Of Aristocratic Family-Graduates at Yale-Studies Law-Moves to St. Louis-Cultivates the Germans-Goes to the Legislature--Starts the "Democrat"-Elected to the United States Senate-Governor of Mis- souri-His Characteristic Traits-A Habitual Bolter and Extremist- How he Doubled on his Track as to Amnesty-Brown and the School- Greeley's Letter of Acceptance-Henry Wilson's ditto-Scraps from Greeley's Paper-A Secessionist through 1860-61-62-Converted to Republicanism-Eulogizes Grant's Administration Repeatedly-What the Tribune Said for Grant in 1870 and 1871-Sumner's Falsehood Concerning Stanton Exposed-" Bayonet Legislation "—Of What it Consists-The New Tax Law-Burdens Lifted from the People-Elec- tion Statistics-National and State Governments-Presidential Tickets in the Field-Sumner Rebuked by a Fellow-Abolitionist-Greeley's Intrigues with the Democracy-The Two Charges against Grant-Ne- HISTORY OF THE Republican Party. CHAPTER I. Its Origin and Organization-The Philadelphia Convention of 1856—The First Platform-The Fremont Campaign-Lecompton-A Pro-Slavery Constitution--The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858, Etc. In its origin the Republican party was a development into organized form of the principles of freedom. In its organization it was the fusion of political elements which had always before refused to coalesce. In the year 1852 there were three parties in the Union, presenting three presidential tickets to the American people. These were the Democratic, the Whig, and the Free Soil parties. In that year the Democratic party gained an overwhelming victory, carrying a large majority of the popular suffrage, and all the votes of the electoral college except those of Massachusetts, Vermont, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Under this crushing defeat the Whig party was destroyed. During the administration of President Pierce, who had been elected in 1852, an event occurred which greatly aroused the country, and broke up old party ties. This was the introduction and passage by Congress of the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, repealing the famous Missouri Compromise of 1820. Large numbers of Democrats, especially throughout all the Northern States, refused to sustain this measure, and the Democratic party, so triumphant in 1852, almost everywhere met with disastrous defeat in the elections of 1854. This defeat would, doubtless, have been even more disastrous but for the fact that the disruption of parties, caused by the elections of 1852 and the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, had been too recent to allow the organization of a permanent political party. There appears to be a temporary necessity for a "make shift" organization, and this was found in the "Know Nothing" party. Of a narrow creed and with secret workings, it was necessarily of short duration. Meantime, the anti-slavery discussion of the Abolitionists had been doing its perfect work. The Abolitionists had for many years received the hearty moral sympathies of many of the purest and ablest men in the old Whig and Democratic parties. The literature and the best journalism of the country were long thus in moral sympathy with what was generally denounced in political circles as "crazy fanaticism." A novel of great literary merit and wonderful popularity-Mrs. Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin"-had taught the people to believe in the gross political immorality of slavery. And hence there was a logical fitness, and apparent national necessity for the formation of a party to be built upon the broad basis of freedom. And it was upon this broad basis, large numbers of people being now ready therefor, that the Republican party was organized early in 1856. The application of the doctrine was not in the abolition of slavery, but in its confinement to the localities in which it then existed. This involved no breach of fundamental law, and tended to accomplish two great benefits: First, the dedication of our vast Western domain to freedom; secondly, the destruction of the political despotism of the Slave Power. The first great triumph of the party was in the admission of Kansas as a free State; and this was a most refreshing demonstration-that the political despotism of the Slave Power had received a mortal wound. FULLY ORGANIZED AT PHILADELPHIA. But before this the party had been regularly organized in national convention. Much, also, had been done toward its organization in some of the states during the years 1854 and 1855. Its first national convention was held at the city of Pittsburgh, Penn., February 22d, 1856. An address written by Henry J. Raymond, the editor of the New York Times, was adopted, but no nominations were made. The regular nominating convention assembled at Philadelphia, on the following 17th |