Mugwuumps

Mugwuumps, a title conferred, during the United States presidential election of 1884 (New York Sun, June 15), on such Republicans as threw over the nominee of their party for Cleveland, the Democratic candidate, in the interests of civil service reform. The title implied a belief that these Independents set themselves up as superior to their former associates.—The word means 'big chief' in the Algonquin Indian dialects, and John Eliot, who spelled it 'Mugguomp,' employed it to translate 'leader' and 'duke' (as in Gen. xxxvi. 15) in his Indian version of the Bible.