(Tea) Partying for Halloween?

NEW YORK (CNN) -- This Halloween, sales are up across the board but sales of Colonial costumes are beating the spread.

Retailers think it's the influence of the Tea Party and election-year patriotism -- but they're not asking too many questions as they bring in more and more revenue from Revolutionary officer uniforms and breeches.

"It's all about the scallywag hats; people are interested in anything they can get for that look," says Andrew Perry, a Halloween Express franchise owner in Charlottesville, Va. Perry has resorted to looting pieces from his pirate costumes to meet the demand for Colonial-style costumes. The category is doing twice as well for him as it did last year, and the vast majority of his Colonial inventory has already sold.

Perry's store is not alone. National online retailers CostumeCraze.com and BuyCostumes.com have both seen an increase in sales of about 50% for their "colonial" items in the past two months, a bigger rise than in overall sales.

"Colonial sales are up even more than all of the other kinds of costumes that we sell," says Dan Haight, chief operating officer of BuyCostumes.com. The company, which has been processing 40,000 to 50,000 orders a day this week, is doing between 15% and 30% better than last Halloween.

Powdered wigs are up 70% for BuyCostumes; tricorn hats, Colonial socks and the shoe buckles sold on the website's "colonial" page are all up 60%.

Across America, Halloween retailers are having a good season. The National Retail Federation projects that sales will be up 17.7% from Halloween last year. They also found more people are planning to dress up this year than any time since 2005.

But why are they turning to Sam Adams for their style?

"There's been a resurgence, as of late, with America. A lot of people are getting involved with politics ... many people are discussing issues relating to our government, our founding, our Constitution ...," Costume Craze's vice president of marketing and business development Jeff Wiseman told CNN. And he believes demand for these period costumes has increased alongside political enthusiasm.

Patriotic spirit might explain why Uncle Sam is so popular this year on their website -- outperforming himself by 138% over last year.

At Target (TGT, Fortune 500), the jabot and cuff set is selling well. "[Compared] to this time last year, we have seen an increase in sales across all colonial costume items," says Target spokesperson Tara Schlosser. Prices range from $11.99 for accessories to $48.99 for the adult men's costume, higher than the average costume price of $23.37 predicted by the NRF.

Some of the states where Colonial costumes are selling particularly well line up with places where there have been Tea Party victories.

In Delaware, where Republican candidate and Tea Party darling Christine O'Donnell is challenging Democrat Chris Coons, sales are up 200%.

In North Dakota, Tea Party-endorsed Republican Gov. John Hoeven is running against Democrat Tracy Potter, and Colonial sales are up more than anywhere in the country, according to Costume Craze.