The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1872-08-14
$500 j, Il. UUULITTLE,
Chairman of Convention at Baltimore
July 10, 1872, and members the
Committee of Notification
MIR. GREELEY's ACCEPTANCE

New YORK, July IS, 1872.
Gentlemen-~Upon mature deIibera.
ton it seems fit that should give to
your letter Of the 10th instant some
further and fuller response than the
hasty, unprecedented words in which
acknowledged and accepted your nom
nation at your meeting on the 18th.
That your convention saw fit to accord
its highest honor to one who has been
prominently, pointedly opposed to your
party in the earnest and angry contro.
versies Of the last forty years. and that
many Of you originally preferred that
the Liberal Republicans should present
another candidate for President, aud
would more readily have united with
us in support of Adams. Trumbull,
Davis OF BrcH';l, I we'll know. owe
my adoption at Baltimore wholly 10
the fact that had already been nomi,
mated at Cincinnati, and that o concel-
tration upon any new ticket had been
proved impracticabie. Gratitied as !
am at your concurrence in the Cincin-
natl nominations, certain as am that
you would not have thus concurreu had
you not deemed me upright and capable,
( find nothing III the circumstance cal
culated tc intlame vanity Or nour;sh
self-conceit.
But that your convention saw fit in
adopting the Cincinnati ticket to reattirm
the Cincinnati platform, is to me a
source of the profoundest satisfaction.
That body was constrained to take this
important step by no party necessity,
real or supposed. 1t might have ac-
cepted the candidates Of the Liberal
Republicans. upon grounds entirely its
own, or it might have presented them
as the first Wing National Convention
did Harrison and Tyler, without adopt.
ing any platform whatever.
That it chose to plant itself deliber-
ately by a vote nearly unanimous upon
the fullest and clearest eaunciation of
principles, which are at once incontest-
ably Republican and emphatically De-
mocratic, gives trustworthy assurance
that Il new and more suspicious era is
dawning upon our long distracted coun-
try. Some of the best years and best
efforts of my life were devoted to a
struggle against chattei slavery; a
struggle none the less earnest and ar
duous because respect for Constitutional
obligations constrained me to act, for
the most part, on the defensive in resis.-
tance to the diffusion rather than indi-
rect efforts for the extinction of human
bondage. Throughout most Of these
years my vision was uncheered; my ex-
ertions were rarely animated by even
so much as a hope that / should live to
see my country peopled With freemen
alone.
The affirmance by your Convention Of
the Cincinnati platform is most con-
elusive proof that not merely is slavery
abolished, but that its spirit is extinct
that despite the protests OF respect
able but isolated, there remains among
us no party, and no formidable interests
which regrets the overthrow or desires
the establishment of human bondage,
whether in letter or in spirit. / am
therefore justified i'll my hope and trust
that the first century of American indie
pendence will not close before the grand
elemental truth on which its rightful-
ness was based by Jefferson and the
Continental Congress of rs, viii no
longer be regarded as glittering gener-
alities, but will have become the uni
versally accepted and honored founda-
ton of our political fabric.
/ demand the prompt application OF
those principles to our existing condi-
tions. Having done what could7for
the complete emancipation Of the blacks,
| now insist on the full acknowledgements
Of all my white countrymen. Let none
say the bar has just been removed from
all but a few hundred elderly gentlemen
to whom eligibility to office can be OF
no more consequence. Ny view con-
templates not the hundred prescribed,
but the millions who are denied the
right to be ruled and represented By
men of their unfettered choice. Pros,
cription were absurd if these did not
wish to elect the very men who they
are forbidden to choose. / have a pro-
found regard for the people of that
New England wherein was born; in
whose common schools was taught; /
rank no other people above them in in-
telligence, capacity and moral worth
but while they do many things we'll,
and some admirably, there is one thing
which am sure they cannot wisely or
safely do, and that is the selection for
States remote from and unlike their
own, of the persons by whom those
States shall be represented in Congress.
If they could do this to any good pur-
pose, then republican institutions were
unfit and aristocracy the only good pc,
litical system; yet what have we recent.
ly witnessed? Zebelon B. Vance, the
unquestioncd choice of u large majority
n .lc present Legislature Of NORTH