The New International Encyclopædia/Half-Breeds

HALF-BREEDS. A political nickname applied, in 1881 and the years immediately following, to members of a faction in the Republican Party in the State of New York, which favored the Administration in the controversy between President Garfield and Senators Platt and Conkling, and opposed the regular Republican candidate for the Governorship of the State, Folger, thus bringing about the election of the Democratic candidate, Grover Cleveland. The name was given in derision, as denoting those who were but half Republican, by the nembers of the opposite faction denominated &lsquo;../Stalwarts/&rsquo; (q.v.). The term was also used to some extent in other States.