Around New England

The Massachusetts Legislature Sex Scandal of 1855

December 13, 2017

A state representative named Joseph Hiss was a member of a state House of Representatives committee overseeing nunneries during the period the anti-Catholic Know Nothings ruled Massachusetts in the 1850s. On a fact-finding mission, Hiss used state funds to get drunk and engage in other extra-legislative activity, as described by Lowell Sun columnist Peter Lucas.