Year: 1872

NEW 1ORK, July 1otn.


GENTLEMEN: Upon mature deliber-
atoms it seems fit that should give to
your letter of the 10th fuller response
than the hasty unpremedit ted words
in which acknowledged and accep
ted your nomination at our meeting OF
the 18th. That many of ynu originally
preferred that the Liberal Republicans
should preseat another candidate fo
the Presidency. and would have more
readily united with us in the support f
Adams or Trumble, Davis or Brown, is
well known.


owe my adoption at Baltimore Who'll
ly to the fact that had already been
nominated at Cincinnati, and that con-
centration Of forces upon any rev tick
ct had been proved unacceptable.
Gratifed as l am at your concurrence
in the Cincinnati nominations. certain
as am that you would not have thu
concurred had you not deemed me up
right and capable. 1 find nothing in the
circumstances calculated to infame
any vanity. But that your Committee
saw fit, in adopting the Cincinnati tick
ct, to refirm the Cincinnati platform,
is to me a sourse of profound satisfac-
tion. That body was constrained to
take this important step by no party
necessity. real or supposed. 1t might
have accepted the candidates of the
Liberal Republicans on grounds entire
ly its own, or it might have presented
them as the first Wing National Conven
ton did Harrisou and Tyler, withoni
adopting any platform whatever. That
it chose to plant itself deliberately, by
vote nearly unanimous, npon the full
est and clearest enunciation of princi
pies, which are ut once incon estibIy R,-
publican, gives trustworthy assurance
that new and more anspicious era is
dawnipg upon our long distracted coun-
try. Some Of the best endeayors of my
life were devoted to a struggle against
chattle slavery--a struggle none the less
earnest OF artluous III cause constitutions
al obligational obligations constrained
me to act for the most part on the de-
fensive in resistance to the diffusion,
rather than the direct efforts for the
extinction of human bondage.--
throughout the most of these Years my
vision was uncheered. my exertions
were rareley animated. by even SO much
as hope that l should live to see my
country peopled by free men alone.


The affirlaance by your Convention of
thu Cincinnati Platform is a most con-
elusive proof, not merely that slavery is
abolished, but that its spirit is extinct
Despite the protests of respectable but
isolated few. there remains among us no
party nor formidable interest which re-
grets its overthrow, or desires the re-es-
tablishment Of human bondage, whether
in letter or in spirit. 1 am, therefore
justified in my hope and trust that the
first century of American independence
will not close before the great truths on
which its rightfulness was based by JEFF
ferson and the Continental Congress of
'76, will no longer be regarded as glitter
ing genelalities but will have become
the univers; lily accepted and honored
foundations of our political fabric I
demanded the prompt application of
those principles to our condition. Hav-
ing done what could for the complete
emancipation of the blacks, I now in
sist on full enfranchisement of all nv
white countrymen. Let none say that
the band has just been removed from all
but few hundred elderly gentlemen, to
whom eligibility of Office can be of little
consequence. My view contemplates
not the few hundreds prescribed, but
the millions who are desiring the right
to be ruled and represented by men of
their unfettered choice.


have profound regard for the peo-
pie of that New England wherein was
born, in whose common schools was
brought up. I rank no other people
above them in intelligence; but while
they do many things well. and some ad-
mirably, there is one thing which 1 am
sure they cannot wisely and safely un-
dertake. and that is the selection for
States remote from and unlike their own
of the persons by whom those States
shall be represented in Congress. If
they could do this to good purpose, the
Republican institutions were unfit, and
aristocracy would he the only true polIt-
ical system. Yet what have we recent
ly witnessed Zebulon B. Vance, the
unquestioned choice of large majority
Of people who voted at its election, re-
fused seat in the Federal Senate to
which he was fairly chosen, and the
Legislature thus constrained to choose
another in his stead or leave the State
unrepresented for years. The vote Of
New England thus deprived North Caro-
lima of the senator of her choice. and
compelled her to send another in his
stead; another. who, in our late contest
was, like Vance. rebel, and fighting