Liberty parties - were chosen to attend the Buffalo convention, and a State committee of fourteen was appointed, of which Mr. Adams was chairman. Mr. Paine and Mr. Hart, of Rhode Island, made earnest and effective addresses. Amasa Walker and Joshua Leavitt followed with warm appeals for unity among Democrats, Whigs, and all others, against these persistent and alarming encroachments of the Slave Power. Lewis D. Campbell, a delegate to the national convention, was then introduced by Mr. Wilson. He vividly protrayed the proceedings of that body and the scenes which transpired in the convention; said he had given a written pledge to the people of his district that he would vote for no man not pledged to Whig principles and against the extension of slavery, and he proclaimed his purpose to return to Ohio and give back to his constituents the authority they had intrusted to his hands; and then he said: "I will take my position, and it will be right."

The address and resolutions were then unanimously adopted. The convention was afterwards addressed by Mr. Giddings, who was welcomed with a most enthusiastic greeting. His address, too, was received with the most lively expressions of satisfaction. Mr. J. C. Lovejoy, then a member of the Liberty party, spoke with vigor and effect. Charles Francis Adams laid down with clearness and precision the fundamental principles of liberty, and applied them to the existing condition of the nation. Charles Sumner followed, in a speech of great thoroughness and force; not only enunciating the commanding principles of liberty, but foreshadowing with confidence and hope the time when they should be embodied in the actual and triumphant policy of the State and nation.

Fletcher Webster and a few of his father's friends were present, not to take part in, but to note, the proceedings of the occasion. E. Rockwood Hoar said in his admirable speech, which was listened to with marked attention, that he was authorized to say that Mr. Webster had not committed himself to the support of General Taylor, and also that he and his friends sympathized with the purposes of the convention. It was the hope enkindled by these assurances which prompted

that convention of earnest, resolute, and hopeful men to declare that Massachusetts still looked to Daniel Webster to uphold before the country the policy of the free States; that she was relieved to know that he had not advised the support of General Taylor; and that she invoked him, at that crisis, "to turn a deaf ear to the 'optimists' and quietists,' and to speak and act as his heart and his great mind shall lead him."

6

Upon a pressing invitation of Fletcher Webster, Mr. Allen. and Mr. Wilson, a day or two after the convention, visited Boston to confer with Mr. Webster in regard to political affairs. But he was absent from the city. On his return, Mr. Wilson called again at his office. Mr. Webster commended very highly the resolutions and the address of the Worcester convention, and expressed his confidence. in the gentlemen who had called it and participated in it, many of whom he recognized not only as political but personal friends. In response to a question as to the purposes of those engaged in the movement, Mr. Wilson replied that they intended to create and combine a public sentiment which would uphold those statesmen who were in favor of the Wilmot proviso, and break down those who opposed it; that they desired to unite all those who would resist and overthrow the dominating influences of the Slave Power, and restore the government to the policy of its founders; that, in fact, they would make “a North." Mr. Webster replied with much feeling that there had never been a North; that, when he and others had striven to resist the demands of the South, they had been overborne by Northern men, by the representatives of such States as Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania. He admitted that if the proposed convention at Buffalo could so concentrate public sentiment as to sustain those who were true to Northern rights and interests, they would achieve a great and much-desired result. But he doubted their ability to do it. The South had long controlled the government, was in possession of power, and had vast and controlling influences at its command.

For weeks, however, he continued to avow opposition to the

nomination of General Taylor. Even after the Buffalo convention, he told his friends that he could stand on its platform. But he soon yielded to the pressure, and avowed his purpose to support the nomination, although he had previously characterized it as "not fit to be made." This sad confession and course of Mr. Webster afford an illustration of, as well as a key to, the political history of the nation from the start. In avowing his readiness to accept the Buffalo platform, of which the Wilmot proviso was the corner-stone, and yet actually supporting a platform the distinctive feature of which was that it rejected that proviso, he did nothing more nor worse than the nation had long been doing, - attempting to combine and harmonize the antagonistic elements of republicanism and despotism, of freedom and chattelhood; announcing the grandest doctrines of human rights, and largely incorporating them into its laws and practical legislation, and yet making no secret of its purpose to maintain and give vigor to the baldest and most oppressive system of slavery, individual and social, the world had ever seen. Though always aware of this inconsistency, and restive under its imputation, it still went on with these two conflicting civilizations. It proclaimed the doctrine of the Declaration, recognized with Washington that intelligence and morality were the "two pillars" on which alone free institutions could securely rest, and sought its own elevation and improvement by developing its resources of matter and mind while subject and yielding to forces, old and new, to which it was ever and necessarily exposed. At the same time it sought with equal and direct purpose to repress and restrain, to darken and degrade, a large fraction of its population, because ignorance and restraint were the only conditions by which slavery could be maintained.

Buffalo convention.

CHAPTER XIII.

BUFFALO CONVENTION.

- Mr. Chase president of the delegated convention. — Mr. Adams president of mass convention. - Unity and enthusiasm. - Governor Slade's letter. King's. — Platform. - Speeches of Adams, Giddings, Butler, Grover, White, Nye, Stanton, Briggs, May, Mahan, Bibb, Bird, and Sedgwick. - Van Buren's letter. - Van Buren and Adams nominated. - Van Buren's letter of acceptance. Popular feeling. - State conventions in Massachusetts, New York, and Ohio.- Movements in the Southern States. - The

canvass.

-

On the 9th of August, 1848, the opponents of slavery extension met in convention at Buffalo. Salmon P. Chase was chairman of the delegated convention, and Charles Francis Adams presided over the mass meeting. A tent had been prepared large enough to accommodate the thousands who gathered there. Mr. Adams stated the reasons for the call which had brought them there, and enunciated the general principles on which the new organization must be based. He declared that they were "under a necessity" to denounce the old organization of parties as no longer worthy of the confidence of the American people. "Set up your standard," he said, "of freedom and truth,- everything for the cause, and nothing for men. Let your deliberations then proceed, and may the Divine blessing rest upon the result, so that we can take one step forward to realize that great idea of our forefathers, the model of a Christian commonwealth."

Unity of feeling, opinion, and action seemed to pervade the convention. The Rev. William Wilson, pastor of the Church of the Covenanters in Cincinnati, sent a despatch which read like a summons to battle. It urged the convention to " exhibit one issue, one front, one nomination; courage! enthusiasm! anticipate victory!" Governor Slade of Vermont, in a letter to Mr. Giddings, which was read, pleaded for union.

"Union," he said, "should be our watchword. Divided we have fallen, and divided we must forever fall, before the allgrasping, overreaching, and never-satisfied power of slavery." He would not, he said, to prevent slavery extension, take Taylor to defeat Cass; for "we should have it under either, and should therefore take neither."

Stirring and eloquent speeches were made. Earnestness, deep convictions, and devotion to the cause, were everywhere manifest. "Let the men of deepest principle," said Mr. Peck of Connecticut, "manifest the most profound condescension and the deepest humility to-day, and posterity will honor them for the deed." Preston King of New York introduced three resolutions, prepared by Mr. Chase, declaring that it was the duty of the Federal government to relieve itself from all responsibility for the extension and continuance of slavery wherever it had authority; that it was not responsible for slavery in the States; and that the only safe means of preventing the extension of slavery into free territory was to prohibit its existence there by act of Congress.

Benjamin F. Butler of New York, from the Committee on Resolutions, reported fifteen, in which were embodied the clearly defined principles of the new organization. They declared that the members of the convention, obedient to the example of the fathers, and trusting in God, aimed to plant themselves upon the national platform, of freedom, in opposition to the sectional platform of slavery; that, slavery being a State institution, they proposed no interference with it by Congress; that the history of the ordinance of 1787 showed the settled policy of the fathers not to extend, but to limit slavery; that the fathers ordained the Constitution to secure the blessings of liberty; that Congress had no more power to make a slave than to make a king; that the national government should relieve itself from all responsibility for the existence of slavery; that Congress should prohibit slavery by law in all free territory; that they accepted the issue forced upon them by the Slave Power; and that their calm and final answer was: No more slave States, no more slave territory, no more compromises with slavery; and freedom for Oregon, California, and New Mexico.