The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1872-12-04
Our CommonweeItb revived the extreme

stitution of slavery but ever since slavery
was destroyed, and extreme State-rightism
became useless, she has been steadily re.
turning to the national politics inaugursted
by her own early statesmen.
Our Republic rests upon equal nights
the equality of all men before the law. A
| departure from these principles, entailed,
after seventy.fve years, sanguinary and
destructive war, nearly involving the ma
tionnl life. In demonstrating the govern.
ment. the party in control was bound to es.
tablish it upon the granite foundation OF
equal rights---the only sure basis of peace
and permanency. With sublime courage,
that party did thus reconstruct it upon tho
principles embodied 10 the last three
amendments of the national constitution.
Virginia has sustained these measures, and
has never turned her back upon the party
or the men who advocated them. Her State
constitution sets out and embodies in de-
tail all the principles of the 18th, l4th and
18th amendments; and she adopted that
instrument by a vote of 100000 to 1900.
Shallow men who affect to lead the Con-
servative party, pretend that she did this
as q trick to secure her admission into
tho Union. ! scorn to refute so groveling
an accusation. The great body of her PEG.
pie accepted these principles in good faith,
and mean to adhere to them. Their vote
in 1869, on the State Constitution, was an
emphatic declaration to that effect. Their
recent vote, in an election in which both
parties soliciting their suffrages were
obliged to stand upon the same platform of
Union principles, daring to differ only as
to men and party affiliations, means the
same thing. That the electoral vote of Vir-
ginia is cast for Gen. Grant meansy that
Virginia formally repudiates sectionalism
and sectionalists forever; that she has re-
solved to be once more a national State;
that she has re.embraced the politics of her
early statesmen and that she re espouses
the sentiments of Washington's Farewell
Address as her political creed for all here.
after. No State has larger material stake,
or grander historical interest in national
politics, than our own good Common
wealth and her people will never again be
separated or seduced from her early policy
by selfish. impassioned and short sighted
politicians.
Excuse my prolixity on this subject. /
have sacrificed too much feeling to my faith
in Virginia's return to the national creed of
our fathers, not to be thus INDUCED on this
proud occasion. She has quit the troublous
waters of sectionalism she has discharged
the blind pilots that have wrecked and
ruined her fortunes. She comes home,
home again, to the natal soil of national
ism, wherein she was always great, PROS
porous and honored and since abandoning
which she has been continually poor, weak
ann despised.
Our policy, in Virginia, as party, to.
I, bnC tu,th uyn hov
is oblivion Of the past, and Cancellation to-
wards ali. Our controversy with our adj
versaries has not been with themselves but
with their errors. We have no war to
wage except for that policy in which are
bound up the true interests of the State.
Political bitterness and partisan intoler-
barred out from Virginia that which she
labor, and population. We cannot afford,
central as we are geographically, and amid
The intelligence of the Nineteenth Century,
to surround ourselves with a Chinese wall
of intolerance, and pursue miserable Ca
clusiveness. This Commonwealth does
not belong to its present race for any such
semi barbarous purpose. 1t belongs to
people: and its society is to be conducted
and its resources utilized, in the spirit of
the active age, for the advantage of the
outer public no less than for the benefit
of the inner occupants.
Freedom of opinion is the cardinal de.
mand of the only immigration which is
worth having by Virginia. The man who
comes to Virginia conserving to be slave
to local partisan despotism, will inevita.
bly, prove himself worthless acquisition.
The man with qualities to dare differ in
opinion with the proudest, has in him the
metal to make a valuable citizen in what
ever walk Of life he may pursue. Let US
secure to all corners the privilege of being
Republicans, or whatever else they will, in
opini IN and by that very fact we throw
wide open the gates Of Virginia, to popu-
been twelve years closed. Let us admit
the vitalizing air into the exhausted 70.
ceiver.
We have the best system of unskilled
labor in the world. Why can we not in
duce all classes Of our people to treat as a
blessing the presence amongst us of the
most amiable, stalwart, teachable, and
faithful race OF laborers possessed by any
millions to the State, if we but do our duty
in educating, elevating, and fostering as
men and citizens this people; eager as
they are for mental and moral improve.
ment; loyal as they are in their domestic
friendships; and patriotic in all their po-
litical impulses.
Let US identify our party with the great
public works of the State on which she de-
ponds for utilizing her commanding 10.
cality in the Union, and for developing her
latent agricultural and mineral resources.
Let US exert all our party power and
discipline to put down the movement for
forfeiting the statutory pledges and repu-
dating the pecuniary obligations of the
State remembering that the Republican
party is everywhere bond-paying, tax
| levying party; and remembering for our
| good State, that honesty is capital that
credit is wealth; and that, Of the little
which Virginia has left of her wrecked re.
sources, her character is the last precious
| jewel, not to be idly thrown away.
Let US demand education for all the PEG.
pie; strengthening and expanding our
present school system until it brings every
child in the State under its tuition and
let us solicit from Congl ess, out of the
| public laads, the means to this end which