The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1872-03-28
Stand by the Republican
Colors!
SPEECH
Hon. Henry Wilson,
At Great Falls, New Hamp-
shire. February "a, 1872.

OF MASSACHUSETTS
At Great Falls, New Hamp-
SHIRE. February 24, 1872.
Mr.. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen:
During the year on which we have
entered the people of the United
States will be summoned to elect a
Chief Magistrate. There are seven
million persons in the country en-
titled to the right of suffrage. They
are now ranged into two great po-
litical parties. One calls itself the
Democratic party; the other takes
the name of the Republican party.
Each of these political organizations
has history, a platform of princi-
Piles, and a programme of policy.
To one or the other of these parties
the people of the United States will
commit, for four years, the precious
interests of the Republic. 1t de-
wolves upon the citizens of New
Hampshire to give the first vote of
the campaign upon which we are
entering. Whatever may be the re-
suit. il will be deemed and taken
throughout the country as an indi-
cation Of public sentiment, and the
victory, to whichever party it may
come, will give to that party in the
nation more numbers than it has
voters in the State of New Hamp-
shire.
1 come here tonight in behalf of
the Republican party of the United
Estates, three and half millions
Istrong, to speak to the Republicans
of New Hampshire; to ask them to
call the battle-roll anew, and to
redeem their State, and place her
where she has so long been, and
where she ought to be again, at the
head of the Republican column. I
am not here to belittle the Demo-
cratic party. 1 know it has power,
I know it has elements of strength,
1 know it will fight great battle
this year for the control of the Cow
ernment. 1 pity the weakness or
ldespise the folly that undertakes the
power Of the Democratic party. 1t
has vast elements of strength; it has
wealth, prejudice, passion, and pride
of race. l know it has able men in its
ranks, and 1 have no sympathy with
that disposition which prompts US al
ways to belittle whatever we oppose.
do not come here to apologize
for the Republican party. l would
as soon apologize for the spots on
the sun that has bathed the world
to-day in light and beauty. The
Republican party needs no apology
and no defense. There is no body
of men in America to-day, who from
their past history or present position
have right to arraign it before the
nation, before the nations, or before
God.
There was struggle, beginning
in 1882, and continuing until the
spring of 1961-the period of one
generation-between these antagon-
istic forces; but it was struggle of
thought, of voice, of the press, a
struggle of votes. Liberty at last
triumphed. Then the slave-masters
raised the banners of rebellion, hurl-
ed their section into a wicked and
brutal, barbarous and bloody civil
war. These are historic facts. They
will go into the history of our coun-
try; and when we who are here to-
night, when the men Of this genera
ton shall have passed away, in oth-
er days, with clearer lights than
those of the present, the human fam
lily will recognize these facts, and
historians will record them for the
study and admiration or condemna-
tion of after generations.
We have had serious contest, a
bloody struggle, in which some of
the bravest and noblest have gone
down4 and sleep in soldiers grves.
In this struggle, where stood these
two great parties that divide the
nation to-day? Where stood the
Democratic party? Where stood
the Republican party? Here to-
night 1 assert if, and there is not a
man on Gods earth can contradict
it, for the record is against him,
that from the year 1882, when Will
liam Lloyd Garrison and eleven
other faithful and fearless men signed
their names to the declaration that
black men had right to liberty,
and that they would do what they
could, sanctioned by law, humanity,
and religion, to emancipate the
bondmen, and to lift up the poor
and lowly in the land, from that
day to this hour, every moment oi
the time, and on every distinct issue,
l the Democratic party has been on
the side of privilege, the side o.
caste, the side of brutal, ignorant
degrading barbarism. Measured by
D the standards of the philosophers
and statesmen of the ages, measur
ed by the law of the living God
there has not been moment wher
it was not clearly, plainly, distinct
ly, unqualifiedly wrong. 1t has beer
wrong, and it is wrong now, and ]
fear it will continue to be wrong.
The Republican party, made W
as it has been of men who came ou
, of other Oroa nizofiOne haoauqn fhax