The weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1852-1858, 1858-01-02


our soourn at Kandotta, with some remarks
respecting the climate, &c., of this part of
Minnesota. t @ ..s W.
The Republican, a Party of Senti-
ment.
NININGER, DAKOTA Co., NJ T..
Dec 8, 1857.
To tie Editors of the Minnesotian:
Having a few moments of leisure, it has
occurred to me to write out some reflections
on the present state of our great party.
Our opponents have apparent cause of tri-
umph in the success they have obtained in
certain States in which other results were
anticipated: The cause of this is easily ex-
planned. The Republican party is party OF
sentiment, and its followers are mainly that
part of the population not essentially politi-
clans. 1t requires great events to call them
forth. They are reserved strength that
rises to the occasion. The Democratic par
ty is, on the contrary, always "at its best,
its partizans are corstitutonally politicians,
and it can roll forth as heavy vote when
nothing is at stake, as when the whole nation
is shaken by new issues. Hence in such a
contest as that in which Fremont and Bu-
chanan arrayed their respective forces against
each other, the Democratic party was forced
to succomb to the torrent of popular senti-
ment that rolled over them in the North -
but no sooner had the occasion passed, and
the tarmer had returned to his plow, and the
artisan to his hammer, than the brawler and
the pot-house politician and the low dema-
gogue once more re-asserted their claims to
be seen and heard.
Let US be comforted with the reflection
that the same great sentiment is still living
in the hearts of the people, and that it needs
but tho occasion to call it forth. Let us also
be comforted with the reflection that alJnougn
we may be defeated in Minnesota, the prin-
cples we have advocated have met with a
greater triumph on more momentuous
field, and that we have gained in Kansas all
we have lost here. When history pauses to
write the record of these days, she cannot
fail to ascribe the'glory of those events which
snatched Kansas from the grasp of the slave
power and turned back the flood that was
careering over the new regions of the conti-
nent, to the efforts of the Republican party
Call it by what name you will. whether it
appears in that closing act of the great
Franklin's public life, when he offered his
simple protest against the existence of sla-
very in these States whether it takes the
crude form of the wild and extreme measures
of the New England Abolitionist /; or wheth-
er we see it, as in the last Presidential con-
test, striding in triumph across the whole
tier of Northern States, we must still recog-
nize init the same deep-moving, ineradicab'e,
eternal principles, co-natal with the birth OF
national freedom, aad omnipresent wherever
error is to be rishted.
No more importent event has occurred in
the history of our land than that which gives
Kansas to FREEDOM. We have fenced in the
contamination. We have laid line of fire
across the advance of Slavery, and we have
stationed the angel with his two-edged
sword ON the flaming wall. "Thus far shalt
thou 60, and no farther" Republicanism
has done this. We have all contributed to it.
Every man who has spoken out his disappro-
baton of the evil, has contributed to it.
Public sentiment has decided the fate of Kan
sas, and VIC have moulded public sentiment.
Democracy cannot claim this as her triumph,
for her only claim has been to neutrality
She has professed neither preference for
nor an opposition to slavery. but to let the
PEOPLE settle the question for themselves-to
stand by and see fair play. Whether her
professions have been honest or not we will
not question here. Whether she really saw
fair play, or whether as Handicapped of this
race, she loaded the horse Liberty, with a
greater weight than the mule Slavery, we
leave each to Judge for himself. But at best
she was but bottle-holder to the contest
And the contest was between whom? Be-
tween those inspired with the teachings OF
the Republican party, and the pure, unadul-
turatcd, undOubted and undenied advocates
of slavery-between those who carried the
New York Tribune in their coat pockets, and
those who carried bundle of miracles in
their breeches pockets. Democracy had
nothing to do with it. If we had delegated
her to do the fighting the result would have
been different. a.fl... t.,.,.i.,-.
Let that great event comfort us for local
losses. We are party not of spoil, but OF
principles; and so that those principles tri.
umph in important struggles, we can afford to
bear disappointments in lesser ones. Let
not our enemies, however, suppose that we
have gone the way Of other 'isms." We are
not dead, but sleeping. The sentiments on
which we are based underlies the widespread
com munity like the primary rocks under the
world they may tread over it unheeding
and contemning for years, but let the occa.
sion demand it, let the circumstances call for
it, and its convulsions will shake the pgmies
from their feet. We can't rouse up earth
quakes to elect Governors, .. l..f....-, -.,..
- "The ocean into billows hurled, p
To watt a feather or to drown fly, '' =
but the vote that was polled for Fremont in
1856, is still intact-nay more, increased
the sentiment that made it is. still growing
and needs only an equally important contest
to call it forth.
Believe me very respectfully yours.
A REPUBLICAN, through good and i'll.
r4i ..s--. - .e.L.e3 =. D. -