, 1906-06-16


Indiana and wisconsin united in a call
inviting the republicans of the union
to meet in informal convention at
Pittsburg on February %, 1856, Wash
ington's birthday. Steps were there
taken to form a national organization.
A republican national committee was
selected. which committee, on March
30, called the national delegate conyen-
ton to meet in the old cradle of liberty
of 1916, Philadelphia, and Bunker hill
day, June II, was selected as the con
v~ention's opening day.
The convention which met in Phlla-
delphia on June II, 1856, nominated the
republican party's first national ticket,
composed of Fremont for president and
William l.. Dayton Of New Jersey for
vice president. Under the auspices Of
the republican national league, whose
president is j. Hampton Moore, there
is to be a republican golden jubilee this
year. 1t is to take place in the city
where luo fItllOuL CONVENTION wac
held, and in the hall in which he was
nominated, on the three days CORE
spending to June II, Is and 10, 1856,
which covered the days when that con
vention was in session. Representa-
tives of the republican clubs from eY-
cry state and territory in the country
will be in Philadelphia on that occa-
sion. The democrats put up a strong
ticket, Buchanan being named for pres
ident and John c. Breckenridge of Ken
lucky, one of the most popular of the
Ex-President Fillmore was put up by
the know-nothings, who by this time
called themselves the American par
ty. The republicans made IN euthusi-
astiC and aggressive canvass, and
would have carried the country had
they won Pennsylvania and Illinois,
states which they expected to get, and
which they did get in the next election
Buchanan carried his state, Pennsyl,
vapia, but only after a hard battle.
There was prophecy as well as cheer in
these words of Whittier, written just
after the canvass Of 1856 and dedicated
to the Fremont clubs:
" Beneath thy skies, November,
Thy skies of cloud and rain,
Around our blazing camp-Gres
We close our ranks again.
Then sound again the bugles,
Call the muster rolls anew,
If months have well-nigh won the day,
What may not four years dor
mo other party in American annals
ever rose to power SO quickly as the
republican party, Or did so much for
the country after it reached power, ex-
cept one. That was the federalist par
ty of Washington, Hamilton, Adams,
Jay, the Pinckeys and many other of
the country's foremost men. The fed
eralist party not only framed the con-
~stitution and carried it through the
to ratify or reject it, but it enacted the
Legislation which pu THE constitution
in operation and constructed the frame
work on which, with some alterations
and extensions, the government has
been conducted ever since. But what
was called the f~ederalist party in the
constitutional convention and at the
outset in the first congress under the
constitution was not what was known
by that name at a later time. Jeffer-
son, though he disliked the constitu-
ton in some particulars, favored its
ratification, with the proviso that GER
tain amendments should be adopted
as a supplement, and these were adopt
ed by the first congress. Madison was
"a prominent member of the conven-
ton which framed the constitution,
and had a powerful influence in shap-
ing that instrument, and in framing the
legislation of the first year or two OF
the government under Washington.
But Jefferson, then secretary of
state, and Madison, a member of the
uOuSe, SOOu uINSl ecu LlOm NdSulu5-
ton, Hamilton, Jay and Adams, and
founded the democratic first called
the republican, party. The remainder
of the constructive work of placing the
government on its feet was done by
The federalists in their strict partisan
Specification. And the shape which
they gave the government, supplement
ed by John Marshall, the federalist
chief justice of the supreme court, has
been retained ever since. Happily for
the government, Marshall, who went to
the supreme bench just as the federal
list party was leaving power, remained
in that station for thirty-four years
and continued to give constitutional
Interpretation a federalist bias for near
ly twenty years after the federalist
partyis death.
The republican party of 1S54-19O6
never went through the minor party
stage. 1t was never a third party.
From the beginning it was one of the
two great organizations into which the
people were divided. In the first year
of its life it carried the house of rep
resentatiyes. This was in the can