The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1868-01-24
ThR 9eafprA Gazette.
GREAT SPEECH OF HON. j. BLACK.
Andrew jackson VS.. Modern Radical
ism.


isRn.
AT the Democratic banquet given a
the Metropolitan Hotel, in Washing
ton, on the eighth of January, the
following toast was proposed: "The
memory of Andrew jackson: A great
general: greater statesman and mag,
istrate." To this Judge Black respon-
ded as follows:
There is no day in the year, except
the 4th of July, that ought to be kept
so sacred as the Sth Of January. Ap-
plause. And, except the Father of
his Country, there is no name known
among men that is entitled to higher
reverence than that'Gf Andrew Jack
son. Applause. L put Washington
first because the place which he occu-
pies in history, as the foremost man of
all this world, has never been disputed.
Applause. 1t was always admitted
that he stood alone, without a peer a.
mong mortals. Competition gave way
before the acknowledged greatness of
his character, and rivalry itselfconced.
ed the palm to his pre-eminent virtue.
| know not how it may be with 9TH
ers. but his is name which | never
was able to pronounce without emo
tions of respect and reverence whicn /
have no form of words to express.
But the reputation of Jackson has
not been so fortunate. His life was
one long battle with the enemies of
constitutional freedom. Applause. |
They assailed him with every species
of slander, and even at this day the
foul birds that streamed around him in
| his lifetime, and others Matched in the
same bad nest, light whenever they
can upon his tombstone to defile his
tomb with their obsaane droppings.
Loud applause. OneUf the most in
furious of these aspersi0ns is that by
which the radical party have attempt
ed to make him authority for their
own attempts to trample upon liberty
and law Great applausel. If that be
true; if he is authority for them if he
has set the example for their miscon-
duct; if they are travelling upon path
which has one impress of his footstep,
then he is wholly and utterly unworthy
of the honor which the American peo-
pie all through the country are bestow-
ing upon him at this moment APP
plause. Then I give him up. He is
their man: he is not ours.
lfGeneral JacKsCTever ana any thing
in his life which can justify the mur-
der, kidnapping and robbery of inno-
cent men and women ifhe ever used
military force for the purpose of en-
shaving any State, north or south, lap
plause i if he ever used one atom of
his powerful influence for the purpose
ofsubjugating his felloW-citizens, or
any portion of them, to the domina-
ton of a negro government, cries of
"good" and applause; j if there be one
single act of his whole life that can be
cited as an example for the coarse, cru
ell and corrupt despotism which the
radicals have organized wherever and
whenever they could, then he don't
belong to our rcommunion. Applause.
In that case he is only fit to be set up
in that heather pagoda which despot-
ism has established among us, as one
of the divinities to be worshipped be-
side such generals as Pope and Baker,
loud applause, and others of that class,
where the worshippers lay it down as
part of their creed that the constitu-
ton is ''a league with hell and cove
nant with death )" where the high
priests that minister at the altar have
qualified themselves for holy orders by
being hired delators and perjured wit
nesses, and where an act of worhsip
which they offer consists in false affi-
davits against the honor and rights of
innocent people.
lam not here to pronounce any eulo-
gy or to make any defense of General
Jackson, but / do wish to refer to one
passage in his life upon which the
slander to which | have referred is
based, if it be based upon anything.
When General jackson undertook the
defense of the city of New Orleans, in
the fall of 1914, he assumed response
bility such as had rarely been taken by
anybody in the world, and such as
very few men except himself would
have taken under such circumstances.
The British army was 1900 strong,
composed ofveterans, ably commanded,
thoroughly trained, and fresh from the
victorious battle-felds Of the Spanish
Peninsula. They had never known
what it was to be defeated. No hostile
army of equal strength had ever before
landed in one body upon the Ameri-
can shores. To meet them General
Jackson had half the number of raw
levies, hastily collected from the plough
and the workshop, not organized all
of them imperfectly equipped, and
some of them-a considerable number
of them-not armed at all.
With these fearful odds against him,
he was required to hold possession of
an unwalled and unfortified town, sit
uate upon an open plain, accessible up
on every side and with absolutely no