The Center Missed History

Slavery was legal in New York until 1827. It was not just a Southern thing. It was just that it was key to the economy only in the South. But it does not stop there. In 1860 New York City voters agreed with Southern voters...and voted 60/40 to allow the expansion of slavery into the territories.

In that year, Lincoln the Republican ran against Douglas the Democrat. Douglas advocated allowing every new state to decide for itself whether to allow slavery in its territory. Lincoln advocated the limitation of slavery to the states in which it was then legal, but no expansion elsewhere. In the practical politics and economics of that day, the expansion of slavery into the territories meant the legalization of slavery in the entire country, really.

In the same 1860 election, New York City voters voted 80/20 to deny the right to vote for FREE blacks.

Upstate voters in NY voted for Lincoln.

All this because of party loyality. So the sophisticated voters of The Center of the Universe can be on the wrong side of history sometimes.

See "Lincoln at Cooper Union - The Speech That Made Lincoln President" by Holzer.