s rights, anti-slavery leader. Supported Free Soil movement.

GATES, Seth Merrill, 1800-1877, abolitionist leader, lawyer, newspaper editor, U.S. Congressman, leader in the Whig and Free-Soil Parties, Western New York. In 1848 he was the Free-Soil candidate for lieutenant-governor of New York, but was defeated. He drew up the protest of the Whig members of Congress in 1843 against the annexation of Texas,

GERARD, JAMES WATSON, 1794-1874, lawyer, philanthropist. A consistent opponent of slavery, he took a leading part in the agitation against the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill.

GIDDINGS, Joshua Reed, 1795-1865, lawyer, statesman, U.S. Congressman, First abolitionist elected to House of Representatives. Opposed Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and was against further expansion of slavery into the new territories acquired during the Mexican War of 1846.

GILLETTE, Francis, 1807-1879, Connecticut, anti-slavery political leader, activist. U.S. Senator, Free Soil Party, co-founder of the Republican Party. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill in the Senate in 1854.

GODWIN, Parke, 1816-1904, editor, author, a Free-Soil Democrat, and Republican.

GOODNOW, Isaac Tichenor, 1814-March 1894, educator, Kansas pioneer. Opposed to the extension of slavery, and in 1854 he supported the New England Emigrant Aid Company to send Free-Soil colonists to Kansas.

GOVE, William Hazeltine, Politician, free-Soil Party, New Hampshire, 1817-1876. He early became an active worker in the anti-slavery cause, a supporter of the Liberty Party, and later a prominent Free-Soiler.

GRAY, Horace, 1828-1902, Massachusetts jurist, justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Was an original Free-Soiler; and, a Republican.

GREELEY, Horace, 1811-1872, political leader, journalist, newspaper publisher, The New York Tribune. Supporter of the Free-Soil and Anti-Slavery movements. Major opponent of slavery.

GRIMES, James Wilson, 1816-1872, statesman, lawyer, U.S. Senator, supported Free Soil policies. Elected as Republican Senator in 1859. Re-elected 1865.

HALE, Edward Everett, 1822-1909, Boston, Massachusetts, clergyman, Unitarian minister, writer, abolitionist leader. Supported the New England Emigrant Aid Company in Kansas.

HALE, John P., 1806-1873, New Hampshire, statesman, diplomat, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator. In 1852, he was nominated for President of the United States, representing the Free Soil Party.

HALLET, Benjamin F. founding member of the Free-Soil Party.

HAMLIN, Hannibal, 1809-1891. Vice President of the United States, 1861-1865, under President Abraham Lincoln. Congressman and U.S. Senator from Maine. Was an adamant opponent of the extension of slavery into the new territories. Supported the Wilmot Proviso and spoke against the compromise laws of 1850. Strongly opposed to the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

HARLAN, James, 1820-1899, statesman, lawyer, university president. Early anti-slavery activist in the Free Soil Party, U.S. Senator. Voted for Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution, abolishing slavery.

HARRISON, Henry Baldwin, 1821-1901, governor of Connecticut, he was a Whig, a Free-Soiler, and a Republican. He introduced the personal-liberty bill which was passed by this session of the General Assembly of Connecticut to nullify in the state the Fugitive-Slave Law passed by Congress.

HASTINGS, Samuel Dexter, 1816-1903, reformer. Co-founders of the Liberty party in Pennsylvania. Opposed to slavery, was the author of the resolutions which committed the new state of Wisconsin to its opposition to the extension of slavery.

HAWLEY, Joseph Roswell, 1826-1905, statesman, clergyman, lawyer, editor, opponent of slavery, Union officer. Member of the Free Soil Party and co-founder of the Republican Party.

HAWLEY, William Merrill, 1802-1869, lawyer, jurist, State Senator. Member, Free-Soil party.

HAZARD, Rowland Gibson, 1801-1888, manufacturer, writer on philosophical subjects, an active Free-Soiler and later a Republican.

HIGGINSON, Thomas Wentworth, 1823-1911, author, editor, Unitarian clergyman, radical abolitionist, women’s rights advocate. An anti-slavery reformer, he ran-unsuccessfully-for Congress as a Free-Soil candidate and secretly supported militant abolitionist John Brown, union officer.

HOAR, Ebenezer Rockwood, 1816-1895, lawyer, jurist, anti-slavery conscience Whig and Free-Soil member, U.S. congressman, was opposed to the extension of slavery into the new territories. U.S. attorney-general.

HOAR, George Frisbie, 1826-1904, lawyer, U.S. representative, U.S. Senator. Helped organize the Free-Soil Party in Massachusetts.

HOAR, Samuel, 1778-1856, lawyer, author, Union officer, U.S. congressman, founding member of the Massachusetts Free-Soil Party, and Massachusetts Republican Party. Anti-slavery political leader.

HOWE, John W., 1801-1873, lawyer, U.S. congressman from Pennsylvania (1849-1853). Member of the Free-Soil Party in the Thirty-first Congress, reelected to the Thirty-second Congress as a Whig Party representative.

HOWE, Julia Ward, 1819-1910, abolitionist, women’s suffrage advocate, social activist, poet, essayist. Author of “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Wife of abolitionist Samuel Gridley Howe, whom she aided in the publishing and editing of the Boston Anti-slavery newspaper, the Commonwealth before the Civil War.

HOWE, Dr. Samuel Gridley, 1801-1876, abolitionist leader, philanthropist, physician, reformer. Anti-slavery advocate. Free Soil candidate for Congress from Boston in 1846. He edited the anti-slavery newspaper, the Commonwealth.

HOWELL, James Bruen, 1816-1880, pioneer editor, political journalist, anti-slavery Whig, Free-Soiler and Republican. Actively supported the candidacy of Van Buren and Adams on the Free-Soil ticket in 1848 and helped organize the Republican party in New York in 1856.

HUSSEY, Erastus, 1800-1889, political leader, abolitionist leader, agent, Underground Railroad. Helped more than one thousand slaves escape after 1840. Member of the Free-Soil and Liberty Parties helped organize new Republican Party.

JACKSON, William, 1783-1855, Massachusetts, newspaper publisher, abolitionist, temperance activist. U.S. Congressman. Active in the Whig, Liberty, and Free-Soil Parties.

JAY, John, 1817-1894, New York, diplomat, lawyer. Leader in the Free-Soil Party and founding member of the Republican Party.

JOHNSON, Oliver, 1809-1889, anti-slavery leader, newspaper editor, printer, reformer. He worked with the Republican (Philadelphia), a Free-Soil paper.

JULIAN, George W., 1817-1899, Indiana, Society of Friends, Quaker, statesman, lawyer, radical abolitionist leader from Indiana. Free Soil Party nominee for Vice President of the U.S. (lost), 1852.

KANE, Thomas Leiper, 1822-1883, Union general, abolitionist. In 1848 he became chairman of the Free Soil State Central Committee in Pa.

KASSON, John Adam, 1822-1910, lawyer, diplomat. Supporter of the Free-Soil Party. Republican Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Iowa.

KEYES, Edward L., U.S. Congressman, member of the Free Soil Party.

KING, Preston, 1806-1865, New York, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator, politician. Opponent of the extension of slavery into the new territories. Supporter of the Wilmot Proviso in Congress. Co-founder of Free Soil Party.

LANE, James Henry, 1814-1866, lawyer, soldier. Union General. U.S. Senator from Kansas, 1861-1866. A leader in the Free Soil militant group.

LARNED, Joseph Gay Eaton, 1819-1870, lawyer, he was one of the founders of the Free-Soil Party in Connecticut.

LAWRENCE, Amos Adams, 1814-1886. Principal manager and treasurer of the Kansas Emigrant Aid Society. Worked to keep Kansas a free state.

LEAVITT, Joshua, 1794-1873, New York, reformer, temperance activist, editor, lawyer, clergyman, abolitionist leader.

LEE, LUTHER, 1800-1889, clergyman, abolitionist, in 1840 he took a leading part in founding the anti-slavery Liberty Party.

LINCOLN, Abraham, 1809-1865, 16th President of the United States (1861-1865), As a U.S. Congressman he was opposed to the extension of slavery to the new territories.

MANN, Horace, 1796-1859, Boston, Mass., educator, political leader, social reformer, anti-slavery activist. U.S. Congressman, Whig Party, from Massachusetts. Opposed extension of slavery in territories annexed in the Mexican War.

MCLEAN, John, 1785-1861, New Jersey, jurist, attorney. U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Free Soil and later Republican Party candidate for nomination for President of the U.S.

MILLS, John, Anti-slavery political leader and co-founding member of the Free Soil Party.

MEDILL, Joseph, journalist, 1823- He founded a Free-Soil paper in 1849 established "The Leader," a Whig journal, in 1852, and in 1854 was one of the organizers of the Republican Party in Ohio.

MORRILL, Anson Peaslee, 1803-1887, anti-slavery governor of Maine, U.S. Congressman, 1861-1863. Candidate for governor on the Free-soil and Prohibition tickets, (lost).

MORTON, Marcus, 1784-1864, Taunton, lawyer, jurist, governor of Massachusetts, U.S. Congressman, anti-slavery political leader, member of the Free Soil Party.

MORTON, Nathan, Worcester, Massachusetts. Member of the Free Soul Party, anti-slavery activist.

NEWHALL, Benjamin F., 1802-1863, abolitionist, Massachusetts House of Representatives, member, Liberty and Free-Soil Parties.

NILES, John Milton, 1787-1856. Member of the Free-Soil party.

NYE, James Warren, 1814-1876, governor of Nevada Territory, supporter of the Free-Soil movement, later a Radical Republican.

OGDEN, William Butler, 1805-1877, former mayor of Chicago, entrepreneur, railroad president. Anti-slavery member of the Free Soil Party.

OPDYKE, George, mayor of New York city. He was a member of the Buffalo Free-Soil Convention in 1848, and was a candidate for Congress on the Free-Soil ticket in New Jersey.

PALFREY, John Gorham, 1796-1881, author, theologian, educator, opponent of slavery. Anti-slavery member of Congress from Massachusetts.

PHILLIPS, Abner, Massachusetts, leader in Massachusetts, Free Soil Party.

PHILLIPS, Stephen Clarendon, 1801-1857, philanthropist. U.S. Congressman, Whig Party. Also organizer and leader of the Free-Soil Party.

PICTON, Thomas, 1822-1891, soldier of fortune, journalist, he edited the "True National Democrat," the organ of the Free-Soilers.

PIERCE, Henry Lillie, 1825-1896), manufacturer, mayor of Boston, congressman, campaigned for the Free-Soil party in national elections.

PIERPONT, John, 1785-1866, Massachusetts, poet, lawyer, Unitarian theologian, temperance reformer, abolitionist leader, member of the anti-slavery Liberty Party. Free Soil candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1850.

POLAND, Luke Potter, 1815-1887), jurist, U.S. senator, representative, in 1848 he was elected by a Whig legislature to the supreme court. A Free-Soil candidate for the lieutenant-governorship of Vermont.

RANTOUL, Robert, Jr., 1805-1852, statesman, reformer, lawyer, writer, publisher, industrialist, Democratic and Free Soil Member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

RAUM, Green Berry, 1829-1909), soldier, politician. In 1856 he moved with his family to Kansas, and supported the Free-state Party opposing slavery in the territory.

READ, John Meredith, (July 21, 1797- November 29, 1874), jurist. Member of the Democratic wing of the Free-soil party.

RIDDLE, ALBERT GALLATIN, 18161902, lawyer, congressman. An ardent Whig and was against slavery. Co-founded the Free-Soil party of Ohio. He was nominated by the Whigs and Free-Soilers for the state House of Representatives, and was elected.

ROBERTS, Jonathan Manning, 1771-1854, U.S. Senator, U.S. Congressman, opponent of slavery. Called for the prohibition of slavery in Missouri in the Senate.

ROBINSON, Charles, 1818-1894, territorial governor, Kansas, member Free Soil Anti-Slavery Party, 1855.

ROBINSON, William Stevens, 1818-1876; journalist, in 1848 he served as secretary of the Free-Soil Convention which met in Mass. He was an outspoken opponent slavery in Massachusetts politics.

ROOT, Joseph M., 1807-1879, Ohio, lawyer, U.S. Congressman, Mayor of Sandusky, Ohio. Whig Congressman and later Free Soil Member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

ROOT, JOSEPH POMEROY (April 23, 1826-July 20, 1885), physician, diplomatist, chairman of the Free-State Executive Committee, in August 1857 was elected to the Kansas Senate under the Topeka constitution.”

SANBORN, Franklin Benjamin, 1831-1917, abolitionist leader, journalist, prison and social reformer, Secretary of the Massachusetts State Kansas Committee. Secretary of the Massachusetts Free Soil Association.

SCAMMON, Jonathan Young, 1812-1890, lawyer, businessman, educator, newspaper publisher, Whig and Republican state leader, member of the Free Soil Party. Introduced legislation to exclude slavery from the California and New Mexico territories.

SEWARD, William Henry, 1801-1872, statesman, U.S. Secretary of State under Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson, U.S. Senator from New York, abolitionist, member Anti-Slavery Republican Party.

SMITH, Gerrit, 1797-1874, Peterboro, New York, anti-slavery member of U.S. congress, large landowner, reformer, philanthropist, radical abolitionist leader. Secretly supported militant abolitionist John Brown.

SMITH, Horace E., New York, abolitionist leader, member of the Free Soil Party. Co-editor of the Free Soiler newspaper with Francis W. Bird and John B. Alley.

SPALDING, Rufus Paine, 1798-1886, lawyer, jurist. Free Soiler and Anti-slavery Republican Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio, 1863-1869. Opposed the extension of slavery into the new territories.

STANTON, Edwin McMasters, 1814-1869, statesman, lawyer, anti-slavery activist. U. S. Secretary of War, 1862-1867. Favored Wilmot Proviso to exclude slavery from the new territories. Member of the Free Soil movement.

STANTON, Elizabeth Cady, 1815-1902, reformer, suffragist, abolitionist leader, co-founder of the Women’s National Loyal League in 1863, co-founded American Equal Rights Association (AERA) in 1866.

STANTON, Henry Brewster, 1805-1887, New York, New York, Cincinnati, Ohio, abolitionist leader, anti-slavery agent, editor, journalist, author.

STEARNS, George Luther, 1809-1867, industrialist, Free Soil supporter, abolitionist. Chief supporter of the Emigrant Aid Company. Founded the Nation, Commonwealth, and Right of Way newspapers. Supported militant abolitionist John Brown, and his raid on the U.S. Arsenal at Harpers Ferry.

SUMNER, Charles, 1811-1874, statesman, lawyer, writer, editor, educator, reformer, peace advocate, anti-slavery political leader. U.S. Senatorial candidate on the Free Soil ticket. Opposed the Fugitive Slave Law and the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Organizer and co-founder of the Republican party.

SWAN, Caleb Dr. Anti-slavery co-founding member of the Free-Soil Party established in 1848.

SWISSHELM, Jane Grey Cannon, 1815-1884, abolitionist leader, women’s rights advocate, journalist, reformer. Free Soil Party. Liberty Party and Liberty League. Republican Party activist. Established Saturday Visitor, an abolition and women’s rights newspaper.

TABOR, Horace Austin Warner, 1830-1899), bonanza king. In 1855 he joined a company of Free-Soil emigrants to Kansas and in 1856 and 1857 was a member of the Topeka legislature.

TAPPAN, Benjamin, 1773-1857), U.S. senator from Ohio, jurist, anti-slavery leader. An anti-slavery man, on July, 1849, he presided at a Northwest Ordinance (Free Soil) political meeting, and in 1856 he cast his presidential vote for Fremont.

TAPPAN, Lewis Northey, 1788-1873, New York, NY, merchant, publisher, radical abolitionist leader. Published anti-slavery newspaper, The Emancipator, member Free-Soil Party. Brother of Benjamin and Arthur Tappan.

TAPPAN, Mason Weare, 1817-1886, lawyer, soldier. U.S. Congressman, Free Soil Party, 1855-1861.

TAPPAN, Samuel Foster, 1831-1913, Manchester, Massachusetts, journalist, Union Army officer, abolitionist, Native American rights activist. Active in the Free-Soil movement to keep slavery out of the territory of Kansas.

THAYER, Eli, 1819-1899, Worcester, Massachusetts, abolitionist, educator, congressman, established Massachusetts Emigrant Aid Society, 1854, which became New England Aid Company in 1855.

THORNTON, Jessy Quinn, 1810-1888, jurist, lawyer. Chief Justice of the Oregon Provisional Government, 1847. Supporter of “Wilmot Proviso” to prohibit extension of slavery in the new territories acquired after war with Mexico.

TREADWELL, Seymour Boughton, 1795-1867, political leader, temperance and anti-slavery activist. Editor of anti-slavery newspaper, Michigan Freeman. Member Free-Soil Party.

TUCK, Amos, 1810-1879, New Hampshire, lawyer, politician, abolitionist. Co-founder of the Republican Party. Free-Soil and Whig anti-slavery member of the U.S. Congress. Opposed the annexation of Texas and the extension of slavery to the new territories.

TYNDALE, Hector, 1821-1880), merchant, Union soldier. Joined the Free-Soil Party in 1856, then affiliated himself with the new Republican party.

UNDERWOOD, Francis Henry, born 1825. Went to Massachusetts in 1850, and took an active part in the anti-slavery cause. Supported the Free-Soil movement by the founding of a literary magazine, the "Atlantic Monthly."

VAN DYKE, Henry Herbert, financier, 1809-1888. “He was active in state politics as a Free-Soil Democrat.

VAUGHN, John C., Ohio newspaper editor. Active in Free Soil movement.

WADE, Benjamin Franklin, 1800-1878, lawyer, jurist, U.S. Senator, active opponent of slavery. In 1839, opposed enactment of stronger fugitive slave law, later calling for its repeal. U.S. Senator, March 1851-1869. Opposed Kansas-Nebraska Bill of 1854. Reported bill to abolish slavery in U.S. Territories in 1862.

WADE, Edward, 1802-1866, Massachusetts, Ohio, lawyer, prominent abolitionist. Free Soil party U.S. Congressman from Ohio in the 33rd Congress. Republican representative in the 34th and 35th Congresses. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.

WADSWORTH, JAMES SAMUEL, 1807-1864, Union officer. Originally a Democrat, with strong anti-slavery leanings made him join and help organize the Free-Soil party, which later merged with the Republican party in 1856.

WALDEN, John Morgan Methodist bishop, born in 1831. He was editor and publisher of a free-state paper in Kansas. He was also a member of the Topeka legislature, and of the Leavenworth Constitutional Convention at the time of its adoption of a constitution in 1858.

WALKER, Amasa, 1799-1875, Boston, Massachusetts, political economist, abolitionist. Anti-slavery Republican U.S. Congressman from Massachusetts. Co-founder of Free Soil Party in 1848.

WALLACE, LEWIS, ”Lew” 1827-1905, lawyer, Union general, diplomat, author, edited a Free-Soil newspaper.

WARD, Samuel Ringgold, 1817-1866, American Missionary Association (AMA), African American, abolitionist leader, newspaper editor, author, orator, clergyman. Member of the Liberty Party and the Free Soil Party.

WATTLES, Augustus, 1807-1883, established school for free Blacks. Agent of the American Anti-Slavery Society. Worked with Emigrant Aid Society in Lawrence, Kansas. Edited Herald of Freedom.

WHITE, W. A., U.S. Congressman, member of the Free Soil Party.

WHITMAN, Walt, 1819-1892, poet, essayist, journalist. Wrote antislavery poetry. Supported the Wilmot Proviso and was opposed to the inclusion of slavery in the new territories.

WHITTIER, John Greenleaf, 1807-1892, Haverhill, Massachusetts, poet, journalist, newspaper publisher and editor, Society of Friends, Quaker, radical abolitionist. Wrote antislavery poetry. Publisher and editor of the Pennsylvania Freeman. Member, Free Soil Party.

WILLARD, Victor, Wisconsin state senator, member of the Free Soil Party

WILMOT, David, 1814-1868, lawyer, jurist, anti-slavery activist, U.S. Congressman, Pennsylvania. He was an early founder of the Republican Party in Pennsylvania. Introduced Wilmot Proviso into Congress to exclude slavery in territories acquired from Mexico in 1846-1849.

WILSON, Henry, 1812-1875, abolitionist leader, statesman, U.S. Senator and Vice President of the U.S. Massachusetts state senator. Member, Free Soil Party. Founder of the Republican Party.   Opposed annexation of Texas as a slave state. Bought and edited Boston Republican newspaper, which represented the anti-slavery Free Soil Party. Called for the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1815. Introduced bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia and the granting of freedom to slaves who joined the Union Army.

WOODARD, Willard, educator, publisher, member of the Free Soil Party.

WRIGHT, Silas, 1795-1849, statesman, Congressman, U.S. Senator, soldier, favored restriction and abolition of slavery. Congressman from December 1827 through March 1829, U.S. Senator from 1833 to December 1844, Governor of New York State, 1844-1847. Opposed expansion of slavery into the new territories acquired from Mexico.

Free Soil United States Senators

BRAINERD, Lawrence, 1794-1870, anti-slavery activist, temperance activist, capitalist, statesman. U.S. Senator, elected 1854, member of the Liberty and Free Soil Parties.

CHASE, Salmon Portland, 1808-1873, statesman, Governor of Ohio, U.S. Senator, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, 1864-1873, abolitionist, member of the Liberty Party, co-founder of the Free Soil Party, and member of the Anti-Slavery Republican Party.

GILLETTE, Francis, 1807-1879, Connecticut, anti-slavery political leader, activist. U.S. Senator, Free Soil Party, co-founder of the Republican Party. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill in the Senate in 1854.

HALE, John P., 1806-1873, New Hampshire, statesman, diplomat, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator. In 1852, he was nominated for President of the United States, representing the Free Soil Party.

SUMNER, Charles, 1811-1874, statesman, lawyer, writer, editor, educator, reformer, peace advocate, anti-slavery political leader. U.S. Senatorial candidate on the Free Soil ticket. Opposed the Fugitive Slave Law and the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854. Organizer and co-founder of the Republican party.

WADE, Edward, 1802-1866, Massachusetts, Ohio, lawyer, prominent abolitionist. Free Soil party U.S. Congressman from Ohio in the 33rd Congress. Republican representative in the 34th and 35th Congresses. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.

WILSON, Henry, 1812-1875, abolitionist leader, statesman, U.S. Senator and Vice President of the U.S. Massachusetts state senator. Member, Free Soil Party. Founder of the Republican Party. Opposed annexation of Texas as a slave state. Bought and edited Boston Republican newspaper, which represented the anti-slavery Free Soil Party. Called for the repeal of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1815. Introduced bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia and the granting of freedom to slaves who joined the Union Army.

Free Soil United States Congressional Representatives

ALLEN, Charles, August 9, 1797 – August 6, 1869. Free-Soil U.S. Congressman from Massachusetts He was twice elected to Congress as a Free-Soil Party candidate (March 4, 1849 – March 3, 1853), but did not seek renomination in 1852. In 1849 he edited the Boston Whig, later called the Republican.

BOOTH, Walter, 1791-1870, Woodbridge, Conn., soldier, jurist, U.S. Congressman from Connecticut, Free Soil Party.

DE WHITT, Alexander, 1798-1879, Massachusetts, Free-Soil U.S. Congressman, elected in 1853. Opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act. In 1854 he was reelected to congress representing the anti-slavery American Party. Later joined the Republican Party. Strong supporter of the Union during the Civil War.

DURKEE, Charles, c. 1805-1870, Royalton, Vermont, merchant, territorial legislature in Wisconsin, U.S. Congressman, Senator, Territorial Governor of Utah. Two-term member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the Free Soil Party, serving March 1849 to March 1853.

GIDDINGS, Joshua Reed, 1795-1865, Ohio, lawyer, statesman, U.S. Congressman. First abolitionist elected to House of Representatives. Opposed Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 and was against further expansion of slavery into the new territories acquired during the Mexican War of 1846.

HOWE, John W., 1801-1873, lawyer, U.S. congressman from Pennsylvania (1849-1853). Member of the Free-Soil Party in the Thirty-first Congress, reelected to the Thirty-second Congress as a Whig Party representative.

JULIAN, George W., 1817-1899, Indiana, Society of Friends, Quaker, statesman, lawyer, radical abolitionist leader from Indiana. Free Soil Party nominee for Vice President of the U.S. (lost), 1852.

KING, Preston, 1806-1865, New York, U.S. Congressman, U.S. Senator, politician. Opponent of the extension of slavery into the new territories. Supporter of the Wilmot Proviso in Congress. Co-founder of Free Soil Party.

MANN, Horace, 1796-1859, Boston, Mass., educator, political leader, social reformer, anti-slavery activist. U.S. Congressman, Whig Party, from Massachusetts. Opposed extension of slavery in territories annexed in the Mexican War.

ROOT, Joseph M., 1807-1879, Ohio, lawyer, U.S. Congressman, Mayor of Sandusky, Ohio. Whig Congressman and later Free Soil Member of the U.S. House of Representatives.

SMITH, Gerrit, 1797-1874, Peterboro, New York, anti-slavery member of U.S. congress, large landowner, reformer, philanthropist, radical abolitionist leader. Secretly supported militant abolitionist John Brown.

TUCK, Amos, 1810-1879, New Hampshire, lawyer, politician, abolitionist. Co-founder of the Republican Party. Free-Soil and Whig anti-slavery member of the U.S. Congress. Opposed the annexation of Texas and the extension of slavery to the new territories.

Sources:
Dictionary of American Biography, Volumes I-X, Edited by Dumas Malone, New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1930.

Appletons’ Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Volumes I-VI, Edited by James Grant Wilson & John Fiske, New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1888-1889.