A partisan of “Dorr’s Rebellion,” in Rhode Island, 1840.
1844. Mr. Dorr, aided by worse Dorr-men out of Rhode Island, throw that State into turmoil and confusion.—Mr. Cranston of R.I., House of Repr., March 8: Cong. Globe, p. 359.
1844. The Dorrites have gained a great deal of sympathy abroad by representing themselves as the exclusive advocates of the democratic doctrine of extended suffrage…. The Dorrites met together and resolved that the people are sovereign, as if anybody had ever denied it.—Mr. Potter of R.I., the same, March 9: id., p. 269, App.
1847. I hold that wherever the idea is a fixed one, that the mere numerical majority have a right to govern—that this right is holden by a sort of divine right—there is then no constitutional liberty. It is Dorrism.… It is bad enough when applied to a State; but when applied to the Union it is ruinous.—Mr. John C. Calhoun of S.C. in the Senate, Feb. 20: id., p. 467.
1857. ‘O Lordy me, Sir! I ’m so dreadful afeard you ’re both on you Dorrites!’ ‘Dorrites!’ ‘Yes, Dorrites! Now a’nt you Dorrites, both on you?’—Knick. Mag., l. 236 (Sept.).
