Consult the Genius of Expediency Approaching Power, 1847–1860

Abstract

In the late 1840s, the focus of New York’s black politics shifted to the philanthropist Gerrit Smith’s plan to award freeholds in upstate counties to 3,000 black men, making them both independent farmers and voters. Although the “Smith Lands” project did not succeed, evidence suggests many used their deeds to gain the vote in New York and Brooklyn, and in 1849-1850 they were credited with giving the state to the Whigs. In the 1850s, the suffrage campaign revived as the state shifted left. Republicans in the legislature repeatedly voted for non-racial suffrage, and Stephen Myers led a State Suffrage Association in tandem with Thurlow Weed’s Republican machine. An 1860 referendum on non-racial suffrage again produced defeat, but the number backing equal suffrage increased substantially.