National Republican., 1875-07-12

ceive anything 30 unutterably mean as his
meanless, it may be well to remind the
young students of the University of Viri
ginia that the blood Of the New England
forefathers was pure and even princely
when compared with that of the common
convicts granted tickets of leave from the
low prisons of Taunton and Bndgewater
to colonize Southern plantations. and the
name of Preston figures largely in the list,
which fact is, perhaps, only coincidence.
A few of the better class were sent South
from the Tower of London, but they were
all attainted of high treason. They were
traitors then, and if the Prestons could
have their way they would be traitors still.
The students of the University of Virginia
can study with profit the fact that one
of the very earliest acts of Charles l., an
act which raised most intense storm of
condemnation throughout his Kingdom,
was the imposition of forced loan
without grant from Parliament
and that John Winthrop and Isaac johnson
and Thomas Dudley were his principal op-
ponents in Lincolnshire and Suffolk, and
that then and there, in 1880, raised on En-
glish soil the standard of liberty and JUS
tice. Thomas Dudley became an early
Governor of Massachusetts. The prisons
of Lincolnshire were filled with the more
important of these objectors to the tyranny
of Charles I. They came under the cogni-
zance Of the "Star Chamber" and many
of them were sent to New England, bring
ing with them a reverence for precedent
liberty; justice and law, and from the loins
Of such men sprung the race that led in the
Revolution. But all this is not to the point
now, and is only referred to as single IL
lustration of the confusion into which the
Prestons, a name not heard of in revolu-
tionary annals, except in the small office Of
a Colonel of Virginia troops, held by his
paternal grandfather, can be easily thrown.
In fact, the family was not known at all in
this country until 1885, when VIM. G. Pres
ton, q brother ofthis fiery orator, was elected
to the Senate of the United States as
reward for supporting John c. Calhoun as
nullifer, and more than two hundred
years after John Winthrop was Governor
of Massachusetts,. Poor fool 1t might be
well for the students of the University to
go on and learn the fact that South Carolina
never had much to do with the Government
in any way, except to give it trouble on
account Of its treason. 1t never had an
officer in the Cabinet until the fourth Ad-
ministratioH, when Paul Hamilton became
Secretary of the Navy In the fifth, John
c. Calhoun, alias South Carolina, was Sec
retary of War. In the sixth, John G.
Calhoun, alias South Carolina, was Vice
President. In the seventh, John C. Cal
boun, alias South Carolina, was Vice
President of Jackson's first term. In the
eighth, Joel r. Poinsett was Secretary of
War. In the ninth, Hugh 8. L,gare was
Secretary of State, and that is all. This
great State was passed over by Washington,
Adams, Jefferson and Madison, and has
not been heard of in the Cabinet since the
ninth, (Harrison's) or in 1S41. There
were thirteen Congresses before Langdon
Cheyes, of South Carolina, was made q
Speaker, and James L. Orr, of South Caro-
lima, was Speaker of the Thirty-fif Con-
gress, and Armisted Burt succeeded Win
throp as Speaker of the Thirtieth Congress,
and that is all she was ever honored in that
way. She gave to the country a Chief
Justice, John Rutledge, for nearly year,
and Preston s. Brooks struck down an
unarmed man without warning. This is
all South Carolina has done since the Rev
olution to make her notable. This is the
extent of the trust reposed in her by her
sister States; and yet to hear the gasconade
from that State at Lexington, stranger
would be led to believe that the balance of
the Union was a mere dependency upon it.
For information as, to the way in which
the address was received, we refer to the
extract above from Southern correspond
ence, 4" and for the opinion of the South
concerning it, to the Lynchburg Repubh-
can, quoted above, a journal of acknowl-
edged leadership and ability, and for its
treason to the extracts given from the
speech ITSELF