Northern white fear of white immigrants had been a staple of some platforms. It worked well.
It had a nice religious flavor re Irish Catholics especially.
Southerners worried less about it, but poor Southern whites too were against more competition where they already had negroes as competition.
The Republicans were able to turn this pre existing fear and prejudice from foreign white immigration against Southern slave holders instead, and especially against their slaves, whom Northern whites came to view as subhuman and fearful competition, thanks to the rhetoric of the new Republican Party and Lincoln, and in spite of abolitionist rhetoric like Uncle Tom's Cabin.
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