The Portland daily press., 1868-06-29

lcAOih eLO OHiNcL>dHsJ JudTJefly LOT July.l
No name connected with the anti slavery
movement in this country, will be permanent
ly associated with that movement unless it
shall be that of one who was leader in some
necessary work of preparation, or an expo
nent of some special truth or idea, or the Or
ganizer OF some timely and practical method,
relating Thereto, and indispensable to its sue
cess.
John Quincy Adams and Joshua r. Gid
dings did special necessary pioneer work as
champions of free discussion and the right of
petition. Garrison, Sumner and Mrs. Stowe
illustrated the essential barba ism of slavery.
Fessenden and Chase demonstrated the pow
er and duty of Congress to forbid its exten-
sion. Seward and Greeley divided, as they
have been during these later years, in opin-
ion and actiOn) were apostles oil the equal and
indestructible rights of men. But ably and
successfully as these men land others who
acted with them labored in their respective
fields, work more difficult, if not more i'm
portant, than theirs, remained to be accom-
plished-the practical work, the work of Or
ganization. 1t was necessary that the people
who had been convinced of the wrong and
danger OF slavery, acting as they were in diff
ferent political parties, to which they were
strongly welded, should be taken out of
these organizations and brought together in
cry.
The man who was to do this work, who
was TO combine and organize the scattered
forces OF anti-slayery opinion; in other words
the immediate founder of the Republican
party, was DR.. Gamahel Bailey.
While DR.. Bailey was a philanthropist and
dOctfinaire, and an earnest anti-slavery man.
he was, also, and eminently, wise and saga
cious statesman; and it was in the rare COM
bination of all these characters that his great
influence was founded. He came TO see ear
lier than most anti slavery men the necessity
and duty OF being practical. He cared little
for parties or party names, but he labored
earnestly and inteligently for results. And
the most valuable work OF his life was that
in which he sought to organize movement
in which the entire anti slavery feeling of the
country should be absorbed, and through
which il should act. He knew that this eel-
ing existed to a large extent among the ad-
herents of the two great parties which divid-
ed the country, but he saw that its power
was welEnigh lost so long as the anti-sla-
very members of those parties were con-
tent to remain in, and act with them
Neither OF them was founded, in any degree,
upon the anti-slavery idea; indeed, articu-
late opinion in agreement with that idea, was
branded by them as sectional, unhealthy,
dangerous. Both parties aimed to be what
was called national; and if Northern men
endeavored to make the party to which they
belonged to any extent anti-slavery, they
were charged with attempting TO make it
aDti-natiOnal; it might be anti-Northen and
yet national, but it could not be national and
anti-Southern! In fine, the shareholders fur
nshed the principles, and controlled the pol
icy, of both parties So far was this thing
carried, that under Mr.. Flllmore's admins
trat no Northern Wing who was unwill-
ing to submit to the Southern opinion and
dctalion on the slavery question, was regard
ed as of good standing in his party; and
in the Democratic party, antisavery men
Jared in much the same way. Within a
month OF the close Of Mr.. Fillnore's admin
istration, Ex-Governor Davis OF Massachu-
setts, a veteran Wing, and one of the ablest
and most respected members of his party,
said that he had felt more like a stranger at
the White House since its occupancy by Mr..
Fillmore, than he had in the time OF the
Democratic administration OF Mr.. Polk.
1t was during the administration of Mr.
Fillmore-in December 1S5I-that the writ
er became acquainted with DIR. Bailey: and
he was very soon impressed with the earnest
ness of that gentleman's conviction that his
special and great work was to build up, from
existing parties, a truly national organization
based on dislike of slavery and opposition to
its extension. Until this should be accom-
pllshed he saw clearly that no effective resist
ence could be made to the progress of this
system. Other journalists and politicians
were fighting slavery. DIR. Bailey fought it,
| too, but he did more,-he told men how, and
how only, they could fight it successfully.
He would have supported, in 1852, the NOM
nation of Gee. Scott, but tor the Tennessee
platform upon which the general was placed.
He would have done this not merely