The Union Ticket: Thurston County's 1862 Political Campaign
As the Civil War rages, local political factions organize mass meetings to nominate candidates and define their loyalties in Olympia.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The voters of Thurston County favorable to nominating a ticket of good sound Union men, without regard to former party names and party predilections, and in favor of preserving the Union and aiding the present Administration in suppressing rebellion and treason, assembled in mass meeting on Saturday, June 28th, 1862, in the Capitol at Olympia. Geo. A. Barnes was called to the chair. The meeting resolved to sustain the Administration in all efforts to crush out treason and suppress the rebellion, asserting that all issues heretofore dividing loyal people into parties have been settled. Nominees for the upcoming July election include Daniel R. Bigelow for Joint Councilman, Henry Handle, William McLean, and T. Hunt for Representatives, Robert W. Moxlie for Sheriff, and Samuel W. Percival for Treasurer.
“The only issue now before the people is Union or disunion.”
Local party conventions and mass meetings were the primary engines of 19th-century civic life, long before the primary systems of today. The high-stakes language of 'loyalty' reflects the intense anxiety of Washington Territory during the Civil War, where local partisan disputes often carried the weight of national existential threats.
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