Political diversity within the American Whig Party?

[Wazza [INACTIVE]]

It has been discussed at great length how the issue of slavery brought liberals, radicals and conservatives under the Republican banner. Individuals such as Hannibal Hamlin, Nathaniel P. Banks and John C. Fremont are frequently mentioned as examples of Liberal Democrats who joined the Republican Party out of opposition to slavery. Conversely the aforementioned issue resulted in conservative Southern Whigs joining the Democratic Party, such as Alexander H. Stephens, Robert Toombs, and Judah P. Benjamin.

In contrast to the mish-mash of the early 3rd party system, the 2nd party system is seen as a relatively politically uniform period in which the Whigs were a conservative, economically nationalist and centralist party with the backing of the mercantile and industrial elites in the North and the majority of planters in the South. Whilst the Jacksonian Democrats were a party rooted in Jeffersonian Liberalism who opposed special interests such as the central bank and tariff and received support from poor farmers and labourers.

However, there appears to have been elements within the Whig Party with a rather liberal or radical outlook. Figures like Charles Sumner, Charles Francis Adams, Horace Greeley, William H. Seward and Thaddeus Stevens come to mind. So my Question is, why is it the case that at a time of relative political uniformity and when slavery was not a partisan issue the Whig Party housed a significant number of people with apparently liberal and radical outlooks? Was there some radical strain of thought that aligned with the Whig program of protectionism and internal improvements? Or perhaps I am ignorant of a shift in political outlook amongst the figures mentioned or am misinterpreting their positions entirely? I would appreciate anyone who has researched this period of history to shed some light on this phenomena.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Broadly speaking, the Whig party that emerged after 1834 was composed of three major groups: National Republicans (who included some former Federalists) supporting the pro-business economic policies of the American System; states' rights devotees led by Calhoun and Willie Person Magnum; and finally Antimasons. The ideology behind Antimasonry can be difficult to parse, and I am only just starting to get a firmer grasp on it, but broadly speaking it was a derivation of the republicanism of the Yankee middle classes. In some ways you can see it as a precursor to the progressive or "one nation" conservatism that would become popular later in the century, in that it attempted to stand apart from class conflict and proposed a government for the people, by and of the natural aristocracy. On the one hand, these republicans or "federalists" (not to be confused with Hamiltonian federalism, though in practice there was a degree of overlap as you can imagine) were very much in favor of a strict social hierarchy with wealthy and educated men at the top, and they opposed the redistributive "agrarian" policies of the Jeffersonians and the early labor movement. On the other, they were deeply concerned by the disruption to communal life caused by the advent of industrial capitalism, and their support for reform causes —public education, women's rights, labor reform, and of course antislavery —reflected a humanitarian concern for the plight of the lower classes. If the distillation Hamiltonian ethos was "f*** you, got mine" and the Jeffersonian "every man a king," the Yankee republican was somewhere in the middle. Above all he hated hereditary aristocracy in all its forms, which led him to oppose elite fraternal orders such as the Freemasons and the Society of Cincinnati.

When you look at the Whig radicals, it is interesting to note that JQA, Seward, and Stevens spent most of the 1830s as Antimasons; Sumner and Greeley did not become active in politics until the following decade, though Greeley's introduction to electoral politics was Thurlow Weed, a leader of the New York Antimasonic party. My provisional thesis is that the lingering influence of Antimasonry is responsible for the "radical but not liberal" Whigs, though I will want to look into it further.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

In contrast to the mish-mash of the early 3rd party system, the 2nd party system is seen as a relatively politically uniform period

Is it? AFAIK the Whig party was nothing but a grab bag of everyone who hated Jackson. It's one reason why the party never managed to govern effectively and imploded spectacularly in a couple of years after Kansas-Nebraska.

[Wazza [INACTIVE]]

In contrast to the mish-mash of the early 3rd party system, the 2nd party system is seen as a relatively politically uniform period

Is it? AFAIK the Whig party was nothing but a grab bag of everyone who hated Jackson. It's one reason why the party never managed to govern effectively and imploded spectacularly in a couple of years after Kansas-Nebraska.

I emphasise the word "relatively". Of course the Whigs suffered greatly from factionalism, but compared to the early Republican Party (Which housed German revolutionaries like Schurz and ex-Democratic Liberals like Banks) there was more commonality in outlook, as the Whig Party in both the north and the south was generally made up of conservative elements opposed to Jacksonian Democracy. Also, whilst it was opposed by some Southern Whigs, the party was largely centred around Henry Clay's American System. At least, this is my understanding of the period.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Like all things Whig Party, I cannot stress enough how much you need to read Holt's 1,000 page book on the subject.

I agree with Truman's assessment of the Anti-Masonic Party and would stress that this is the wildcard leading to the question posed by the OP and the seeming presence of Radical or proto-radical Republicans.

It is also worth noting that on many occasions, the Anti-Masonic types tended to cause a great deal of strife for Henry Clay with a lot of machinations between Clay, Webster and the Anti-Masons who if I recall correctly were some of the driving supporters of Harrison in 1840. This should emphasize the difficulty in enacting Clay's agenda, because the Anti-Masonic types were far less concerned with that agenda for obvious reasons, Webster also frequently did his own thing and at times you get a John McCain esque vibe from him and and then on top of that you have the Southern wing of the party.

It also never as simple as a North-South split, as there are three factions in the North at any given time:
Clayite, Websterite, Anti-Masonic

And three in the south:
Clayite, State's Rights, Nullifiers.

With all kinds of chaotic overlap and factional infighting.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

In contrast to the mish-mash of the early 3rd party system, the 2nd party system is seen as a relatively politically uniform period

Is it? AFAIK the Whig party was nothing but a grab bag of everyone who hated Jackson. It's one reason why the party never managed to govern effectively and imploded spectacularly in a couple of years after Kansas-Nebraska.

The Whigs were like a mid-1800s equivalent of the Janata parties in India that functioned as anti-INC big tents.

[Unconditional Surrender Truman]

Webster also frequently did his own thing and at times

That's an understatement. IIRC he for a time believed that the Nullification Crisis would be a realigning event and hoped to become Jackson's chosen successor as leader of an imagined "Union party" opposed to the "States' Rights" party led by Clay and Calhoun.

[Orser67]

The key figure of the 2nd party system was Andrew Jackson, and the nature of both parties was largely determined by the coalition that he assembled between 1824 and the election of his handpicked successor in 1836 (the big exception here being John C. Calhoun and his allies, who returned to the Democratic Party after Jackson left office). The Democratic Party’s base was white farmers and (relatively) recent immigrants; its ideology promoted expansionism and opposition to a strong, centralized government (e.g. high tariffs, a national bank, federal funding for infrastructure, etc.). The Whigs, by contrast, were strongest with the middle and upper middle class, and sought what they saw as modernizing policies through a lot of the policies that the Democrats opposed. However, the Second Party System generally wasn’t as polarized as other party systems; e.g. most states had a fairly competitive two-party system, and in some (but not all) elections where there wasn’t a huge separation between the two party’s presidential candidates in terms of ideology.

If we’re talking more in terms of economic policy, I would argue that it was the Democratic Party that actually had more supporters/leaders who could reasonably be described as "radicals". The best example here is probably the (ultimate) abolition of the national bank; abolition was a fairly radical idea that aroused opposition even among many of Jackson’s allies (e.g. Jackson had to remove two different Treasury Secretaries over policy disagreements). The Whigs, meanwhile, were split between “true believers” in the American System and pragmatists (or whatever you want to call them) who were most concerned with winning elections (plus their allies, especially in the South, who simply never got onboard with the Whig program; this split between pragmatists and true believers, btw, is one of the big themes of Howe’s book). This is best exemplified by the Whig conventions of 1839 and 1848, which were both fights between Henry Clay on the true believer side and “random military figure” (Harrison and Taylor) on the other. Clay and his allies generally aren’t regarded as radicals, but rather as conservatives who sought pro-business policies that largely upheld the economic/political/social status quo, and it probably goes without saying that the pragmatists weren’t especially radical.

Now, if we’re speaking in terms of slavery, then yes, the Whigs hosted a disproportionate number of people who could reasonably called radical on the issue of slavery (and many anti-slavery leaders also favored the then-radical notion of women’s suffrage). It’s worth noting that there were, in fact, Democrats who were anti-slavery, a position generally based on racism (i.e. preventing African Americans from moving to the territories), fear of Southern elites limiting economic opportunities for Northern whites, and (especially wrt to Van Buren’s 1848 candidacy) a general desire to avoid Southern domination of the Democratic Party. And it's also necessary to note that, even among Northern Whigs, there were quite a few Northern leaders who had no particular issue with slavery (Fillmore being one example). But in general, anti-slavery leaders were a better fit in the Whig Party, which a)was less dominated by Southerners and their Northern allies at the national level, b)was less expansionist (which in practice, tended to be driven largely but not totally by Southerners looking to expand slavery), and c)generally didn’t have hardcore slavery supporters in the South (at least after the 1830s) like e.g. Jefferson Davis. There's also a big religious factor at play here, but this post is probably long enough already.