The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1853-04-07
TO TIE PEOPLE OF CUYAHoGA, LAKE, AND GE
AuGA COUNTIES.

FELLOW CITIZENS: The official relation
which have so long held towards you is now
dissolved. The occasion is one which demands
OF me an expression Of gratitude which feel
towards those in whose service nearly one -half
Of the business portion of my life has been
spent. leave you with emotions stronger than
those of ordinary Friendship. Long have been
sustained by your influence strengthened by
tho sepsAred psoss 90 soSx condolences, and
cheered on to effort by your approval Of my
labors. You have generously excused my er
rors and overlooked my impcrfections. These
circumstances have created within me feel
ing of affectionate attachment of heartfelt
gratitude, which can never DO effaced Will,
memory shall perform It's Office.
In return for your kindness, and the conf
dence reposed in me, can only say that | have
endeavored to discharge my public duties with
fidelity My positions in Congress have been
somewhat isolated: have followed the dictates
of my own best judgment; yet my opinion,
have been formed with elaboration and care
fol preparation. In looking over the past,
experience the most unfeigned pleasure in the
consciousness that thus far no political oppo
nent indeed no stakeholder, has attempted to
meet the views have expressed, or to refute
the positions have taken concerning our con.
stitutional relations to slavery. The declama-
ton, misrepresentation, and personal detrac-
ton, with which have been assailed, furnish
abundant proof that my opponents were un-
willing to assail the doctrines which | main
tanned
My views upon the great questions which
now agitate the country are placed upon rec
ord they are TO be found in the official debates
of Congress, and will soon appear in collect
ed form before the country. To you may say
that shall cheerfully trust them TO the exam
ination and scrutiny of the public and of those
who shall come after us. Whether they shall
hereafter be approved or condemned, can
only say they were the solemn conclusions of
my own judgment after mature and deliber-
ate investigation.
Since you first honored me with seat in
Congress, many changes have come over the
physical world around us. Much of the dark
forest Of our country has given place TO fruitful
fields; beautiful dwellings now stand where the
gloomy wilderness was then unbroken our
railroads have placed US in juxtaposition with
the Atlantic cities; and our magnetic tele-
graphs enable us to converse with friends who
are thousands of miles from us in short pro
gress is written in unmistakablc characters
upon the natural world around us; but this
progress is not more obvious than that which
is seen in the moral world, or which marks the
political sentiment Of our land.
Of ali the political issues existing between
the parties when entered Congress, not one
now remains In reviewing the past, it appears
appropriate that the issuc made upon the exist
ence Of United States Bank, should be con-
temporaneous with muddy roads and semi
monthly or weekly mails The absorbing con-
test in regard to the division Of the proceeds Of
the public lands, and protective tariff, appears
appropriate TO the period when we travelled on
horseback, TO New York and other Atlantic
cities; and we should be no more astonisbed to
meet q conservative, now advocating the an
cient mode of carrying the mails on foot, than
we should to meet one who attempts TO revive
the political issues of 1896.
At that time few, very few, admitted Con-
gress TO possess the constitutional power 10
abolish slavery in the District Of Columbia !;
now no STAKEHOLDER denies it,
In 1910, our people generally regarded slaves
as property; now no man will insult us by
pretending that Shareholders and doughfaces
convened in Congress, by impotent words ar
ranged in the form Of a Congressional Law,
can convert the image Of God containing a
HNinB iumoIsni 1oui ipO P'VP'''t """ N0 S'""'
it TO the level Of brute
The popular sentiment amongus now denies
the power Of human Legislators 10 sanctify
crimes which God has denounced. The man
who, under tho supposed protection of Congress
sional law, now buys men and women in the
District of Columbia, and sells them to the far
South, with the perfect knowledge that they
will be hurried to premature graves under the
scourge is regarded no less murderer, than
he under whose lash the victim expires nor Is
the member of Congress who lends his infu-
ence 10 sustain the slave trade there, consider
ed less guilty before the Searcher Of hearts,
than the man who buys and sells his fellow
mortsls under the sanction and protection OF
laws sustained by Congress
In the city of Washington, We have recently
seen children torn from the embrace Of their
frantic parents, and, moaning and sighing,
draoged 10 tbo auotioa block aud sold " tho