It quickly grew as a powerful political force in the area but its later activities are what associate it most with Samuel Adams and the run up to American Independence.

[11] The goals of the caucus were to protect the interests of the lower and middle classes in Boston, and to champion popular programs.

[1] Although providing representation for the common people, the Caucus in some ways subverted the democratic process by setting the agenda for the Boston Town Meetings in advance, and through concerted action largely predetermining the results.

[13] According to Peter Oliver, the last chief justice of Massachusetts before the revolution, the caucus spent huge amounts of money on liquor to win elections in the 1720s.

William Gordon, in his History of the Independence of the United States of America (London, 1788), said: More than fifty years ago Mr. Samuel Adams' father and twenty others, one or two from the north end of the town where all the ship business is carried on, used to meet, make a caucus and lay their plan for introducing certain persons into places of trust and power.

[19] Adams also became part of the Sons of Liberty, a mass movement of mostly working class men that could be used in street protests to support the goals of the Boston leaders opposed to British rule.

[29] From 1751 the caucus collaborated with a "Merchant's Club", a "select group of shipowners and wholesalers", to "protest the oppressive tactics of royal customs officials".

[33] A critical commentary on the press's treatment of Andrew Jackson, and on the practice of nominating candidates by caucus during the presidential race of 1824 with James Akin's cartoon pointedly attacks Republican nominee William Crawford and his powerful supporter Martin Van Buren.

Jackson, in military uniform, stands amid a pack of snarling dogs labeled with the names of various critical newspapers.

One dog, named "Richmond Whig," is whipped by a nude black boy who says, "Mas Andra I earry say dis eah jew dog blongst to Tunis, bark loud, somebody tief way ee paper & show um one ghose, wite like Clay; dat mak um feard.

look pon dat sleepy dog; jumbee da ride um, can't bark no mo for Crawfud."

In the lower left corner a dog named "Democratic Press" is ridden by a skeletal Death figure holding aloft a tract with the words "Immortal memory Revd.

On the dog's side appear the words, "Good sprite, In mercy lash me with a dry corn stalk; I'm so jaded by stable swooning smoke house steams & Hog Cellar sweats!"