Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1904-07-21
YE GOLDEN JUBILEE.
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY CELE-
BRATEs FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY.
Secretary of State Hay Sounds Key
note of Campaign-Senator Fair
banks Speaks on History
of the Party.

LoomiS park at jackson, Mich, on July
6, to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary
of the birth of the republican party I'm
der the Oaks" in that city July 6. 1854.
Ii was there on that date that the first
state convention acting under the name
of republican" was held. The state
ticket nominated on that day went
through heated campaign to election
day success.
A tremendous audience was present
when Senator J. G. Burrows, of Michi-
gan, introduced Secretary of State John
Hay, the orator of the afternoon. Secre-
marks:
"A century Is but moment of history;
ii has often happened that several of
them have passed away, since men began
to record their deeds, with little change
in the physical aspect or the moral
progress of the world. But at other
times-of intense action and spiritual
awakening-a single generation may
form an epoch, and few periods of equal
duration in political annals have beer
so crowded with great events as the so
years we celebrate to-day.
"UInder the oaks of Jackson on the 9th
of July, 1854, party was brought into
being and baptized, which ever since
has answered the purposes of its exist
ence with fewer follies and failures and
more magnificent achievements than
ordinarily fall to the lot of any institu-
tion of mortal origin. And even the be-
ginning of the end is not yet. This his
toric party is only now in the full matur
ity of its power and its capacity for
good.
THE republican party had a noble
origin. 1t sprang directly from an
aroused and indignant national con-
science Questions of finance. of po-
1itical economy, of orderly administra-
tion, passed out of sight for the moment,
to be taken up and dealt with later on
But in 1854 the question that brought
the thinking men together was whether
there should be limit to the aggressions
of slavery, and in 1861 that solemn in
quiry turned TO one still more porten-
tous. Should the nation live or die?
''The humblest old republican in
America has the right to be proud that
in the days of his youth in the presence
of these momentous questions he judged
right, and if he is sleeping in his honored
grave his children may justly be glad of
his decision
ut was not so easy so years ago to
take sides against the slave power as it
may seem to-day. Respect for the vested
rights of the southern people was ore
of our most sacred traditions. 1t was
founded on the compromises of the con-
stitution and upon a long line of legal
and legislative precedents.
IF the Shareholders had been content
with their unquestioned predominance.
they might for many years have con-
trolled our political and social world.
"They felt instinctively that if their
system were permanently to endure it
must be extended, and to attain this
object they were ready to risk every
thing. They rent in twain the COM
promises which had protected them so
long. They tore down the bulwarks
which had at once restricted and de-
Tended them; and confiding in their
strength and our patience they boldly
announced and inaugurated the policy
of the indefinite extension of their
peculiar institution
yet the most wonderful feature of
that extraordinary campaign which
then began, and which never ceased
until the land was pureed of its dead
ly sin, was that even in the very TEN
pest and whirlwind of their passion
the great leaders of the republican
party kept their agitation strictly
within the limits of the constitution
and the law. There was no general
demand for even an amendment to the
organic instrument.
They pleaded for the repeal of un-
just statutes as inconsistent with the
constitution, but did not advocate
their violation. Only among the more
obscure and ardent members of the
party was there any demand for the
abolition of slavery. but the whole
party stood like a rock for the princi-
pie that the damnable institution must
be content with what it had already
got, and must not be allowed to pol
lutte another inch of free soil.
'On this impregnable ground they
made their stand; and the mass con-
vention which assembled here in 1854
while the vibrations of the thunder of
the guns and the shoutings of the
birthday of liberty yet fingered in the
air, gave nucleus and a name to the
new party, destined to a great and
beneficent career.
Before the month ended the anti
slavery men of five more great states
adopted the name republican, and
under that banner congress was car
ried and two years later a national
party assembled at Pittsburg and nom-
mated Fremont and Dayton, who
failed by few votes of sweeping the
north.
Who of us that was living then