Citizens Or Papists?: The Politics of Anti-Catholicism in New York, 1685-1821

Front Cover
Fordham Univ Press, 2005 - History - 253 pages

Based on careful work with rare archival sources, this book fills a gap in the history of New York Catholicism by chronicling anti-Catholic feeling in pre-Revolutionary and early national periods.

Colonial New York, despite its reputation for pluralism, tolerance, and diversity, was also marked by severe restrictions on religious and political liberty for Catholics. The logic of the American Revolution swept away the religious barriers, but Anti-Federalists in the 1780s enacted legislation preventing Catholics from holding office and nearly succeeded in denying them the franchise. The latter effort was blocked by the Federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, who saw such things as an impediment to a new, expansive nationalist politics.

By the early years of the nineteenth century, Catholics gained the right to hold office due to their own efforts in concert with an urban-based branch of the Republicans, which included radical exiles from Europe. With the contributions of Catholics to the War of 1812 and the subsequent collapse of the Federalist Party, by 1820 Catholics had become a key part of the triumphant Republican coalition, which within a decade would become the new Democratic Party of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren.

Jason K. Duncan is Assistant Professor of History at Aquinas College.

 

Contents

The Hand of Popery in this Hellish Conspiracy The Legacy of AntiCatholicism in Colonial New York
19
The Encouragement Popery Had Met With Catholics and Religious Liberty in Revolutionary New York
30
No Foreign Ecclesiastical Authority Catholics and Republican Citizenship
54
Federalists and Tories Carrying Everything With A High Hand Catholics and the Politics of the 1790s
81
In All Countries Such Distinctions Are Odious In None More So Than This Political Equality in the Early Republic
109
A Middle Party? Catholics and Republican Nationalism
133
The Great Chain of National Union Catholics and the Republican Triumph
161
A Most Democratic and Republican Class
189
Copyright

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Page 36 - Then the more shame upon her conduct. Even brutes do not devour their young, nor savages make war upon their families; wherefore, the assertion if true, turns to her reproach; but it happens not to be true, or only partly so, and the phrase, parent or mother country, hath been jesuitically adopted by the King and his parasites, with a low papistical design of gaining an unfair bias on the credulous weakness of our minds.
Page 36 - America, is a strong and natural proof that the authority of the one over the other was never the design of heaven. The time likewise at which the continent was discovered adds weight to the argument, and the manner in which it was peopled increases the force of it. The reformation was preceded by the discovery of America, as if the Almighty graciously meant to open a sanctuary to the persecuted in future years, when home should afford neither friendship nor safety.
Page 33 - And, for the more perfect security and ease of the minds of the inhabitants of the said province, it is hereby declared that His Majesty's subjects professing the religion of the Church of Rome, of and in the said province of Quebec, may have, hold, and enjoy, the free exercise of the religion of the Church of Rome, subject to the King's supremacy...
Page 33 - Provided nevertheless, That it shall be lawful for His Majesty, His Heirs or Successors, to make such Provision out of the rest of the said accustomed Dues and Rights, for the Encouragement of the Protestant Religion, and for the Maintenance and Support of a Protestant Clergy within the said Province, as he or they shall, from Time to Time, think necessary and expedient.
Page 40 - Except the professors of the religion of the Church of Rome, who ought not to hold lands in or be admitted to a participation of the civil rights enjoyed by the members of this State...

About the author (2005)

Jason K. Duncan is Assistant Professor of History at Aquinas College.