Masons, it asked to be discharged, and the papers went to another. The report when made closed with a statement that, having failed to devise a tribunal for the investigation of the outrage, a tribunal with jurisdiction over the whole extent of country covered by the conspiracy, with power to enforce the attendance of witnesses, with right to imprison such as refused to obey, and with authority to arrest and hold for trial, yet not infringe the chartered privileges of the humblest citizen, nothing was left but to recommend a joint committee of investigation and a reward of five thousand dollars for the discovery of Morgan if living, and a like sum for the apprehension of his murderers if he were dead. Resolutions embodying these suggestions were, however, voted down by a great majority of nearly three to one.*

The refusal of the Legislature to act, the continued failure of grand juries to indict, the silence of the masonic newspapers, or, what was worse, the imperfect reports of Morgan meetings, and even positive assertions that Morgan was not dead, served but to increase the excitement. The whole population of Ontario, Monroe, Livingston, Genesee, Erie, Niagara, and Orleans Counties seemed arrayed as Masons and Antimasons. In Genesee, where the feeling was especially strong, a great meeting of citizens of the county was held at Batavia, and every voter pledged to support none but Antimasons. Three thousand people, men and women, were estimated to have been present. This was followed by a call from the "Morgan Committee" for a convention at Warsaw to nominate a candidate for the State Senate.

Without the limits of New York, Antimasonry excited little or no interest. In many places it was regarded as a shrewd electioneering movement. At others it was believed that the commotion had been stirred up in order to sell a new edition of an old book, and that Morgan had been abducted by his friends.

To disprove these rumors and, if possible, confirm the belief that he had been murdered, the Lewiston committee

* Albany Argus, April 12, 1827. The report of the committee is in Niles's Register, April 14, 1827, vol. xxxii, pp. 120, 121.

1828.

MORGAN OR MONRO!

117

kept boats and vessels busy for months dredging the Niagara river and the shore of Lake Ontario. But no body was found till one day in October, when a hunting party discovered a corpse stranded on the lake shore some forty miles from Fort Niagara. A coroner was at once sent for, an inquest was held, and, as the body was in such an advanced stage of decomposition as not to be recognizable, a verdict of drowning was rendered and the remains buried on the beach. In ordinary times an event so common would have passed unnoticed. But these were no ordinary times, and the report of the coroner was no sooner published than the Lewiston committee began to suspect that the dead man had been Morgan. Hurrying to the spot, the grave was opened, and what seemed a strong resemblance to Morgan was recognized. The coroner thereupon assembled a new jury, examined Mrs. Morgan and a host of men who knew her husband, and, influenced by the testimony so collected, a verdict was rendered by the jury that the body was that of Morgan. The corpse was then removed with great ceremony to Batavia, where it was interred in the presence of an immense crowd.

The account of these proceedings soon reached Canada and came before the eyes of the friends of a man named Timothy Monro, who in September was drowned by the upsetting of his boat in the Niagara river. The description of the body, and especially of the clothing and the bundle of tracts in the pockets, convinced them that the corpse found on the beach was not that of Morgan, but of Monro. So sure were they that they came to Batavia, persuaded the coroner to hold a third inquest, and presented evidence so overwhelming that a third verdict was obtained, and the unknown dead declared to have been Timothy Monro. The fate of Morgan then remained as impenetrable a mystery as before.

By this time Miller had published the now famous "Illustrations of Masonry by One of the Fraternity who has devoted Thirty Years to the Subject "; the Lewiston committee had given to the world a long "Narrative of the Facts and Circumstances relating to the Kidnapping and Presumed Murder of William Morgan," and in the local elections some seventeen thousand votes had been cast for Antimasons. To secede from

the fraternity and make a public declaration of the fact became the most popular act an aspiring politician, a doctor with small practice, or a tradesman with little business could perform. So great was the defection that in February, 1828, a convention of seceding Masons was held at Le Roy. Morgan's " Illustrations of Masonry was there declared to be a fair and full exposition of the first three degrees; a committee was appointed to prepare and publish all degrees above that of master; a memorial was ordered to be sent to Congress complaining of the use of Fort Niagara for the imprisonment of Morgan, and a second convention called to meet July fourth. Shortly after the delegates had gone home yet another body, representing the Antimasons of the twelve western counties of New York, assembled in the same town. The address which it issued to the people of the State set forth that the existence in such a country as ours of any society whose purpose, principles, and measures are secret is hostile to the spirit and dangerous to the existence of free institutions; that masonry was such a society, and had showed itself ready to subvert law and defy justice in furthering its own ends; that the entire subjection all over the Union of the press to masonry was an evil which called for correction; that it was necessary for the people to establish free presses with editors ready and willing to uphold the rights of citizens and the laws of the land; and that a convention of Antimasons ought to meet at Utica and take measures to destroy masonry as an institution, to establish free presses, assert the supremacy of the law, and protect the rights of citizens against the vindictive persecutions of masonic bodies.*

This was a serious movement. A presidential election was at hand; congressmen, a Governor, a State Legislature were to be chosen, and the political results of the convention were quickly apparent. When the memorial from Le Roy reached Congress, no committee wanted to receive it, and a good excuse was found for sending the paper to the President.

When Pitcher, who by the death of De Witt Clinton in

*Proceedings of a Convention of Delegates opposed to Freemasonry, which met at Le Roy, Genesee County, N. Y., March 6, 1828.

1828.

MASONRY ANTIRELIGIOUS.

119

February had become Governor of New York, heard of the proceedings at Le Roy, he lost no time in urging the Legislature to act, and easily obtained authority to appoint a special commissioner to investigate the Morgan affair. When the memorial from the convention was laid before the Legislature, it was found to contain a request that, as the masonic oaths were profane and impious, no oaths should be allowed unless administered by a public officer. This was not granted, though an act to do so was passed by the Assembly.

Much stress was now laid on the character of the masonic oaths, and no pains were spared to excite the animosity of the churches and array them against masonry. Its oaths were depicted as shockingly unchristian, its ceremonies as sacrilegious, and the whole institution as antireligious in that it profaned Holy Scripture by using it for unholy purposes, made religion a performance of outward duties, confounded knighterrantry with Christianity, and was regarded by its members as a saving institution.*

To the American proud of his country and her free institutions, to the firm believer in democracy, the appeal was made from the standpoint of politics. He was assured by men who had once been Masons that the very design and purpose of freemasonry were hostile to the principles of our Government and the welfare of society. He was told that it exercised an absolute jurisdiction over the lives and persons of its members, and, with the recollection of the Morgan case in mind, he believed the statement. He was assured that it arrogated to itself the right to administer oaths and to punish for offences unknown to the law; that it hid crime and protected the guilty; assumed titles and dignities not compatible with republican institutions; and created an aristocracy odious in the sight of a free people. †

*Two oaths were cited as especially offensive: "Furthermore do I promise and swear that I will aid and assist a companion royal arch Mason wherever I shall see him engaged in any difficulty, so far as to extricate him from the same, whether he be right or wrong." "I swear to advance my brother's best interests by always supporting his military fame and political preferment in opposition to another." + Proceedings of the Convention of Seceding Masons, held at Le Roy, July 4,

The effect of such charges was lasting. Gradually a firm conviction took possession of the public mind that masonry was all it was said to be; that it did exercise a too powerful influence on the press; that it did control the acts of tribunals of justice in civil as well as in criminal cases; and that judges, juries, justices of the peace, and even referees had been forced to do its will.

In this state of the public mind the antimasonic convention assembled at Utica in August to take measures, so the call said, to destroy masonry as an institution, and, fully satisfied that no help would be given by either the friends of Adams or of Jackson for such a purpose, it disregarded both parties, nominated candidates of its own for Governor and Lieutenant-Governor of New York, and appointed a general committee to call future conventions if necessary. The candidates selected were Francis Granger and John Crary. Granger, who had already been nominated for Lieutenant-Governor by the Adams party, declined, and at a second convention of Antimasons at Le Roy, Solomon Southwick was chosen in his stead, and polled more than thirty thousand votes.

Meanwhile the excitement had spread to Vermont, where, in the congressional election of 1829, seven thousand votes were cast by the Antimasons. The whole New England belt from Boston to Buffalo fairly teemed with antimasonic newspapers.* A new political party had arisen to complicate still more the political situation in New York, and, indeed, in all the States from New England to Ohio.

* There were thirty-two in New York State.