Virginia free press. (Charlestown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1832-1916, 1872-07-27
Mr.. Greeley's Letter Accepting the
Baltimore Nomination.

nation in reply to the letter Of the committee
appointed to notify him threof:
Neic York, July 1S.-Gentlemen: Upon
mature delberation it seems fit that should
give to your letter Of the 10th inst, some furth
err and fuller response than the hasty uupre-
meditated words in which | acknowledged and
accepted your nomination at our meeting on
the 18th inst That your convention saw tt
to accord the highest honor to one who had
been prominently and pointedly opposed to
your party in the earnest and sometimes angry
controversies Of the last forty years is essential
ly noteworthy. That many Of you originally
preferred that the liberal republicans should
! present another candidate for President, and
would more readily have united in the sup
port Of Adams, or Trumbull, or Davis, or
Brown, is well known.
! owe my adoption at that time, or at ALL
to the fact that | had already been nominated
at Cincinnati and that contraction Of forces
upon any new ticket had been proved imprac-
ticable. Gratified as am ct your concur
renee in the Cincinnati nomination, | would
not have thus consented had you not deemed
me upright and capable. ! find nothing in
the Circumstances calculated to infame vanity
or nouriSh seliconccit but that your conven-
ton saw fit in adopting the Cincinnati ticket
10 reaiiirm the Cincinnati platform Is to me
source Of the proloundest satisfaction. That
body was constrained to take the important
step by no party necessity, real or supposed.
1t might have accepted the candidates of
tie liberal republicans upon grounds already
its own, or it might have presented, as the first
wing national convention did Harrison and
Tyler without any platform whatever.
That it chose 10 plant itsefdeli6erately by
vote nearly unanimous upon the fullest and
ccarest enuncia;iOa of principles, which are at
once incoutesGbly republican and emphat,-
caily democratic, gives Trustworthy assurance
that new and more auSpicious era IS dawnlng
upon our long distracted country. Some OF
the best years and Ges efforts of my life were
devoted to a struggle against chattel slavery
a struggle none the less earnest or arduouS be-
cause respect for constitutional obligations con-
strained me to act, for the most part. on the
defensive in resistance TO the diffusion, rather
than in direct efforts for the tinCt0n Of hui
man bondage.
Throughout most Of those years my vista
was uncheered, my eXertions were never ami
mated by even so much as a hope that should
live to seemy country peopled 10y reemen alone.
The ailirmance by your convention OF the Gin
cjnnati platform Is a most conclusive proof
that not merely is slavery abolished, but that
its spirit is extinct, that despite the protests
ola respectable bat isolated few there remains
among Us no party and no formidable interest
which regrets the overthrow or desires the re-
establishment Of human bondage, whether in
. the letter or IN the spirit.
am thereby justified in my hope and trust
that the first century Of American iadepcud-
G euce will not close before the grand elemental
truths on which its rightlulness was based by
jefferson and the Continental Congress of ,G
viii no longer be regarded rs "glltterng gen
eral,tics,' but will have become the Universal
3 " accepted aud honored foundations Of oUr po-
o litical fabric demand the prompt appI.ca-
s ton Of those principles to our existing coudi-
tieu.
Having done what could for the complete
i emancipation Of the blacks now insist on the
D full enlrancLsemeut If all my white country
= men. Let none say that the Ian has just been
removed from all but few hundred elderly
% gentlemen, to whom eligibility to Office can be
p of little consequence.
0 Ny view contemplates not the hundreds
o. proposed, but the millions who are denied the
risit to Le ruled aud represented 10y the men
OF their ualettered choice Prescription were
q absurd if these did not wish % elect the very
e men whom they are forbidden to choose
l have profound regard for the people Of
. that New England wherein | was born, aad In
whose common schools was taught. think
no other people above them in intelligence, ca
i pacity and moral worth, but while they do
u many things well and some admirably there is
~ one thing which am sure they cannot do
wisely or safely, aud that is to undertake tie
selection for States remote from aud ul,ike
' their own Of the persons by whom those States
D shall he represented in Congress. If they
h could DO this to good purpose, then republican
institutions are unfit and aristocracy the only
true political system. Yet what have we re-
G Gently witnessed? T. Il. Vance, Of North
$ Carolina. the uuqucstioned choice Of a large
T. majority of the present Legislature, a majority
, hacked byamaor'yof thepeople VINO voted at
its election. reiusedthe seat m tie Federal Senate
to which be was fairly chosen, and the Legs
= htvlc was thus constrained to choose another
e 10 bis stead or leave the State uayeprcsenicd
for yeats.
Tie vote Of New England thus deprived
ID North Carolina Of the Senator Of her choice and
b compelled her to send another in bis stead, an
70 other, who ia 10 our late contest was like
Vance a rclc, and fighting rebel, but who
had no. served in Congress before the war as
Vance lad. though the latter remained faith
fuI TO the L. Ion until after the close Of his
term. protest ag.irst tie disfanchisemeut
Of a State, prcsumpdreiy OF a number OF
States, on grounds so narrow ana iechalc"I as
this Tie fact that the same Senate whlU. re-
q fused Vance his seat, proceeded to remove bis
disabilities after that seat had been Gled by
another, only serves to place in stronger light
the iudign:ty to North Carolina, Tie arbitrary,
capricious tyranny which dictated 1t.
thank you, gentlemen, that my name is 10
D be couspicuously associated with yours 'a de-
. term'rel effort to render amnesty complete
and universal in spirit as well as in letter.
Even defeat in such cause would leave no
sting while triumph would rank with those
victories, which no blood roddeus and which
evoke no tears, but those Of gratitude and jHy.
Gentlemen, your platform, which IS also
, niue assures me that democracy is not hence
forth to stand for one thing. and repubIicausm
= for another, but that those .erms are to mean
in politics, as they always have meant 10 the
dictionary, substantially one and the same
thing, namely. equal rights regardless OF
. ereeGs or cline, OK color.
e hail this as a genuine new departure from
S outworu leud aud meaningless contentious 10
the direction Of progress and reform. Nheth-
er shall be found worthy 70 bear the standard
- of the great liberal movement which the Amerl-