from "Franklin Pierce" by Michael F. Holt.
Given the rancor of the current political environment, it is worth recalling the extraordinary chaos and rancor in the United States in the months leading up to the 1856 political conventions. The Whig party had effectively disintegrated, and was being replaced by three nascent parties -- the Know Nothings, the North Americans, and the Republicans. Unbelievably, while two competing governments were vying for control of the territory of Kansas, Senator Preston Brooks was beating Senator Charles Sumner unconscious on the floor of the Senate, and President Franklin Pierce was burned in effigy while seeking the Democratic Party renomination:
"Meanwhile, the Know Nothings' national nominating convention in Philadelphia fractured along sectional lines over the slavery extension issue. Most northern delegates stomped out in disgust when the convention nominated former president Millard Fillmore and when its national platform failed to call for repeal of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and for reimposition of the 1820 ban on slavery north of the thirty-six-thirty line. Dubbing themselves North Americans, they called for a sepa*rate party nominating convention in New York City, one week before the Republican national convention was scheduled to meet. The bolt of northern Know Nothings did not assure Republicans that they might join forces with their new party, which styled itself the defender of northerners' rights against Slave Power aggressions. It did, however, enhance the chances that North Americans might do so.
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