Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1872-07-31
Mr.. GRRELET's ACCEPTANCE.
The following is Greeley's acceptance of
the Baltimore nomination:

Ihe foiiowlng Is Greeley's acceptance of
the Baltimore nomination:
NEW York, July 18th, 1872.
Gentlemen: Upon mature deliberation it
seems fit that should give to- your letter of
the 10th inst. some further and fuller response
than the hasty, unprecedented words in
which acknowledged and accepted your
nomination at our meeting on the 18th. That
your convention saw fit to accord it's highest
honor to one who has been prominently and
pointedly opposed to your party in the earn
est and sometimes angry controversies Of the
last forty years, is essentially noteworthy
nat many OF you originally preferred that
the liberal republicans should present another
candidate for President, and would more
readily unite with US in the support Of Meesrs.
Adams OF Trumbull or Davis or Brown, is
well known. owe my adoption at Baltimore
wholly TO the fact that had already been
| nominated at Cincinnati, and that a concen,
tration OF forces upon any new ticket has
been proved impracticable. Gratifed as
am at your concurrence in the Cincinnati
nominations, certain as | am that you wonld
| not have thus concurred had you not deemed
| me upright and capable, find nothing in the
| circumstance calculated TO inflame vanity or
nourish select conceit. But that your con-
vention saw fit in adopting the Cincinnati
ticket TO feaffirm the Cincinnati PLATFORM is
to me source of the profoundest satisfae-
ton. That body was constituted to take this
important step by party necessity, real or
supposed. II might have accepted the candi-
dates of the liberal republicans upon grounds
entirely their own. or il might have presented
them as the first national whig convention did
Harrison and Tyler, without any platform
whatever. That it chose to plant itself de-
liberately. by a vote nearly unanimous, upon
the fullest and clearest enunciations Of prin-
cipies which are at once incontestably repub-
lican and emphaticaly democratic, gives
trustworthy assurance that the new and more
auspicions era is dawning upon our long dis
tracted country. Some of the best years and
best { ffors of my life were devoted to a struk.
gle against chaitel slayery-a struggle none
the less earnest or arduous because respect
| tor constitutional obi cations constrained me
TO act Tor the most part for the defensive, in
resistance TO the diffusion rather than in d.
rect etforts for the extinction Of human bond
age. Throughout most of those years my
vision was uncheered, my exertions were
rarely animated by even so much as hope
that should live to see my country peopled
by freemen alone.
The aftirmance by your convention Of the
CINCINNATI Platforms a most conclusive proof
that not merely is slavery abolished but that
its spirit is extinct; that despite the protests
of respectable but isolated few there re.
mains among us no party and no formidable
interests which regret the overthrow or de-
sire the re-establishment of human bondage,
whether in letter or in spirit. | am thereby
justified in my hope and trust that the first
century of American Independence will not
close before the grand elemental truth on
which its righteousness based by Jeffer-
son and the continental Congress of '76 will
no louger be regarded as 'glittering generali-
Ties but will have become the universally
accepted and honored foundations OF our po-
lnicai fabric. l demand the prompt applica-
llon of these principles to our existing condi-
tions. Having done what l could for the
complete emancipation of the blacks, now
insist on the full enfranchisement of all nv
white countrymen. Let none say that the law
has just been removed from all but few hun
dred elderly gentlemen to whom eligibility to
Office can be of little consequence. My view
contemplates not the hundreds prescribed
but the millions who are denied the right to be
ruled and represented by the men of their un-
tettered choice. Prescription were absurd If
these did not ish to elect the very men whom
they are forbidden to choose. l have q pro.
found regard for the people Of that New Eng
land wherein was born and in whose COM
mon schools l was taught. l rank no other
people above them in intelligence, capacity
and moral worth. But while they do many
things well and some admirably, there is one
thing which am sure they cannot wisely or
saf,ly undertake, 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 "A good purpose, then republican insti-
tutions were unfit and aristocracy the only
true political system. Yet what have we re-
Gently witnessed? Zebulon B. Vance, the un-
questioned choice of a large majority of the
| leg a m
jori,y backed by a majority of the people who
voted at its election, refused the seat in the
General Senate to v hich he was fairly chosen.
and the legislature thus constrained to choose
another in his stead or leave the State unrep-
resented for years. The votes of New Eng
land thus deprived North Carolina of the Sem
tor of her choice and compelled her to send
another in his stesd-another who was in our
late conquest, like Vance, rebel, and a
fighting rebel but who had not served in Con-
, gress before the war as Vance had, though
the latter remained faithful to the Union un-
al after the close of his term. l protest
against the disfranchise of a State, pre-
snmptively of a number of States, on grounds
so narrow and technical as this. The fact
that the same Senate which refused Vance his
seat proceeded TO remove his disabilities after
that seat had been filed by another, only
serves to place in a stronger light the indigni-
~ 10 NuTtn tdLoliid anu TIE aIDltIdIy, capri
cious tyranny which dictatedit it. thank you
gentlemen that my name is to be conspicuous
fly associated with yours in determined effor
TO render amnesty complete and universal il
spirit, as well as in letter. Even defeat il
such cause would leave no sting, Will,
triumph would rank with those victories
which no blood reddens, and which evoke NJ
tears but those of gratitude and joy.
GentleHan, your platform, which is also
mine, assures me that the Democracy is no,
henceforth to stand for one thing AMI Re-
publicanism tor another, but that those term'
are to mean inpoltics, as they always hav.
meant in The dictionary, substantially one and
the same thing, namely: equal rights, re.
gardllss OF ere ed or cline or color. han
= thESas a genuine new departure from ootworn
teuds and meaningless contentious In the
l. direction of progress and reform. Whether
10 | shall be found worthy to bear the standard
nt ,b, great Liberal movement which the
n American people have inaugurated Is TO be
d. determined, not by words, but by deeds with
ne me if steadily advance, over me II fxlter.
I,s ,rsnd array moves on to achieve for our