What happens when a political party implodes?
One newspaperman in hindsight said, "The Whig party died of too much respectability and not enough people." The Whigs were the party of Henry Clay, pictured above. For a generation, Clay's Whigs offered the political alternative for Americans to those who weren't enamored with Andrew Jackson's Democratic party. In the 1850s, the Whig party simply ceased to exist. It's a strange concept to our modern reality.
The decade before the Civil War saw politics as figurative and literal mayhem as parties splintered and fistfights broke out on the floors of Congress. Politicians not only brought ideas and debate into the Capitol, they also brought Bowie knives and pistols.
Americans backed a revolutionary in Cuba. The territory of Kansas became a battleground. A brilliant eccentric led a coup to take over Nicaragua. The Supreme Court made the worst decision ever. A series of debates captured the nation's attention via social media. And violence predicted the eve of full-out and open war.
Was there a group or a person who could lead the country forward?
Episode 4 of BREAKING NATION is now available… A Political Free-For-All. Buckle in for the latest long form podcast that examines the Civil War as if we didn't know how it would all turn out.
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