Antedatings in The Yale Book of Quotations - 39: Silent Majority

[Baker, John]

        None of these citations, either Joel's or mine, are exactly the
modern sense of a politically inactive majority that, through reticence
or disinclination, does not express its views, although the slave
majority in my 1816 example comes close to this sense.  In my 1789
example, Mr. Ames seems to be saying that the committee's majority will
not merely vote silently for the location they favor, but will submit
their compelling arguments to a candid world.  (As you may be aware, the
Susquehanna location ultimately did not win out over the Potomac.)
Still, I think these early citations are important evidence of the
development of the phrase.

        Although I am inclined to think that this is a real example of a
1789 use of "silent majority," I must admit the possibility that the
editors, writing in 1834 or later, chose to summarize Ames's remarks
using an anachronistic phrase.


John Baker



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
Of Joel S. Berson
Sent: Monday, July 16, 2007 8:38 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: Antedatings in The Yale Book of Quotations - 39: Silent
Majority

If the provenance of the Debates were to be considered dubious, there
are the following, courtesy of America's Historical Newspapers:

The Philadelphia Gazette & Universal Daily Advertiser, Dec. 2, 1796,
Vol. 13, Issue 2531, page 3 [near the bottom of column one].  This is
described as "From the (New-York) Diary."

"That, sir, is not the effect of a distempered imagination, but facts
which every act of parliament, and every act of the crown demonstrates.
We see an Herculian, corrupt, and silent majority invulnerable to every
feeling of duty and humanity, spurning with contumelicusness [sic, I
think], the soundest reasoning and wisest measures; and like a violent
tornado, bearing down every thing before it."

I will leave it to others, who undertake to read the lengthy context, to
decide whether this is our sense of "silent majority" -- "(b) the mass
of people whose views remain unexpressed, esp. in political contexts;
those who are usu. overlooked because of their moderation"
-- or its antithesis!  Or perhaps not the desired sense at all:  it may
merely mean the majority in parliament, which has been silent about the
issues discussed.  Which might also, I ponder, be the sense of John
Baker's Debates citation -- merely a silent majority of the committee;
as might also be the following two.

A dozen years later, The Newport Mercury, Jan. 2, 1808, Issue 2386, page
3 [near the end of the second column]:

"Attempts were made to obtain amendments to the bill; among others to
limit its operation to 60 days; but they were repeatedly negatived by
the silent majority."

And the same year, Litchfield Gazette, Apr. 13, 1808, Vol. 1, Issue 5,
page 3 [within the last paragraph of the second column]:

"In a very short period of time, a silent majority voted for its
adoption in the house, and the signature of the president was
immediately put to it."

The act so passed is roundly criticized in this article.

The next citation found by me in America's Historical Newspapers is
1831.

Joel

At 7/16/2007 07:20 PM, John Baker wrote:
>         "Silent majority" seems to be much older than I would have
>supposed.  The earliest I see is from an account of the congressional
>debates of September 4, 1789, discussing the location of the permanent
>seat of government of the United States.  "Mr. AMES never intended that

>this question should be carried through the committee by the strength
>of a silent majority; he had confidence in the weight of the arguments
>to be urged in favor of the Susquehanna, and he was willing to put the
>decision of the question on that ground."  This is from The Debates and

>Proceedings in the Congress of the United States (aka The Annals of
>Congress), available online at
>http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llac&fileName=001/llac001.d
>b &recNum=452.  According to the Library of Congress, the Annals of
>Congress were not published contemporaneously, but were compiled
>between
>1834 and 1856, using the best records available, primarily newspaper
>accounts, and speeches are paraphrased rather than presented verbatim.
>
>         Another early example is from The Pamphleteer, Vol. VII, No.
>XIII, p. 68 (Mar. 1816) (Google Books full text), discussing the
>relative considerations to be given the interests of the slave majority

>and the white minority in determining whether to register slaves in the

>British colonies in order to enforce the Abolition Acts:  "Nor is the
>opposition to such a particular order deserving of the more respect,
>because the great majority, comprising all other classes [besides the
>white minority], is silent, when that silence is known to be not a
>matter of choice, but a necessary consequence of the strict and
>despotic subordination in which they are held.  In such a case, the
>legislature is bound to consider whether the silent majority have
>really an interest [letters or words missing] ption of the measure
>opposed."  The author's name does not appear to be given.
>
>         Finally, here is a nonpolitical use from A Sexton of the Old
>School [Lucius Manlius Sargent], Dealings with the Dead, Vol. 2, p. 441

>(1856; copyright 1855) (Making of America), referring to a quack:
>"Those, who got well, proclaimed Dr. Bodkin's praises--those, who died,

>were a very silent majority."
>
>
>John Baker
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
>Behalf Of Fred Shapiro
>Sent: Friday, June 15, 2007 11:37 AM
>To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>Subject: Antedatings in The Yale Book of Quotations - 39: Silent
>Majority
>
>silent majority (OED 1874, political usage 1955)
>
>1870 _Economist_ 19 Nov.  The silent majority which so seldom appears
>at the polls.
>
>Fred Shapiro
>
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