- Location
- Albany, NY
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Herbert Charles Holdridge
Tonight I learned about... Whoa boy
Herbert Charles Holdridge
Best quote from his Wikipedia article:Tonight I learned about... Whoa boy
Despite having failed to secure a presidential nomination from even minor national parties in three different elections over a dozen years, Holdridge would always claim to have been nominated by the Vegetarians and the Prohibitionists, an achievement of such ephemeral value that no reporter ever questioned it.
Real Dry Socialist Anti-Papist Meatless HoursBest quote from his Wikipedia article:
Also, TIL that the American Vegetarian Party was a thing, and in 1964 they nominated a dead guy for President.
This is somehow both the best and worst possible 2020 election. This was an excellent list all in all.2020 (Coalition with Alliance): Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (Labour), Liz Truss (Alliance), Stewart Hosie (Scottish National), Martin Daubney (Centre)
If QAnon is so fake, how come Q was John Adams’ son and the sixth President, John ‘Q’ Adams? Checkmate libs.
One senses an oncoming storm, perhaps
1825-1828: Andrew Jackson (Republican)
1824 (with John C. Calhoun) def. John Q. Adams (Republican), William H. Crawford (Republican), Henry Clay (Republican)
1828-1829: Andrew Jackson (Democratic)
The narrow victory of Andrew Jackson in the 1824 election began a new age in American politics: the age of the common man. Long having languished under the aristocratic pretensions of the Founders' elitist republic, the people had finally risen, and had put one of their own in the White House, the hero of the war of 1812. But for many, this victory was not enough. In 1825, as Jackson chaffed against Congresses unwilling to dissolve the national bank and rumours began to swirl of a failed attempt to deny him the Presidency in Congress the previous year, a series of mysterious pamphlets began to appear at the homes of prominent Democrats in Washington. Little noticed at first, these pamphlets signed 'Quintus Aelius Tubero' (after the famously plain spoken Stoic and Tribune of the Plebs) contained the most outstanding rumours. Tales abounded in them of secret plots by the elite, an alliance between Alexander Hamilton and the British army which had created a secret cadre in the Federalist Party dedicated to overthrowing the American republic, mysterious occult rituals performed by leading supporters of John Quincy Adams, and the covert manoeuvres of the President to defeat this evil cabal.
These rumours remained the stuff of hushed back room chatter between zealous Jacksonians, little known or cared about, until the day one of Quintus’ pamphlets fell into the hands of Edwin Crosswell, editor of the Argus, that venerable organ of van Buren’s ‘Albany Regency’. That was in 1826, amidst the difficult battle between the Clintonites and ‘Bucktails’ for mastery of New York, and Crosswell saw Quintus’ ravings as an opportunity to tip the balance against Governor Clinton and in William Rochester’s favour in that year’s tight gubernatorial race. And so it came to pass that ‘Quintus’ came to New York. His movement never looked back. Though the claim that Clinton was a “British stooge” and possible a pedophile Satanist was baseless and ludicrous, condemned by President Jackson and his enemies alike, it seemed to work. Or, at the very least, the Bucktails felt it had tipped enough votes their way to win their election, and soon enough Quintus’ memoranda were being delivered en masse by Tammany Hall - for many historians, this was the beginning of the “Q Letter” mania.
Quintus’ pamphlets, many signed simply Q, quickly spawned a whole genre of American poison pen letters, but a distinctive style quickly emerged which marked out the authentic missives from Quintus. These letters, combative, blunt, and outlandish spoke universally of a coming “storm” in which President Jackson would destroy his enemies and save the republic. Mass arrests would see crypto-Federalists interned or executed, and the secret forces controlling American life - particularly bankers and Free Masons - would be destroyed. President Jackson, still struggling with crypto-Federalists, Adams supporters, and Clayites in Congress neither denied or accepted Quintus' support, but the ambiguity of his response helped to fuel rumours that Jackson really was moving as Quintus' pamphlets and letters suggested. The growing sense that a quiet civil war was raging was only heightened by the Tariff Crisis of 1827, and the secession of South Carolina avoided only by military force - that crisis gave Quintus' theories a shot in the arm, just in time...
In late 1827, the effects of the Second Cholera epidemic began to be felt in the United States. The young nation was obviously unprepared - and unwilling - to take action to deal with its first major public health emergency, but Quintus was all too willing to portray it as a plot by the British and the Federalists. Perhaps such nonsense would have gone unheralded, had it not been for the leaking of the 'Number 7 Letters' by an exiled British diplomat in New York. Whilst widely (and, we now know, falsely) accused of being forgeries, the letters galvanised the President's supporters to see plots and cabals everywhere. So-called 'Quintians' began to seek office en masse, and by 1828 the newly formed 'Democratic Party' had been overrun. Whilst Jacksonian populism, and the smears against Jackson's assumed rival John Quincy Adams, were indeed popular, Quintianism was too much for respectable gentlemen both North and South. The 1828 election would see Henry Clay take enough votes from both men to force another contingent election, and as February neared, the fog of civil war loomed over the young country.
It was, then, unsurprising that the date of the contingent election, February 11th 1829, was one of calamity. Neither a Presidential nor Vice Presidential selection was at all certain, and with a significant minority of Jacksonians riled up, some began to feel it necessary to take matters into their own hands. The match that lit the powder keg came with Quintus’ last and most incendiary pamphlet of the campaign, which the pro-Jackson United States Telegraph quickly copied into their paper, containing a series of accusations that, amongst other things, Adams had publicly sought to persuade his wife to leave her former husband, his father had hopes to establish the family’s hereditary succession to the Presidency, that the National Party intended to abolish slavery and grant the vote to all former slaves, promote miscegenation in the south, and reform the plantation economy by redistributing land, and that Adams had schemed to give Henry Clay the State Department in return for his supporters’ votes in Congress. For many Democratic partisans it was all too much, and as the House met to try and hash out a compromise, it’s security was overwhelmed and angry rioters entered the chamber.
When the dust had settled, by most standards the riot had been far from disastrous: an attempt to hang Vice President Calhoun by insurrectionists flowing into the Senate had failed, and only a handful of Congressman had been injured and one killed as fighting between the National Guard and protestors (as well as some Representatives and Senators) raged in the Capitol. After the Quintians and insurgents had been cleared, however, it became clear that they had snatched defeat from the jaws of a possible victory. With President Jackson erring on whether or not to condemn his rivals, and embattled congress selected the National slate for the presidency. Tarred with the brush of his supporters’ treason, and avoiding impeachment only thanks to the partisanship of his congressional supporters, Jackson skulked in the White House until the end of his term, and skipped Adams’ inauguration.
1829-1848: John Q. Adams (National)
1828 (with John Sergeant) def. Andrew Jackson (Democratic), Henry Clay (Whig)
1832 (with John Sergeant) def. Andrew Jackson (Democratic)
1836 (with John Crittenden) def. John C. Calhoun (Democratic), Martin Van Buren (Whig-Democrat), Andrew Jackson (Quintus Movement) [did not accept nomination]
1840 (with William H. Seward) def. Henry Clay (Whig-Democrat), Andrew Jackson (Quintus Movement) [did not accept nomination], James Henry Hammond (Democratic)
With the beginning of the Adams administration, it was hoped that the Quintus panic would vanish - such hopes were quickly revealed to be naive. The coronation of the Quintus movement's great enemy, the conspiracy theories intensified, but at the same time pre-existing fractures began to intensify. The Second Sedition Act of 1829, passed to try to curb the "wicked Jacobin terrorism" of that February helped to prevent further Quintus inspired violence, and it just so happened that it helped in the destruction of the Democratic Party. In 1832, Jackson rode again amidst accusations of 'sedition' from the federal government, but his popular vote victory was not translated into a return for the White House, and with his retirement from politics, his movement fractured, and along with it so did Quintus' following.
By 1836, with Adams seeking an unprecedented third term, a certain sort of Quintianism - toned down, less obsessed with Satanism and the occult - had taken hold in the mainstream Democratic Party, and fuelled the "anti-tyranny" campaign of John C. Calhoun. But this hidebound defence of "slave power" against an Adams administration increasingly using abolitionism to secure Northern support caused a rift with the van Burenites, who allied with Henry Clay's followers to oppose Adams' pursuit of a third term. Likewise, Calhoun was outflanked from the other angle by a "pure" Quintianism, which continued to advocate for mass executions, a crusade against Nationalist Satanism, and war with Great Britain: when, two months after his ascension to the Democratic nomination as a compromise candidate, the ambitious rising star James Henry Hammond was revealed by his own patrons to be a serial sexual abuser and pedophile, the 'Quintus Movement', once again running a despondent former President Jackson despite his own protestations, was able to surge into third place, and guarantee a fourth term for Adams.
Nonetheless, the simple question "Who was Quintus?" remains unanswered, but entertain a curious anecdote, if you might. In 1831, the young abolitionist and anti-quintain journalist William Lloyd Garrison began an investigation into the sources of the - then far less regular - 'True Q' pamphlets which still emerged from time to time. After months of searching, it became clear that their source was in Washington. Though Garrison died in a horrific carriage accident some days later, and his findings were not brought to light for over a century afterwards, in the last hastily drawn up notes for his investigation he left one curious phrase. Quintus, or Quincy?
Disclaimer: Obviously this list plays with, and to some extent 'realises' QAnon tropes and conspiracies. Hopefully its clear that as I am not a nutter, I don't intend this to be read as some lame and nutty parallel for anything going on today, its just a bad joke.
One senses an oncoming storm, perhaps
Holy shit.
That’s
That’s brilliant.
Thank you.
Thats utterly hilarious. Admittedly I think a better comparison might be the Illumanti panic in the 1790s but I also get the literary value of Q.
@Cevolian that list was very good. I really liked the part where it shows a split between Calhoun and Jackson, something that happened IOTL, but happens here as well and played well to show an analogue.
Thanks lads, glad it’s tickled people a bit!Amazing
Oh well, at least humanity is merging closer and closer with there machines more and more...
Fascinating and not over the top. Nice.History of Benedict Arnold: