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Michael J. Connolly

Dr. Michael J. Connolly is Professor of History at Purdue University Northwest in Indiana. Dr. Connolly received his Ph.D. from the Catholic University of America and is the author of Capitalism, Politics, and Railroads in Jacksonian New England, as well as many articles on nineteenth-century American History. He has been published in New England Quarterly, Modern Age, the Historical Journal of Massachusetts, and the Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, among others.

Franklin Pierce, Political Protest, & the Dilemmas of Democracy Blog

Franklin Pierce, Political Protest, & the Dilemmas of Democracy

On the stump in New Boston, New Hampshire in early January 1852, Franklin Pierce gave a long oration during which free-soil hecklers forced him to address his ideas on slavery. “He was not in favor of it,” the Concord Independent Democrat reported. “He had never seen a slave without being sick at heart. Slavery was contrary to the Constitution in some…
Michael J. Connolly
January 17, 2019