The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1867-08-23
Committee Of Arrangements.

Committee Of arrangements.
To the committee of arrangements on the
occasion of the 4h Of July, 1867, at Ire
lands Corners
MEssRs-I have received your request
fora copy of my recent speech at your
place, for publication, but think it more in
debted to the generous Inspirations of the
day than to its own merits for your favor.
| do not, however, feel at liberty to with
hold the copy you desire.
Respectfully yours.
II. ". TUCKER.
Mr.. President, Fello,o Citizens, and you
who have come from foreign shores to make
this home of the free, your home,-this
asylum of the oppressed, your asylum we
are come up hither from every point of the
compensation far distant countries, speak
ing different languages and comparative
strangers to each other into this primeyal
grove to celebrate this jubilee consecrated
to patriotic memories and the birth of our
American Republic. We here, in spirit,
kneel around the holy altar erected by our
revolutionary fathers to the GODDESS of Lib
erty, to the defence Of which they early
pledged their lives, their fortunes and their
sacred honors.
Well and nobly did they redeem their
pledges. Thoroughly did they sever the
bonds that bound them to power which
sought to enslave them. GloriousIy did
they establish the ind dependence of thirteen
British colonies, and incorporate them into
little republic, whose infantile boundaries
were the great lakes on the north, and
Florida and Louisiana. on the south-the
sea beaten shores Of New England on the
east and the Mississippi river on the west;
but which has since extended its domain
to the Gulf of Mexico, across the Mis-
sissippi river to the Rocky Mountains-to
the Pacific ocean through the great valley,
to the peninsula Of California, and now en-
braces the whole of Russian America.
But all those worthless are no more.
They sleep that sleep that knows no waking
and silence will forever brood over their
graves F.;
And here in these appropriate bowers
Wepause and muse upon the fleeing hours
and quickly passing glory of that band,
Who spread that banner forth and joy
through all the land.
And let us, here, with uncovered heads,
under the canopy of the broad heavens, re.
new our devotion at the same altar and EN-.
ulating their example, pledge to the support
and defence of the same sacred rights of
humanity our lives, our fortunes and on,
sacred honors.
Although we are strangers to each other
| trust we are not strangers to that emblem
of our national sovereignty-it floats on the
winds of every clime-is unfurled on every
sea-is understood Of all nations, and is
every where protection to American right:
and citizenship.
Count its stars-thirty- sovereign
States are represented. Read its motto
"E Pluribus Unum. By this | under.
stand is meant to be declared that all those
States are equal in sovercignty-are indisso.
lubly united in the same political pursuits
fellowships and destinies, and in the exer
else of the same national sovereignty. We
arc not, then, strangers and aliens from the
American commonwealth, but fellow-citi
zens thereof and brethren in the inalienablt
rights Of humanity, and we cordially re
ciprocate to each free born citizen the righ
to claim these heavy woods of old Brown
county to be ''his own, his native land"
To the auspices of the free government
established by the immortal patriots Of tht
revolutionary period, are we indebted for the
expansion of our public domain, North and
South, East and West, around the pro-
montory of Alaska and along the shores O.
the Northern seas, until prophetic visions
seems to claim, at no distant day, as incyi-
table destiny, a bou ndess continent as ours.
Humanity has also been disenthraled,
emancipated, exalted, enfranchiscj. Man
is no longer here the born thrall, the de
graded serf, nor the trembling slave Ed
ucation has been e Extensively fostercl and
its interest literally sustained.
Dark, Ignorant superstition and intoler-
ant bigotry have rapidly receded before the
increasing lights of science, until man no
longer here fears the fagot, the poison, OF
the torture for infdelity Or heresy.
He is not bound by law to the car Of any
idol God, nor doomed to degrading rites OF
human sacrifices.
The equal rights Of conscience are sacred
ly guaranteed in our organic laws, and every
man is protected in worshiping at the altar
of his own choice, and the roads to wealth
and happiness through honest industry and
useful pursuits are thrown open to all.
Governments based on these principles
of freedom and equality would seem 10 be
the heighth of human wisdom, yet the voice
of the past of other republics and our own
recent experience, admonish that fatal dan.