8 the case, that it will, in all courts and places, stand by the freedom of speech and of the press, and the constitutional rights of freemen everywhere; that it will favor the speedy improvement of the public domain by homestead laws, and will encourage mining, manufacture and internal commerce, with needfnl connections between the Atlantic and Pacific States —for all these are important interests of freedom. For all the rest, the national emergencies, not individual influences, must determine, as society goes on, the policy and character of the Republican party. Already bearing its part in legislation and in treaties, it feels the necessity of being practical fn its care of the national health and life, while it leaves metaphysical speculation to those whose duty it is to cultivate the ennobling science of political philosophy. But in the midst of these subjects, or rather, before fully reaching them, the Republican party encounters unexpectedly, a new and potential issue—one prior, and therefore paramount to all others, one of national life and death. Just as if so much had not been already conceded; nay, just as if nothing at all had ever been conceded to the interest of capital invested in men, we hear menaces of disunion, louder, more distinct, more emphatic, than ever, with the condition annexed, that they shall be executed the moment that a Republican administration, though constitutionally elected, shall assume the Government. I do not certainly know that the people are prepared to call- such an Administration to power. I know only, that through a succession of floods which never greatly excite, and ebbs which never entirely discourage me, the volume of Republicanism rises continually higher and higher. They are probably wise, whose apprehensions admonish them that it is already strong enough for effect. Hitherto the Republican party has been content with one self-interrogatory—how many votes it can cast ? These threats enforce another—has it determination enough to cast them? This latter question touches its spirit and pride. I am quite sure, however, that as it has hitherto practised self-denial in so many other forms, it will in this emergency lay aside all impatience of temper, together with all ambition, and will consider these extraordinary declamations seriously and with a just moderation. It would be a waste of words to demonstrate that they are unconstitutional, and equally idle to show that the responsibility for disunion attempted or effected, must rest not with those who in the exercise of constitutional authority maintain the Government, but with those who unconstitutionally engage in the mad work of subverting it. What are the excuses for these menaces ? They resolve themselves into this, that the Republican party in the North is hostile to the South. But it already is proved to be a majority in the North ; it is therefore practically the people of the North. Will it not still be the same North that has forborne with you so ' long and conceded to you so much ? Gan you justly assume that affection which has been so complying, can all at once change to hatred intense and inexorable ? You say that the Republican party is a sectional one. Is the Democratic party less sectional ? Is it easier for us to bear your sectional sway than for you to bear ours ? Is it unreasonable that for once we should alternate? But is the Republican party sectional ? Not unless the Democratic party is. The Republican party prevails in the House of Representatives sometimes; the Democratic party in the Senate always. Which of tho two is the most proscriptive ? ' Gome, if you will, into the free States, into the State of New York, anywhere from Lake Erie to Sag Harbor, among my neighbors in the Owasgo Valley, hold your conventions, nominate your candidates, address the people, submit to them, fully, earnestly, eloquently, all your complaints and grievances of northern disloyalty, oppression, perfidy; keep nothing back, speak just as freely and as loudly there as you do here; you will have hospitable welcomes, and appreciating audiences, with ballot-boxes open for all the votes you can win. Are you less sectional than this ? Extend to us the same privileges, and I will engage that you will very soon have in the South as many Republicans as we have Democrats in the North. There is, however, a better test of nationality than the accidental location of parties. Our policy of labor in the territories was not sectional in the first forty years of the Republic. Its nature inheres. It will be national again, during the third forty years, and forever afterwards. It is not wise and beneficent for us alone or inj urious to you alone. Its effects are equal, and the same for us all.
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