Not all Bostonians shared the views of the Know-Nothings
Charles Francis Adams, the son of John Quincy Adams, thought that the Know Nothing Program was “immoral” and “antisocial.”
Wendell Phillips, a prominent Boston abolitionist, wrote that “You and I lament, that so large a share of the abolitionists have scampered off into the “know nothing party.” Well may we lament, that they were educated to no higher point than to be guilty of such folly...My experience teaches me, that foreigners and natives are about equally good; and that Roman Catholics and Protestants are also about equally good.”
- February 20, 1855, Syracuse University Library, Special Collections Research Center, Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection.