Cleveland morning leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1854-1865, 1860-09-08
MORNING LEADER
,SDeech Of Senator Seward,

tons Of our tfee institutions, aud the necessity
Ofateturn to them TO give perpstuity to the
blessings Offree government Il is addressed
to thinking men, and treats the great problem
discussed With the distinguished Senator's
usual clearness and ability. Mr.. Seward
paid deserved tribute TO Mr. Lincoln, as
the man through whom our government is
to be restored to the character and princis
pies impressed upon it at its birth by Washing
ton, Franklin, Jefferson, and the other Faith
ers of the Republic
The speech is long, and as Mr.. Seward viii
speak to the people of the Reserve at Cleve-
land on Bis return from the Northwest, we
win now only give the readers of the Leader
the benefit of his Detroit speech an intelli-
gible abstract, .t..
Senator Seward commenced by saying
We claim that our political system is a ju-
dicious one, and that we are an intelligent
and Virtuous people. The government ought
therefore not only to secure respect and good
will abroad, but also to produce good order,
contentment and harmony at home. It fails
to attain these ends,
Mr.. Seward presented. the various evil
dences Of those propositions. Speaking of
the universal dissatisfactiOn''he said
The North is not satisfied. It's masses want
a suppression Of the African slave trade, and
an efectual exclusion Of slavery from the ter
ritories; SO that all the new and future states
may surely be free states The South is not
satisfied. Its masses by whatever means
and at whatever cost, desire the establish
npnt aud protection Of slavery in the terrific
ries, so that none of the new states may fail
to become slave states. The East is discon-
tented with the neglect Of its fishery, manu-
facture and navigation, and the West is I'M
patient under the operation of national POI
icy, hostile to its agricultural, mining and so
eial developments. What government in the
world but ours, has persistently refused to
improve rivers, construct harbOrs and estsb-
lish light houses, for the protection of its
commerce New and anomalous COM
binations of citizens appear in the North,
justifying armed instigators Of civil and ser
vile war, in the South devising means for the
disruption and dismemberment Of the Union.
1t is manifest that we are suffering in the re-
spsct and confidence Of foreign states, and
that disorder and confusion are more ia
grant among ourselves now than ever be-
fore.
Looking forward he said:
Diseontentment is the wholesome frui; of
discovery of maladministration, and con-
vietion of public error is here at least always
a sure harbinger of political reform
Speaking of the offices of a statesman in
this connection he said:
regard it as belonging to the office of a
statesman, not merely to favor an immediate
and temporary increase of national wealth,
and an enlargement of national territory,
but also to fortify, so far as the prescribed
| constitutional limits Of his action may allow,
the influence of knowledge and humanity; to
abate popular prejudiees and passions by
modifying or removing their causes; to as
certain and disclose the operations of gener
nj laws and to study and to reveal the social
/ tendencies of theage, and by combining the
past with the present. while giving free play
all the time to the reciprocating action of the
many co-existing moral forces, to develop
! that harmonious system which actually pre-
walls in the apparent chaos OF human affairs;
and 50 to gain something in the way of as
surance as to the complexion of that futurity
toward which, since our country.is destined
to endure, and insOmueh as we desire that it
may be immortal our thoughts are so vehem-
entity driven even by the selfish as well as by
the generous principles of our nature.
He spoke next of the failures Of the late
Democratic Administration to manage the
slavery question. In this connection he
said:
Solid, enduring and constant parties, in
spired by love of country, reverence for vir
tue and devotion to human liberty, bold in
their conceptions Of measures moderate in
success, and resolute throughout reverses, are
essential to effective and bene6eent admins
tration in every free State.
Of impracticable politicians be had to say:
He who proposes measures so impracticale
that be can win no party to their sup
port, may be a philanthropist, but he
cannot be statesman and even when the
leader in administration is thus sustained, he
is, although never so earnest or wise, every
where and at all times inefficient and imbe-
cile, Just in the degree that the party on
which he depends, is ineOnstant vacilating
timid or capricious.
as W huat un4 UGL0AAN VI VIC poAAAAltA
parties be said;
That dashing unterrifed, defiant party
whose irresistible legions carried the homes
and intrepid hero of New Orleans on theil
shields, through so many civil encounters
: that generous though not unprejudiced Whil
! party, which apprehensive Of perpetual dan
E ger from too radical policies ofadministratiln
! SO often with unabated chiyalry and enthusi
asm, magically recombined its bruised anc
scattered columns, even when q a,riciou
: fortune had turned its rare and hard-won tri
Iumphs into defeats more disastrous than tn
9 field fights which It had lost-ths reeen
: American party, that sprang at one boun,
> from ten thousand dark chambers, and whicl
seemed only yesterday at the very point O
carrying the government by coup de man
+ These had all persisted. And the Demo
h cratic party Of this day
The Democratic party too that has clothe
itself so complacently with the pleasant ira
l. ditions of all preceding parties, and combine
{ so felictously the most popular Of our nation
al sympathies with the most inveterate an
repulsive Of our conservative interests, ths
e has won the South so dexterously, by stint
b. latiug its maddest ambition, and yet has hel
the North SO tenaeiously and so long, b
O. awakening i s widest and most demoralizin
+ fears. What is its condition2 1t is distir
70 guished in fortune from its extingu;shed riva
/ only, by the circumstance that both portion
of it8 crew, divided as the hulk breaks INF
he two not unequl parts, retain sufficient energ
e e in their despair oseze on the drifting Wrecl
a Of other parties, and by cunning thoug
hopeless earpentery, to frame wretched an
rickety RATS on which to sustain themselv'
for one dark night more on the tempestuOI
sea Of national politics. i-
Mr.. Seward argued that these parties g we
:. organized not specially to establish justi
ios and maintain freedom and equality among
mt honest, Jealous and liberty loving people, b
/ to achieve some material public advantai
Is2 of temporary Importance, or to secure the
= vancement of some chief to whose discretio
as ifthe government were an elective desp
tism instead of Republic, the distribution
. its patronage and the direction Of its affai