Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1888-02-15
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
Murst HaIstea ADDS Response ct the Lin
coln Birthday Banquet at Celum-
bus, Ohio, February IS.
A Glowing Tribute to Old Abs from an Ed
itor Who studied Him Well at Time
When Critics Were Plentiful.
OHIO REPUBLICAN LEAGUE.

the Ohio Republican Lesgue tonight were
Senator Sherman, Governor Beaver Of
Peunsylvsnis, Governor Luce, Michigan !;
Governor Foraker, Ohio; Ben. Butter
worth, S. P. Foster, president of the New
York League; W. b. Smiley Warren, Pro-
fessor Scarborough, Wilberiorce; Murat
HaIstead, Cincinnati, all Of whom are on
the programme for toasts. Seats for $50
are all occupied and some cannot be &C.
Lommodated.
At the Lincoln birthday banquet, Mon
day evening, February Is, 1888, Mr..
Murat HalsteGd responded to the follow
ing toast:
The Press-Wtth public sentiment, nothing
can fail without iT, nothing can succeed. Con-
deeper than 10 who enacts statutes or pro-
nounces decisions. He makes statutes ana de-
cisiOns possible Or impossible to lie executed,
i Lincoln In joint debate with Douglas. Of
tNwa. II August 81 1885 RESPONSE 6g Murat
Halstead, Esq, edIsor Cincinnati Commercial
Gazette.
Mr.. Chairman and Gentlemen:
When Abraham Lincoln was young
man appealing to the people as candi-
Date for the Legislature, he said:
Upon the subjects of which have treated
have spoken as 1 have thought. may be
wrong al to any or all of them; but holding 1t
sCuud decision, that It Is better only some
times to be right than at All times wrong SO
soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous,
shall be ready TO renounce them.
An older man, with the greater part OF
life behind him, would have told, with
concern but without confusion, the tale
OF error without wrong intention, and re-
nuncistion that meant advancement to
higher ground for 1rmer footsteps in the
straight way of the righteousness thSt ex-
ats people.
We may infer that II Mr.. Lincoln had
been au editor instead of lawyer, il he
had been of the press instead of President,
snd il for many years he had spent the
long nights in writing as he thought of all
subjects OF current interest, often upon
imperfect Information, and there had ap-
peared each morning printed sheet upon
which was unchangeably recorded his
candid expressions of opinion, there
would have been many mistakes &C
knoWledged as to men and measures,
many regrets confessed and judg-
menEs reversed, misgivings as to labors
personal and public INDUCED. All of this
in his own language, "with malice toward
none and charity for all;" and that he
would safely and reverently have invoked,
85 upon the act held to be the most i'm
ment Of mankind, and the gracious favor
Of Almighty God"
December, 1850, Mr.. Lincoln, Presi-
dent-elect, wrote an editorial paragraph
for the Springfield Journal, as follows:
We have such frequent illusions to q sup.
posed purpose on the part of Mr.. Lincoln 20
call into his Cabinet two or three southern gem
tlemen from the par les opposed to him po-
ltically, that we are prompted to ask few
questions
l. Is it known that any such gentleman of
character would accept place in the Cabi
net
.. If yea, on what terms does he surrender to
Mr.. Lincoln or Mr.. Lincoln to him, all the po-
Ii ical differences between them, or do they
enter upon the administration in open opposi-
zion to each other
Messrs. hay and Nicolay, the private
secretaries and historians of Lincoln, say
of this that the authorship of the para
graph WAS not made public, but l hap
pened to be OF those who knew at the
time that Lincoln had written the lines
that were as characteristic as they were
significant. Henry Willard, the distin-
guished railroad builder and anancier,
then the Springfield correspondent Of the
Cincinnati Commercial, sent me the
"copy" OF the paragraph in the handWrit-
ing of Mr.. Lincoln.
have no purpose of speaking exclu-
siVely or chiefly, or even by preference, of
those things in which 1t was my fortune to
beIn agreement with Mr.. lincoln, and in
which strove to help him, for there is
nothing that so fly becomes tribute to
him, or is so precious to US all, as the
truth of history. OF this it has been re-
marked that the truths of history are ss-
cred, like those Of religion, but it is bet
ter to say that the truths of history and
Tho Aofanao for
untruth is only that as the winds blew and
the water flowed and the light shone, 1t
was believed to be truth,
1 well remember Mr.. Lincoln's editorial
in the Springfield Journel-remember
reading 1t repeatedly in the manuscript,
which was plain as print, and in the Jour-
nal, with growing sense OF the deepen
ing trouble in the air and tremor in the
earth we had thought solid ground-and
the idea that perhaps 1t nigh be inspired
by suggestions that had penned, tor 1
was of those who knew the absolute good
faith of Mr.. Lincoln's conservatism, and
hoped that he might by some extraordi-
nary, even excessive concession, make
manifest to the Union men of the south,
SIS It was to US of the north, the safety
with which the country might repose upon
his saving common sense Of justice and
respect for law; and that they might thus
be strengthened to stay the hands Of those
whose footsteps were already upon the
paths that led to war.
Then, as at the beginning of the war,
and in every chspter Of 1t to Appomattoy,
and indeed ever since, and never more
than now, Republican statesmanship upon
which the national life Twas suspended,
and in which 1t is yet bound up. consisted
in uniting the north and dividing the
south. We did not all see then, but who
can read history and not see in the amaz-
ing unity Of the northern uprising efter
the bombardment of Fort Sumter, that
the genius of craftsmanship was with the
Kentuckian who was President of the
United States, and not with the other son
of that state who was the President Of the
Confederate states.
This craftsmanship Of Lincoln WAS not
the expression of artificial accomplish
ments, but the inherent ssgscity of honest
manhood and the intultive prescience OF
patriotism.
One of those slow to see In It's full pro-
portions the serious greatness Of Lincoln
was Salmon P. Chase, whom loved, ad-
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