I am cobbling together sources for a project and have become frustrated at what I see is a historical gap on Quakers in the Northeast US.
There are plenty of writings on the Quakers pre-Civil War, including their abolitionism, but after the Civil war I'm confused how the number of Quakers simply tailed off so rapidly.
For example, this website mentions that the state of New Jersey was the only northern state to vote against Lincoln twice - in 1860 and 1864, but the Southern Counties, which were heavily Quaker, all voted for Lincoln.
So, at least in my home state of New Jersey, it seems like the North part of the state was more "southern" in its politics, values and culture and the southern part was more northern - owing a lot to the legacy of Quaker values.
Then, as I approach the era of WWI, the Great Migration and WWII, many sources summarize that it switched. South Jersey had the most segregated schools, buses and policies and many towns tried to kept it that way even after the NJ amended its state constitution in 1947, which desegregated schools, before Brown v. Board. North Jersey apparently became more progressive than the south, and though still rife with discrimination like much of the North, became a more welcoming place to African Americans than South Jersey.
What happened from 1865 - 1945 that seemingly wiped away the Quaker influence in South Jersey and other areas of the Delaware Valley? How did these become the most progressive areas to some of the least?
Quakers have been concerned about their population declines since the 18th century. However, major immigration and population booms of non-Quaker groups in the 19th century have led to those groups far surpassing Quakers numerically, particularly outside of the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions. The population of the United States was about 23,000,000 in 1850. From 1880 until about 1930, you had over 5m Italians, 2m Central Europeans, 2m Russian Jews, and 1.5m Swedes/Norweigians come to the United States. That's over a 50% increase in population that totally discounts the immigrants' own reproduction. None of these were Quakers. I'm not sure how many Quakers existed in the United States prior to 1850 (a million? fewer?) but it's never been a particularly large religion. It's also not a religion that proselytizes compared to others. In other words, the combination of major non-Quaker immigration and the failure of Quakers to win many converts in the United States relative to other major religions destined their decline.
Frederick Tolles' classic Meeting House and Counting House traces a kind of de-radicalization among the Quaker families in Philadelphia, as they become more affluent and established, the younger generations lose some fervor and drift into becoming Episcopalian. Perhaps the same dynamic was at work here?
The Southern connections of Princeton University you've probably noticed ( Virginian Woodrow Wilson was a president, before becoming US President) . But as far as influences: the biggest change in NJ 1865-1945 would be less garden state and more industry state, no?
One line of my family left north Delaware in the mid 1700s to go to NC for more land. Another left Jersey in the late 1700s to go to Ohio for more land. I'd expect that many farm families did that same move. You'll find Meetings in NC, OH, IN with names matching the DE, PA, and NJ meetings.