of New York was convulsed with a financial panic; and no efforts were spared to extend the alarm into all parts of the state. It was every where proclaimed that only the defeat of Lincoln could save the country from ruin. In this crisis, as heretofore, the people turned to Mr. Seward. He was pressed to speak in almost every county in the state. In one of his letters declining an invitation, he says: "My friends will ultimately excuse the delinquency I am sure, when they reflect that since the 25th of November, 1858, I have had only eighty-five days, all told, for the occupations and duties of home, while I not only enjoy no exemption, but on the contrary have more than an ordinary burden of domestic cares and responsibilities." He found time, however, to address immense assemblages at several places within the state. At the earnest request of the republicans of the city of New York, he visited that city a few days before the election, and spoke in Palace Garden, to one of the largest and most enthusiastic audiences ever seen in New York. His reception in the metropolis was flattering, indeed. At Binghamton, Fredonia, Seneca Falls, Lyons, and wherever he appeared, the people gathered to hear him, in unusual numbers. On the night before the election, as it was his custom, he addressed the people of Auburn. His speech on this occasion, although partaking of the character of a familiar counsel with neighbors and friends, was full of his usual broad and statesmanlike views. It fittingly closed the great debate.' The result of the election is too recent to need remark. Every free state gave its electoral vote for Abrahain Lincoln, except New Jersey, which voted four for Lincoln, three for Douglas. The republican majority in the state of New York was over fifty thousand. In Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota, as in the New England states the opposition seemed to have abandoned the field. In Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa the pluralities for Mr. Lincoln were unexpectedly large. Equally unexpected were the favorable results in Oregon and California. In the slave states nearly thirty thousand votes were cast in favor of Lincoln and Hamlin. As the tidings of the result spread over the free states, joyous 1 This speech, with those at New York, Seneca Falls, and other places, will be found in subsequent pages of this volume. demonstrations, in almost every city and town, burst forth, spontaneously. At Auburn the republicans celebrated the national triumph in an appropriate manner. The enthusiastic procession which paraded the streets, lighted up with fireworks and illuminations, called upon Mr. Seward. Gathering within his beautiful grounds in front of his house they insisted upon his addressing them. The demonstrations of secession, soon so flagrant, were just then revealing themselves. After a few humorous remarks in allusion to local incidents and the result of the election in their city and county,' he spoke as follows: "FELLOW CITIZENS: You have a right to rejoice. I remember that I thought it an occasion for rejoicing when the good cause we now maintain carried one ward in the city, one or two, or three towns in the county, and the state of Vermont alone in the whole country. Who then will deny our right to rejoice now when it carries all the wards in the city, all the towns in the county, all the counties in the state where its argument is fairly heard, and practically all the states in the Union which allow in law and in fact, free speech, free debates, free mails, and free and universal suffrage. It is the earnest of its universal acceptance. "But there is still greater reason to rejoice in the manner in which this success has been won. It is the verdict of the people for a principle-the republican principle the true democratic principle of equal and exact justice to all men. It is a verdict rendered purely on conviction, without passion or interest. Not a republican vote in the United States has been procured through terror, not one by bribery or corruption. Nay, every vote has been given in resistance of intimidation and corruption. I do not charge that the fusion votes or other opposition votes were largely given under such appliances. But the record of the canvass remains, and bears its testimony that the main argument of those parties was their menace of disunion, and the last reliance was money at the polls. Who will now libel the American people? Who will deny their virtue? "But this demonstration of yours has its meaning--its meaning in various relations. It recalls the past, and tells that the erroneous national policy of forty years has been retraced, reconsidered, reversed, condemned and renounced. Let, then, the passions and the prejudices be buried with the errors of the past. It bears on the future. It assures us that hereafter the policy of the country will be the development of its resources, the increase of its strength and its greatness, by the agencies of freedom and humanity. Dismiss we, then, the future, until some new election call you again to your council chambers, to renew your efforts in obedience to the principle that eternal vigilance is the tax we pay for enduring liberty. "The immediate question is the bearing of the occasion on the present. What is our present duty? It is simply that of magnanimity. We have learned, heretofore, the practice of patience under political defeat. It now remains to show 1 Cayuga county gave Mr. Lincoln 4,000 majority; and Auburn 450-an increase over any previous election. The gain in the state, from 1856, was nearly one hundred thousand. the greater virtue of moderation in triumph. That we may do this let us remember that it is only as a figure of speech that the use of martial terms, such as 'defeat' and 'victory,' obtain in our system of elections. The parties engaged in an election are not, never can be, never must be, enemies, or even adversaries. We are all fellow citizens, Americans, brethren. It is a trial of issues by the force only of reason; and the contest is carried to its conclusion, with the use only of suffrage. "An appeal lies from the people this year to the people themselves next yearto be argued and determined in the same way and so on forever. This is indeed a long way to the attainment of rights and the establishment of interests. It is our way, however, now as it has been heretofore. Let it be our way hereafter. If there be among us or in the country those who think that marshaling armies or pulling down the pillars of the republic is a better, because a shorter way, let us not doubt that if we commend our way by our patience, our gentleness, our affection towards them, they, too, will, before they shall have gone too far, find out that our way, the old way, their old way as well as our old way, is not only the shortest but the best. Fellow citizens, I should do injustice to you, and violence to my own feelings, if I did not recognize in this visit a warm and most generous demonstration of your personal kindness to me. You know how deeply I was committed to the triumph of this presidential ticket more than to any other in times that are past, and to its triumph more distinct and emphatic, if possible, here than any where else. How the eyes of patriots in every part of the country were anxiously fixed on this state, on this county, nay, even on this town, to learn whether we were true to this crisis, to our cause, our country, and to ourselves. This lent a new and intense earnestness to your efforts, and our success, therefore, has exceeded all that we dared to promise, though not what we dared to hope. The year 1860, how many acts of home kindness has it brought to me from all my neighbors. My welcome from abroad-sympathy with me in my labors for the country at Washington—the rescue of my dwelling from fire during my absence-co-operation with me, so earnest, so devoted, so effective in securing the ascendancy of the republican cause throughout the Union, these congratulations on its success—I feel them all more deeply, more gratefully, than I dare express. May you all find your rewards in the increasing happiness and growing greatness of our country. "And now we part again. You to lay aside the emblems of your political association, at least for a time, and to return to your industrial pursuits and social enjoyments. I to return to the theatre of public duty at the national capital. May a kind Providence spare all your lives and continue all the blessings you enjoy, and when we meet again in the coming spring season, when these now naked trees shall have resumed their wonted foliage, may our hearts be renewed in their mutual affections and may all the sullen and angry clouds which seem to be gathering in the political atmosphere have then given place to those serene and auspicious skies, which properly belong to the only pure and complete republican system to be found on the face of the earth.” The triumph in the country of the principles which Mr. Seward, through his whole public life, has so perseveringly sustained, was not more distinctly announced by the election of Abraham Lincoln than it was significantly confessed in congress by the prompt admission of Kansas into the Union a Free State. The bill for the admission of Kansas passed the senate on the twenty-first day of January, 1861, and received the signature of President Buchanan on the thirtieth. Mr. Seward, on moving to take up the bill, and while urging its immediate passage, pertinently remarked that "If any people have the right to self-government, it is the people of Kansas." The senators who voted for admission, were Messrs. Anthony, Baker, Bigler, Bingham, Bright, Cameron, Chandler, Clark, Collamer, Crittenden, Dixon, Doolittle, Douglas, Durkee, Fessenden, Fitch, Foot, Foster, Grimes, Hale, Harlan, Johnson of Tennessee, King, Latham, Morrill, Pugh, Rice, Seward, Simmons, Sumner, Ten Eyck, Thompson, Trumbull, Wade, Wilkinson and Wilson-36. Those who voted against it were Messrs. Benjamin, Bragg, Clingman, Green, Hemphill, Hunter, Iverson, Johnson of Arkansas, Kennedy, Mason, Nicholson, Polk, Powell, Sebastian, Slidell and Wigfall-16. As soon as the Electors had formally ratified the choice of the people, the president elect tendered to Mr. Seward the chief place in his cabinet, which, after some deliberation, was accepted, and became known to the public. On the twelfth day of January he expressed his views in the senate "On the State of the Union." He had previously, in New York, at the "New England Dinner," made some unpremeditated remarks on the same subject, and subsequently, in the senate, he delivered a second speech, on the occasion of his presenting a mammoth petition from the merchants of New York. These speeches produced, in congress and throughout the country, a profound sensation.' The first speech begins with this declaration: "I avow my adherence to the Union, in its integrity and with all its parts, with my friends, with my party, with my state, with my country, or without either, as they may determine; in every event, whether of peace or of war, with every consequence of honor or dishonor, of life or death." It closes in the same spirit and with that consistency which marks all that Mr. Seward says: "I certainly shall never, directly or indirectly, give my vote to establish or sanction slavery in the common territories of the United States, or anywhere else in the world." 1 They will be found at the close of this volume. The scenes attending its delivery in the senate, are thus described by a listener: "Mr. Seward's speech was the event of the week, and is the topic of discussion in all political circles. The scene before and during the delivery of the speech, was almost unparalleled in the senate. By ten o'clock every seat in the galleries was filled, and by eleven the cloak rooms and all the passages were choked up, and a thousand men and women stood outside of the doors waiting to catch the words of the speaker when he should commence. He did not open his speech til nearly one o'clock. Several hundred gentlemen come on from Baltimore to hear it, and the curiosity among all the southern men here to listen to it was intense. The southern senators and representatives paid the utmost attention, and the galleries were as quiet as their suffocating condition would warrant. It was the fullest house of the session, and by far the most respectful one. During the delivery of portions of the speech, senators were in tears. When the sad picture of the country, divided into two confederacies, was presented, Mr. Crittenden, who sat immediately before the orator, was completely overcome by his emotions, and bowed his white head to weep." The eminent Quaker poet and philanthropist, John G. Whittier, on reading the speech, addressed the following lines to Mr. Seward: To William H. Seward. Statesman, I thank thee!—and, if yet dissent Of Peace, for wise calm words that put to shame He may be bravest who, unweaponed, bears A wreath whose flowers no earthly soil has known, And the peacemaker be forever blest! |