The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1880-12-03
KANSAS REPUBLlCANIsM.
BY HON. B. F. SIMPSON.


To the Editor Of the Miami Republican,:
SIR: AS read the details of the cleo
tion returns of Kansas and note the IN
majority to climb the upper stair and
reach the altitude of OO,O00-a summit
that will probably be attained four
years from now-the splendid adjura-
ton of Horace Greeley at Osawatomie
to the men who organized the party in
the territory comes to my mind.
/ can see as well as hear him even
yet talking to the Republican chiefs
with animated gesture and almost pro-
phetic words. Grouped about him were
more than hundred of the most prom
inent and earnest of the Free State
pioneers. Pomeroy was there with full
supply of oleaginous matter, and years
after he managed to saturate succeed
ing 1egislatures with his unetuous
fluid. Thomas Ewing, Jr., was there
an earnest radical, with no dreams of
q future peace congress, or no cravings
for future Democratic nominations. w.
4. Phillips, then and now and always q
radical, was there. T. Dwight TEACHER
was there. with his intense love for free
dom, that twcnty-one years possession
has ripened INTO an absolute title to his
Republican faith, John A. Martin was
old head full of good resolves for the
future of the party and of the state. Mark
w. Delahay was there, and declared that
he had travelled one thousand miles, prin-
cipally by water, to be at the birth of
the new party in Kansas. Web. Wilder
and his ''blg brother Cart. were there,
and were as noble pair of devoted
Free Stale men as ever trod the soil of
the virgin territory. James A. mellow
ell, D. w. Houston, VIM. Spriggs, Chas.
II. Branscomb, w. Y. Roberts, o. E.
Price, James McCahou, G. K. Holiday
and A. D. Richardson were all there.
OF all the prominent free state lead.
ers, Jim Lane alone was absent. He
had also avoided the big Springs con-
ventiOn week before, as the object of
that convention was TO provide place
where the free state Democrats might
linger until some of the more recent
horrors of the Democratic party in Kan
sas should be forgotten. He ought To
have been there, for be il recOllected that
the "Grim Chieftain" was the most radi=
cal of men when in an assured majority,
and the most conservative when in doubt
| as to the strength of his movement.
The convention was largely composed
| of class of men who believed the time
had come when that timid conservatism
of the free state Democracy should be
| weeded out of the free state councils,
| ana that the way to do it was to make
the party part of that great national
| organization that was fighting the bat.
ties of Kansas in Washington. But the
minority died hard, and / recollect that
when the platform was reported very
| animated discussion arose over its
| amendment and adoption, and how w.
" RnhorfC Nhaa
others pleaded for a squattcr sovereign
ty planks; and how afterwards free
| state Democrats fingered for q time
within the precincts of our party be-
cause they professed to believe that the
| fourth resolution gave expression to the
'glittering generalities" of that most
charming of political frauds.
Twas in such presence, on such an
occasion, and at place where. men had
fought and died u make Kansas free,
that Horace Greeley said:
81 entreat you to keep the Republican
| flag flying in Kansas so long as one man
can anywhere be rallied to defend it
Defile not the glorious dust of the
martyred dead whose freshly grassed
graves lie thickly around us by trailing
that flag in dishOnor, or folding it in des-
| pair, on the soil so lately redeemed by
their patriotic blood. If it be des-
tined in the mysterious providence of
| God TO go down, let the sunlight that
falls lovingly upon their graves catch
the last defiant wave of its folds in the
free breeze that sweeps over these prai-
ries. Let it be buried, not surrendered,
| when no one remAiAsstD upf1Eadsit, and
let its ashes rest forever by theirs by the
banks of the Marias de Cygnes.''
How faithfully the people of Kansas
have oheyed the injunction, let the ever
| increasing Republican majority attest
The subsequent action of Greeley is q
sad commentary on his splendid decla-
nation, as, twelve years later, he aposta-
tiZed for the bauble of Democratic
nomination; and another king arose
who knew not Joseph" found ITS paIal-
lei in his future.
1t is a question worthy Of an exanina-
ton by some disciple of Buckle, or by
Herbert Spencer, whether il was the
colony that came to Wakarusa on the
LIST day of August, 1854, or the bloody
| deeds o. the border ruffians which
sowed the seed that produced such q lux
uriant crop of Republican maiorities in
Kansas. The Yankee normal belief in
freedom was outraged into an intensely
active determination by the bloody
usurpations of the slave power.
The attempt to make the territory q
slave state provoked a CONFLICT OF arms
and OF ideas, and in the white heat of
that night was evolved the great truth
| that this must be . government of free
homes, free speech and free men. and
the many incidents of the collision and
| the glory of the triumph has beeosten q
sentiment that fingers in the shady hooks
and basks in the sunny slopes of the
vigorous memory of all those who were
On the bright side of the contest.
Republicanism in Kansas is both a
sentiment and conviction, and the radi-
Gals hold their title TO the state by con-
quest and inheritance. and the sons of
the bleeding sires" win guard their in
heritance with such Jealous care that
there is no danger OF being baffled by the
tential platform, with q pretended as
signment of leadership to q Union SOL
der.