Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 May 1884 — THE REPUBLICAN PARTY. [ARTICLE]

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.

Eloquent Speech of On. Oglesby Before the Illinois Republican Con* vention. The Republican party of tbe nation has presented to the American people seven national platforms. Upon six of those, now near the close of a quarter of a century, we have been successful. The flist National Republican platform was laid deep in the hearts of the people, as the basis, the foundation, upon which the structure was afterward to be elected which those other six National Republican platforms exemplify in thia country to-day.. Firm and solid as the foundations of the Libyan coast and the grand pyramids of Egypt, built by the ingenuity and art of man thousands and thousands of year sago, those grand structures, fixed upon a basts that will never yield, were built to stand all time. So Republican principles, as exemplified In the six succeeding national platforms, were based upon tbe fitst one, as the pyramids in the Libyan desert were based upon their impregnable and eternal foundations'. We have implanted in the hearts of the American people, old and young, the fundamental truths of human liberty. We have sealed it so deeply in the human breast that time can never eradicate it. That was the leading doctrine of the first platform. The one of 1860, reasaerting the grand principles of the first one, went a stop further and dealt with the question of interstate commerce, the opening of the Pacific Railway, it took the ground that in levying taxes for the support of the Government it should be so laid as to protect American industry and American labor. In 1»64, when the third one came, we were in thq agonies of a death struggle. Oh, the eleven resolutions of that platform will shine as a glittering diadem in political Wlstory forever and forever! You may not have read them of late days, but in the throes of civil war, when all around us was the most frightful misery, this grand National Union Republican party mot in convention arid sent forth to the world in the midst of awful war the bold, the grand, the glorious declaration that tbe Union was {Paramount, that the Union was inseparable, that disunion was heresy fraught with the foulest consequences to mankind, and that there should be no peace, no end to the war, except upon the .terms of unconditional surrender. We do not quite appreciate it now, but theft, gentlemen, you who are yet in the vigor of manhood know that then it was a living issuer then it was a Cardinal principle. Turn back and read those eleven resolutions. Y'ou can : read them in twenty minutes. Y’ou will find no higher or grander utterance since the Sermon onhhc Mount; no grander utterance than the Ten Commandments that came thundering through smoke and flame from the top of Mount Sinai, those laws written by the finger of God to last forever. Nowhere will you find a grander consummation. In 1868, drawing together all the consequences of the war, dealing with reconstruction, that troublesome question of 'the constitutional amendments, we came up again and said the constitutional amendments were to be respected and obeyed, because they were right, not because they were simply jaw; and then we came on with our renewed declaration upon the tariff, and put in substantially the flrst resolution upon the subject.of civil service reform, pledging the honor of the nation that the national debt should be paid, that ttfe national word should be faithfully kept, and that every dollar of the debt should tie paid. We pledged the honor of the people for the payment of that debt. - In 1872, still bringing forward these declarations and holding them together as a bouquet of beauty and power and splendor—a thing to electrify the heart of every man and woman in. the land —we went still'further. Giving those declarations a new assertion, and putting in the tariff clause and the reformation of the civil service, we denounced polygamy; and stood again upon the continued strength and beauty of union, and so on until 1876, when we took up the question of national educat on. And while we agreed that the States properly had control of it, that the National Government should foster education throughout the land, we took good care to put in a clause that neither . State nor nation should appropriate mot ey for sectarian purposes, and proposed an amendment to the Constitution of tbe United States that ' money should not be appropriated by States or the Government fog -sectarian school purpose-, but pledging ourselves to foster. education; and but the other day our Senators who supported the bill received the indorsement of public sentiment, and I have no doubt they feel very comfortable over it, for they both voted for it, voting to take out of the National Treasury your money and mine, and the poney of-'. American people, $77,006,600, based upon the enlightened principle of illiteracy; not based upon population, but based upon Illiteracy according to the census of 1860. So that $77,000,000 of our money is to go—and I say it with my heart and with my voice t>day, so far as I am concerned, my heart will go with every dollar of it—to common school education throughout the United States. We do have a regard for the colored people. We did riot only stand by (hem to break the galling chains that held them in abominable slavery; we did not only lift them up to manhood and clothe them in the shining garments of American citizenship; we did not only endow and equip them with the wonderful weapon, the great political bludgxm of political power, the right to vote, the right of suffrage; but, hovering about them still in their manhood, in their citizenship, marching by the side of them, yet we call upon the National Treasury, for tbcm and their friends in the South, for millions and millions of money, that they may not only be free, but that they may have a good common school education. We have done this by ceaseless, watchful vigilance. It has been the vigilance of the party which has strengthened our glorious Union, whleh has made our people happy and free. New things are coming upon the theater constantly. Look at England, where they are wrestling with a domestic question. England 2,000 years old. England, nearly 1,000 years since the Norman conquest, a strong and intelligent Government, good and useful for Its own purpose—and she has dissensions and is deeply aroused. A Ministry is threatened to be removed from power, and, but for the assistance they obtain from the Parnell party and from the liberal thinkers of Ireland, Scotland, and England, Gladstone would not be able to tell what tbe result might be. And what is tbe question? To give 2,000,000 of living, immortal souls there the right to vote that never in this world have had that right. A question serious, vital to tbo British Government today—tbe old fundamental idea *of suffrage. Why, great God, don’t they know, have they not always known, shall they not soon come to* know as well as we know, that voting is the birthright of every man of every nationality upon God’s green earth? This is the central-' izing and vitalizing idea of manhood. It is what makes tbe human soul a thing worth having. It is what makes man move upon this earth in tbe image of God. And yet there to-day they are mouthing and fumbling in Great Britain as to whether so many Scotchmen, so many Irishmen, and so many Englishmen shall vote. But then we have questions here still to demand our attention, not only in Illinois in regard to our statutes, in retard to ourlaxes and revenue, and our criminal law, and all those interesting questions; but we hare polygamy in Utah, those great questions of Interstate commerce, railroad communication —those wonderful projects that now invade tbe whole country. They are to be met, and also whether the Government should take the telegraph lines and. operate them, and make appropriations Jft case of an epidemic, of great overflows, )n the interest of common schools, and legislate to dignify and lift up thia great American people. Oh! we have a great deal of work for this Republican party for the next quarter of aqentury; yea, tor a thousand years to come. Believe me In my concluding words for my cause. I have already announced my oka election —Jxat is fixed. 1 don't believe there are many people in Illinois that really want to beat me. It would be the silliest thing in this world to seriously try to do It. 1 think ’ after wisdom shall prevail, and deliberation

*an prevail, and patrotism, shall prevail, and above all this great political aod thia groat Republican economy of oura shall prevail, that somebody will be selected that this great Republican party and those other elements or our political society floating and flopping around alone, not just knowing Where to tie to, not just knowing where to rest, will fill quietly flock in and you will see us again triumphant. You Will behold us again victorious, and then all the great interests of the Nation will he at rest. Tbe great money questiobs, the great questions of taxation, the great questions of tariff, are to be settled alone by this Republican party, and by none other. Oh! bow we have stood by the national credit; how we have stood by the national honor; how we have bulided up the nat onat glory! Gentlemen, do not talk about tbe past record of the Republican party; the record Is not past. It Is like tbe Sermon on . the Mount. It Is like the Ten Commandments. Are those now in the past? The record of tne Republican party is still being made. It is still expanding. How oan a record bo past when you are living upon It? When you are marching upon it to-day, when every gentleman in. my presence feels in his inmost heart, when be comes to reflect upon it, that he is lifted up and dignified by it? There is no man who is not proud of it. it is not a past record; it is an everlasting record that will never be past. It will go on with us forever while we remain here, and, as the Chairman of the meeting said this morning In his opening address, our political opponents—thanks to them for their opposition : thanks to the Democratic party for fighting us a little bit; thanks to them for rating us a little; thanks to them for watching around on the bills, the little promontories, and in the thicxets, and along the little streams and rivulets, and in the barren and Ropeless places, standing to watch and else us, to pass in judgment upon our conduct—lt is the best test we can have in this country. There is no other party of breadth and scope and strength enough to fill that place. And while we might hope to have a little higher standard of criticism, it Is bet*' ter, God knows, than none. As our Chairman said this morning, allow me to repeat that alt thoughtful Democrats, men engaged in business affairs, our neighbors, our associates, who love good government, who love to see property rights protected and maintained, and who, I may hope, will yet come to see the value, and beauty, and dignity of labor—toy, with these views, cannot help feeling otherwise than, as the Chairman said, satisfied and contented with the powers of government in this country intrusted to our hands. They know we love the republic; they know welove the flag; they know the national banner has been washed in the blood of Republicanism; they know that It stains lta g.orious folds; they know how dearly we lov® liberty; they know how we love, law and order, and they know we will have law and order under Republican rule and domination; they know that we will have no Communism, lawlessness, riot, plunder, sedition, revolution,' or devilment of any kind. Ob, no; wa are a party of law and order. We are a party that understands what Justice means. We have studied the high <1 (Man.ls of justice. We know whatyve ta>k about when we speak and legislate upon it. We kmv what liberty means. We know what a good strong National Union means. We know what State sovereignty, or State Jurisdiction, or State political power is. We know the boundary line between the Nation and the State. They know we respect it. We have brightened the line; we have made it more conspicuous in preserving honestly and sincerely,Oas we have always done, the rights of the States. We have still been able, thank God, by the groat power that we wield as a party: we have been able to go down into and evoke -from the Constitution those powers which we h ive applied there, and which have built up this great National Union, wiih ample powers, well defined, potent, omnipotent tor good at home and abroad. We have thus made a Government strong and firm, fixing deeply in the hearts of the people liberty.