Definition of turnbuckle. : a device that usually consists of a link with screw threads at both ends, that is turned to bring the ends closer together, and that is used for tightening a rod or stay.
Such splintering had not yet led to formal party organization, but later the faction led by Andrew Jackson would evolve into the Democratic Party, while the factions led by John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay would become the National Republican Party and later the Whig Party.
Clay lost the election by fewer than 38,000 votes. Due to the Liberty Party's poor showing in both the elections of 1840 and 1844, the organization came to an end. Many former party members joined the Free-Soil Party, which ran its first candidate for the presidency in 1848.