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Political Etymology, Barn Burners And Hunkers

Political Etymology, Barn Burners And Hunkers image
Parent Issue
Day
18
Month
August
Year
1848
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

The S'ew-York Day Book givcs the oiinn of these tenns, now so cominon, as follow.i : About ihe year 1S3S or'39, a plain speaking and humorous Senator in [lie Siate Legr stature, who had seceded from the o!d Locofoco party tojoin the Whjgs nnder the name of "Conservative," (A. B. Dickinson, ofSléuben county,) in the course of a speech, said that the extreme and inconsideraie disposilion of those ultra-locofocos to destroy all corporations for the sake ofgetting rid ofhe aboses to vvhich they vvere lial)le, reminded bira of the wisdom of an oíd Germán Pennsylvanian farmer, wlio, hnving an immense ham filled with wheat n which a great number of rats vvere making extensive ravages, after vjrrious conirivances to rid himself of the nuisnnce, decided tbat fire was the only tbtng which woüld completely exierminate the multitudinóó9 devourers oftiis grain, and accordingly " burnbd" tip his "barx" to kill the rats, beforo il occurred to him that the wheát musí necessarily be burned also - a fa-et which suggested itself to him only wlien the barn was completely in flames. Tliis liarmiess Senatorial joke, being nn eminently happy illustration of the destructiva policy of the ultra-locofoco, "look" very well, was circulated through ihe Whig papers of the State, and acquired a currency 3 koget faer beyond the expectations of its originator. - T!ie term "barnburners" was fixed by the Wliigs upon the destructives, and though discouatenanced by both secrions of the locoloco pariy for a time, w;:s fionll) in 1 S43 and '44, taken up by die "conservative" mèrhbers oí the locoloco party as the appellation of their trouulesome brethren.