Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 October 1879 — THE REPUBLICANS AND STATES RIGHTS. [ARTICLE]

THE REPUBLICANS AND STATES RIGHTS.

In 1860 the Republican party was in the buoyancy of youth, in the hope and pride of a sanguine ambition, and in the meekness of a good behavior, like that of a stranger seeking to make friends. Like most boys, it was full of good resolutions. Without patronage it was compelled to make an appeal to conscience, to the sense of justice, to the judgment and reason, and it was' forced to base this appeal upon the constitution, the fundamental law of the laud. It dared not then openly and flagrantly defy the constitution, for it was humbly knocking at the gates of power. The constitution, even so short jt time ago, was held in some respect and reverence. There was something fine in the spectacle of a young and lusty party, in a melancholy minority, without money to disburse or offices to dispense, pleading with millions of men to vote for it because it claimed to represent an idea within the constitution that hovered about freedom. The Republican party never before and never after occupied a position so eminent. It was not yet corrupted by power, and was, in some sense, made lofty with hope. It seemed to try to stand, upon the constitution, and plead for liberty for all men. In that convention of 1860 were some of the infin who have lent luster to the Republican party, and have been identified with its only glories. John A. Andrew was there from Massachusetts, bravo, eloquent, lofty, tender, with convictions made beautiful by courage and flavored with sentiment. George S. Boutwell, from the same State, was there, tame but tenacious; somewhat dull but firm; not showy but tireless. Ebon F. Stone, who was Temporary Chairman of the last Massachusetts Republican Convention, was a delegate, and William Claflin and Samuel Hooper, both since then prominent in the politics of Massachusetts, were delegates to this convention. Gideon Welles, of Connecticut, was a delegate at large, as were William M. Evarts and Preston King, of New York. George William Curtis was the first delegate from the First district of New York; and it was he, of the melodious voice and scholarly face, the gentle, cultured dreamer, then so much the hope of our literature, who asked the convention if it was prepaved to go upon the record as voting down the words of the Declaration of Independence. William Curtis Noyes an 1 James W. Nye were delegates from New York. David Wilmot was a delegate at large from Pennsylvania. Thad Stevens the indomitable, the heroic, was also a delegate at large. Wm. D. Kelley was there. Francis P. Blair and Montgomery Blair were delegates. Tom Corwin, the wit, the man of sunshine, was a delegate from Ohio. Joshua R. Giddings, fearless, devoted, conspicuous, was a delegate from Jeflerson. Fred Hassaurek was there, an eloquent speaker. David Davis and O. H. Browning were delegates from Illinois, Carl Schurz, of course, was there, a -delegate at large from Wisconsin. From what convention has this mercenary destructionist and place-seeker been absent since Europe spewed him into this country? Kasson and Allison, of lowa, were delegates. Frank Blair, Jr., and Gratz Brown were delegates at largo from Missouri. And Horace Greeley, that strange combination of guilelessness and intrigue, of ambit’on and modesty, of loving kindness and bitterness, of breadth and narrowness, of philosophy and fickleness, of humaneness broad as the sea and spites as little as the pebbles it washes on the whitened shore, a monument of tifeless toil till he filled a grave of despair—Horace Greeley, the hater of Seward, the erratic man of unsurpassed sincerity, the weak man of power, was there as a delegate from Oregon. Such was the composition of the convention. George S. Boutwell, F. P. Blair, Joseph H. Barrett, of Ohio, Carl Schurz, J. A. Kasson and Horace Greeley were among the members of the Committee on Resolutions. The Republican party, let ns believe, was then honest and earnest. What did this convention, in that hour, say about the rights of the States ? The second resolution in the platform of this convention declared: That the maintenance of the principles promulgated in the Declaration of Independence and embodied in the Federal constitution * * is essential to the preservation of our republican institutions; and that the Federal constitution, the rights of the States, and the Union of the States, must and shall be preserved. The Republican party in 1860 was not content with this enunciation of the rights of the States. The fourth resolution of this platform was follows: That the maintenance inviolate of the rights of the States, and especially the right of each State to order and control its own domestic in - stitutions according to its own judgment exclusively, is essential to that balance of power on which the perfection and endurance of our political fabric depend; and we denounce the lawless invasion by armed force of the soil of any State or Territory, no matter under what . pretext, as among the gravest of crimes. We appeal “ from Philip drunk to Philip sober.” It has become the Republican theory that, inasmuch as the late civil war destroyed all vestige of the alleged right of secession, no rights of a State remain; that all the rights of the States perished when the Union of the States was restored. We appeal from the Republican party in 1879 to the Republican party in 1860.