The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1879-08-14

know you will be glad to make whatever re-
naming exercise of the day you have very
short, and shall enjoy with you that short
ness. am sure you have with me enjoyed
richly what you have heard to-day of the history,
of the "reminiscences, of the poetry, of the mu-
sic, of the prospects, of the prophecy, of all
that belongs to the history of the Republican
party. have only two thoughts in my mind.
and, therefore, I may not be long in getting
them at you and the first is, that the origin of
the Republican party is very important in the
matter of history. We have heard it said to-
day that it was born twenty five years ago. lii
one very important sense it was, but in an
other exceedingly important historical sense
the Republican party of twenty-f years
ago was revived. It was indeed the re-
storation of the earliest party, of this
Government. The Declaration Of indie
pendence was the originator of the first
Republican party. The grand inspiration of
that great instrument gave life to a thought,
and subsequently gave name to a party which
for nearly a quarter Of a century was known
as the Progressive Republican party of the
United States It was the party of Jefferson.
1t was the party of the fathers that made the
Government, that created the constitution, that
started into its long career of life the new re-
public, and it was party that had as destruc-
tive doctrine as we have had since our more
recent origin of 1854. z.
That first Progressive Republican party had
for it's central idea the doctrine of the declara-
ton Of independence, the equality of all men
before the law. They hated slavery, and they
loved liberty, and they made it part of their
great work to go just as far as they could to-
ward realizing the full measure of that doc
trine. They did not hope to destroy slavery in
their day, but they hoped to limit it, restrict it,
narrow it's field, and enlarge the boundary or
liberty, as far and as fast as the vested rights
and the vested wrongs of shareholders would
let them. They did abolish the slave trade on
the high seas, they did declare that the slave
trader was pirate to be known and punished
as such everywhere that our commerce or our
ships Of war could reach him. While they
knew that they could not make men equal in
talents, they did declare they would make
to do all that God had enabled him to do by the
talents given in his creation, and that old Re
publican party, therefore, dedicated q part of
all our public territories in all portions of the
West to the freedom of schools forever Again,
that old party dedicated all this territory that
we are on, and all that it then owned to free
dom forever. .rs
They did more They knew that all men
were not equal in wealth, but they would do
all IN their power to give each man a free
chance in the race for wealth, and that old Re-
publican party abolished imprisonment for
debt in every State In which they had control
They did more. That old Republican party
exempted from execution the necessaries of
life of all housoholders in all the States where
they had control. They did more That old
Republican party abolished slavery in some
a ioht Of tho hofor
of power. They did moro. They MADE suf-
frage universal without distinction of race in
almost every one of the old Northern States
except, perhaps, the single State of New York
and that old Republican party that died in the
days of the younger Adams administration
covered itself, and covered the first quarter Of
our present century with glory in the interests
ers, and of all those rights that are
necessary to the intelligence and pros
peritv, the freedom and the honor, of great
people. But there were conservatives in those
days, and every one of these measures was
opposed by conservatives to the utmost of their
power. The attemptto stop the slave trade
was declared to be ungodly, for it cut of the
poor heather of Africa from coming to this
country to hear the Gospel preached in it's
purity. The abolition of Imprisonment for
debt was assaied as stroke against the rights
of property and of creditors, and the abolition
of The old system, that took away the last thing
from the poor man m executions, was also
stroke they condemned for the same reason.
Year by year the malcontents, the conservatives,
the resisters of Progressive Republicanism
gained ground, until at last they allied them
selves with the slave power, and that alliance
was too strong for the early Republican party,
and it broke i'll pieces, and the regular Democ-
racy, into which all the better elements of the
early day had degenerated, became the ruling
of !, ion oxy
had many noble impulses In it's earliest days
it held to some good doctrines, but, at last, un-
consciously to itself, imperceptibly, as the
charges went on, it bowed lover and
lower, until it became the bond slave
of the slave power on this continent, and it was
only when, twenty five years ago, it had gone
so far as to violate an old ordinance of
1857, to break down compromise of 1920. to
prostitute to the base purposes of slavery the
freedom of all our Western Territories-it was
only when at last freedom of speech, through
discussion and debate everywhere, freedom in
Congress, freedom at the ballot box, and all
freedom that was worth having by freeman,
was gone, denied, and the aristocratic mob
spirit of slavery rolled over the rocks of free
dom eyerywhere-it was only then, in the ex-
tremlty OF that doctrine and the depth of that
oppression, that, all over this country-not in
Wisconsin alone, but IN Michigan, in Ohio, and
the belt of States to the ocean, all over the free
North-they sprang to their feet and restored
the Republican party of seventy years ago. &c.
therefore, say the work that was done here in
1854 was the revival Of the noblest party that
ever existed on this continent, and the chap
tiers of it's work dropped when it persisted
with the younger Adams were revived by
the new Republican party Of 1854. We
have been told by our Democratic friends
that they were the only people that could hold
up Government on the continent-that all
parties that opposed them we're ephemeral and
temporary, to pass away; but we date back to
a party older than the modern Democracy,
higher in it's aims, nobler in it's purposes, and
worthier OF the high honor of the Republic
The work did not all spring up in 1854 We
have been told the spirit of revived Republican
liberty lived when the younger Adams stood up
IN the House of Representatives and defended
the right of slaves even to petition for liberty,
lived wherever afreeman raised his face, lived
in the person of that noble old predecessor of
mine from the District I now have the honor to
represent. He stood there in his place-he,
Joshua R. Giddings, for twenty long, turbulent,
perilous years-against the bludgeon of the as
sassin, against the pistol of the duelist, against
the bowie-knife of the cut-rhroat, that carried
about him his best argument against = the
truth-stood there, I say, until his white
hair, like the plumes of Henry of Navarro,