Morgan’s abduction, and the formidable influence which the masonic fraternity was found to possess, in the attempt to convict for that crime, excited extreme indignation and disgust against these secret and powerful societies in the minds of the citizens of New York, who argued that secret societies were not only dangerous, but incompatible with the institutions of a republican government, that their oaths and mysteries were illegal and immoral, and that the use of them must disqualify for offices of public trust. A political party, called Anti-Masonic, soon rose in the western part of the state, which acquired such great influence that its leaders became members of the legislative body. The example of New York was followed by the states of Vermont, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, Ohio, and the territory of Michigan. But freemasonry existed through it all. About the time that the anti-masonic party began to decline, the anti-slavery party arose. It still has its work to do; to battle with oppression and crime a thousand times greater than that of freemasonry. May God help the right! The presidential election of 1828 was decided in favour of General Jackson of Tennessee, with whose arbitrary and decisive military movements we are already acquainted; and John Calhoun, of South Carolina, was chosen vice-president. When, on the 4th of March, 1829, Jackson assumed the reins of government, he found the country rich and prosperous, at perfect peace with all nations, and having in the national treasury a surplus of more than 5,000,000 dollars. During the year 1828, congress enacted a tariff law, laying protective duties on such imported articles as competed with certain manufactured goods and agricultural products of the United States, by means of which additional duties were laid on wool and woollen goods, iron, hemp and its fabrics, distilled spirits, silk-stuffs, window-glass and cottons. The manufacturing states were well pleased with this law, which, however, was highly unsatisfactory to cotton-planters of the southern states. This tariff law was the fertile source of agitation, and almost revolution, during the presidentship of General Jackson.