Equal Rights Party (N.Y.)

found: MWA/NAIP files(hdg.: Equal Rights Party (N.Y.); usage: Equal Rights Party; Loco-foco Party; variant: Locofoco Party; note: established at state convention of anti-monopoly or Loco-foco Democrats held at Utica, N.Y., Sept. 1836; initially faction of the N.Y.C. Democratic Party opposed to chartering of state banks and other forms of monopoly; informally dubbed Loco-focos the day after the 10/29/1835 meeting at Tammany Hall at which the split with the regular Democrats occurred; Feb. 1836 Loco-focos held county convention to renounce the Tammany organization but disclaimed any intention of establishing a separate party; by summer those in favor of organizing a new party had sufficient strength to call for the convention at Utica at which the name and platform of the Equal Rights Party was adopted; second state convention held at Utica Sept. 1837, but by 1838 most of the party's members had been reabsorbed into the Democratic Party)