440 
 
University Library 
 University of California Berkeley 
 
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Printed by tlie KEPTTBLICAN STATE CBNTBAL COMMITTEE of California. 
 
 Campaign Document No. 15. 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 OF 
 
 HON. EDW. D. BAKER, 
 
 TT. S. Senator- from Oregon, 
 
 DELIVERED AT 
 
 A REPUBLICAN MASS MEETING, 
 
 Held at the American Theatre, in the City of San Francisco, 
 
 ON 
 Evening-, October 
 
 REPORTED BY SUMNER AND CUTTER. 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO: 
 
 COMMERCIAL BOOK :j STEAM PRINTING ESTABLISHMENT, 
 
 - Sansorae f 
 
 1860. 
 

 Bancroft Library 
 
 \ 
 
 SPEECH OF HOK E. D. BAKER. 
 
 On the evening before named, the American 
 Theatre w:is crowded to repletion with the larg- 
 est and most brilliant audience ever assembled 
 at any political gathering on the Pacific coast 
 Not less than 4000 persons were packed within 
 the walls of the Theatre, and not less than twice 
 
 that number were disappointed in their effort to AsA T - LAWTON, 
 gain admittance. The dress circle and the rear JAME S L. RIDDLE, 
 of the stage were occupied by ladies and gentle- B - c - DONNELLAN, 
 men accompanying them, and in every other ' SILAS SELLECK, 
 r>o,* r fi,^ i ii .-I.,,. ., , SAMUEL THOMSON", 
 
 F. S. BALCII, 
 GEO. W. CLARK, 
 MICHAEL HEVKKIN, 
 WILLIAM SCHMOLZ, 
 DR. ISAAC Row ELL, 
 
 Mr. Sullivan then read the following list of 
 Vice-Presidents and Secretaries placed in nomi- 
 nation by Mr. Hathaway, and indorsed unani- 
 mously by the meeting : 
 
 VICE-PRESIDENTS : 
 
 '"""V **O v*-'"j CUlVt 1IJ. CVUIV U tllCl 
 
 part of the house all available space was filled 
 by the mighty assemblage. 
 
 At 8 o'clock, B. W. Hathaway, Chairman of 
 the Republican State Central Committee, under 
 whose auspices the meeting was held, came for- 
 ward to the footlights and said : As Chairman of 
 the State Central Committee, it devolves upon 
 me to call this meeting to order. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen: We have met here 
 to-night to listen to the first Republican who has 
 
 GEORGE ALEXANDER, 
 ALEX. G. ABELL, 
 J. W. CUDWORTH, 
 HENRY THOMPSON, 
 THEODORE A. MUDGE, 
 ALFRED J. ELLIS, 
 WILLIAM C. PARKER, 
 THEODORE J. WOOD, 
 
 ClIAS. A. SUMNER, 
 
 S. STEVENS, of Gregon. 
 
 SECRETARIES : 
 
 WILLIAM S. REESE, W. B. FLEMING, 
 
 As soon as the officers of the meeting were 
 
 men to the first Republican who has As soon as the officers of the meeting were 
 >ver been elected to a distinguished position on duly installed, the cry of ; ' Baker," "Baker," 
 Pacific coast, but unless the signs of the times was sounded vociferously from all parts of the 
 
 iiiJ.\yOO VIIV OlgLin \JL lillU I HIM. >i 
 
 do not deceive us, he will not be the last. (Great 
 applause.) Our guest is one of the great champi- 
 ons of Freedom, the orator of the Pacific coast. I 
 perceive that you are extremely anxious to have 
 the meeting proceed, and I propose the HON. E. 
 L. SULLIVAN as your Chairman. 
 
 Mr. Sullivan's nomination was indorsed unani- 
 mously by the audience ; and in response thereto 
 Mr. Sullivan came forward, amid tremendous ap- 
 
 plause, and said 
 LADIES AND GENTLEMEN 
 
 I appreciate highly 
 
 v* *. *+*Miums\ . j. a^jiji cuiuit? lllS-fllly 
 
 the honor of being called to preside over so mag- 
 nificent an assemblage of fair women and brave 
 men. We meet to-night to exchange congratu- 
 lations over the glorious political news from the 
 East, and also to welcome our distinguished 
 fellow citizen from Oregon. (Cheers.) When 
 we remember, fellow citizens, how short a time 
 has passed since the Republican party was bit- 
 terly assailed by storms of opprobrium and con- 
 tumely, and now behold that same party on the 
 full and swelling tide of victory, we may well 
 believe that our cause is just and that Provi- 
 dence is on our side (Great applause), and I 
 think we may properly take up the war-cry of 
 le old crusaders : " God wills it; God with us." 
 (Tremendous cheering.) The victory which we 
 shall achieve in November next, will not bring 
 with it tears or blood, or one human cry of des- 
 pair; but, on the contrary, that day of Freedom 
 will be hailed by all good and true hearts of 
 every land, and by the oppressed of every nation. 
 (Great cheers.) 
 
 I will not detain you longer, ladies and gentle- 
 men, as you have a great treat in store for you 
 to-night. 
 
 building. 
 
 Soon, the form of the gallant old Gray Eagle 
 of Republicanism was seen coming up from the 
 rear of the stage, and as the immense assemblage 
 caught sight of his silver locks, cheer rose upon 
 cheer in indescribable enthusiasm. The building 
 seemed to rock to its foundation, so tremendously 
 did the long peals of applause fall upon the ear 
 of the spectator. 
 
 The President had to indicate a desire to intro- 
 duce the distinguished speaker, before there was 
 the slightest abatement in the vehemence of the 
 cheering and applauding welcome which the citi- 
 zens of San Francisco extended to the veteran 
 soldier in the Republican cause, who now stood 
 before them as one of the Senators from the State 
 of Oregon. 
 
 Suddenly all was still ; every one stood breath- 
 less while the President said : 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen : It is hardly necessary, 
 but it is in proper form ; you will allow me to 
 introduce to you the Hon. Edward D. Baker, 
 United States Senator from the State of Oregon. 
 
 Again the tremendous shout of welcome rose 
 nigh and reverberated long. 
 
 Mr. BAKER said : 
 
 I owe more thanks than my life can repay 
 and I wish that all Oregon were here to-night. 
 (Applause and laughter.) We are a quiet, 
 earnest, pastoral people; but by the banks of 
 the Willamette there are many hearts which 
 would beat as high as yours if they could see 
 what I see at this moment. (Applause.) People 
 of San Francisco and of California, I owe you 
 very much. But I owe Oregon more. (Great 
 laughter and cheering.) And my heart is very 
 
[4] 
 
 full and very glad when I think that in trying 
 to pay her all, I will pay you some. (Applause.) 
 
 The interests of the Pacific coast are one 
 "Whether by the mouth of the Columbia, or at 
 the Golden Gate ; whether in the valleys of the 
 Willamette or on the ridges of the Sierra Nevada, 
 the interests of the Pacific coast are one. 
 
 And more than that: Oregon believes that the 
 interests of the whole Union are one ; and she 
 intends to stand by them. (Great applause.) 
 
 Many of you know how I am situated. If 
 you will only think how you would feel if you 
 were standing in my place; how glad, how 
 happy and how grateful, and just say it for me, 
 then you could do more than I can expect to do 
 for myself. 
 
 I am going to make, as of old, a Republican 
 speech. And just when I ought to make the 
 best one I ever did make, I know that I am 
 going to make the worst. (Laughter.) 
 
 Four years ago, almost this very night, in front 
 of this house I recollect that it was a very 
 stormy evening I had the honor and pleasure 
 to lay the foundations of the Republican belief a 
 little deeper, as I trust, and a little broader in 
 San Francisco. (Applause.) "We were then 
 striving to elect, although striving against hope, 
 an eminent citizen (Fremont) now happily 
 among us, and who I believe honors us with his 
 presence here to-night. (Great applause.) We 
 were a young party, untried and upon this 
 coast weak and, it may be, a little timorous. 
 Then, even, if we had not been cheated, we 
 would have won. And we did win, with the ex- 
 ception of three or four States, and one of 
 hose exceptional States is called Pennsylvania 
 (Applause); one is called Indiana. (Applause.) 
 You have heard from Pennsylvania recently, and 
 you have also heard from Indiana. (Great ap- 
 plause.) 
 
 I recollect saying four years ago and I sup- 
 pose that my remark was an application of the 
 old proverb, that " Revolutions never go back- 
 ward;" I recollect saying then that whoever 
 became a Republican would remain one. We 
 have lost nothing since then. We have lost no- 
 body, and we are gaining everybody. (Applause.) 
 
 What I said then more earnestly than I can 
 say now, I would desire to repeat to-night. The 
 trouble is then we had a great battle to fight ; 
 now the battle is fought for us, in fact, won for 
 us. 
 
 I sat down an hour ago and determined : Now 
 I am going to make a grave argument about 
 Slavery, the Territories, the Railroad, the Home- 
 stead Bill, and the Pacific interests, and the 
 Atlantic interests, and all American interests. 
 But if you were to stand where I do you would 
 say, what for ? We know that we are going to 
 triumph we will triumph. All signs in earth, 
 in Heaven, approve it. And all I can do and 
 all I ought to do, if for the moment I may 
 assume anything, is just this : Upon the eve of 
 a battle, although every skirmish has shown 
 your superiority, your leaders pass the front and 
 utter in the presence of the exulting troops words 
 of high hope and burning courage. If for a mo- 
 ro<?>nt or an hour I might assume that task, I 
 
 would pass along the Republican front and as 
 the shouts of victory already echoing and re- 
 echoing from wing to wing, are heard in front, 
 in flank, in rear, I might, I may, I will do my 
 little to assure the fearful and confirm the bold. 
 (Cheering.) 
 
 I used to begin talking about Republicanism 
 by answering objections. For instance : They 
 were wont to denominate us Black Republicans. 
 Well, either they don't say that now, or they use 
 the adjective so faintlj that it does no harm. 
 (Laughter.) They used to call us Abolitionists. 
 They used to call us sectional agitators. They 
 used to pretend that we desired the dissolution 
 of the Union. But events are answering these 
 allegations so fast what is there left for me or 
 for you to say ? 
 
 We are sectional, are we ? Who is national ? 
 How many States will Breckinridge get ? 
 (Laughter.) He won't get any in the North, 
 and the Bell and Everett men say he won't get 
 one in the South. (Renewed laughter.) ' 
 
 We are sectional, are we ? Let me see now 
 if I can begin the old reply. First Freedom 
 cannot be sectional must be national. This is 
 the first answer. Freedom cannot be national. 
 Why, would not anybody be ashamed to pretend 
 that in the land of liberty with a flag which \ve 
 are proud to call the banner of freedom that any 
 idea that belongs to freedom itself, to liberty, 
 can be otherwise than the idea of the nation ? 
 
 Now, they used to say that we were sectional 
 because we were not represented in the Electoral 
 College or in the National Convention which met 
 in Philadelphia by delegates from all the States 
 in the LTriion. I saw a letter last week from a 
 very honest and a very good man by the name 
 of Abraham Lincoln. (Tremendous applause.) 
 And he in thus communicating to a friend said 
 that it was very queer that he should be called 
 sectional by certain politicians when it was a 
 fact that he got more votes in the Chicago Con- 
 vention from the South than Judge Douglas did 
 in the Baltimore Convention. " Yet the party 
 to which I belong is said to be sectional, while 
 that of Judge Douglas claims to be national!" 
 
 Again, to be sectional as a party if it means 
 anything, it means as I suppose that the party 
 in question intends or desires to do something 
 by legislation for the benefit of one portion of the 
 Union injuriously or to the exclusion of the 
 other. I cannot give a fairer definition of it. 
 Now, when they say that we are sectional, we 
 just enter a denial. We say that we are not 
 sectional; and we call on you to prove the 
 accusation. Are we? Why? How? When? 
 Where ? Now you Breckinridge gentlemen and 
 I know that there are some of you here to-night 
 let me ask you if you have ever thought of it 
 candidly. You call me a " sectional man." What 
 did you ever hear me say or ever know me to do 
 that was sectional ? What do I desire that is sec- 
 tional ? And why should I be sectional ? And 
 I speak of myself as a type of my friends. Where 
 do we come from ; who are we ; where are our 
 interests in what? Why should we, how can 
 we, be sectional ? Now these are questions that 
 are politics a grave, earnest, serious matter of 
 
[5] 
 
 business ought to be answered, and we invite 
 you to answer them before the next election. 
 
 Now, what do our opponents say ? Let us 
 take their strongest argument. They say that we 
 are sectional because we do no! represent in our 
 Conventions the Kleetoral College of the whole 
 Union. Whose fault is that? You won't let us 
 go down South and make Republicans, or we 
 would soon have a host of converts in that lati- 
 tude. (Applause.) I believe that my friend 
 Judge Douglas, (hisses) intimates that Lincoln 
 South to see his mother. (Laughter.) 
 Surely this is no cause for your complaint against 
 us, if "you won't allow us the liberty of speech in 
 order to express our opinions, or even to record 
 our votes in your States. That is not being sec- 
 tional in us, is it ? If so, the fault is yours, and 
 not ours. 
 
 But you observe that if we were sectional four 
 years ago we are getting less so very fast. Have 
 you hoar I from St. Louis lately ? Do you know 
 Frank Bliir? (Applause.) Do you know what 
 we are doimr in Western Virginia? More than 
 that, do you know how many people there are in 
 the South, whom they call " poor white folks," 
 that would be Republicans, if they could have 
 half a chance to express their views ? (Applause.) 
 And therefore, if as yet we do not get a great 
 many votes South, that be your fault, not ours. 
 "Why reproach us on that ground with being sec- 
 tional ? 
 
 Well, again : if " sectionalism " means not to 
 get many votes in one section of the country, 
 what is the position of Breckinridge ? (Great 
 laughter.) How many votes will he get in New 
 York ? All the votes that he gets there, he will 
 get under a pretense* of not running at all. 
 (Laughter.) That is the idea of the fusion in 
 New York. If they get him and his pretensions 
 out of the way they may have some possible 
 chances ; otherwise none whatever. How many 
 votes will Breckinridge get in Illinois? Will he 
 get half as many votes in Illinois as Mr. Lincoln 
 will get in Missouri ? 
 
 Well, now, the Breckinridge men will think, 
 perhaps justly, that it is very bad to say, you 
 are a sectional party, because there are some 
 states in which yon will not get many votes. 
 
 I prefer to test the matter by the other rule. 
 Is there anything we desire to do unjustly to op- 
 erate to your disadvantage and to our benefit? 
 And you may consider that, if you like, as bring- 
 ing up and at once, this whole question of slave- 
 ry in the Territories and elsewhere. 
 
 First, we deny, as we have denied from the be- 
 ginning, and as we shall deny to the end, that 
 we have any desire, however remote, to interfere 
 either directly or indirectly with the existence o 
 the- institution called siaverv, where slavery does 
 now exist in the States by law. (Great applause. 
 We Say, ---condly, that it is no portion of our po- 
 d to object to the admission of States 
 with a slavery clause in their constitution-, 
 there firmly and honestly by the will of their 
 people. (Renewed applause.) We say, (>< 
 that no Republican body, either popular or legis- 
 lative, ha- ever proposed I won't say carriec 
 out, I will go, further has ever proposed to in 
 
 terfere with the existence of Slavery established 
 >y law in any of the Slave States. More than 
 ,hat, we say that it so happens that at the very 
 ,ime when our good Southern friends prate most 
 about the dangers of Black Republicanism to 
 them and their interests, it so happens that at 
 hose peculiar moments, at that crisis, cotton and 
 lingers are always higher than at any other pe- 
 "iod. (Laughter and applause). I have not time 
 to comment upon this, but it is a very pregnant 
 fact. Again, we say, that as a party and as in- 
 lividuals, we have a great deal more interest in 
 preserving the Union than you have; judging by 
 our number, our property, our extended connec- 
 tion with commerce and manfactures, or by any 
 other mode that you may suggest. We never 
 proposed to dissolve the Union; you never 
 heard one of us make such a proposition. I put 
 it now to the intelligence of every man who hears 
 me : did you ever hear a member of the Repub- 
 lican party proposing a dissolution of the Union ? 
 Now, a great many of us were old Whigs and 
 we have been beaten severely, not only once, but 
 almost all the time. (Laughter). 
 
 Four years ago we deplored the election of 
 James Buchanan as a national evil. Have you 
 since heard of the tarring and feathering of Re- 
 publicans ; of running them out of the Slave 
 States ; that they deprived us of the rights of citi- 
 zenship guaranteed to us by the Constitution? 
 They have got the President, they have the Sen- 
 ate and the "House of Representatives, they have 
 got the Supreme Co m*t ; they thus have the Judi- 
 cial, the Legislative and the Executive branches 
 of the Government, against us; and for them. 
 And in the face of this, did you ever hear us as- 
 sert as possible, or predict as probable, the disso- 
 lution of this Union? Now, these are things for 
 you to consider before you vote against us. 
 
 Now, talking on that point, where are you on 
 that subject? First, you Breckinridge men, 
 where are you? I won't say; it might be un- 
 just, perhaps; it would be unkind, certainly; I 
 won't say that every Breckinridge man is a 
 disunionist; but I will say that every disunionist 
 is a Breckinridge man. (Great applause and 
 laughter.) And the difference is about like the 
 Irishman's idea of pronunciation. He was walk- 
 ing and talking with a Mr. Footney, an English- 
 man, and the Irishman, with the proverbial po- 
 liteness of his race and lineage was constantly 
 agreeing with his companion. Whenever the 
 Kngiishman said anything, he agreed with him, 
 " Ah, yes," said the Irishman, " I agree with 
 you precisely, Mr. Fat-ncy." {; But," said the 
 gentleman, l> my name is not Fal-ney, if you 
 please, it is Foot-ney" " Ah, yes, Fut-ney, Mr. 
 : that is what I said," exclaimed the 
 Irishman. " Mr. Fwt-ney. if you please," again 
 responded the Britisher. " Mr. Ful-uey, I said," 
 retorted Patrick, " Fool-ney, Foot-ney, Foot-ney, 
 my name is Footney!" "And by the man that 
 made Moses, what the divil is the difference be- 
 tween Fat-ney and Fai-iiey'l" (Great laughter.) 
 
 Now, while I say, as I have before said, out of 
 politeness, that every Breckinridge man may not 
 be a disunionist, I am bound to add that every 
 disuniouist, from Yancey up and down, is a 
 
[6] 
 
 Breckinridge man. And it is one evidence of 
 the mutability of human affairs, that here, four 
 years ago, you were charging us with disunion 
 sentiments as if you believed it, and now we 
 take up all that you have said, and a great deal 
 more, and hurl it back at you, and you don't dis- 
 pute it. 
 
 I am told that here in California your stump 
 speeches boldly proclaim the doctrine of Senator 
 Lane from Oregon, that if the South did not stand 
 up for her rights, she did not deserve to have 
 any. 
 
 Well, now, as proof that we are not sectional, 
 we will tell you what we mean about this mat- 
 ter of " Union." We mean to do as we have 
 done ; to submit to everything wrong, as we 
 have done, for the sake of the Union. (Applause.) 
 The State of Oregon is farthest from the center. 
 I think it will be among the last to leave the 
 confederation. You are numbered among the 
 latest of the States. I know you love the Union. 
 I am sure you do. You never did mean and 
 you don't mean now to dissolve the Union ; you 
 are determined that it shall be preserved. (Great 
 applause.) It is very easy, I know, to talk of 
 dissolving the Union, as long as you have all the 
 offices and all the honors. Tho test will come 
 when you have not these ; we have been tried in 
 that way a good while. (Laughter.) Now, when 
 we get a chance to take offices, you attempt to 
 frighten us out of a victory by proclaiming that 
 you will dissolve the Union in the event of our 
 succession in power. While in a minority we 
 entertained no such ideas, and made no such 
 threats. When we are fairly in power, as a ma- 
 jority, we intend to rule, and we do not propose 
 to have you destroy the government of the nation 
 for the sake of the few offices and the few honors 
 connected with the control of public administra- 
 tion. 
 
 I have seen the time when I would have stop- 
 ped just here and indulged in a dissertation on 
 the value of the Union ; but these Breckinridgers 
 have completely tired me out of that kind of talk, 
 and I have not the heart to enter upon it. 
 
 Let us candidly consider : What do disuriion- 
 ists propose to dissolve the Union for ? They 
 say, with the grammar and sense of Van Buren's, 
 "Our sufferings is intolerable." (Laughter.) 
 And they propose in alleviation to dissolve the 
 Union. Speaker Orr does it : Yancey does it ; 
 thousands do it. They echo it and re-echo it 
 here. 
 
 They say first that they will do it if Mr. Lin- 
 coln be elected some of them say that. Now 
 they will have a chance to "try it on that 
 ground." (Laughter and applause.) But, while 
 they are talking only, we will take the liberty of 
 asking them : What for? What can Mr. Lincoln 
 do, alone ; what can any President do without a 
 Senate, without a House of Representatives; 
 without a Supreme Court ? He cannot nominate 
 an officer that can hold his place. He cannot 
 touch one dollar of the public money. Although 
 nominally, the Commander-in-Chief of the Arm)' 
 and Navy, he cannot order a single soldier to 
 any point from which Congress cannot order his 
 return on the next week. He cannot free a slave. 
 
 STow what, in itself considered, can there be in 
 the election of Mr. Lincoln, or any other Repub- 
 ican, to justify anybody in proposing a disso- 
 ution of the Union? But now suppose Mr. 
 Lincoln gets the House of Representatives with 
 aim, as by the way I think he will? (Applause.) 
 What then ? Wiiat can they both do ? There 
 will then be against them the Senate, who can 
 put a check on all legislation, and the Supreme 
 ourt who have a faculty for giving a construc- 
 tion to the Constitution a great deal higher and 
 stronger than the Constitution itself. (Laughter.) 
 But suppose, after a little while, and I do not 
 think it is a very violent assumption, that these 
 Black Republicans get the House and the Presi- 
 dent, and the Senate too I What then? Why, 
 it seems to me that if they get a majority of the 
 people, and the President and the Senate, it will 
 be a pretty hard thing to dissolve, won't it. 
 (Great laughter and applause.) Well now if 
 otherwise. You yet have the Supreme Court. 
 Those Judges, I know, are very old. But Jeffer- 
 son said that "Judges never die and very seldom 
 resign;" and, by the way, they are living now, 
 I begin to believe it. (Laughter.) But if Mr. 
 Lincoln should be elected, still the Senate,as it is 
 now constituted, would act as a check on his 
 nomination for Judges; and it will be a long 
 time, according to the belief and opinion of every- 
 body in the opposition, before the Republicans 
 can get power to do anything which the general 
 sense of the country will not approve. 
 
 Something there is in party platforms. Some- 
 thing there is in what parties attempt to do. Now 
 what do we propose, or what have we attempt- 
 ed, to justify a dissolution of the Union? Take 
 our platform. A great many gentlemen in the 
 Southern States will persist in asserting that we 
 don't intend to admit any more Slave States. We 
 simply reply, we have no such intention; we 
 have no such platform; we make no such declar- 
 ations; we give no such votes. (Applause.) 
 Still they go on to say, you are going to interfere 
 with Slavery in the States. We say, first, we 
 never have attempted such interference, and you 
 know it. We say, secondly, to you in the terse 
 expression of Mr. Seward, no interference with 
 Slavery in the States ; no interference with Free- 
 dom in the Territories. (Great applause.) Well, 
 say they, you are opposed to the extension of 
 Slavery in the Territories. We reply,, suppose 
 we are : What then ? How would you begin to 
 argue the matter ? We say, if you are sensible 
 and moderate, we will give you our reasons. To 
 begin : Our fathers were of the same conviction 
 as that entertained by ourselves ; Washington 
 and Jefferson were with us. In the beginning 
 everybody was with us. The first, the second, 
 the third important acts of the men who made 
 the Constitution, \ipon the subject of Slavery, 
 were to dedicate all the free Territory to Free- 
 dom, unalterably and forever. And from the be- 
 ginning until now, if we follow that example, 
 who can blame us? Did you ever hear that 
 answered? I have heard a good many debates, 
 and I have heard a great many speeches, and 
 yet whenever that proposition has been fairly 
 and honorably put I have never heard a fair and 
 
m 
 
 valid answer to it. We say in effect, that if wo 
 do desire to dedicate all the Territories hereafter 
 to be acquired to free labor. we are doing nothing 
 more than our fathers did and proposed to do from 
 the very beginning. 
 
 Again, we say that we have not gone as far 
 as that. We have yielded something of their 
 sternness in opposition to Slavery. For instance, 
 the compromise of 1820 allowed the admission of 
 a Slave State out of Territory acquired by pur- 
 chase ; ami only insisted that Slavery should not 
 be allowed north of a certain line. Say we, we 
 will stand by that compromise. That is a de- 
 parture from the original plan, but still we will 
 abide by it. Why ? Because there does appear 
 a certain degree of fairness in saying that if a 
 Territory is free when we get it, it ought remain 
 free. If) on the contrary, it is Slave Territory 
 when We acquire it, do not exercise the power of 
 the Government to banish Slavery therefrom, but 
 let that question remain for the decision of the 
 people themselves whenever they shall come to 
 form their State Constitution. So we have gone 
 on; and, under that rule, practically applied, 
 what has been the result ? Florida, Texas, Ten- 
 nesee, Kentucky, Arkansas, Missouri perhaps 
 other States which 1 do not now recall come in 
 as Slave States; 'Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, 
 "Wisconsin, Minnesota, California, Oregon, come 
 in as free States. The line w r as marked thus. 
 In the States I have mentioned first, Slavery ex- 
 isted before they become States. Or, to state it 
 more correctly, Slavery was there in their Terri- 
 torial condition, and the rights of the Slave 
 owner w r ere continuously guaranteed by State 
 action. There we let it remain. But, to use the 
 expression of the Chicago platform, where the 
 normal condition of the Territory was in the be- 
 ginning, freedom, we have insisted upon perpetu- 
 ating that condition of society by State law. 
 
 Again, in 1850, when as Mr, Seward very 
 philosophically said, the Whig and Democratic 
 parties were in a state of dissolution, the slavery 
 question once more excited an intense public 
 attention. What then happened? I will not 
 here attempt to say. That state of things did 
 exist. I was there ; I saw it. The South said, 
 We want another set of provisions ; we want a 
 Fugitive Slave Law. That is one case. We 
 desire that the notion that slavery shall not go 
 into a territory by law shall be done away with ; 
 not everywhere, but in relation to Utah and New 
 Mexico. Now, we of the North, Democrats and 
 Whigs, said: What do you want of a Fugitive 
 Slave Law? Haven't you got one already? 
 Yes, said they, we have got one. We have had 
 it for forty years, but it is not a good one. Well, 
 we said, if it has done for so long a period, won't 
 
 prudence, whenever the question of property in 
 a nigger comes up in a Free State ! The thing 
 is impossible. Well, they said, We wan't fct.ll 
 another thing of you. You have in your States 
 a machinery you call Habeas Corpus. Ahl yes, 
 
 we say, that is very dear to us. Our forefathers 
 in England and our forefathers in '76 fought and 
 bled and died for that invaluable writ and safe- 
 guard of personal liberty. But, say the gentle- 
 men of the South, that is all very well when it 
 is applied to a white man, but you act very im- 
 properly when you attempt to apply it to a 
 nigger. Now, let us look at the strangeness of 
 that proposition. There is a case between two 
 men ; the matter in dispute is the ownership of 
 a black horse which strays from Kentucky into 
 Ohio. In order to settle this question of pro- 
 prietorship there is a trial by jury as to who 
 shall have the black horse. But when a black 
 man runs away from Kentucky into Ohio or any 
 other free State, he shall not have a jury trial. 
 When a question arises as to the personal liberty 
 of a human being, he is denied the privilege of 
 judge or jury trial in the ordinary forms of law. 
 But a black horse cannot be transferred from one 
 man to another, where there is a dispute about 
 the ownership, without the matter being fully 
 determined by twelve men. Again, they repeat, 
 all this talk will do very well for a white man, 
 but it don't do for a nigger. If you don't allow 
 me to have a Fugitive Slave Law in order to 
 facilitate our operations in catching negroes 
 without any interference with jurors, you will 
 dissolve the Union 1 Oh ! very well, we say, 
 if you are going to dissolve the Union, why, 
 take your nigger. (Laughter.) We won't break 
 up the Union for such a reason as that. So the 
 Fugitive Slave Law was passed in 1850, and we 
 got along very well up to the year 1854. And 
 then a new difficulty arose. 
 
 The South said, we want to carry our negroes 
 into this new Territory called Kansas. It has 
 been dedicated to free labor. We know that, 
 but we want to carry our negroes there. But, 
 said we, you can't do that, because the Missouri 
 Compromise precludes you from taking any such 
 step. You remember how that Compromise was 
 established; you remember who made it. Old 
 Clay! (Applause). You remember, too, that 
 some of you said that no hand had yet been 
 found base enough to desecrate it. We can't 
 give up Kansas. You have got two-thirds of 
 the organized Territory dedicated to slavery ; 
 you have not got a third of the population, and 
 is not that enough ? They say no, and they go 
 to work, frame the Kansas-Nebraska Bill ; get 
 Northern men to do it ; get Northern endorse- 
 ments, and in the name of Democracy, carry it 
 
 it do a little while longer, as well as before ? ! through Congress I They uprooted the Missouri 
 
 They replied, The difficulty is that your judges 
 and your jurors up North are not to be trusted. 
 Well, we then said, What are you to do about 
 
 Compromise and destroyed the public faith. They 
 put the nation in an uproar, and they have kept 
 it there ever since. What then ? Why, some 
 
 it? They replied. We want to secure the ap- how or other, this notion of Popular Sovereignty, 
 pointment of a set of Government Commissioners ; this idea of applying Popular Sovereignty when 
 who shall take charge of this question of slavery; j it was not needed, in Kansas, did network well, 
 and we will not allow your judges or your juries ! Instead of making Kansas a Slave State, it made 
 to have anything to do with it. What ! said we j Kansas a Free Territory, and would have made 
 of the North, set aside our entire system of juris- 1 it a Free State long ago, if it had not been for 
 
[8] 
 
 
 the rascality of J. B. (Applause). What hap- 
 pened uext ? Why, we Republicans in Oregon 
 and California, particularly, and a great many 
 Republicans everywhere, say Well gentlemen, 
 we will hold you now to your Kansas doctrines. 
 It works better than we thought. Popular Sov- 
 ereignty in that sense is not such a bad thing 
 after all. As for your notions about " inherent 
 Popular Sovereignty," that is all humbug. The 
 idea that one or two trappers or deserters can go 
 into a wilderness and make a government for 
 themselves, control their own affairs, divide and 
 sub-divide the different parts of government into 
 as many or as few sections as they like, is sheer 
 humbug. But the idea that the first bonafide 
 settlers of a Territory have a right to adopt a 
 form of government for themselves under the 
 Constitution of the United States, in relation to 
 marriage, about whiskey and niggers why, this 
 is a tolerable idea. It worked well in Kansas, 
 and we are willing to try it again. 
 
 All of a sudden, and at last, they find out that 
 this won't do ; and because poor Judge Douglas 
 happened to be the author of that doctrine, they 
 are exercised dreadfully in the South, and, as for 
 that matter, in the North, too, and just here, and 
 just now, it is due to good faith for me to say 
 that I am a Popular Sovereignty Republican, 
 and I believe in holding them to that bargain, 
 and I was so last year, and I am so now. If 
 there is any Douglas man here who has any 
 doubt about my good faith in adhering to those 
 ideas let him listen to me to-night, and in the 
 Senate. I said, and I re-affirm it, that I believed 
 that the doctrine of Popular Sovereignty practi- 
 cally and honestly applied in Kansas, is a safe 
 doctrine for the friends of free labor. I believe 
 that the people in a Territory may be safely 
 trusted with legislation upon this subject of 
 slavery. And this I say, not because I do riot 
 care about Slavery, not because I do care 
 about Freedom. I tolerate none of that miser- 
 able delusion ; I do care about Slavery and I 
 do care about Freedom. (Applause). I entertain 
 these opinions because, since our experience in 
 Kansas, I have fresh hope and courage and faith 
 in the people, and for free labor, I believe more 
 than I did of old, in the eminent capacity of the 
 people to govern themselves. (Applause). I be- 
 lieve in them God bless them ! I bow with 
 reverence to the majesty of the people in their 
 collective might. I thank G-od that I see more 
 than I believed before that, in spite of the 
 machinations of those in power, the people of 
 this nation, the free white laborers of this nation 
 will uot tolerate Slavery upon free soil. (Great 
 applause.) I am willing to trust them, and I 
 am glad that when I do trust them, we seize 
 from the Douglas men a weapon which in their 
 hands is but a reed, but in ours is a spear, and 
 a spear as strong as that somewhere described 
 by Milton when he said, "his spear a fir, fit for 
 the mast of some tall admiral." (Applause). It 
 is a great weapon. Popular Sovereignty in our 
 hands is not a delusion, a snare, but a great 
 weapon for Freedom anywhere and everywhere. 
 (Applause.) You can see that when you see 
 tlvese gentlemen on the other side writhe so 
 
 about it. Therefore they bolted the Charleston 
 Convention, coming out as Joe Lane says, to 
 "stand, stand, STAND by the rights and interests 
 of the South." (Laughter and applause.) They 
 will break up even the traditional love of 
 Democratic Conventions, and the dearest thing 
 on earth to them, "organization," rather than 
 permit that idea of Popular Sovereignty to de- 
 face the Democratic platform any longer. Well, 
 now, when they writhe at it, I rejoice. "I mock 
 at their calamity, and laugh when their fear 
 cometh." (Laughter and applause.) We say to 
 them, What's the odds? Popular Sovereignty 
 means the Government of the People. What 
 difference does it make whether we govern it by 
 the whole people of the whole IT. S. or by the por- 
 tion immediately and more directly interested ? 
 It makes no odds whether we govern it in Kan- 
 sas by the vote of Kansas, or whether we gov- 
 ern it in the Union by the vote of the Union. 
 You see the result ; it is freedom. What need 
 you care? You will never get any niggers 
 there. What are you grumbling about? 
 
 Now, they yet insist in their posters and plat- 
 forms, " Equal rights to all sections." The dis- 
 unionist man comes up, and when asked, replies, 
 Equal rights to all sections, all men. as far 
 as provided for in the constitution" one as 
 well as another have a right to go into the Ter- 
 ritories with their property, of whatever species 
 that property may be. Yes ! the southern man 
 can go there and take with him his peculiar pro- 
 perty. Says the Douglas man: That depends 
 entirely on the kind of property taken. Some 
 property is good, other property is bad: some 
 is productive, others unproductive; some is safe, 
 others dangerous. Now, if a man wanted to 
 take a pet jackass (laughter) instead of a pet lap 
 dog into a parlor, would it be right for him to do 
 it. But. the southern man says, I have a right 
 to go where I like with my own property. That 
 means niggers. The negro in the first place, let 
 me observe, is special and qualified property ; 
 made so by local law ; he is called slave by spe- 
 cial enactment, not by natural law, not by the 
 law of humanity, npr by the general opinion of 
 the world. Yet, he is property in the face of all 
 this, they argue. 
 
 Literature, philosophy, common law and the 
 general opinion of mankind, all concur, that 
 whether black or white, rich or poor. " a man's 
 a man for a' that." (Applause.) Naturally, in 
 in a government formed as a constitutional com- 
 pact between States organized before that Con- 
 stitution existed, certain compromises were made 
 by them by which we agreed that by local law 
 a negro is a slave. He is a slave, where you 
 can catch him, hold him, and legislate for him. 
 Wherever your force can hold him, or your law 
 can bind him, we acknowledge he is your slave. 
 But, beyond that, beyond your force and beyond 
 your law, he is a slave no longer. (Applause.) 
 And, therefore, when you tell us that .you can take 
 your property where you like, we meet you with 
 the broad and general answer. Property is of 
 two kinds. I have described the one. There is 
 another kind of property acknowledged to be 
 such by the general consent of mankind : by 
 
[9] 
 
 every system of philosophy, by every govern- 
 ment, and by every law in the world; and that 
 property you can take with you everywhere. 
 .. The other* is local, sectional; in contravention of 
 the broad dictates of humanity, and in violation 
 of those principles, of thought or action which 
 arc broad arid general as the universe, or which 
 all good men love. It is the misfortune of your 
 locality, and you shan't carry it with you against 
 the common consent of the men among whom 
 you go. (Applause.) 
 
 I ask you, is not that fair ? Don't you 
 feel that to be so ; is there any equivocation that 
 can overcome it ? Well now, the Douglas men 
 in my own country, they put the argument a little 
 diilerent in substance and in terms. They say it 
 is not true that a man can take his property 
 wherever he pleases, with impunity. For in- 
 stance, in my country, Oregon, (Great merri- 
 ment) where the hospitality of the people is a 
 - Teat deal broader than their convenience; in my 
 country. (Renewed merriment.) Well, in Ore- 
 gon, (til-eat laughter.) 
 
 :Viend here, whose country it is, reminds 
 me, if it ain't mine, it ain't Joe Lane's. (Great 
 -liter.) But, at any rate, in any country 
 where the hospitality is more enlarged than the 
 convenience you have sometimes known that in 
 traveling, you have to be accommodated badly 
 to use the common expression, sleep three in a 
 bed. Thence springs the proverb: " as thick as 
 three in a bed," (laughter) and all who have 
 lived in the western states, or who are acquaint- 
 ed with western pioneer life, know it is a com- 
 mon way of doing. 
 
 But imagine three of us traveling the road to- 
 gether. We stop at a house at night, and are 
 informed that we three, being strangers the one 
 to the other, must sleep in the same bed, if we 
 desire accommouat on. When about retiring for 
 the night, I look at one of my companions, and 
 1 smell brimstone. (Tremendous laugh.) I say 
 to him very politely, " Why, God bless my soul. 
 ni} r friend, are you from Scotland?" (Renewed 
 laughter.) I am reminded of that by Macaulay. 
 who, in the most brilliant history that ever was 
 written, said a thing pertinent thereto, which 
 caused him to be burned in effigy at Edinburgh. 
 I hope no Scotchman will take offense because I 
 repeat it. Macaulay said the Scotchman of 
 that day not now " was the most finished 
 gentleman of the age, and he would receive you 
 with a gr :ild do honor to Versailles; 
 
 but in his house yon would lie down on a dung- 
 hill and g-t up with the itch.'' (Great laughter.) 
 1 am sure ir was a slander then, and I know it is 
 now. Well, I look at my friend and say. "Why. 
 7.iy friend, you have got the itch." I say" well." 
 He sa\s " well." I turn to my other companion 
 en us. and we say to the man 
 with the itch, " We are in the majority; you 
 can't sl.'f-p in this bed. We are two against one. 
 and \v.- will prevail/ 1 What does he say ? He 
 > this, that a man can't go 
 where In- * ;h his own property.'' (Pro- 
 
 longed laugh'- r a id cheering.) Xow I leave 
 
 a Republican, I only add this: Slavery is the 
 itch to Free Labor. It irritates and discommode* 
 it. 
 
 The normal condition of a Territory is Freedom. 
 (Applause). It don't need any declaration in the 
 Chicago platform ; it is known everywhere. I 
 have a !<>w estimate of platforms, but it is true 
 that the normal condition of the Territories is 
 Freedom. Stand upon the ridge of the Sierra 
 Nevada, or upon some mountain height that 
 overlooks the eastern and western valleys be- 
 yond you, and what do you behold ? The sav- 
 age may be there ; the beasts of the forest may 
 be there; the pestilence may be there; but 
 SLAVERY is not there. (Applause). And if it 
 goes there, you take it with you by your force, 
 your fraud or your law. 
 
 Well, now then, the people of the North and 
 the people of the South or in other and better 
 words, the slaveholder and the non-slaveholder, 
 go there. They have an equal right to go each 
 with his ax, his spade, his wagon, his cattle, hie 
 capital. But the slaveholder takes his slaves. 
 That is his capital. The eastern man takes his 
 free labor. That is his capital. They come 
 together, and the eastern man says, "I can't 
 work side by side with a slave. It degrades 
 and dishonors my free labor," And the Irish- 
 man and the German who never go down to 
 South Carolina and Tennessee to make a home, 
 but go to Oregon, California, Illinois, and Iowa, 
 and who if they do go where there are many 
 niggers, go to Missouri to root them out ; they 
 say, we will not work side by side with a nigger, 
 either. You degrade and you injure our free 
 labor. You diminish its value, you diminish its 
 credit, you lower its dignity. And we will g 
 to work now for the doctrine, the Republican 
 doctrine, that Congress may pass a law ex- 
 cluding slavery from the territories. Congress 
 would in so doing only do what Washington, 
 Jefferson and Madison did. If they don't help 
 us, we will apply the doctrine of Popular Sover- 
 eignty, the right of every man to value and pre- 
 serve his own labor, by the will of the majority 
 of the people ; just then the southern man says, 
 : - Not so fast, I have got the Dred Scott decision 
 in my pocket," out it comes, "and I have got the 
 President, Mr. Buchanan's interpretation of what 
 the Dred Scott decision means, and I will teB 
 you. It means this: Neither Congress, nor the 
 Territorial Legislature, nor any human power 
 can remove slavery from a territory, because it 
 goes there protected by the Constitution of the 
 United States. And now, Mr. German, Mr. 
 Irishman, and Mr. Illinoisan, I tell you that ail 
 your talk about freedom and popular sovereignty, 
 the popular rights, and free labor, is a humbug 
 from beginning to end. Here is the Constitution, 
 and here is the Supreme Court, arid here is Mr. 
 liuclianan: and now what are you going to do 
 about 
 
 You Douglas men, tell me what yon are going 
 to do? 1 will i.ell you what .some of you have 
 been doing. You go along whistling tor want of 
 thought and say. we don't care. Judge Douglas 
 
 yout' on of the illustration. I saya as I understood him in his northern 
 
 have made the illustration ; do you apply it ? As 1 speeches, for I won't say anything about big 
 
[10] 
 
 southern ones, that Congress bothers itself with 
 slavery when it ought to be attending to some- 
 thing else. "I don't care. If the people of the 
 territories want slavery let them have it ; if they 
 don't, let them keep it out. I don't care." Do 
 you agree to that? Don't you care. You do 
 care. It is nonsense, it is absurd to say you 
 don't care. You can't help caring ; first, as a 
 man, because you are a man. There are 4,000,000 
 of slaves in this country. They are increasing 
 very rapidly. They bring reproach on us in the 
 eyes of the whole world. The interests of 
 slavery kept Kansas out. They have defeated 
 the railroad; denied us homesteads ; refused us 
 a telegraph line, and a daily overland mail. 
 Slavery goes every where ; meets you face to face 
 everywhere you go and you do care. Besides, 
 you are men. Many of you have read the say- 
 ings of the noble dramatist (Shakespeare) "I am 
 a man ; and whatever concerns humanity con- 
 cerns me." 
 
 Well, in the next place, if you don't care, you 
 do care about the idea of Popular Sovereignty, 
 don't you? You love that; you believe in that; 
 you intend to stand by that. Now, if you do, I 
 want you to vote with me in November. Tell 
 me, what are you going to do with your Popular 
 Sovereignty? Suppose you are for Douglas. 
 You have got Nesmith from Oregon a noble 
 man for Popular Sovereignty. You have got 
 me, who will vote on it when it comes up directly. 
 That is all. The whole South and the doubtful 
 gentlemen of the North, all the Republicans 
 excepted will not sustain Douglas' doctrine of 
 Popular Sovereignty. They worship at the foot 
 of another idol. Now, what are you going to do? 
 Your idea of " unfriendly legislation" is unwor- 
 thy of yourselves and the cause. If freedom is 
 right, sustain it like men. (Applause. ) If it be 
 not, abandon it. Now I will tell you how I am 
 going to sustain it. I will not make war, I will 
 not revolutionize the Government, I will not dis- 
 solve the Union, I will not dispute the Supreme 
 Court. If they say Dred Scott is not a citizen. 
 I say Dred Scott is not a citizen. If they say 
 that all negroes are not citizens, why in that 
 particular case, where a negro comes to me, I 
 say : You are not a citizen John, Sambo, Pom- 
 pey; the Supreme Court has so decided. But 
 when a Douglas man comes to me and says, what 
 shall I do about Popular Sovereignty? I say, be 
 a man and attack the Supreme Court; not by 
 revolution and violence, but reform it altogether. 
 Do what? Is not that nullification? By no 
 means. When the Supreme Court decided upon 
 the mere question of money, that the United 
 States Bank was Constitutional, General Jackson 
 and Mr. Douglas said it was not; Congress said 
 it, and the people said it was not a Supreme 
 Court were put in to say that it was not, and 
 that was the end of the whole matter. Well 
 now, we will obey the Supreme Court in the par- 
 ticular case decided, but the character of the 
 Court will soon change in the natural order of 
 events; we will then through Lincoln, a Republi- 
 can Senate and House, put in better men. We 
 will reverse the decision of the Supreme Court 
 toy the decision of the people. What will you 
 
 Douglas men do ? Will you march in that great 
 procession or will you turn your ear coldly 
 away from the music of that march. There is no 
 nullification in that ; there is no revolution in 
 that ; there is no violation of the Constitution. 
 Why, what is this Government? Think of it! 
 It is the government of the people. Not a pure 
 Democracy. We don't gather together in the 
 market place as they did in the time of Pericles 
 and all determine our laws, but we elect Repre- 
 sentatives and Senators, and make a President 
 and a Supreme Court, reserving to ourselves the 
 power to change them at limited and stated 
 periods. When they do not please us, we reverse 
 their decisions by changing their places and 
 sending them away. And at last, not by party, 
 violent, impetuous action, but the determinate, 
 well considered, deliberate expression of the peo- 
 ple will prevail. It must prevail at last, just as 
 well in relation to a construction of the Consti- 
 tution as anything else. The idea that there can 
 be a power which can give a construction to a 
 Constitution, mightier than the Constitution it- 
 self, is a very strange idea in a free country. The 
 other idea, that there can be a power in the 
 State, which can declare by way of construction 
 and by way of construction only that the 
 Constitution means what our fathers and its 
 framers denied that it ever did mean : and that 
 once having done that and said that, though they 
 die and pass away, yet that their decision re- 
 mains in full force irreversable forever and for- 
 ever, is absurd, slavish and despotic. 
 
 Yet, once more, add to that the other idea 
 that this decision is made not in relation to prop- 
 erty merely, but that it is made in relation to hu- 
 man rights and liberty not mere public liberty ; 
 worse than that, personal liberty. It is made, 
 according to that idea, not for any State, but for 
 all Territories wherever the American flag may 
 float, wherever the banner of the stars may 
 be seen wherever the name of Freedom 
 may be echoed from human lips, there Slave- 
 ry by virtue of that decision, is to go protected, 
 guarded, hedged about with all the divinity that 
 invests and guards a king, to remain there a 
 black stain, a disgrace, a wreck and ruin forever 
 and forever. By all the hopes and joys of liber- 
 ty, to my mind that is treason against human 
 hopes. (Great applause.) 
 
 Now you Douglas men, what are you going to 
 do ? You will vote for Popular Sovereignty, 
 will you ? Well now, first, probably you are not 
 going to carry a State. (Tremendous applause.) 
 Suppose you do carry one, which will it be? Cal- 
 ifornia? (Voices, no 1 narrytime!) Perhaps I 
 don't live in California ; no, I don't know about 
 it. (Laugh.) But suppose you do carry Califor- 
 nia and Missouri. Any more ? No. What good 
 will that do if you don't join the defenders of true 
 Popular Sovereignty, in whose ranks we are? 
 
 If you don't join us, what are you Douglas 
 men going to do ? Come with us and we will do 
 you good. (Laughter.) We will stand by your 
 doctrine of Popular Sovereignty as an engine for 
 Freedom. We do care. Now do you come and 
 care too. Well now, suppose we do create Free- 
 dom, if I may use the expression, in the Territo- 
 
[11] 
 
 ries by Republican or Douglas votes, and keep it ! 
 there, what is the harm? Who will dissolve the 
 Union then? Why these gentlemen talk about 
 this question of the Territories as it' we were do- 
 ing the people of the South, as a body, some 
 grievous wrong. They forir-t that as yet and I 
 trust it will l>e so for all time the interests of 
 freedom and of free labor are the great interests 
 of the American people. There are to-day, as 
 the late census will show, but 270,000 persons in 
 the Union who are interested in slaves at all. 
 All the rest of our white population have an in- 
 terest diivctly adverse. Suppose it were true, 
 that we would be sectional enough to legislate 
 for thirty millions of people less 270,020. Would 
 that be a cause for a dissolution of the Union ? 
 
 When I stand here as an advocate fur Five 
 Labor in the Territories, whom am I working 
 for? Did you ever think of that? There are a 
 great many poor laborers in the South as well as 
 in the North. The dedication of Free Territory 
 to Free Labor, affects them favorably. I do not, 
 therefore, as a Republican, go to a man from 
 Maine, Illinois or New Hampshire, but I go to 
 the man of labor everywhere. I say, come, take 
 your axe, and your spade and come out. Leave 
 your idea of a nigger behind you. Work, culti- 
 vate, adorn, fertalize and beautify! Be a man. 
 Make homes for yourself and those who come 
 after you ; I do not ask, I do not care where you 
 come from, whether North, South, East or West. 
 Nay. more ; I do not stop on the soil of America. 
 I wade waist deep into the surf and say to the 
 German, come ! to the Irishman, come ! I say, 
 there is ample room and verge enough for all. 
 The American flag shall float over you, and the 
 ideas of liberty advance as long as there shall be 
 a bright eye on earth, and as long as the stars 
 shall shine in Heaven. (Terrific applause.) Be 
 ing fortified by party organization, it is sorrow 
 fnl to see how our Irish friends are going. We 
 talk to them ; I talk to them. They have stood 
 by me in more than one battle. Many did last 
 year. I appeal to them once more. I say to 
 them, you have come from a land where your 
 fathers have been oppressed more than eight hun- 
 dred years, you have come to a land where the 
 great idea is Freedom. Every country has a pe 
 culiar and great idea. In England it is the com 
 mercial one ; in France, the military one. But, ] 
 say the great idea of America is Free Labor 
 Freedom. (Applause). 
 
 You, from the Shannon or the Lifiey, you 
 come here with labor as your only capital. \\ h\ 
 not dignify it, why not make it valuable, why 
 not guard it, why not assert its right? Do you 
 want slaws among you ? Do you go where the\ 
 are ? Do you want them to come here ? Do yoi 
 believe in these so-called notions that will carrj 
 them to Arizona and Washington Territory 
 everywhere in the territories, wherever you ma\ 
 go? You do not. It is the name, it is the idea 
 it is the odor that lingers around the vase ; 
 fetid odor at that. (Laughter and applause) 
 Now I tell you. that Democracy iu that sense i- 
 dissolving. It is Democracy no longer. There 
 is none of it in that so-called party. They can 
 agree among themselves what Democracy is 
 
 and one says, lo here ! and another says, lo there I 
 
 Laughter and applause). 
 And you pretending to come to a land of free- 
 
 ;om, and live in it ! What are you doing? If I 
 were to appeal to a young German. I would say 
 
 him this: I will imagine you have come here, 
 oiled live years, and gone back on a visit. You 
 \now since the time the Republicans backed 
 
 'ass and others out of their Leclerc letter, you 
 can go safely. Well, when you get back what 
 lo you do ? You go to the old house, to your 
 ather and mother and give an account of your- 
 self. "Where have you been." asks the old 
 gentleman. " I have been in Illinois, in Califor- 
 lia, and in Oregon." "Well yes," the old peo- 
 le will say, "you have been there; but have 
 not you been down in states so fertile and with 
 <o fine a climate, Virginia and South Carolina ?" 
 4 Oh, no." "Well, why not?" " Oh, they have 
 slaves down there." "Ah ! " says the old man, 
 'that's right. Don't go where there are slaves. 
 You went out of Germany to go to a land of 
 rcedom. When you go back, don't go to the 
 Slave States. Well John," continues the old 
 man, how are you in politics?" "Oh ! I am a 
 Democrat." "All right; a good name. The dis- 
 tinction in this, your native country, John, is be- 
 ween Democracy and Aristocracy. Now John, 
 you are not an Aristrocrat, but a Democrat. I 
 suppose the distinction there is the same as 
 here." " No," says John, " the parties in Ameri- 
 ca are Democracy and Republicanism." "Re- 
 publican!" says the old man, "that is a good 
 name too. What is the distinction between the 
 two?" "Oh," says John, "the Democrats go 
 for equal rights to all sections." "Oh yes!" 
 says the old man, "equal rights to all men, very 
 good." "No, no, no!" says John, "not equal 
 rights to all men, but equal rights to all SEC- 
 TIONS." " Sections;" says the old man, " what 
 does that mean ?" " Equal rights to all sections 
 means the right to take your property, whether 
 in slaves or otherwise, wherever you please. 
 That is the Democratic doctrine. Equal rights 
 to all men, is the Republican doctrine." 
 
 Now, how are you going to account for this? 
 What can you tell the old folks, but what I have 
 already said. Why, you will say, perhaps. 
 " Father, I did not like Slavery. I would not 
 go down to Virginia because I wanted to avoid it. 
 
 1 voted against it in California and against it in 
 Oregon. But, somehow or other, to be sure, the 
 influence of the Democracy and the influence of 
 the administration and of the organization is for 
 it. They do want to have negroes everywhere ; 
 they intend to take them into all the Territories. 
 They don't care about any other right but " equal 
 rights to all sections." Says the old man: "Did 
 not you love Freedom in Germany? Did not 
 you feel in 1848 as if you could have died for it? 
 and do you go now and sneak at the heels of an 
 administration which is endeavoring to carry 
 negroes everywhere because it happens to have 
 the name of Democratic?" You German Repub- 
 licans do not talk that way. You can go home 
 and answer such questions with cheerful and 
 honest pride. You can go home and say: 
 " Father, I have not shamed your teachings ; i 
 
[12] 
 
 love Freedom here, and I love it there. I went 
 on the soil of freedom, and my voice has ever 
 been for it there." 
 
 Did any of you ever hear Carl Schurz talk ? 
 He said the other day that there were 300,000 
 Germans for Fremont in 1856, and that there 
 were now 600,000 for Lincoln. (Applause). 
 He talks like a man inspired. Why? Because 
 he brings all the enthusiasm of his own nature, 
 all the deep enthusiasm of the German nature, to 
 bear on that great idea of the progress of liberty 
 in this land devoted by our fathers to Freedom. 
 (Applause.) Well, now, you Germans, German 
 Republicans, is there in all this any pretense for 
 dissolution? Will anybody be hurt? Suppose 
 we do keep all the Territories for free labor. 
 The Popular Sovereignty men and the Republi- 
 cans both propose arriving at the same thing, 
 but by two different modes. What then ? Who 
 is hurt ? We shall do but as our father's did. 
 We strike for Freedom. In every free Govern- 
 ment Freedom is the rule ; Slavery but the ex- 
 eep'ion. Thence the toil and struggle in legisla- 
 ting for free labor. Thence we obey the will of 
 the Master and by that we act in the eyes of the 
 world as becomes a free people. 
 
 Again, yet once more. Do you reflect that 
 to-day two-thirds of all the organized Territory 
 of this Union is dedicated to slavery. That, too, 
 when they have but one-third of the population. 
 Do you know that they have more slave territory 
 than they can scratch over, in the way they are 
 doing, in two hundred years to come. But, 
 above all, do you remember that these States, 
 in which the area of slavery is comprised, have 
 no sympathy either from God, angels, or men, 
 save within their own borders. Do you remember 
 that they have forced the Democracy North for 
 a long time to go with them. They have held 
 the balance of power. They say to the North, 
 " You take the offices and give us the slaves. 
 Give us the power to extend the institution of 
 slavery, abandon the Railroad, homesteads, etc., 
 and take the offices. You can take a good many 
 of them, because we can wind you round our 
 finger whenever we like." Of what is the 
 Breckinridge party in this Union composed? 
 First, every man South. I begin to believe 
 from accounts, however, only some men South 
 are Breckinridge men. (Laughter and applause.) 
 Second, all the office-holders in the North. 
 Third, nobody else. (Laughter) There were 
 some Germans, some Irish in their ranks; the, 
 Germans became Republicans, the Irishmen, 
 Douglas men. And where is Breckinridge ? 
 Well, now I repeat, the Democracy of the North 
 have gone with the slave power. Perhaps they 
 went unwillingly? "Organization," "the real 
 Democracy," "Democratic principles/' and such 
 twaddle have made them do it. Now, where' 
 are they? The Democrats in the North as a 
 body, except the office-holders, go for Douglas. \ 
 As for t';i6 office-holders, we are about to turn 
 them out. (La lighter and applause.) Now is there 
 one land which sympathizes with the attempt td 
 govern this country for the purposes of slavery ? 
 Do you ? Does England ? Does Russia ? Does 
 6-ertnany? Does Spain? Does Mexico? Why,, 
 
 one of the most affecting incidents I know of in 
 connection with the war with Mexico, occurred 
 when the Mexican Commissioners met the 
 American Commissioners near Mexico to de- 
 termine the treaty of peace. They said in effect, 
 to Mr. Trist : " Sir, we are a conquered people. 
 You can prescribe your own terms. But, we 
 implore you, in the name of humanity and liberty, 
 that you do not force slavery upon an unwilling 
 people." (Applause.) That was the Mexican 
 settlement. And sometimes when I hear myself 
 reproached for being a Black Republican. I "stop 
 and consider, who I am and where I am, what 
 I am doing, and who I am doing it with. A 
 Black Republican ! With whom ? Let me look 
 at California. I look around me. Who are we? 
 Look at our intelligence, our wealth, our taste, 
 our brilliancy, our beauty, our numbers, our force, 
 our enthusiasm, our growing power, our deep 
 convictions, our real, earnest convictions, and see 
 who we are. (Applause.) 
 
 Who are you ? In California, shifting, fusing, 
 dividing, some for Douglas, some for Breckinridge, 
 now here, now there. The cry of " Black Repub- 
 licanism" avails you nothing. "Abolitionism" 
 chokes in your throat. You see signs of success, 
 omens of fortune on either hand. For us it 
 thunders always on the right, but you but I 
 leave you to determine. Again, take the prop- 
 erty, the wealth, the agriculture, the amount of 
 taxation, the intelligence, the discovery, the in- 
 vention, the poetry, the philosophy, the cities, 
 the churches, the school-houses, the pretty 
 women. (Great laughter and cheering.) And 
 on whose side are they? Why, if you want a 
 cotton-gin cleaned you have to come to us to do 
 it and to make it in the first place. I speak not 
 in disrespect of the South. I know the virtues of 
 the South. They are courteous, hospitable and 
 brave ; and in spite of this trouble about dissolu- 
 tion, they do love the country. They do ; I 
 know it; God bless them for it. (Applause.) 
 But in many of the elements that go to make a 
 nation, they, by reason of slavery, are lamentably 
 deficient. The books, material wealth, moral 
 advance, deep philosophy, inspired poetry, all 
 these they have not in a great degree of them- 
 selves. The books they read, we write ; the 
 philosophy we teach, they learn ; the lectures 
 we deliver, they hear. Bancroft and Prescott 
 write their histories ; Bryant and Longfellow 
 their poetry. (Applause.) 
 ' In the whole world abroad, even where there 
 is the lowest political degradation, ideas of per- 
 sonal liberty, at the present time, grow apace.' 
 Beneath the shadow of the throne of Russia ; 
 above the ruins of the Inquisition ; on the banks 
 of the Seine; around the ashes of Napoleon, and 
 where a British Queen presides in all her matron- 
 ly dignity over a free people ; everywhere, ideas 
 of personal liberty fructify and grow. It was 
 the boast of a groat Irish orator (Curran ?) long, 
 long ago, that when a slave touched the sacred 
 soil of Britain, the fetters fell from his limbs, and 
 rose disenthralled. I think that was his idea> 
 though not his glowing language before the 
 genius of universal emancipation. (Applause,) 
 Everywhere the great idea of personal libertj, 
 
[13] 
 
 developes, increases, and fructifies. Here is the 
 exception. Here, under the American (Jovern- 
 nient. in the laud of liberty, the chosen of all 
 freemen, the home of the exile, such is not the 
 ease. Here, in a laud of written constitutional 
 liberty, it is reserved for us to teach the world 
 that under the American stars and rtri] 
 very marches in solemn procession; that under 
 the. American flag, slavery is protected to the 
 utmost verge of acquired territory: that under 
 the American banner, the name of freedom is to 
 be faintly heard; the songs of freedom faintly 
 sung; that while Garibaldi, Victor Kmanuel, 
 every great and good man in the world (tre- 
 mendous applause) strives, struggles, fights; 
 prays, sutlers and dies, sometimes on the scaffold, 
 sometimes in the dungeon, often on the field of 
 battle, rendered immortal by his blood and his va- 
 lor; that while this triumphal procession marches 
 on tli rough the arches of freedom we, in this 
 land of all the world shrink back trembling 
 when freedom is but mentioned. (Great ay 
 plan so.) 
 
 At this moment, Mr. Edward Harte, who was 
 occupying a seat on the stage, employed in re- 
 porting for the Times, apparently seized with un- 
 controllable enthusiasm, sprung from his place 
 and advancing to the foot-lights, exclaimed: 
 By God, it is true! You are all slaves compared 
 with the rest of the world. The Colonel is 
 right!" (Great applause). 
 
 Mr. Baker, (resuming) : It is out of the ques- 
 tion. I cannot go on. [Cries of "Go on!" 
 "Goon!"] You cannot discuss Republicanism 
 in half a night, and it would be presumptuous 
 and absurd on my part to attempt it. You know 
 these things as well as I do. You feel them in 
 your heart. Perhaps I could talk to you an hour 
 longer without losing those who love me [" Go 
 on! Goon!"] of the application of these ques- 
 tions of slave and of free labor to our ulterior 
 and immediate interests. I will glance at them, 
 with your permission, and glance at them only. 
 
 To begin : The SOUTH has an identity of in- 
 terests in slaves. Our interests are diversified. 
 Our interests are in stocks, in farms, in cattle, 
 in manufactures of every branch, and industry 
 connected with free labor. Now, whenever, in 
 this country any measure comes up which does 
 not, in some shape, in their judgment, operate 
 favorably for the perpetuity or extension of sla- 
 very, if it does not send support to their one 
 single subject of interest, they go against it. 
 
 You may take, now, the Pacific Railroad as 
 a striking example. Ten years we have been 
 here; ten years away from home; ten years 
 ' children of the dispersion '; ten years longing and 
 lingering with our eyes turned towards the Kast, 
 towards the happy land so many of us may 
 never, never, see again. We have sighed for a 
 Railroad ; we have begged for it. We have 
 pointed out with deep research and wide philos- 
 ophy, and eminent learning, and great enthusi- 
 asm, its importance to ns. We have shown its 
 importance, not only to us, but to the United 
 tales, not only to the United States, but to the 
 world, not only to the world now but to coming 
 generations. We have pointed out the best 
 
 route. "We have indicated the best mode of con- 
 structing this work. We have reflected mature- 
 ly and fully upon the subject, and our conclusions 
 have been well founded and unimpeachable. 
 \Ve have, in this connection, demonstrated the 
 needs of the people. \Ve have shown how towns 
 and cities would spring up along the line of this 
 road, forming a perfect line of defense across the 
 entire continent. And the military need forfhis 
 work has been thoroughly proven. We have 
 illustrated how this road was bound to be the 
 great highway of nations the great line of trade 
 between the nations of Europe and Asia. How 
 often have we pointed out the absolute certainty 
 that commerce, in her legitimate working would 
 establish along the line of this route States of 
 unsurpassed wealth and glory. All this we 
 have done over and over again. But it has been 
 of no avail. Buchanan professed to recommend 
 the road ; Pierce professed to recommend its con- 
 struction. But all these favors, if they were 
 such, went for naught. "We asked them for 
 bread and they gave us a stone ; we asked them 
 for fish and they gave us a scorpion." The De- 
 mocracy, the Southern Democracy, the slave in- 
 terests would not permit it. Even while I speak, 
 the intelligence comes that the Breckinridge 
 Convention of Virginia resolves again and again 
 against any railroad in anyway. Hero is the 
 fact. Well, what are you going to do about it? 
 How are you going to help it? RISE as they 
 have risen in Oregon; RISE, as you are rising 
 in California; assert your rights; declare your 
 purposes; stand by free labor and the time will 
 speedily come when you will attain the full fru- 
 ition of your hopes. (Applause.) Yon cannot 
 win on these matters unless you have the admin- 
 istration with you. You cannot win unless you 
 send men to Washington who will unite your 
 interests with sympathisers for free labor. You 
 cannot win as long as you send men to the Sen- 
 ate and the House who will yield your interests 
 to the dictates of an unfriendly administration 
 or a sectional Convention. These are very plain 
 truths for you to ponder upon. 
 
 If four years ago, we had elected Col. Fremont, 
 what would have happened ? In a few months 
 he would have commenced the work ; and pre- 
 paratory to this he would have sent out two reg- 
 iments of dragoons to tramp the track. (Applause) 
 He would have immediately recommended a rail- 
 road. There would have been no beating about 
 the bush, on the mere question of the constitu- 
 tionality of building a military road ; he would 
 have recommended the building of a road at once 
 with the money and for the probable benefit of 
 the whole people. He would have had no con- 
 stitutional scruples himself, and he would not 
 have tolerated any in anybody else. He would 
 not have allowed Senators to come to the White 
 House and say to him, you must go against this 
 proposition for a Pacific Rail Road, or I will op- 
 pose you and your administration. He would 
 not have delayed the work because Senator Ma- 
 son, or Toombs, or Hunter, expressed their dis- 
 approbation of it. He would have simply said : 
 The Government needs the road, and the labor 
 on its construction must immediately proceed. 
 
[14] 
 
 In the name and for the cause of free labor he 
 would have commanded in all legitimate forms 
 the prosecution of the mighty undertaking. And 
 though I candidly believe that there is not a 
 more incorruptible man in the world than Fre- 
 mont, I may be permitted to say that I think that 
 if there had been any corruption under his ad- 
 ministration it would have operated for and not 
 agayist that great work. (Great applause.) 
 
 Now we are running a man by the name of 
 Abraham Lincoln, (Great cheering) who will do 
 that same thing. He really loves free labor and 
 her interests ; he was born with such sentiments 
 though a native of a slave state ; he is of it. He 
 cay say, speaking of free labor achievements, as 
 yEneas said to Dido, when he was describing 
 the sacking of Troy, " All of which I saw 
 and part of which I was." He is a simple mind- 
 ed, an honest, a true man a Hero without 
 knowing it. (Great applause.) He will guard 
 you and your interests because he is with you 
 and of you. If he gets into the White House, 
 (and there is no "if" about it) he will recom- 
 mend the construction of a road in all sincerity. 
 He will not dodge the question. But his hands 
 must be strengthened and upheld by you. You 
 must send men to Congress Senators and Rep- 
 resentatives who will sustain him ; men who 
 do not have all their feelings enlisted for the prop- 
 agation of "the peculiar institution." 
 
 Now, allow me to say that what is true of Rail 
 Road propositions as viewed by the South is 
 equally true of the Homestead Bill. Nor of these 
 alone. But is equally true of all things connec- 
 ted with the interests of common men. What 
 does the South care about Homesteads ? What 
 does the South care about spreading the cordon 
 of homes that themselves will constitute the very 
 best of military posts from Missouri to the Rocky 
 Mountains, and thence to the Sierra Nevadas ? 
 They never trade with us ; the citizens of the 
 South do not send goods to us, their interests lie 
 in quite a different direction. Yirginia ! Vir- 
 ginia! Once the Mother of States and the 
 Mother of Statesmen, is now almost exclusively 
 engaged in slave breeding ; engaged in rais- 
 ing them to send South. What does she care 
 about homesteads and railroads ? Nothing. 
 Pity, 'tis 'tis true ! Why there are 50,000 whites 
 in Virginia over 21 years of age who can neither 
 read nor write ! She don't care about Railroads. 
 But we do. The German immigrants do. Nor- 
 way and Sweden, they who come to us from 
 those countries, care about those things. We 
 have a thousand millions of acres of Public Land. 
 Let us repeat it, \ve have a thousand millions of 
 acres of Public Land. And upon them, during 
 generations to come, thousands and hundreds of 
 thousands of happy homes may be reared. The 
 taxes they will yield, the wealth they will create, 
 the strong arms they will sustain for willing and 
 valuable labor in time of peace and for ample 
 and prompt defence in time of war. These con- 
 stitute our power, these, to use the expression 
 of the Roman matron when called upon to 
 produce her chief treasure, produced her children, 
 saying. "These, these are my jewels." (Ap- 
 plause.) 
 
 What does the South care about these things ? 
 Her interests are not ours. The institution of 
 Slavery overshadows everything. Day laborers, 
 common people, laboring white folks, who are 
 neither politicians nor office-holders and the lat- 
 ter now involve the former have no interest, 
 and apparently few rights which the sectional 
 chivalry are bound to respect or candidly to con- 
 sider. And as long as they can keep them under 
 their direction, the slaveholders of the fifteen 
 slave States will secure their votes against a 
 Homestead and against a Pacific Railroad ; 
 against all the interests which are common to the 
 people of this coast. But this is not always so 
 to be. 
 
 Allow me to say that one day this month, a 
 Republican Senator was elected in Oregon. The 
 next day the Democratic Legislature instructed 
 me to vote for a Homestead Bill. Lane and 
 Smith having heretofore voted against that be- 
 neficent measure. Now, there is a revolution 
 going on upon this coast. Here, the vote of Cali- 
 fornia has been at one time against a Homestead 
 Bill. But this will be so no longer. Positions 
 are to be renewed, and Freedom and Free Labor 
 are to have the representation from the States of 
 the Pacific. (Great applause.) 
 
 When we get into power, as soon we shall, it 
 will be our aim to use that power wisely and 
 temperately. We will infringe upon no Consti- 
 tutional rights. We will not attempt to interfere 
 with the slave where he is now held under a State 
 law. We will not organize, encourage, or for 
 one moment tolerate the insane movements of 
 any John Browns. (Applause.) We will justify 
 nothing of the kind. If another John Brown 
 should descend upon the Old Dominion, and take 
 the State by storm, and keep the people on the 
 northern outskirts in dreadful captivity for twen- 
 ty-four hours, and should get hung for his fantas- 
 tic and treasonable capers, it will not be our 
 fault simply a misfortune in which he will not 
 have our sympathy as true and loyal citizens. 
 (Applause.) And not only so, but let anybody 
 else, high or low, rich or poor, from the North or 
 from the South, attempt treason, and we will 
 hang the traitor on the instant the overt act is 
 committed. (Great applause.) While that is so, 
 we must insist with the fullest emphasis that the 
 majority must rule. Our's is not a Government 
 of Minorities, but of Majorities. At least we 
 come to this conclusion : we either rule or submit 
 as politicians. This is the end of the whole mat- 
 ter. 
 
 Again, there is the direct opposition between 
 slave labor and free labor. And here I am ad- 
 dressed by some Democratic friend : " Col. Baker, 
 what say you concerning Seward's opinion that 
 there is an irrepressible conflict between Slavery 
 and Freedom? What do you say, Col. Baker, 
 about that idea of Lincoln's, that the States will 
 not always remain half slave and half free, but 
 ultimately they will be all free or all slave? 
 What have you to say on that matter? " I think 
 that if that 'is Lincoln's opinion, he has a right 
 to express it. In the next place, I apprehend that 
 that is your opinion too. So you think that 
 Slavery is going to last forever? I know you 
 
[15] 
 
 don't ,'ood for that . We know that | that stump, have too much sympathy with the 
 
 n but as one day j negro race. Why, there are men in my < 
 
 at be 
 
 rk its 
 
 iy to quarrel 
 with tit-. rs if a suspicion 
 
 on their part with the negro race was but hint- 
 ed. "W:. 
 
 nod d abolitionist." My urn- 
 
 i !]. There are :;y people of 
 
 that sort who set-in to ibar that there is direcon- 
 
 to ti:> banks of the 
 
 Mr. Clay of being an 
 
 . -. 
 
 
 /ants it to last nlways ? 
 ill not last for- 
 
 ;.;h sym- 
 not la.-; lieanng Mr. ; pathy 
 
 in one of his not a Catholic, but I will get on th-- 
 inself and his ' and acknowledge that J . ith the 
 
 country: i have sympathy with all slaves; 
 
 ! <1 with the suffering and unfortunate of every class ; 
 
 and I would to God that I could help the whole 
 of them. I sympathise, as I ii 
 a man who has a scolding wife ; or a s 
 chimney, or the fever and ague ; but I don't know 
 bound to vnan to 
 
 whip his wife or to pull down his chimney or to 
 take arsenic for his fever and ague, and 1 don't 
 feel bound to run a tilt to free e > at the 
 
 expense of breaking my own neck. (Laughter 
 and applause). I have sympathy for ti 
 but I am restrained in a:i . actuaJ 
 
 liberation by the laws of my country, which I 
 implicitly obey and profoundly reject. My 
 first duty is for the honor and glory of my own 
 race. A portion of the colored race are 
 in this free country. I would to God that it 
 were of ,! if within constitutional lim- 
 
 its it were possible to help them to their freedom, 
 I would do what I could for their relief. My 
 Douglas friend would do the same. Why not? 
 As we all ought. I go to the temple of the MOST 
 HIGH to hear arid to utter prayer and praise. I 
 I join with all men in their devotions. When 
 the Pri< Lord, have mercy upon all 
 
 ;<;od Lord, on ail 
 .en," I say " on all men." 
 
 1 our adversaries i* this: Thoy 
 seem to suppose that if we have human hearts, 
 letting trej. - ihem. Not 
 
 so. While \ve have sympathetic feelings, which 
 are nothing more than human. vrthat 
 
 we live in a land of iial Law. We are 
 
 a confederation of st We concede 
 
 to the south their propt ; ''h'ng to 
 
 their own law, in their own way. Far be it from 
 us to violate the provisions of the Constitution. 
 
 hard. 1'v: 
 
 it wore to be made over again, we would not 
 brrn it in the same te: whatever is 
 
 nominated in the bond we will abide. For in- 
 stam... : 10,000 en >00, 
 
 [ have but one my own. If I 
 
 1 
 aboii:. nse. 
 
 And I ap; < I'rtvkinridge am 
 
 . Inv- a little sense of piety in you 
 
 composition inherited from yjur mother no 
 
 .') individually, I 
 
 1th rno that the time 
 
 tg when SI >e abolished. You 
 
 go and read Pop- .-ages 11 
 
 iblime O'.nr.fio-ition. See how he treab 
 the subject. I don't know that Pope was an 
 Abolitionist, though great and inspired poets are 
 Vpttobe. Horner care was, the Bible 
 
 . and though I can't stop 
 ider the question as to whether Pope 
 >!itionist or not, I can say that he 
 very good company if he was. How 
 it may be, I In; an expression 
 
 part of Lincoln as to what was going 
 to be ; but if you will read the rest of the pas- 
 sage. ,' that he tells you that while 
 
 he thinks that s^:h things are sure to come to 
 iisturb the present 
 
 : '-tier of things in the 'Union for the 
 
 purpose of effecting or hastening such a re- 
 sult. .-'. .'rard and Lincoln agree 
 
 iiat there is an ''irrepres* 
 
 icr any- 
 in the world, the heart of the slave will 
 
 -ill sirug-i 
 be him, and he will i; 
 
 :1 can't help standing up and saying, 
 ' Hurrah fur the weak) 
 
 to our party 
 
 the term "^boUti .uionist," are alto- 
 
 gether out . , . half dreams that 
 
 'site race, 
 for civil . lom every- 
 
 But it wo'ild seern that my friendly inquirer 
 does not rememlx 
 
 
 
 
 
 Gonatitu 
 flion of '.-lanand a - 
 
 <ion to the wisdom 
 and Pr 
 
 permit me to say 
 JP T fear ,;n and Hamlin, and men of 
 
 Five negroes Ii 
 
 i'lil 
 
 at num- 
 itative 
 
 givea 
 
 1 effect, That 
 s h ird . ; u the bond, and we abide it 
 
 f lutbeas COTJ> rial by 
 
 >id jurors are 
 to be trusted, but that a black man accused of 
 
 
 
[16] 
 
 being a runaway slave -hall be delivered up to 
 you on your simple affidavit. That is hard, but 
 we will abide iy it. 
 
 As Hammond (Senator) said the otl< 
 the South has administered the Government for 
 sixty years. lie asks if they may not safely do 
 it for sixty years more. Th- 
 we think that wo will try the business. (Ap- 
 plause). There need be no fear 
 The Government which our fathers 'bunded will 
 not be broken up by us. No threat of disunion, no 
 hard names, no fear of outside feuds shall drive 
 we froni the broad, .uminous path of right and 
 duty. (Applause.) In the presence of God 
 looking Yip reverently to Him while we say it 
 -..us declare that Freedom, in this 
 great Government, is the rule, and slavery but 
 the exception. (Great applause.) Slavery is the 
 exception marked, guarded, hedged in and pro- 
 tected ; there let it remain. (Applause.) Let it 
 elaun its' just righcs, and possess them if we 
 are to be accessory to all its vices and errors If 
 even public opinion is not to be allowed to visit 
 its dusky check too roughly let that be so; 
 but beyond \vhat is nominated in the bond, we 
 will not ar,d dare not go. We live in a day of 
 a in an advancing generation. "We 
 Sve in the presence of the whole world. "We are 
 w like a c : ty set on a hill which cannot be hid.'' The 
 tears and hopes and sighs of all 
 good men are with us, of us. 
 and for r.ic, I dar 
 
 that portion. Here then, v v y-;.rs 
 
 { by Freedom, and 
 
 where in my earliest youth my feet were planted, 
 there my manhood and my age shall inarch. And 
 for one, I arn not ashamed of Freedom. I know 
 her power. I rejoice in her majesty. I walk 
 beneath her banner. I glory in her strength. I 
 have seen Freedom in history, again and again; 
 with mine own eyes I have watched her again 
 and again, struck down on a hundred chosen 
 fields of b;; I 
 
 I have seen her friends fly from her ; I have 
 seen her foes gather aroijnd her; I have seen 
 them bind her to the stake; I have seen them 
 give her ashes to the wind? regatherimr them 
 again that they might scatter them yet more 
 
 ; but when her foes turned to exu^ 1 
 seen her again meet them face to face, resplen- 
 dent in complete steel and brandishing in her 
 strong right hand a flaming sword, red with in- 
 sufferable light. (Tenific cheering and -tpplause, 
 the and r - ^d pealing 
 
 cheer). And I take courage. Thepeo}- 1 
 around her. The Genius of America will, at last, 
 
 -,-nia! once in four years, ac- 
 ; to The appointed ln\> r you Assemble to 
 conduct a complete, yet in H > peaceful 
 
 revolution. No d. . ' : '<> day. Dis- 
 
 union is far from us. Tie hc:;u't of the people 
 
 'ill roll 
 
 on in r ! ( >iain, 
 
 hon- - rm. Let i;s 
 
 do it well. AT 
 after all. the best onion is a good cause. On 
 
 this Pacific coast we have labored Ion- 
 heretofore, with little ho. 
 
 viled; even scoffed at, bclea.7ured and 
 beset. It is but a year ago. a few days past, 
 since I, your humble an-; ''estul cham- 
 
 pion, was beaten in . beaten 
 
 though obtaining a vo1 >est ex- 
 
 pectations, for the offie- five in 
 
 Congress. "With my heart brm>,- .1 my ambition 
 somewhat wonnded, my hopes crushed and de- 
 stroyed, it was my fortune, one week later. j o 
 stand by the bedside of my slaughtered friend 
 Broderick, who fell in your cause and on your 
 behalf, (sensation) and I cried aloud, how loud ! 
 0, bow long! shall the hopes of Freedom and 
 her Champion be thus crushed forever and for- 
 ever T 1 
 
 The tide has turned ! I regret my Jittli 
 I renew my hopes. I see better omens. The 
 warrior rests! It is true he is in the embrace of 
 .that sleep which knows no earthly waking. Nor 
 word, nor wish, nor prayer, nor triumph can re- 
 call him from that lone abode. (Sensation ) But 
 
 D pie lives inn. 1 '. ;;.rst us. In San Ft . 
 I know I speak to hundreds of men t< 
 perhaps to thousands who loved him in hi.; IJK-. 
 and who will be true to his memory always : 
 and if I were not before a vast assemblage of the 
 people I would say that in a higher arena it may 
 be my fortune to speak of him and for him, as I 
 will. (Great eheer 
 believe that ^ 
 
 in the midst of a people who k>\> 
 well, who are riot and never will be forgetful of 
 the manner of his life, nor of the manner of his 
 death, 
 
 People of San Francisco, I thank you for the 
 honor of your presence here to-night. You make 
 me very happy and very proud. In the contest 
 through which I have just passed, your earnest 
 desire for my success, the kindly words, Uiat 
 were spoken of and to me, cheered mo in times 
 of doubt and adversity, and infinitely heightened 
 my satisfaction in times of prosperity and tri- 
 umph. I rejoice that through circumstances 
 beyond the probable hope of any man here 
 present, a State generous, confiding beyond 
 any man's; desert, has placed rue where I can 
 show that I really do feel in the deeps of my 
 heart their trust in me, and where, in doing that. 
 I can serve you. (Applause.) Believe ni<> that 
 as I can not as a politician merely, not as a 
 mere party follower or party lender If I can in 
 an earnest, simple, heart-felt way, show them, 
 and next to them you, the gratitude I feel for 
 favors long since and but recently bestowed, ibr 
 
 f.-.ii you 
 
 :,11 consider myself extremely happy 
 and extremely fortunate. (Great applause.) 
 And expressing to you again and again my 
 ibr the great honor you py me this night. 
 I bid you a cordial, heartfelt, affectionate, fare- 
 well. 
 
 Senator Baker retired amid a wild st-or 
 applause and cheering. 
 
 The meeting then adjourned. 
 
X