'S^^ljM|§j^^iiii j^ossi?^ , BOSTON 1 A % CONDJTA>"- w. lllii iiSii ft \^2 HK9K» mm IWWm W^ff ill |1 w$ mm Ml fill «1 sip iti /A\f(ft/i |( 8te nBuV^fHAflvfl ■ 1 /JI ill ffrL ffe'W / ^ ♦ «* ^ ORATION DELIVERED BEFORE THE City Council and Citizens of Boston, WITH COMPLIMENTS OF John J. Teevens, Jr. Common Council, Ward 14. BOSTON: PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE CITY COUNCIL. MDCCCLXXXIX. ( Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries http://www.archive.org/details/orationdelivered1889swif ORATION DEUVKRED BEFORE THE City Council and Citizens of Boston, ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTEENTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, JULY 4, 1889. GEI. JOHI L. SWIFT. BOSTON: PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE CITY COUNCIL. MDCCCLXXXIX. 53S1S CITY OF BOSTON. In Board of Aldermen, July 15, 1889. Ordered, That the thanks of the City Council be hereby expressed to Gen. John L. Swift, for the patriotic and eloquent Oration delivered by him before the city authori- ties on the Fourth of July, in commemoration of the One Hundred and Thirteenth Anniversary of American Inde- pendence, and that he be requested to furnish a copy thereof for publication. Passed unanimously. Sent down for concurrence. HOMER ROGERS, Chairman. In Common Council, September 12, 1889. Concurred unanimously. HORACE G. ALLEN, President. Approved September 14, 1889. THOMAS N. HART, Mayor. A true copy. Attest : JOHN T. PRIEST, Ass't City fMgffci. THE AMERICAN CITIZEN. To have advanced from three millions of dis- contented Colonists, stating their grievances to mankind, to sixty-five millions of contented citizens commemorating, with unbounded delight and amid scenes of exhilaration, the mighty circumstance, is proof of " what a day may bring forth." In obedience to usage, and by invitation of the Mayor of Bostou, we gather to do honor to the Fourth of July, 1776, because of an event of such magnitude that it changed the current of history and reconstructed the map of the world. Without that event, there would not have been an American nation, as we know it; and by that event new mean- ing was given to human rights, and a grander range and loftier hope to human government. This day, because of that event, is set apart for celebration, and it is our duty to celebrate. For that purpose we are here — not to sermonize, not for antiquarian information, nor to warm up general history. We have met for congratulation upon the national 6 ORATION. record already made, and for encouragement con- cerning the record to be made, by a people drawing their political life from the Declaration of Indepen- dence just read in our hearing. If anywhere a patriotic praise-meeting is proper, and a lecture or treatise out of place, it is here. A long line of eloquent citizens has performed this task of recognition, and there seems to be no sentiment of enthusiasm left unexpressed, nor incident of interest unmentioned. On a like service to this, a former speaker observed of the mission of contemporary nations: "France says, r I polish the world; ' Germany says, ? I educate the world; ' Eng- land says, ? I circumnavigate the world;' America says, c I liberate the world.' ' These achievements fall far short of the sublime purpose of the "Momen- tous Declaration." That glorious message to the world expressed, for the first time, a measureless future for man organized by consent under laws and constitutions. As the third and last of the primal and inseparable rights of men, it declared " pursuit of happiness " to be the end of the institution of government. This complete and original statement of final governmental concern gives to this day its significance and abiding force. We are Americans in fact as well as by title, just so far as we have faith in the " self-evident truths," JULY 4, 18 89. 7 the proclamation of which makes this day memo- rable. Ah! Declarations of Independence alone do not make history. "When Benjamin Franklin was told that the war for independence had been success- fully closed : " Say rather," said he, " the War of the Revolution ; the war for independence has yet to be fought." In the bitterness of severe discipline, it was learned that no mere announcement of rights, nor years of harrowing and destructive war, nor brilliant strategy over Cornwallis, nor reluctant acknowledgment of independence wrung from a monarch, could bring peace, plenty, and order to the American struggle. The distress and despair of the " League of Friendship " was so widespread that union and prosperity under a common government seemed hopeless. It is not for us to dwell upon the bankruptcy, poverty, hardships, and dissensions which marked the years of the Confederation, when our fathers had ceased to be English subjects, but had not become American citizens. Dark, indeed, were the clouds that lowered over this critical stage of the great experiment for self- government. The obstacles to the consummation of nationality and citizenship seemed so near to being insurmountable that Washington had, with regard to the condition of affairs, grave misgivings. 8 ORATION. In a letter written in 1783 to Lafayette, "Wash- ington said : " We are placed among the nations of the earth, and have a character to establish; but how we shall acquit ourselves time must discover. The probability is (at least I fear it) , that local or State politics will interfere too much with the more liberal or extensive plan of government which wis- dom and foresight, freed from the mist of prejudice, would decide. . . . The honor, peace, and true interest of the country must be measured by a conti- nental scale, and every departure therefrom weakens the Union, and may ultimately break the bonds that hold us together. To arrest these evils, to frame a new constitution that will give consistency, stability, and dignity to the Union, and sufficient power to the great councils of the nation for general purposes, is to-day incumbent on every man who desires well to his country, and will meet with my aid so far as it can be rendered in the private walks of life." It has been said, " that the whole earth is a monument of great characters." Washington is greatest as a founder of this nation, and the greatness of the nation is his proudest monu- ment. Only when he left the walks of private life for the highest public station was the failure of self- government by our fathers arrested. He came to the heights of civil power at the bidding of the JULY 4, 1889. 9 people, who saw in him a true leader. There are those who never tire of reminding us that George Washington was an Englishman. Lord Chesterfield, when Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, was asked who was the greatest man in Ireland, and replied, " The last man who arrives from England, whoever he may be." Equally Anglo-maniacal is the fondness, in our day, to blazon as the last and leading merit of Washington that he was English. He was born a subject of Great Britain; but his early life, in its dependence upon personal exertions and its social surroundings, was in strong contrast to English social pretensions, and, thank God, he helped to found another and better citizenship for himself and all Americans. Specialists have collected data about him, eulogists have commented on his self-control and magnanimity, poets over his virtues have sounded unstinted praise, but vain is the attempt to com- pute our debt to Washington. He had paid $72,000 in personal expense during the Revolutionary War, and the unpaid soldiers knew he had refused recom- pense. The people knew that he had spurned offers or suggestions to be king or dictator, and their be- lief in him was without flaw of distrust. Honoring and endeared to him, they followed him in taking the great step towards national consolida- tion within guarded constitutional bounds. When, 10 ORATION. with his tall and commanding form, he bent over the jsacred page to record his vow of fidelity to the Union and the Constitution, he was the first to pledge support to the nation, as it then received the breath of life. He thns became, to quote the words of his honored successor, Benjamin Harrison, w The First American Citizen." In the then Federal capi- tol, April 30, 1789, when, by authority of the people, George Washington assumed the functions of the Federal President, there was inaugurated with its undreamed destinies that unique, potential citizen- ship which we now enjoy. Then came the fusion of the two forces of pro- vincial autonomy and continental power, which, in its results, and through its inexhaustible resources, still continues to amaze the world. The story of America takes its admirers into the regions of wonder and romance. In the fifth century, Clovis founded the French Monarchy. Eleven hundred years have passed since Egbert was "styled King of England." Ancestors of Prussian rulers built homes on the Danube more than a thousand years back. The American Re- public has existed a century ; and France, Eng- land, Germany, individually, show fewer millions of population and fewer billions of property than does our young nation. In count of heads Asia JULY 4, 1889. 11 far exceeds us. In display of precious stones the diamonds of an Indian prince, flashing the light of ages, outshine even the gems of a centennial ball. To see galleries of art and baronial castles, and to know the courtly manners of highest breed- ing, older countries must be visited. For remains of ancient architecture, mouldering in magnificent ruins, we go to Babylon and Egypt. But ask where agriculture reaps its greatest harvests, where mines pour out the most abundant treasures, where machinery is most active and railroads are most numerous, and telegraph and telephone wires are busiest in interchanging communications the world over, and the answer is found to be, the land in which we live. The alleviation of the human race, and not the splendor of its decay, is our chiefest jewel. Nineteen millions of daily earners of wages, delving beneath the earth, tilling the soil, toiling in factory, foundry, furnace, and in all mechani- cal arts, and paid better than elsewhere for their service ; increasing commerce on inland seas and navigable rivers, with busy craft to vex their sur- face for four thousand four hundred miles, — these make interesting even dry statistics. Expan- sion does not weaken our national system. Wher- ever the American citizen halts in his search 12 ORATION. for settlement, the free school, the right to unim- paired religious liberty, home-rule by equal and honest ballot, and the reserved force to establish the lawful will of the majority, spring up as the source and safeguards of social order. Forty-two sovereign and self-ruled commonwealths make our sisterhood of States, bounded by two oceans, and stretching from the tropical borders of the South- ern gulf, until our territory touches the frozen deserts of the Northern pole. With this vast reach of power, never could the words " one and indivisible " more justly describe our national unity and strength as on this day we celebrate. The American eagle of right spreads its eager wings for a sunward flight to-day, while our hymns tell us : — " Goodly wore thy tents, O Israel ! Spread along the river's side ; Bright thy star which rose prophetic, Herald of dominion wide. Fairer are the homes of freedom, Scattered o'er our broad domain ; Brighter is our rising day-star, Ushering in a purer reign." " Not purer reign ! " exclaim those who regard themselves as the " saving remnant," and who dis- trust numbers and fear majorities. " Is the whiskey scandal, the Tweed ring, or the electoral peculiar- ities of 1876 forgotten?" they ask. Not at all! JULY 4, 1889. 13 The whiskey scandal, born in the wild period of inflation, is not forgotten; but it is remembered with satisfaction that it exists no longer. The Tweed ring is not forgotten, nor the uprising that drove its participants, now to Canada, now to Europe, and now to Sing Sing. The election of 1876, with its six of one and half a dozen of the other, in its sharp practice and its arithmetical conclusion of eight to seven is not forgotten; but with grat- ification it is recognized that law will prevent hereafter a similar strain upon our system. The earlier views of the national situation give an impression that, as a rule, the burden upon those by whom they were expressed was to state, with great precision and frequency, the certainty of our national doom. Mournfully they maintained that our fate was sealed, and according to the oratorical programme of the greater part of the century, we ought not at this time to be as a .nation alive and well. Rhetoric has often pointed the people to supposed ruin staring them in the face; but the people have persistently declined to be ruined, and are very far from it on this recurrence of our day of jubilee. It has been customary — and the habit lingers — to paint " politics " in the blackest colors. Sodom and Gomorrah, the Trojan Horse, and the Whited Sepulchre are a few of 14 ORATION.- the unsavory parallels with which partisan spirit has been associated. Long ago our temple of lib- erty was to have been laid waste by party rancor and infamy. ^Notwithstanding these storm-signals, portending tempest and havoc, more than three- score millions of Americans see that fair temple rising to grand proportions, with untarnished walls resting on unmoved foundations. The last national canvass, one of great political interest and activity, is conceded to have been one of great political courtesy. It was, more than any political contest since the Monroe " era of good feeling," orderly, free from riotous proceeding, and mainly void of personalities. Twice within a few years we have seen political parties change from holding power to losing it, with no friction, bad blood, or disturbance. The second President of the United States left Washington in haste to avoid, it is said, the necessity of being polite to the third President. The twenty-second President invited, previous to his successor's installation into the presidential chair, the twenty-third President to lunch at the White House. Ex-President Cleveland waited to witness the inauguration ceremonies, and to listen to the address to the country of President Harrison. This is an im- provement in presidential manners. Serious faults JULY 4, 1889. 15 in party conduct and questionable party tactics are slowly but surely being corrected. The press, now our strongest conservative force, by giving publicity to political indiscretions, assists the tend- ency towards reform within party lines, where reform means a genuine political advancement. Whoever with care examines the orations made before our authorities on this day, — a list of which has, by the courtesy of an official of the Public Li- brary, been furnished me, 1 — will not fail to observe the apprehension once prevalent, that an ambitious soldier, in full regimentals, was, at some period, to cast his gleaming sword into the political scale to lift despotism into power. The "man on horse- back," as the " Atlantic Caesar," has been a familiar spectre of the past. Nine soldiers, all generals by title, have been elected Presidents of the United States. Had they lived out their terms, and should the present incumbent conclude his limit of service, it would make forty-eight out of one hun- dred and four years of our national existence under rule of military chieftains. Who of them has turned out despot or dictator? Was it George Washing- ton, the hero of Yorktown? or Andrew Jackson, the hero of the New Orleans? or William Henry Harrison, the hero of Tippecanoe? or Zachary Tay- 1 See Appendix. 16 ORATION. lor, the hero of Monterey? or Grant, the hero of Appomattox? — all of whom were at times officers in the regular army. The volunteer generals, — Pierce, Hayes, Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, — all of them, with their men, gallantly fought for the nation. Did any one of them become " the man on horseback," to lead us into " Csesarism"? Our great soldiers have been, and shall continue to be, men of peace and patriots, and the dread of a military tyrant has gone forever. It was also assumed, in the old days, that the Bank of the United States, from its corrupt political combinations, would be a peril to the nation. The Bank of 1816 had a capital of $35,000,000, and Gov- ernment owned $7,000,000, — a fifth of the stock. For years, by a portion of our countrymen, this institution was regarded as the untoward instrument by which ultimately the Republic would fall. Na- tional banks to-day number over 3,000, and have a capital of $764,000,000, their deposits amounting to $1,300,000,000, and their loans to $1,500,000,000, and every dollar of bills issued is as good as gold. These banks are for business purposes, and together have no more political influence, as banks, than a school picnic, a base-ball match, or a circus proces- sion. The prophets of evil who foretold that at the first shock of civil strife the nation would go JULY 4, 1889. 17 to pieces like a house made of cards, were plentiful at home and abroad. The shock of battle came. Eleven millions of determined people put their fight- ing men against the Republic. Four years, with a courage that may have been equalled but never out- done, they contested the ground, until the scene of hostility was drenched in blood; yet this nation repelled the shock, and stands to-day strong, free, and imperishable. "Are you sorry you turned out? " asked the father of James Hay ward, one of the Acton heroes who fell on the 19th of April, 1775. The father was told to look at the powder-horn and bullet-pouch of the soldier. They were both nearly empty. The dying young patriot said : " I started with a pound of powder and forty bullets. Xou see what is left! Tell mother not to mourn too much. I am not sorry I turned out. I die willingly for my country." It was men like that who made this nation, and just such men, on the battle-fields of the Civil War, went down to prevent the unmaking of the grandest Republic in its deeds and possibilities that has yet existed. It is time to stop the babble of men who tell us that the commemoration of soldiers who fought in the war that led to the Union, or in the war that saved it, tends to keep alive the animosities of the past. Honor to loyal soldiers keeps alive 18 OEATION. patriotism, and only that. A few days since, a Senator of the United States from South Carolina, in dedicating a monument to the dead of the Confederate army, said : " We regard these our dead as martyrs." So be it. ~No men fought harder and died braver for their cause than the armed Confederates. The fearful loss of our brothers in arms attests their fighting qualities. But their " cause " was to shatter the Union, and by national valor it became, to remain forever, the "lost cause." Our dead are martyrs to a cause holy to loyal memory. Ours were martyrs to a cause, the triumph of which was the greatest honor to those by whom it was maintained, and the greatest blessing of the children of the men who made war upon that cause. Union soldiers made impossible the attempt by arms to found two national days in this land. One is enough, and that one is, and is to be, the Fourth of July ! Independence day is too near Decoration day for us, while honoring the founders of the American Union in 1789, to forget those who saved the Union in 1865. It would be a strange sight if, on an occasion of this nature, no Union veterans were present. From many loyal battle-fields such soldiers are here to-day by special invitation. Some are here from the 19th Army Corps. JULY 4, 1889. 19 With us is their old commander, who in an exigency called for a thousand men as a Forlorn Hope to assault works from which our troops had been twice repulsed. It was twenty-six years ago this month, when, two thousand miles away from New England homes, these men wrote letters, thinking they might be the last to be written by them, and then waited for orders to go where death was certain to many. Surrender of the garrison to save needless slaughter made this movement unnecessary; but the men who are here to-day, were ready then, with their comrades at Port Hudson, for duty. They had no resentment to those who had thinned their ranks. It was war. They ask now for no right they would not willingly share with their old combatants; but it would be a lie if any of them should say that the cause of those who fought for the Stars and Bars was equal in right and honor to that for which they were willing to do and to die. In their presence let lips be stilled that would tell us it is the same thing to assail this nation as to defend it. Commercially the bunting decorating this audience- room with the national colors of red, white, and blue has no great value. But in memory, and as a flag, it is beyond price. This day, as the 20 ORATION. earth in its revolution turns to the East, every hour of the twenty-four the sunlight will baptize with radiance this symbol of the nation. It is to the everlasting honor of the Union soldier that never for a moment was he disloyal to the old flag. The world knows, and God knows, that to stand between that flag and the bullet aimed at it, and to fire that bullet, differs in motive, act, and consequence as much as mid- night darkness differs from the splendor of mid-day. To stand thus meant that in this Re- public there was room but for one flag, and that the Stars and Stripes. " The trials of the future will be exactly pro- portioned to the advantages of the future," is the statement of Mr. Charles Francis Adams, in one of the most instructive of our Fourth-of- July orations. Accepting this view, from our national precedents we may add that our trials will be as courageously met and successfully mastered in the future as in the past. Our safety from falling below the high-water mark we have reached lies in the vitality of the agitator and the preservative effects of agitation. To the New England American, agitation is a normal condition, and our obligation to this quality of character is incalculable. The Revolution and JULY 4, 1889. 21 the Declaration are its offspring. We look back with admiration at the boldness of men, who, for theories, with a few flintlock muskets, defied the trained armies of a king victorious on most of the conspicuous fields where his generals had fought. Of heroic stamp were those old agitators, who, educated in the tumult of town-meetings, lifted themselves to the summit of political wisdom to define the rights of man and his province of government. " The fanati- cism of to-day is the fashionable creed of to- morrow," said Wendell Phillips, an agitator derided and hissed in early life for a moral courage that feared nothing and dared everything, and when dead was borne, to lie in state, to the historical hall where his fame began. The ideal agitator can be claimed as a Boston specialty. Thriving on east wind, believing with Calvin in the perseverance of the saints, and for exercise sharpening the beak and filing the claws of the proud bird of freedom, he is the nearest approach to perpetual motion yet produced. Rude, egotistical, very angular, he introduces himself by brandishing a weapon of attack. He treads on tender feet, and smashes idols, never failing mean- while to treat with more harshness his natural friends than his natural enemies. He goes 22 OKATION. into the worrying business, if not with the rigor, at least with the persistence, of the old times when the witch was disposed of by summary exit and the Quaker by expeditious exile. But the agitator believes in destroying evils, and never accepts any terms but unconditional sur- render. E-ufus Choate once remarked of an emi- nent Massachusetts judge, who had the appearance of a lion slightly tamed, " We all feel that he is ugly, but we know that he is great." We are all aware that the political and social agitator is un- comfortable, but it is certain that he is needful. In all our history the agitator has been prominent. Far away back, in 1636, when only a few hamlets clustered around the shores that bordered Copp's, Beacon, and Fort Hills, Anne Hutchinson agitated among her sex during the week against the for- malism preached on Sunday. Her bold speech shook primitive Boston from centre to circum- ference, and from then Boston has never been without a live, but distressingly inconvenient, agi- tator. Massachusetts never blindly follows the agitator, but the State is famous for filing to the right and wheeling into line with advanced or progressive measures. Massachusetts may never again furnish a President for the Republic, or rule from weight of numbers. She may be out- JULY 4, 1889. 23 stripped in population by younger States, and may not be at the head of the column of States as it marches; but in loyalty to the best idea, and for grandeur of example, will be still at the front. Even now our agitators are on duty. They are crying out against Ninevitish sins, and loudly call to our shirking Jonahs, "Awake, thou sleeper! " Whether the agitator hoists signals to arouse minute-men to arm for freedom, or sounds with much din the radical gong to frighten puffy and unctions conservatives in their effort to block and baffle the latest movement, he always does more good than harm in tearing down in order to build wiser and stronger. He may be premature in his activity, and be over-anxious in his vigilance; better that than neglect to watch the citadel which guards our rights. If the agitator thinks that sappers and miners are at work to weaken the system of public education, which, according to Bancroft, has proved the secret of our success and glory, let him shout aloud and cease not. The danger may not be vital, but the response to the call to rally around "the old red school-house," with its modern improvements, may prevent after- plots against its welfare. It will teach that the American plan of educated childhood, by "prince, 24 ORATION. or potentate, or power," can no more be taken from the . American mind than one of our shining stars can be taken from the azure of our flag. There are some things settled — settled right, and settled forever. Among the settled things is the public school on the American basis, untrammelled by either party or sect. The statutes of Massachusetts should state as clear and distinct as Holy Writ that compulsory education must not be evaded in its main purpose of preparation for citizenship. All preliminary schools, whether public or private, must use the language of the nation in teaching, and there must be approval by the State of books and of branches taught. If our present legislators are not suffi- ciently skilful to draw a bill with this intent, we should select those who have the sense to under- stand the people, and the agitator will see that it is done. The agitator has great staying powers, and nothing but death can stop him when his conscience is awakened. Men with their brief authority deny him the right to preach in special places paid for by the people. He sees on these public grounds persons of wealth rolling by in carriages; he looks on bands of youth at sport, on picnic groups, — everywhere he sees games and amusements indulged in at seasonable times, *and JULY 4, 1889. 25 he asks, "Here in Boston, the city which Samuel Adams prayed might become a Christian Sparta, — here is everything lawful but criminals and Chris- tian teachers." '* "Why," he asks, "from the people's land am I, and those who wish to hear me, driven out for talking about ? peace on earth and good- will to men.' " " Is there," he continues, " in Massa- chusetts, the Constitution of which enjoins relig- ious freedom and the public worship, a spot so sacred to pleasure that duty to the Most High God is out of place? Any spot in the land of the pilgrims where the landscape gardener or artist is more to be revered than the landscape Maker? Any place where He who ordered the seasons and seed-time and harvests, and has poured the sunlight and glorified field and bush and tree, cannot be honored because it is consecrated to base-ball, bicycles, or baby-wagons?" If he is told that the gospel and pleasure parks are incom- patible, he replies, "I will appeal to the millions who on the Lord's day sing, — ' Waft, waft, ye winds His story, And ye, your waters roll, Till like a sea of glory It spreads from pole to pole,' to know who and what it is that rules Boston, — Christianity or commissioners." He, the agitator, 26 OKATION. knows that the majority rules Boston, whatever for the moment it may be ; and he also knows that even one with God on his side becomes at last the majority, and that the unconquerable purpose of agitation is to make the majority right. Will Boston hold six hundred acres of land, owned by the people who have been taxed for its payment, in such close bonds to the minor pleasures, that not a rod of it can be had on Sunday upon which to preach the gospel, nor a spot be found where men of labor can congregate on the Fourth of July for the exercise of free speech ? This is to be answered not with regard to holiday rights, but to human rights. This is not the time or place to ignore con- troversies certain to confront us. It would be craven to omit plain speaking upon American issues on this day in this city. Two powerful and baleful forces, each alien to the spirit and design of the Declaration, are active in all our public and influential channels, not so much to endanger our territorial unity, as to impair its usefulness by dragging down to a level of misrule by the unchristian prejudices of caste one section of the Republic, and by power of money making social disorders easier everywhere. JULY 4, 1889. 27 Sacredness of life, security to liberty by restraint of that which is enemy to it, and the least obstruction to reasonable happiness are the funda- mental principles on which hang American law and justice. Two pernicious tendencies, caste and greed, — one acting on the color line, and the other trading on human frailty, — are the eternal foes of all for which the Declaration was written and the Constitution was framed. The human weakness upon which this money-power thrives has been the bane of American civilization, from the arrival of the " Mayflower " to this day. ]^ot mine the task to picture its awful record of tears, sorrow, anguish, broken hearts, and of drops of blood scarcely dry on the stained stones of your streets. The logical conclusion from that clause in the Declaration which enjoins "pursuit of happiness," and of the Constitution interpreted by its preamble, which makes it incumbent " to provide for the com- mon welfare," is, that any combination, trust, in- terest, traffic, or conceivable movement of capital attempting by association to reap unjust profits from the people, or prosecuting a business detrimental to the public, is so essentially un-American that its legal interdiction is but a question of time. And the fact that a moneyed interest, rising to billions 28 ORATION. in amount, with its plethoric purse menaces good government from the remotest hamlet to the capital of the Republic, ought to make its control the most important of all our issues. The right of personal liberty to trade stops at the exact spot where its exercise is unsafe to the public. The jurisdiction of this momentous and unsolved problem lies within State authority, the arena of actual conflict being local decision; and there the battle will be fought out until whatever in Massachu- setts harms our homes or jeopardizes their inmates will be driven beyond popular consent or shelter of law. It is the concern of the nation rather than the State to deal with the monstrous demand of caste, that in this Republic, life, liberty, and happiness shall have one meaning for thirteen millions of citizens who are white, and wholly another meaning to seven millions of citizens who are black. Openly, un- blushingly, without denial or apology, caste disobeys and defies the Constitution of the United States. By device and jugglery of ballots if possible, by brutality of bullets if necessary, minorities in some portions of this country are, in violation of the supreme law, made to become majorities. In this our land, where life, liberty, and happiness are declared inalienable rights, on this day, this hour, the political machinery of some States and their ablest intellect JULY 4, 1889. 29 centre on methods to keep a certain class of Amer- ican citizens in political subjection to benefit another and less numerous class! Failure so to do is cor- rected by assassination ! The unavenged murder of a distinguished citizen of a sovereign State, slain while obtaining proof of his election to Congress, the certificate having illegally been given to his opponent, is evidence of the prostitution of political rights in our country. No horror of the " middle passage," when the negro was taken from his native wilds to be sold to Christian countries; no hour of misery, when, as property, the negro lifted up his fettered hands to God for help, — exceeds the inhu- manity by which one portion of our country brands millions of American-born population with deg- radation, and blots out from an entire race the in- spiration of hope, while people at large stand dumb in the presence of the shame. The first negro color-bearer to fight in the Union ranks was a soldier in the Louisiana Brigade. In reply to the charge of his captain not to dishonor the colors in action, he said : " I will carry this flag into the fight and bring it back with honor, or report in heaven the reason why." It cannot be that the American people will desert the race from which came such a hero in black. Here, where has been raised a monument to Crispus Attucks, the agita- 30 ORATION. tors who would not be still while four millions of American citizens of African descent remained in chains, will never be silent over the attempt to make seven millions of black serfs on American soil. There are supreme moments in the life of nations, as of individuals, when by vivid lightning in mid- night darkness new bearings are revealed to the bewildered traveller. We remember that a howling mob once hunted William Lloyd Garrison through the streets of Boston for his life, because he was the foe of slavery. ISow we see him seated on pedestal of stone, in enduring form, on our wealthiest avenue, surrounded by our costliest edifices, and as by a lightning flash we discover the potency of eternal justice. We remember the humiliation with which we saw, through the streets of Boston, lined with soldiery under arms, a pursued and powerless slave on his way to his so-called owner. We remember that nine years after, one thousand black soldiers in uniform marched through the same streets as part of the Massachusetts quota, stepping to that ringing chorus, " His soul goes marching on." We remem- ber that these and other soldiers in black went marching on, leaving on the battle-field 37,000 dead, ere they came back singing : — JULY 4, 1889. 31 "Blotted out! All without and all within Shall a fresher life begin. Freer breathes the universe, As it rolls its heavy curse On the dead and buried sin." Remembering this, we may trust the American people answering to the dictates of conscience to suppress the cruelties of caste, as once in the name of God they sundered the chains of the slave. Social distinctions are beyond legal regulation. Our right to select our friends and choose our society is individual. There are everywhere mean and contemptible social limitations, founded on color, on race, and on bank-books, which will exist until the world is much better than it now is. While the family with a hundred thousand dollars cannot hope to be at home in the drawing-rooms of the millionnaire, we cannot expect social fusion where caste prevails or race lines are rarely crossed. But there is one place where American citizenship shall find exact equality and justice. Poor a man may be, or rich beyond the " dream of avarice ; " swarthy or pale ; naturalized or by birth American, — one spot there will yet be where poverty must not degrade or riches give advantage, where complexion neither helps nor harms, where citizenship in all its duties 32 O K A T I N . and prerogatives is a common possession with unimpeded rights, and that spot is the American ballot-box, open for national purposes, under the protection of the American flag and supervision of national authority! Agitation will yet secure this political equality, and upon this anniversary of the immortal agita- tion of our fathers, let us extol that inherent contention planted by God in human nature, that makes it impossible to have peace without first being right. Those who sneer at agitators scoff at their betters. Agitators are servants of that invisible power which earliest detects danger to free institutions. Volunteers to watch on the walls that surround our political Zion, they sound alarm at the least suspicion of peril. Their theatre of operation is every foot of American soil, and their thoughts and their right to express them are as unchained as the folds of the American flag. Nothing is privileged against their criticism or censure. The ermine of the judge, the dignity of the statesman, the robe of the priest, do not exempt from attack those who wear them. The platforms of politicians, the platitudes of select circles, the mystic solemnities of secret orders, the pretensions and traditions of faith, the warnings of pulpits, and the author- JULY 4, 18 89. 33 ity of synods or hierarchies do not deter the agitator. His determined and fearless command " Halt ! " to whoever or whatever threatens popu- lar government is the surest guarantee of national safety. The threshold of our second national century has been crossed. We start upon its responsibilities with sounder and juster relations between capital and labor, with wider religious and broader political influence, with more effective and less partisan civil service, with better-equipped school-buildings and a constantly improving educational standard, with closer observation and truer understanding of common burdens upon a common citizenship, with an increased desire to make new homes among working men and women, and a general distri- bution of advantages among the people. There is also a growing conviction that every idea of a moral and political nature concerning human good is an imperative command to duty, that never leaves its sphere of action, but "Is like A star new born, that drops into its place, And which once circling in its placid round, Not all the tumults of the earth can shake." It is not in the power of many to be great citi- 34 ORATION. zens, but it is the power of any man to be a good citizen. To the youth of men, generations, and races come dreams of a golden age and visions of promised lands, Arcadian valleys, ideal republics, and glowing outlines of the " city which is to come." The American is rare who has not ascended some Pisgah to look over into imaginary Canaans. To believe in the conquest over evil and in the reign of good is an American instinct. Ah! we have to find that our Canaans are not external, but internal, and that the battle against evil is not to be fought on distant ground, but next door, over the way, in the adjoining' street, and the immediate neighborhood. We find that within, and not with- out, is our Celestial City. This lesson learned, — " 'Tis well! from that day forward we shall know That in ourselves our safety must be sought; That by our own right hand it must be wrought; That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low." That is the doctrine of personality and primary citizenship. The battle-ground where the immediate interest of the citizen is decided is, in the main, local. Whatever is possible in moral struggle to help society forward and upward, must be won close at hand. There the power of the people has its JULY 4, 18 89. 35 most natural expression, and there the will of the majority is most certain to be respected. There must be a controlling motive in public duties. In the constitution of things it is a com- manding necessity to cherish and shield the dom- icile. Thereon all legitimate business, all sound legislation, all proper municipal supervision, bears directly or indirectly. The public policy or private pursuit that stimulates the founding of homes, or tends towards their support and defence when established, is of the highest order of permanent blessings. The rapidly increasing prosperity in cooperative banking and building among the earning class is becoming a powerful factor in our civilization. The membership in these mutual enterprises in this State is thirty thousand, and the beneficent features of these associations cannot be over- stated. It is now demonstrated that with ordinary wages, a healthy, sober, and industrious person can, with little more outlay than average rent, become owner of a comfortable home. The Lieu- tenant-Governor, with us to-day, has long been connected with these institutions, and from his untiring zeal in their behalf he knows well their value in aiding temperance and in making good citizens. This method of capitalizing the surplus 36 ORATION. of wages, and by it inducing young men to become house-owners, serves to make them careful, sober, and thoughtful concerning their material well- being. When a citizen lives on his own land, in his own house, and pays taxes, he is not likely to be carried away with schemes for free title to land made valuable by labor or general division of property. With men owning bank-shares to procure a home, and women casting a ballot to protect home, popular government will be founded on a rock. It has been said that some men spend all their lives in hunting after righteousness, and have no spare time to practise it. So there are men who, in their anxiety to be important and distinguished personages, fail to do as citizens anything to make the world better or happier. The field of true citizenship is right around us. Loyal to the nation, and willing to live or die that it may endure ; loyal to the State, and ready at any sacrifice to maintain, without compromise or surren- der of an iota of its reserved rights, — we yet cling to the pavements on which we daily walk, and to the homes upon which our eyes so fondly look. We owe, also, loyal regard to the City of Boston. Our estimable fellow-citizen, Oliver Wendell Holmes, says the " State House is the hub of the JULY 4, 1889. 37 solar system, and that you couldn't pry that out of a Boston man if you had the tire of all creation straightened out for a crow-bar." We all, as good Bostonians, are confident of the close relation of our city with the universe. Here are our homes, where most of our lives are spent. Here we worship God unmolested. Here we greet friends and visit neighbors, and reap from existence its harvests of joy. Boston is no mean city. She is adorned with natural charms. Her waters, before mingling with the Atlantic, are studded with picturesque islands. On her southern border is a range of hills of such attractiveness that they were given by the explorer who first mapped New England, in 1614:, the name of the hills endeared to his youth. From these Blue Hills is seen the ocean, with its busy commerce; and there are dis- cerned indications of sunshine and storm. Within our bounds flows the Neponset from enchanting meadows; and the Charles, winning praise from Longfellow's verse, winds through our landscape to the sea. Here are roads smoother than the Appian Way, bordered by estates, abodes of wealth and refinement. Here are Museums of Art and of Natural History, and here is our Public Library, pioneer of the free use and distribution of books, and 38 ORATION. in volumes second only to the library at Washington. For this institution is constructing a building, in itself a work of art, where this complement to the public school — this University of the people — in its new home will more than realize the hopes of its founders. It is fitting on this patriotic day, knowing well that there is no future for our country without intelligence, to speak of this great auxiliary to free learning. It is also fitting to refer to our fellow-citizens, the trustees of the Public Library, whose constant, faithful, unremunerative, service has brought this vast trust to its highest usefulness, and by unceasing attention, will deliver to the city authorities a completed structure, where our citizens, within its spacious walls, can say, — " These chosen precincts, set apart For learned toil and holy shrines, Yield willing homes to every art That trains or strengthens or refines." Here are romantic drives, arboretums, play and pleasure grounds, owned by and free to the public, and here are shores of rocks and wide beaches and charming heights as reserves for enjoyment. To all these haunts of interest and delight, commodious vehicles, soon to be moved JULY 4, 1889. 39 with speed and comfort by electricity at trifling- cost, shall bear the people. Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, and never lost his love for it. He sought to benefit its citizens by leaving funds to purchase medals for deserving scholars, and to provide opportunities for worthy young persons to start in life. His greatest benefaction will be in making it possible to get the best return for an expenditure of five cents. Franklin is famous for having compelled electric force in nature to obey the will and serve the needs of man. ~No triumph could be more con- spicuous than that the spark coaxed from the skies by Franklin's kite should become the mightiest servant of Franklin's native city. Here also are the inspiring lessons and memories of patriotism. Here is the Old South Church, where the child Liberty was baptized; and here is- Faneuil Hall, where it was cradled and rocked. Here, in Roxbury, is the home of Warren, and on Bunker Hill the stately pile where Warren fell. Here are Dorchester Heights, the frowning guns on which compelled the removal of the British army on the 17th of March, 1776, — an event for which we raise our flag on each returning anniversary to com- memorate the first victory of George Washington 40 ORATION. and the retreat of the British soldiers from Boston forever. Everywhere are everlasting memorials of a freedom-loving people, whose determined action on the British Colonial policy, when the cargo of the "Romney" was cast into the harbor, caused Edmund Burke to say, "that so paltry a sum as threepence in the eyes of a financier, and so insignificant an article as tea in the mind of the philosopher, have shaken the commercial pillars of an empire that circled the globe." It has been said that in a bygone period this was the city of one sect, and now it is the city of an- other sect. We have been told that this city, in earlier days, was the Boston of one race of men, and now it is the Boston of another race of men. Boston is the city of the American citizen, whatever be his sect, or race, color, or condition. Here is his heri- tage, fair and great, and with as loud calls to duty to those who possess it, as at any moment since John Winthrop, in 1630, came, to use his own words, " to abide here to plant the gospel and to people the country." Never in the history of Boston was there a more inspiring sight than the dedication a few weeks ago of a most beautiful section of Franklin Park to its children, for all time. As over that emerald plain the school regiment inarched and JULY 4, 1889. 41 manoeuvred, and as thousands on thousands of pub- lic-school children massed around the flagstaff and cheered and sang " America " as the old flag was un- furled, it did not strike the beholder that our public- school system was either immoral or godless. ~No one could look upon that scene without being con- vinced that the public school and the dignity of citizenship and the future of the flag and the trained force to successfully meet any foe were as everlasting as intelligence, as virtue, and faith in Almighty God. The one thing needful for this honorable city is a permanent public opinion insisting that every dollar of the eleven millions required to conduct its ordi- nary affairs shall give an honest account of itself. It does not make the slightest difference whether strict accountability is brought about by Democrats or Republicans, or by a mixture of both ; it does make great difference whether it is done or not done. Wealth, fame, distinction, Boston now has, and with an administration commensurate with her means and opportunities, she needs no more to prove false the statement of an English statesman, that America cannot show a well-governed city. It is in cities that self-government is put to the severest test, and in them, if anywhere, its fail- ure will come. Whoever successfully solves our 42 ORATION. municipal problem will find a noble place in onr Val- halla. The model, industrious, honest, capable, mayor, knowing before aught else the welfare of the city, will be an American benefactor. A step towards an exemplary city rule has already been taken in Boston. We are paying our bills or doing without things. Artemas Ward said, " I will live on my income if I have to borrow money to do it." That is not good city financiering ; and to the credit of Bos- ton, it is not making loans to piece out its income. When the terse sentence of Mayor Hart in his inaugural address, " that no law or ordinance can ever take the place of good citizenship or municipal integrity," shall be made the text of municipal duty, the political pestilence of cities shall no longer be the bugbear of the political moralist. We cannot all be mayors, aldermen, or mem- bers of the council, but as citizens we can each do something to relieve the reputation of great centres as nurseries of social disorder and rottenness. If anywhere an effort should be made to have sound local government, it is here, where liberty in America was nurtured, where the chord was struck that led to the Revolution, where the first bold signer of the Declaration of Independence lived; here in Boston, the stronghold of national JULY 4, 1889. 43 sentiment, the home of the great defender of the Constitution ; here, " Not in Utopia, subterranean fields On some secreted island, Heaven knows where, But in the very world, which is the world Of all of us, the place where in the end We find our happiness or not at all." Here, in Boston, we should have that municipal cleanliness that is the hope and aim of honest and wise home rule to secure. This is the obli- gation of the citizen to his city, his country, and his God. ~No one of the more than a hundred citizens who have performed the task now in process of being fulfilled has omitted to recognize the Almighty power that has shaped our career. One of them, referring to the battle of Lookout Mountain, fought above the clouds, with eloquence declared: "It is my faith that the battle of America is indeed to be fought and won far above the clouds." From the time that the British Port Bill pressed Boston so hard that George Washington offered to lead a regiment of a thousand men at his own expense to relieve the town's distress, until now, when it is the fourth in wealth and fifth in population of the cities of 44 ORATION. the Union, Providential intervention in onr history has been reverently acknowledged. ~No plea for the blessing of Heaven upon onr Republic or the American States shall avail unless the American citizen does what lies within his power to bless his locality by worthy public and private example. Washington asked, " Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicities of the nation with its virtue ? Alas ! is it rendered impossible by its vices?" It was a cardinal doctrine with Jefferson that "error of opinion can be tolerated if reason be left free to combat it." We should apply the unhampered reason, free from the restraints of tradition or selfishness, to the errors of policy as well as opinion. If virtue is the path to national and social safety, if vice is the open and downward way to national and social disaster, then to hinder the highest attainment of virtue and to encourage the tendencies of vice is un-American. When- ever, by personal influence, or choice of officials, or passage of laws, the maximum of protection is established, and the minimum of danger from the elements of disorder is provided for, then is recorded a victory for enlightened citizenship. Character in individuals and in communities lives. Not long since the National House of Rep- JULY 4, 1889. 45 resentatives did great honor to the most eminent living citizen of Boston, Hon. Robert C. Win- throp. Having been its Speaker, when that body received his portrait to be hung upon the walls of the Capitol, the occasion called out earnest praise of our distinguished townsman, and ardent enco- miums on his native Commonwealth. The member from Kentucky, Mr. Breckenridge, in one of the most brilliant speeches ever made in the historic chamber, said concerning the sectional contest which grew out of the slavery dispute: "Massa- chusetts stepped to the front, and, as the begin- ning of the leadership in that tremendous struggle, Nathaniel Prentiss Banks became Speaker of the House of Representatives, and though Orr followed him, and though a Democrat was elected once more, yet practically from 1855 to 1875 the House of Representatives registered the decrees of Mas- sachusetts, and the Republic of America followed the lead of the Old Bay Commonwealth. . . . Massachusetts led America, and led her with an audacity and an aggressiveness, with a skill and counsel, with a power and force, that has never been surpassed in all the tide of time in the lead- ership of a great people." The veteran citizen, again member of Congress, is with us, and while his life is spared, freedom of man and the honor 46 ORATION. of the nation will have in him a friend and cham- pion. On the Fourth of July, 1876, Boston invited Hon. Robert C. "Winthrop to be its orator. His address was one of much enthusiasm and histori- cal importance. Amid a burst of applause, in com- menting upon the Declaration of Independence, he presented the identical desk on which Jefferson wrote the glorious document. He said, with much feeling, "I could not omit to urge upon every man to remember that self-government politically can only be successful if it be accompanied by self-government personally. ... I could not omit to caution them against intemperance, extrava- gance, and luxury." These wise and patriotic words are a bugle-call to fall into line for coming conflicts. With alarming social dangers now assail- ing us, with the pomp and revel of Vanity Fairs, and the enervating debasement of affluence and luxury, Boston has not yet grappled. The Puritan self-denial and resolution, the uncompromising at- tention to the sterner issues of life which marked the Bostonians who helped to throw off the yoke of Britain, have failed to be developed when their descendants are looked upon to throw off the yoke of servitude to selfish usages of society. Boston had another son as orator on the Fourth JULY 4, 1889. 47 of July, 1845. His name can never be left out when chivalric service to Massachusetts and un- yielding opposition to the political designs of slavery are under discussion. Among onr illus- trious men he shines with unclouded lustre, — " A pillar of the State, deep on his front engraved Deliberation sat and public care." Charles Sumner was United States Senator from 1852 until his death. In his oration, in 1845, he tenderly spoke of his native city. "Athens," said he, " has been called the eye of Greece. Boston may be called the eye of America, and the influence she exerts is to be referred, not to her size, for there are other cities larger far, but to her moral and intellectual character." Charles Sumner and Robert C. "Winthrop, on this jubilant day, felt called to impress upon those hearing them the imperative obligations of moral as well as political duties of citizenship. To follow such guides is not inappro- priate. There can be no patriotism, no genuine Americanism, without healthy moral control. Offer- ing our vows upon that altar where the citizen lays his sincerest tribute and renders his holiest service, to crush petty ambitions and earthy im- pulses, and to hold fast to American loyalty and all that it implies without exception or reservation of 48 ORATION. allegiance, let us make Boston one of the purest, as it is one of the most prosperous, of American cities. By adherence, without why or wherefore, to non-partisan and unsectarian public schools, by unfaltering fealty to State and nation, by with- holding from evil habits the countenance of ex- ample, and from evil traffics the sanction of law, by utmost toleration and utmost watchfulness that toleration is not abused, by protection to homes, and by conscientious service in that citizenship which shows love to God in striving to elevate men, with clean hands and pure hearts, let us make Boston, during the next hundred years, as conspicuous for public morality as in the century that has passed it has been renowned for its ser- vice to public liberty. James Bryce, in his great and exhaustive work on the American Commonwealth, speaks of our Republic as the "Land of the Future." To make our land what it should be will demand that rev- erence for law and moral reenforcement only to be obtained by the vote of woman on municipal and moral issues. Our country will be the ideal land, when one-half of the Republic now deprived of suffrage shall have something to do and to say about local laws and rulers — and national mat- ters and national men, if it will accept the JULY 4, 1889. 49 responsibility. The participation of woman in the management of the locality is a necessity of good government. It reaches the climax of absurdity to maintain that the Declaration of Independence applies to half of the people by proxy. Boston, at a distant day, when it numbers three-fourths of a million souls, and sums up its real and per- sonal estate by billions, may invite one of its daughters to address its people on the Fourth of July. With representatives of her sex distributed in official relations for which woman is adapted, it will be taught then more fully than now that it is undemocratic and unrepublican to rule the whole peojne by half of its numbers. Woman in this world gives much, as well as man, to religion, to country, to civilization; and why not to govern- ment ? When the personal purity and high re- gard for character by which woman regulates and elevates home become factors in rule of munici- j)alities, the most exalted standard of duty will be approached. The most flagrant heresy to human nature and human rights is to re- strict suffrage to men because in war they bear arms. It is a tribute to muscle. The mother who bears in her arms the children who are to make the future of America has, in her duties and 50 ORATION. affections, the highest human incentive to cast an intelligent ballot. When for local duty it is in her hand, then the spirit which animated the city of the Adamses, the Quincys, and the Han- cocks in the days of the Stamp Act, and the city of Sumner and Phillips and Andrew in the days of the Fugitive Slave Act, will compel Bos- ton to take a step forward in that warfare of all races and all ages, — the struggle of the best against the worst, by which alone the evils of society can be overcome. When, in this noble municipality, the organized power for good shall so overmatch as to overmaster the combined forces of wrong, then, more than the peal of bells and roar of cannon and triumphant outburst over evacuation of hostile troops from Boston in 1776, or from New York in 1783; more than the joy over the formation of the Federal Union and presidency of Washington in 1789; more than the wild rapture over the return of victorious legions with their war-worn standards in 1865, — shall be the loud applause of mankind over the moral and municipal advancement, making this fair city, where is garnered our affection, "The foremost of fair Freedom's cause, The chief of Virtue's band." A city where JULY 4, 18 89. 51 " Man is more Precious than the gold of Ophir ; " where law in all its majesty is the bulwark of family and its fondest hopes ; where moral force and influence protect the inmate of the cradle and the footsteps of youth, as the flaming sword guarded Paradise from persistent evil ; where freighted ships, that fly to and fro over oceans, as shuttles weaving the web of international unity, unlade their wealth; where stores of coin and mer- chandise are poured into the lap of enterprise; and the song of contented labor rises from countless hives of industry, and lordly residences increase on spacious and costly boulevards, and music of happy households is heard, and crowded seats of learn- ing grow in distinction and power; — in such a city shall all the unconceived brilliance and bene- faction of material prosperity dwarf beside that climax of praise awarded by the poet Whittier to Sumner : — "His Statecraft was the Golden Rule, His right to vote a sacred trust ; Clear' over threat and ridicule, We heard his challenge, 'Is it just?'" A praise yet to become the blameless record of millions upon millions of upright, honorable, God-fearing American citizens. APPENDIX APPENDIX. Beginning with the year 1783, and coming down to the present year, 1889, one hundred and seven Fourth of July orations have been delivered before the authorities, first of the town, and then of the city, of Boston. The series is continuous, and, though neither so valuable bibliographically, nor so well known historically, as the Massachusetts Election, the Artillery Elec- tion, or the Convention Sermons, — all of which antedate the Fourth of July Oration, — it is, nevertheless, not without interest to history and literature, as a reminder that there is much con- servative force in our old and well-established customs. The Orations to commemorate the Boston Massacre were regularly delivered from the year 1771-1783, when it was voted in Town-meeting, on March 5 of the latter year, to substitute the celebration of the Declaration of Independence for that of the Massacre. This interesting continuity excited the warm admiration of John Adams, who said, in a letter to Dr. Morse, that he had read as many of the orations as he had seen, and "scarcely ever with dry eyes." The names of the orators, as a rule, show that judicious selection has been made, — most of those chosen being men of real prominence and ability. Though some famous names are missing, — noticeably those of Fisher Ames, Webster, Choate, and Cushing, — yet, as a whole, the list represents the best that the city could put forth from year to year. 56 OEATION. Only two persons have delivered orations more than once upon this occasion : the elder Quincy in 1798 and 1826, and George Ticknor Curtis in 1841 and 1862. The Boston Fourth of July orations have, to a remarkable degree, been wont to express the honest, fearless opinions of those who have delivered them, although that freedom of speech incident to the fierce strife which attended the downfall of the national Federalist party could not now be tolerated, so little was it lifted, even on this unpolitical occasion, above mere rancor. The oration has frequently afforded an opportunity to free the mind upon all sorts of national, civil, and social reforms. Anti-slavery, woman suffrage, temperance, — all themes dear to the American citizen, — have been largely discussed on this plat- form, and it is the farthest possible from the truth to suppose that "gush" has been the predominating characteristic. It has been customary for the town or city to request of each orator a copy of his address for the press ; and, no matter what the substance, his effort is always referred to in such complimentary terms as " spirited and elegant," " eloquent and impressive," and other expressions of satisfaction. There were, in years past, other Fourth of July orations in Boston besides those delivered before the " authorities." No extended account may be given of them here, but a mention of some of them seems necessary. It is safe to say that they were to the full just as patriotic and eloquent as those of the "regular" series. In the year 1787, John Brooks spoke before the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati; in 1788, William Hull ; in 1789, Samuel Whitwell ; and in 1790, William Tudor, in which year the oration before this society ceased, although other customs were still kept up. Party feeling never ran higher than it did from Adams's administration to the end of the APPENDIX. 57 War of 1812, when Federalism, even in Massachusetts, became practically extinct. The Young Republicans, no doubt in a spirit of protest against the prevailing Federalism of the early orations, required Fourth of July orations of their own, and in 1805 were addressed by Ebenezer French, in 1806 by Joseph Grleason, and in 1808 by Charles Pinckney Sumner. In 1808 the Federal selectmen refused the use of Faneuil Hall to the Republicans of Boston for their national celebration, and, as a result, the Bunker Hill Association was promptly formed. David Everett and William Charles White spoke before the Association in 1809, Daniel Waldo in 1810, and Henry A. S. Dearborn in 1811. These departures from the chief rhetorical event of the National day were all of them sporadic and tem- porary. Perhaps the address which for some time held most successful rivalry with the civic one was that delivered before the Washington Benevolent Society during most of the years from 1815 to 1837. 1 A few scattering orations, without special significance, were Joseph Bartlett's in 1823 ; James Davis Knowles's in 1828, before the Baptist Churches of Boston ; Will- iam Foster Otis's in 1831, before the young men of Boston; Edward Goldsborough Prescott's in 1832, for the Boston regi- ment ; Caleb Cushing's in 1833, for the American Colonization Society ; Theophilus Fiske's in 1835, for the Trades Union ; David Henshaw's in 1836, before an Assembly of citizens in Faneuil Hall; and William Lloyd Garrison's in 1838, before the 1 1815, William Gale, 1816, Asher Ware, 1819, Samuel Adams Wells, 1820, Henry Orne, 1821, George Fairbanks, 1823, Russell Jarvis, 1824, John Everett, 1826, David Lee Child, 1S2S, Joseph Hardy Prince, 1829, Charles Gordon Greene, 1830, Henry Barney Smith, 1832, Andrew Dunlap, 1833, John Wade, 1837, Edward Cruft, Jr. 58 ORATION. Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. In 1833 Amasa Walker spoke before the Young Men's Societies of Boston, twelve of which societies were represented in a procession which at- tended the ceremonies. Frederick Robinson spoke before the Trades Union on July 4, 1834, a day of special significance to laboring men, because on it first took effect the new law for the abolition of imprisonment for debt. In 1858, besides the regular oration by John S. Holmes, Rufus Choate delivered another before the Democratic Young Men's Celebration at Tremont Temple. The year previous, the Rev. W. R. Alger had termed as an act of " flunkeyism " the introduction of James M. Mason, of Virginia, author of the Fugitive Slave Bill and the eulogizer of Preston S. Brooks, to a Massachu- setts audience at Bunker Hill, on the 17th of June. To re- buke this frankness was one object of the celebration. A very tart article appeared in the "Atlantic Monthly" for August, 1858, entitled "The Pocket Celebration of the Fourth." It is no secret now that this witty and forcible attack on Mr. Choate was from the pen of James Russell Lowell. Boston has had one mad orator, the more than eccentric William Emmons, who, in 1826, had his oration and poem printed and for sale immediately upon their delivery. I have been indebted largely to James Spear Loring's "Hun- dred Boston Orators" (Boston, 1852), in which is given the first list of Boston Fourth of July orators of which I am aware. In the Municipal Register for 1889 is given another list to date, in which there is no attempt to furnish the full name of each orator. These lists have been given for some years back in the Register. It being nearly forty years since Mr. Loring's list was made, I have ventured to present the following, knowing from experience how useful are the similar, APPENDIX. 59 though more elaborate, lists of the Massachusetts Election Ser- mons, by Mr. H. H. Edes, 1 and of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Election Sermons, by Capt. A. A. Folsom. 2 A com- plete file of the Fourth of July Orations as published is in the Library of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Another excellent, though not yet complete, set is in the Boston Public Library. It lacks at present eleven of the printed orations. It should be added that three of the orations, those for 1806, 1812, and 1852, have never been printed. There is hardly need to say that I am aware that this note and list should be far better than they are, and that I shall be pleased, with true biblio- graphical humility, to receive corrections and additions. I must not forget to thank Dr. Samuel A. Green, to whom no one who needs help in such matters as these ever turns in vain. Judge Chamberlain, of the Boston Public Library, has also been so kind as to help me. LINDSAY SWIFT. 1783. — "Warren, John. 1784. — Hichborn, Benjamin. 1785. — Gardiner, John. 1786. — Austin, Jonathan Loring. 1787. — Dawes, Thomas. 1 788. — Otis, Harrison Gray. 1789. — Stillman, Samuel. 1790. — Gray, Edward. 1791. — Crafts, Thomas, Jr. 1 At the end of O. E. Grinnell's Election sermon for 1871; there are earlier lists of the Election sermons by David Osgood in 1809, by Andrew Bigelow in 1836, by John Pierce in 1849, and by A. H. Quint in 1866. 2 In the later years of the Annual record of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. 60 ORATION. 1792. — Blake, Joseph, Jr. 1793. — Adams, John Quinct. 1794. — Phillips, John. 1795. — Blake, George. 1796. — Lathrop, John. 1797. — Callender, John. 1798. — Quinct, Josiah. 1 799. — Lowell, John. 1 1800. — Hall, Joseph. 1801. — Paine , Charles . 1802. — Emerson, William. 1803. — Sullivan, William. 1804. — Danforth, Thomas. 2 1805. — Dutton, Warren. 1806. — Channing, Francis Dana. 3 1807. — Thacher, Peter Oxenbridge. 1808. — Ritchie, Andrew, Jr. 2 1809. — Tudor, William. 1810. — Townsend, Alexander. 1811. — Savage, James. 2 1812. — Pollard, Benjamin. 3 1813. — Livermore, Edward St. Loe. 1814. — Whitwell, Benjamin. 1815. — Shaw, Lemuel. 1816. — Sullivan, George. 2 1817. — Channing, Edward Tyrrell. 1 Federalist to an extreme. "Let us treat with Frenchmen, only at the point of our bayonets." " Adams, Law, and Liberty " is his rallying cry. 2 There is a second edition. 8 Not printed. 4 On February 26, 1811, Peter Thacher took the name of Peter Oxenbridge Thacher. (List of persons whose names have been changed in Massachusetts. 1780-1883. p. 23.) APPENDIX. 61 1818. — Gray, Francis Calley. 1819. — Dexter, Franklin. 1820. — Lyman, Theodore. 1821. — Loring, Charles Greely. 1822. — Gray, John Chipman. 8 1823. — Curtis, Charles Pelham. 1824. — Bassett, Francis. 1825. — Sprague, Charles. 1826. — Quincy, Josiah. 1827. — Mason, William Powell. 1828. — Sumner, Bradford. 1829. — Austin, James Trecothick. 1830. — Everett, Alexander Hill. 1831. — Palfrey, John Gorham. 1832. — Quincy, Josiah, Jr. 1833. — Prescott, Edward Goldsborough. 1834. — Fay, Richard Sullivan. 1835. — Hillard, George Stillman. 1836. — Kinsman, Henry Willis. 1837. — Chapman, Jonathan. 1838. — Winslow, Hubbard. "The means of the per- petuity and prosperity of our Republic." 1839. — Austin, Ivers James. 1840. — Power, Thomas. 1841. — Curtis, George Ticknor. "The true uses of American revolutionary history." 1842. — Mann, Horace. 1843. — Adams, Charles Francis. 5 There is a second edition. 6 The first oration under the new city charter. 62 OEATION. 1844. — Chandler, Peleg Whitman. "The morals of freedom." 1845. — Sumner, Charles. 7 " The true grandeur of nations." 1846. — Webster, Fletcher. 1847. — Cary, Thomas Greaves. 1848. — Giles, Joel. "Practical liberty." 1849. — Greenough, William Whitwell. "The con- quering republic." 1850. — Whipple, Edwin Percy. 8 " Washington and the principles of the Revolution." 1851. — Russell, Charles Theodore. 1852. — King, Thomas Starr. 9 1853. — Bigelow, Timothy. 10 1854. — Stone, Andrew Leete. 11 1855. — Miner, Alonzo Ames. 1856. — Parker, Edward Griffin. "The lesson of '76 to the men of '56." 1857. — Alger, William Rounseville. 12 "The genius and posture of America." 1858. — Holmes, John Somers. 7 This was one of the longest (96 pp.) as well as the best known of all these orations. It passed through three editions in Boston and one in London, and was answered in a pamphlet (Remarks upon an oration delivered by Charles Sumner . . ., July 4th, 1845. By a citizen of Boston) . 8 There is a second edition. (Boston : Ticknor, Reed, and Fields. 1850. 49 pp. 12°.) 9 Not printed. 10 This, and a number of the succeeding orations, contain the speeches, toasts, etc., at the dinner customarily held in Faneuil Hall on this occasion. 11 There is a second edition. a2 As many as four editions were printed in 1857. (Boston: Office Boston Daily Bee. 60 pp.) Not until Nov. 17, 1864, was Mr. Alger asked by the Common Council to furnish a copy for the press. He granted the request, and the first official edition (J. E. Farwell & Co., printers. 1864. 53 pp.) was then printed. It lacks the interesting preface and appen- dix of the contemporary editions. APPENDIX. 63 1859. — Sumner, George. 13 1860. — Everett, Edward. 1861. — Parsons, Theophilus. 1862. — Curtis, George Ticknor. 1863. — Holmes, Oliver Wendell. 14 1864. — Russell, Thomas. 1865. — Manning, Jacob Merrill. "Peace under lib- erty." 1866. — Lothrop, Samuel Kirkland. 1867. — Hepworth, George Hughes. 1868. — Eliot, Samuel. "The function of a city." 1869. — Morton, Ellis Wesley. 1870. — Everett, William. 1871. — Sargent, Horace Binney. 1872. — Adams, Charles Francis, Jr. 1873. — Ware, John Fothergill Waterhouse. 1874. — Frothingham, Richard. 1875. — Clarke, James Freeman. 1876. — Winthrop, Robert Charles. 15 1877. — Warren, William Wirt. 1878. — Healy, Joseph. 1879. — Lodge, Henry Cabot. 1880. — Smith, Robert Dickson. 16 13 There is another edition. (Boston: Rockwell & Churchill, city printers, 1882. 46 pp.) It omits the Dinner at Faneuil Hall, Correspondence, and Events of the celebration. 14 There is an edition of twelve copies. (J. E. Farwell & Co., printers, 1863. (7), 71 pp.) It is " the first draft of the author's address, turned into larger, legible type, for the sole purpose of rendering easier its public delivery." It was done by " the liberality of the City Committee," and is, typographically, the handsomest of these orations. The regular edition is in 60 pp., octavo size. 16 There is a large-paper edition of fifty copies printed from this type, and also an edition — Boston : press of John Wilson & Son, 1876. 55 pp. 8°. 10 On Samuel Adams, a statue of whom, by Miss Anne Whitney, had just been com- pleted for the city. A photograph of the statue is added. 64 ORATION. 1881. — Warren, George Washington. "Our republic — liberty and equality founded in law." 1882. — Long, John Davis. 1883. — Carpenter, Henry Bernard. "American char- acter and influence." 1884. — Shepard, Harvey Newton. 1885. — Gargan, Thomas John. 1886. — Williams, George Frederick. 1887. — Fitzgerald, John Edward. 1888. — Dillaway, William Edward Lovell. 1889. — Swift, John Lindsay. 17 [" The American citi- zen."] 17 Contains a list of Boston Fourth of July orations, from 1783 to 1889, inclusive. Sm! Date Due V % 1 1 >*> ;| ^ I mk W b i • r >,'\ ^ 1 9 4 KS 3 9031 01119497 f 53815 BOSTON COLLEGE LIBRARY UNIVERSITY HEIGHTS CHESTNUT HILL, MASS. Books may be kept for two weeks and may be renewed for the same period, unless re- served. Two cents a day is charged for each book kept overtime. If you cannot find what you want, ask the Librarian who will be glad to help you. The borrower is responsible for books drawn on his card and for all fines accruing on the same. ^litMk&j&Ji* ^*i&L*,±± ^rt&tik/iii .%£«*$