The Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Ohio) 1863-1886, 1866-08-30
THE CAMPAIGN OPENED!
/ Speech d Of Gov. Cox,
!. !. AT coLuaIBus, sEPT. 2I,Isso.

AZ AT COLUMBUS, SEf,I. 2is slSoo.
t1oa The campaign in Ohio was opened
2 at the capital by great meeting on
the evening Of Tuesday the 2lst inst.
1t was addressed by Gov. Cox, MIR,
Shellabarger, and Milton R, Scott, Of
Delaware county, late a private sol
dier in the Union army. The excel
LENT speech of Gov. Cox, we print in
fulb as follows:
FELLOW. CITIZENS, Every year brings
to,a free people the necessity of con
sidering grave questions of public poll
icy, and of determining, each citizen
for himself, how duty requires us to
act upon those questions. The ap-
pcoaching elections will decide what is
r the popular judgment upon measures
II of vital Importance to the country
And my purpose in addressing you is
to state as clearly and definitely as |
can what issues arc made up, and what
action regard as obligatory upon my
X self and you.
q. q. Could wecnter upon tho discussion
q without partizan prejudice or passion,
it would seem easy to reach the truth
'ib but for a people just coming out of a
terrible war, calm and dispassionae
consideration of the problem Of the war
,JIitself is the rarest Of all virtues We
must moi be disappointed if after doing
our best to divest ourselves Of iniu
.ences which would warp our Judgment,
&, we should still find them creeping in
y unawarcs. All Lean promise s to make
q the effort TO be entirely candid, and to
state the positions of parties and OF
persons as they really appear to me.
) The close Of the war, by the surren-
: der of the armies of the rebellion,
brought us to the problem how real
peace should be made and the whole
Z, country brought most speedily and
safely into the full enjoyment Of a con-
I. stiLutional republican government,
without sacrificing any of the proper
results of the war.
.a-,r Two great organized political par-
ties, and only two have, existed from
the outbreak of the rebellion to this
time. The Democratic party before
the war numbered among its most
trusted and honorod leaders those men
. in the Southern States who plotted and
ID organized the rebellion These leaders
not only represented the party OF the
~ rebellion in the South, but by their in.
tluence upon the party in the North
f' had SO far led it away from the uncon-
dilonal Unionism which once marked
it,thaL now for many years the theoret,
,ic right of secession has been accepted
by the organization as an established
party dogma. SO far has that party
m@been from changing this article of its
creed under the lessonso of the war, that
it is still affirmed. both in the formal
statements of principle published peri
odcally BY It's conventions and in the
speeches OF those who are regarded by
the country as its most authoritative
representatives. On this subject, both
thep party and its orators still habitual-
ly adopt the formula which has been, so
to speak the sacred text of sccessionism,
which was always in the mouth OF Cal
houn and his followers namely that
q each Staso has the right in reference
to all questions of constitutional law
arising between itself and the federal
government ITO Judge for itself as well
~ of iniractious as of the mode and meas
ure of redress"
This cardinal doctrine of the Demo.
cratic creed accounts for the attitude
of tho party toward the war and all the
questions which have arisen out of it,
Their conclusions have generally been
deduced logically from it, and would
be right doctrines if the original were
true. Many of that party regarded the
rebellion impoiitic, but they could not
condemn it as wrong. Ifthcy were con.
sistcnt, however, they must deny the
right to coerco the rebelious States in
to submission, and accordingly their
boldest and most honest leaders were
found opposing the Government during
the war; and embarrassing it by all tho
ordinary tactics Of parliamentary oppo'
sition.
Under the control of the same ideas
that party has taken its ground upon
existing questions. AS secession was
in their opinion right, there can be
no penalty imposed upon those who
practlsed it, and no terms whatever
can be insisted on by the Government
They claim that the rebellious States
spring at once into full possession o.
every right and privilege enjoyed by
them before the war, and that they may
assume and exercise full participation
in the Federal Government, "uncondi'
tioually and Immediately"
There are some other conclusions
flowing from the same fundamental
doctrine of the right of secession which
the Democratic party has not so open
" avowed, but which their genera
faithfulness to the logical results of tina
article Of their creed would warrant III
in expecting them to draw whenevel
they may attain TO power. Among
these are the doctrine that the consti
tutional abolition of slavery is no
binding upon the South, since it wal
obtained from them under duress; tina
the debt contracted by the rebellion
States in asserting their right to seced
is as binding upon the country as tha
Incurred by US in putting down there
bellion: and that all legislation enacted
in the absence from Congl ess of th
members from those States is void.
The more. honest, earnest and abl