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 AN 
 
 ORATION 
 
 DELIVERED BY REaUEST 
 
 BEFORE THE WHIGS 
 
 OF 
 
 PHILADELPHIA, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 FOURTH or JXJ1.Y, 183 4. 
 
 nv 
 
 WILLIAM MORRIS MEREDITH. 
 
 nil I- A DEL nil A: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY THE COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENT. 
 
 1834. 
 
 
AN 
 
 ORATION 
 
 DELIVERED BY REaUEST 
 
 BEFORE THE WHIGS 
 
 OP 
 
 PHILADELPHIA, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 FOURTH OF JULY, 183 4. 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM MORRIS MEREDITH. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 PUBLISHED BY THE COMMITTEE OF ARRANGEMENT. 
 
 1834. 
 
Fj^ 
 
 Soraroe itCLkuoTrn 
 
Philadelphia, July 25th, 1834. 
 
 W. M. Meredith, Esq. 
 
 Dear Sir, 
 
 We take great pleasure in hand- 
 ing you the enclosed resolution, passed on the evening 
 of the seventh* instant, and have the honour to be 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 SAM'L j. robbins, 
 
 LEVI HOLLINGSWORTH, 
 SANDERSON ROBERT, 
 THOS. HARTLEV, 
 CHARLES SCHNEIDER, 
 HENRY F. ANNERS, 
 PETER CONRAD, 
 WM. J. WAINWRIGHT, 
 WM. F. BURKHART, 
 JOSEPH AKENS. 
 
 Extract from the Minutes of the Committee of Arrangement, 
 for Celebrating the Fourth of July. 
 
 Resolved, That the thanks of this Committee be 
 tendered to War. M. Meredith, Esq. for the chaste, 
 spirited and patriotic oration, delivered by him before 
 the Citizens of the Second Congressional District, on 
 the fourth instant, and that the sub-committee of 
 arrangement be directed to request a copy for publi- 
 cation. 
 
 Attest, 
 
 Henry F. Anners, Secretary. 
 
AN 
 
 ORATION. 
 
 AssEJiBLED to commemorate the triumphs of our 
 ancestors, let us rejoice that we are still worthy to 
 honour them. Though we have distress around us, 
 and before us a struggle of which the result is in the 
 hands of Providence, yet we keep this festival with 
 the cheerful hearts of freemen. Determined in any 
 event, not to disgrace our fathers, we can speak of 
 their deeds without the blush of shame, or the down- 
 cast eye of conscious degeneracy. We look back 
 to them, not as slaves look to the memory of kind 
 protectors or generous avengers, — but as freemen turn 
 with honest pride to their predecessors. When we 
 shall cease to revere tiiem, we shall have been ren- 
 dered incapable of the admiration of heroic actions : 
 — when we shall despair of imitating them, we shall 
 have lost our distinguishing characteristic as a people, 
 and become a reproach to our common country. 
 
 In Washington, and the men of 1776, was embodied 
 the spirit of our race, the spirit of liberty. That 
 
spirit had dwelt a thousand years with their forefathers, 
 and is not extinct in their descendants. We do injus- 
 tice to the vast scheme of Providence in our behalf, 
 when we limit our view of its operation to the Revolu- 
 tion, or even to the colonization of this country. We 
 may observe it from the time when those who were 
 destined to found the Saxon race, were led from the 
 sunny plains of the south, to acquire in a frozen and 
 unkindly region, the hardy frame, the sturdy man- 
 hood, and the personal independence that form the 
 groundwork of civil liberty. Turbulent and untutored, 
 yet in the earliest history of the Anglo-Saxons and 
 their ancestors, we find them maintaining the privi- 
 lege of electing their ow n chiefs, and acknowledging 
 no hereditary right, except where they found heredi- 
 tary merit. 
 
 Throughout the various stages of English history, 
 we can trace the germ of liberty, gradually expanding, 
 amid all the storms and earthquakes that surrounded 
 it. To what dangers was it not exposed ? Through 
 what struggles was it not preserved? By what 
 severe lessons was that experience acquired, which 
 was necessary to secure its full development? What 
 blood was shed, — what suffering endured, — what toil 
 undergone, for the full education of the principle of 
 CIVIL LIBERTY ? Enlightened civil liberty — the fruit, 
 not of impulse merely, but of impulse and knowledge, 
 — to be enjoyed amid the comforts and luxuries of 
 the highest civilization, — that liberty which no im- 
 provement in the arts can endanger, — which no ac- 
 cumulation of wealth can corrupt, — which is the living 
 
soul of THIS PEOPLE ! The history of England is 
 but the history of the preparation for our repubhc. 
 From Alfred to the Barons at Ilunnimcde, and from 
 them to the Hampdens, Cokes and Seldens, and down 
 to the Sidneys and Russels of later days — all her 
 noble hearts were working for us. 
 
 In the seventeenth century, when religious and 
 civil liberty were understood; when the shackles 
 had been struck from the intellect of man ; when 
 the most gigantic minds had been employed in 
 collecting and arranging all the lights which the 
 experience of so many ages afforded ; then the mag- 
 nificent design of the creator was unfolded, and 
 then were led forth, from the bosom of a commu- 
 nity advanced in arts, in letters and in civilization, 
 the selected bands, to found this republic, on a 
 soil not stained with the- blood of oppressors or 
 their victims, and where we yet breathe an atmos- 
 phere untainted by successful tyranny. They were 
 indeed few in number, and apparently feeble, but they 
 were firm in purpose, powerful in intellect, ripe in ex- 
 perience, and confident in themselves, — and they had 
 hearts in whose pulses throbbed the blood of the only 
 free race on earth. This nation had no infancy of 
 barbarism and disorder. The handful of men that 
 landed on our shores, formed, from the first, a policied 
 people. Though with a nominal dependence on the 
 mother country, our governments were, from the 
 beginning, republican in principle and in essence. 
 Yet their founders tried no rash experiments. They 
 brought with them such of the laws of their forefathers 
 
8 
 
 as were suitable to their circumstances, and none 
 other. Coming from a country in whose system of 
 jurisprudence at that day, prerogative and privilege 
 regal, ecclesiastical and baronial, were so intricately 
 interwoven with the common rights of person and 
 property, that the labours of lives would have appeared 
 insufficient for their complete extrication, mark with 
 what a miraculous instinct the early colonists (heav- 
 en-directed) performed this almost impossible task. 
 They retained nothing however remotely dangerous 
 to REPUBLICAN LIBERTY. Tlicy sacrificcd or injured 
 nothing material to the preservation of order and 
 public and private rights. The fulness of time was 
 come. The sacrifices of past ages were to be recom- 
 pensed. The edifice was completed, — and although to 
 the unskilful eye, the massive and towering scaflfolding 
 appeared essential to sustain the structure, yet at the 
 touch of THE 3IASTER, it fell away at once, and left 
 the temple standing in its fair proportions and im- 
 pregnable strength. Let those who affect to lament, 
 or study to supply, our want of that executive 
 SUPREMACY, and of the other devices which are 
 elsewhere considered necessary to the stability of 
 a government, look at our history, and learn that they 
 might as well censure the gallant frigate which cleaves 
 the waves, rejoicing in her peopled deck and battery 
 of thunder, because she lacks the shores and braces, 
 timbers and wedges, that supported and restrained 
 her before she reached her destined element. 
 
 With what unheard of rapidity did our ancestors 
 advance in their new career to prosperity and power ! 
 
How soon were the most distant seas vexed by their 
 commerce, while the farthest forests groaned beneath 
 their axes ! And wherever their foot pressed the 
 soil, there was planted a population of hardy and 
 unflinching men, flllcd with the same spirit of enter- 
 prise, and the same instinct of freedom. 
 
 When the appointed hour came for severing the last 
 tie that had feebly pressed without repressing their en- 
 ergies, and tho final separation from Great Britain was 
 at hand, with what cheerful alacrity, did the glorious 
 descendents of those men, rise to fulfil their destinies! 
 They understood the first slight touch which was to 
 summon them to their task, and they moved to its 
 performance with joyful solemnity. The chord had 
 been struck. They did not wait till the spur of 
 tyranny had been buried rowel-deep in their flanks, 
 nor rise at last against intolerable oppression. Al- 
 though they took arms against fearful odds, yet it 
 was not in the phrensy of desperation, nor with the 
 pusillanimous ferocity of slaves. With deliberate 
 coolness and invincible resolution, a free people 
 swore to maintain their freedom against any odds, — 
 and they did so. Throughout that struggle no blood 
 was shed in popular tumult. No life of foreign or do- 
 mestic foe was lost, save in the field of open battle, or by 
 the regular judgment of a judicial tribunal. Although 
 the murderous savage was let loose on our borders, 
 and the prisoners taken by the enemy were treated 
 as malefactors, yet no breach of the laws of war ren- 
 dered our magnanimity questionable. No principle 
 
 2 
 
10 
 
 of order was shaken. No right of person or property 
 Avas violated. No law was disregarded. No frame of 
 government was violently upturned. The world never 
 witnessed so glorious a spectacle ! How could it be 
 otherwise ? The men whose lot it was at that day 
 to obey the impulses of their nature, and establish 
 undying names, which will honour us, and which we 
 shall honour " to the last syllable of recorded time," 
 looked to their fathers for examples, as we look to 
 them. Ages had contributed to their production : 
 they were the fruit of a tree which had been cher- 
 ished for centuries, and had come to maturity here. 
 We have this day, in our Guests, the living proofs 
 that it has not yet ceased to bear. 
 
 We cannot better celebrate the day, than by de- 
 voting it to the inquiry, with what fidelity we have 
 preserved our inheritance ? Safe from foreign aggres- 
 sion, we have had domestic dangers, and in sustain- 
 ing the severest test to which a republic can be 
 subjected, we have been near the rock on which all 
 former republics have been wrecked. 
 
 Though the old party names were retained to a 
 later period, yet it is now about fifteen years since 
 the wholesome action of parties ceased among us, 
 without which a free government is like a standing 
 pool. The questions of foreign policy which had di- 
 vided the country, were at an end. If there were 
 diflerences of opinion on certain domestic questions, 
 those differences were sectional. The candidates for 
 the suffrages of the people, throughout any one 
 quarter of our country, generally professed the same 
 
11 
 
 principles. Our politics degenerated really into per- 
 sonal politics, and our parties into factions. No prin- 
 ciple seemed to be at stake in our elections. The 
 government moved on almost without an efibrt. 
 A period ensued of great public quiet, and great 
 private prosperity, but of remarkable political apa- 
 thy among the mass of the people. The states- 
 men who had been formed in more active times 
 were gradually disappearing, though some of them 
 are fortunately still left. A class of men arose 
 who were called politicians ; who for their own ad- 
 vantage paid that attention to public affairs, which 
 others neglected to pay for the public good. The 
 public service became almost a trade. Men whose 
 intellect and energy had failed to secure success in 
 other avocations, and who -possessed no principle but 
 the determination to keep on the strongest side, crept 
 into the inferior offices, and too often gained a footing 
 even among our representatives. Amid the appear- 
 ances of great prosperity, the vitality of our institu- 
 tions, was, in fact, daily diminishing. Our government 
 is a government of balances. Due vigour is required 
 in all its branches, otherwise irregular action will 
 take place in some of them. When, above all, the 
 integrity of the representative body is touched, the 
 heart of our system is struck at. If its corruption 
 or imbecility have not passed a certain point, it may 
 be restored in season, to the due performance of its 
 functions, by the operation of the ballot-box, when 
 the people have been roused to a sense of their dan- 
 ger. Let us hope that this is the case now. 
 
12 
 
 It was during the dangerous calm of which we have 
 spoken, that a man was raised up among us, destined 
 to enhance our love of liberty, by endangering its 
 continuance, and to give us a lesson of future vigi- 
 lance, by exhibiting a startling example of the perilous 
 consequences of supineness and neglect : — a man, 
 whose military services were undoubted, and whose 
 civil capacity was taken upon trust, — whose temper 
 was known to be impetuous, and was therefore sup- 
 posed to be generous, — who was believed to be igno- 
 rant of the arts of intrigue, because he had never 
 been versed in the science of civil business : — a man 
 whose professions were of reform and retrenchment, 
 — of the purity of the elective franchise, and the dimi- 
 nution of executive patronage. His popularity was 
 unbounded. He had the generous confidence of a 
 free people, and although many who knew him better, 
 or trusted him less, foresaw and foretold the danger 
 of his elevation, their voices were drowned in the 
 acclamations of an enthusiastic and determined majo- 
 rity. 
 
 Soon were the worst anticipations to be reali- 
 sed. At first, indeed, he seemed to give his confidence 
 to those of his friends who best deserved it ; and 
 although the numerous removals from merely minis- 
 terial offices, of men who had grown gray in the pub- 
 lic service, and whose only fault had been their pre- 
 ference of another candidate, showed that in the dis- 
 charge of his functions he was to be controlled by 
 considerations rather of private resentment, than of 
 public good, yet his constitutional advisers were men, 
 
13 
 
 to whom the country could look with some feeling of 
 security. It remained to be shown how easily and 
 fatally the instinct of tyranny could be awakened in a 
 man whom nature had made arrogant, and education 
 had not made wise, and in whom age had increased 
 the susceptibility to flattery, and the obstinacy of 
 the will, while it had weakened the force of the 
 judgment, and the generous impulses of the heart. 
 In such a man, a small knot of traders in politics, 
 — corrupt and unmeritable persons, with no public 
 character to lose, nor principles to restrain them, — 
 in such a man, in a word, the under-cabinet found 
 their proper prey. In a short time they secured 
 the full possession of him. His own better friends, 
 and the friends of their country who had supported 
 him, besan to stand aloof in sorrowful amazement. 
 A cabal, holding no responsible situations, and to the 
 members of which the people would have refused 
 their votes as candidates for the lowest office, 
 became in effect the executive of the republic. They 
 obtained the control of its action. Against whatever 
 man or institution stood in the way of the accomplish- 
 ment of their purposes, they took care to excite a 
 feeling of hostility in the mind of him whom they de- 
 light to call their chief, — whom they hail as " born to 
 command," — at whose feet they prostrate themselves 
 in the enthusiasm of sycophancy. And when that 
 feeling was onte roused, then commenced a relentless 
 war, prosecuted with unmitigated rancour, and 
 scarcely ceasing with the ruin of the victim. Cabinets 
 
14 
 
 dissolved, in order to strike an effectual blow at high 
 officers, whose only offence w^as that they refused to 
 compel their famihes to be governed in their social 
 relations, by the will or whim of Cjesar. An igno- 
 minious dismissal followed in one case by threats of 
 personal violence, before the obnoxious individual 
 could leave the seat of government. In other cases, 
 personal violence actually offered to members of 
 Congress, w ho had been active in resisting the abuses 
 of the administration. Let one instance suffice, as 
 an example of the nature and spirit of their pro- 
 ceedinors. 
 
 The Vice-President of the United States, an early 
 and sincere supporter of the party, a man — I do not 
 speak of the present incumbent — of lofty spirit, com- 
 manding talent, and unbending integrity, (whose sub- 
 sequent errors, great as they were, are already almost 
 redeemed) — John C. Calhoun, — that honest states- 
 man — was a perpetual oppressor, a natural enemy, of 
 the creeping cabal that covered the foot of the execu- 
 tive throne. On w hat flimsy pretences was a quarrel 
 fastened on him, and a savage nature stimulated to the 
 revenge of supposed injuries ! With what unrelenting 
 ferocity was the attack commenced ! With what bit- 
 ter malignity was it prosecuted ! Neither the high 
 office of its object, nor his unstained character, nor 
 his long public services, nor his party claims, nor his 
 personal fidelity, could protect him from an inunda- 
 tion of calumny. 
 
 For nearly five years past, public affairs, so far as 
 the executive is concerned, have been conducted os- 
 
15 
 
 tensibly on grounds of private resentment and malig- 
 nity, — really, with the purpose of subserving the 
 interests, and perpetuating the power of a band of 
 unprincipled intriguers. The immense patronage of 
 the government, has been unscrupulously abused, — 
 the money of the people lavishly spent in attempting 
 to corrupt them, — elections openly interfered with by 
 minions, — a frightful discipline established, enforced 
 by threats of the most deadly war on all who refused 
 to submit, — private character wantonly assailed, — the 
 constitutional functions of the Senate in reofard to 
 appointments, almost superseded, — the integrity of the 
 legislative bodies deliberately trenched upon. Mena- 
 ces for the insubordinate ! Offices for the complyino- ! 
 We have seen more members of Congress appoint- 
 ed to executive offices in the last five years, than 
 during the whole of our previous history. " Corrup- 
 tion HAS BECOME THE ORDER OF THE DAY." RcWards 
 
 and punishments are proffered and threatened, — pub- 
 lic service held as " the spoils of victory." The 
 time has been in this republic, when men were ap- 
 pointed to fill the offices, but we have lived down 
 to the day when offices are given to fill the men. 
 
 Our STATE governments have been tampered with 
 by the central power behind the throne. In a thou- 
 sand shapes, intimations and wishes (which are com- 
 mands) are issued from Washington to our local 
 legislatures. Too fatally was this influence exerted 
 within our borders, when Pennsylvania, for the first 
 time, at the will of one man, faltered in maintaining 
 her formed, and repeatedly expressed opinions, on a 
 
16 
 
 great question. When she voluntarily abandoned 
 her own and the national interests, and disregarding 
 her sense of justice, and swerving from the course of 
 her policy, assisted to injure her own credit, and 
 diminish her own resources, and was reduced to 
 pride herself on obtaining from the bankers of the 
 HOLY ALLIANCE, (whosc moncy was always poured out 
 like water in the cause of tyranny,) coin yet wet 
 with the blood of the gallant Poles. 
 
 There remained one instrument of power, the pos- 
 session of which was to be by all means compassed. 
 I mean the control of the great monied interest of the 
 country, concentrated in the Bank of the United 
 States. That interest has no immediate or natural 
 connection with political affairs, and had stood aloof, 
 content with the due performance of its own duties. 
 The attempt was made on the bank, and it failed. 
 The men to whom the conduct of that institution had 
 been confided, had themselves a stake in the country ; 
 they had no common feelings or opinions with those 
 who were conspiring against our liberties. They 
 were neither to be cajoled nor brow-beaten. They 
 defied the devil and all his works. 
 
 It is to be observed, that down to a recent period, 
 notwithstanding all the misgovernment and abuses 
 which prevailed, a great majority still supported the 
 man of their choice. When blame could not be with- 
 held, it was laid upon the advisers, and not upon their 
 CHIEF. Although his friends were gradually giving 
 him up, yet his personal popularity with the great 
 mass of the people, was, as yet, scarcely affected. 
 
17 
 
 A great lesson was to be given. It was decreed that 
 his downfall should be a triumph of principle, and 
 that no plausible reason should be left, for ascribing 
 the decay of his popularity to the fickleness of pop- 
 ular favour. 
 
 One defeat, indeed, had already been experienced. 
 Even the administration majority in the House of 
 Representatives, had refused to throw the currency 
 and business of the country into confusion, at the 
 command of the chief, by destroying the Bank of the 
 United States. The disappointment felt on this oc- 
 casion, led directly to the desperate measures, which 
 we are next to notice. Like Charles I. his Parliament 
 had proved intractable, and he was now to try 
 another way. 
 
 Thus far, the forms of law had been observed. 
 However, the experiment was now to be tried, and 
 he looked about for an operator. He first sought 
 one in Pennsylvania. But there he was mistaken. 
 He had, and has still, many warm adherents in Penn- 
 sylvania, honest, virtuous and upright men, whose 
 eyes have not yet been opened to all the deformities 
 of their idol. But from the Lake to the Delaware, he 
 could not find in Pennsylvania, the man who would 
 deliberately become an active instrument in the de- 
 struction of our liberties. The individual whom he 
 selected had a conscience, and a will of his own, and 
 resolutely maintained his right to exercise in his own 
 way, a discretion which the law had confided to him. 
 He was, therefore, summarily discarded as a refrac- 
 tory subordinate. The president had discovered that 
 
 3 
 
18 
 
 all executive officers, were merely instruments of the 
 chief magistrate, and of course have no right to an 
 opinion of their own. No, — he admits their right to 
 hold an opinion, provided they do not express or act 
 upon it. He has made, indeed, many discoveries. 
 Among others, that as he is to execute the laws, he 
 can only be expected to do it in the sense in which he 
 chooses to understand them. So that of course those 
 laws which he chooses to misunderstand, are to be 
 executed according to his whim, while those which 
 he cannot understand at all, are to remain unexecuted. 
 He is to protect the Constitution ; therefore, when 
 either or both houses of Congress, do what he thinks 
 the Constitution does not warrant, he must read them 
 a lecture on their departure from its letter or spirit ; 
 point out the subjects which they may debate, and 
 how they may debate them, the propositions which 
 they may entertain, and to what decision they are to 
 come on them. In fine, his will is to be the law : — 
 that is the plain Enghsh of it : — we all understand it. 
 To return. His experiment was to be tried, and 
 he wanted an instrument. Well, he found an instru- 
 ment. The work was urgent. It must be completed 
 before the meeting of Congress. He condescended 
 to give his reason for this ; he knew, forsooth, that 
 a majority could, and would be bribed to oppose his 
 measures ! (O my country ! how art thou degraded, 
 when an executive officer dares to speak thus of the 
 
 REPRESENTATIVES OF THE PEOPLE !) WliatCVCr might 
 
 have been the case with some members of his party, he 
 had the best reason for knowing that others of them 
 
19 
 
 could not be bought to oppose him, unless they were 
 as knavish as the burglar who on the day before his 
 execution sold his body to two different surgeons, and 
 ended by bequeathing it to the hospital of the 
 prison. But the work was to be done quickly, and 
 an instrument was provided. The blow was struck. 
 A charter, solemnly granted by law, was violated ; 
 the trial by jury was taken away ; the rights held 
 under a binding contract were disregarded ; illegal 
 contracts were made ; the accruing public treasure 
 was stopped in its way to the place of its legal depo- 
 sit, and scattered in divers places, where it may be as 
 hard to find as the surplus revenue of the post office 
 department. The country was thrown into confu- 
 sion ; its currency disordered ; its industry paralysed; 
 its resources cut down. The breach of law and of 
 justice was attended by as much private misery as 
 public wrong. The deed was done. Congress had 
 adjourned in the spring, leaving a country still gov- 
 erned by laws, and enjoying the highest prosperity. 
 They met in the autumn amid the wreck of a broken 
 Constitution, and the groans of a ruined people. Hap- 
 py were the men whose destiny it was at this crisis to 
 be posted in the front of the battle, and to strike the 
 chord which was to vibrate in the hearts of millions. 
 Need I name them ? They live in our hearts ! Their 
 names are written where every day we turn the 
 leaf to read them. The usurpation was de- 
 tected and exposed. There had been expected the 
 tame hum of acquiescence, or at most the murmurs 
 of timid discontent, but in lieu of these, there rose 
 
20 
 
 from all parts of our territory the trumpet-tones of 
 defiance and the earthquake voice of freemen de- 
 manding their rights ! No, we are not degenerate. 
 At a word, the whigs started again into hfe for the 
 GOOD OLD CAUSE ! When forty thousand men assembled 
 around the Hall of Independence and swore to live 
 and die freemen as their fathers had lived and died, 
 their voice was echoed from the north to the south. 
 New York, — that had been trebly shackled, — awoke, 
 arose, struggled, and is free ! Virginia, (God bless 
 her, the gallant old racer !) Virginia has leaped like a 
 giant on the course ! Pennsylvania is up 1- ^rom the 
 Valley of the Mississippi come the echoing tones of 
 freedom ! No, we are not degenerate ! We have sworn 
 to be free, and we will be so. We tread our native 
 soil, — we have rallied round the standard of our coun- 
 try ! Every day we know ourselves and each other 
 better, and acquire new confidence and new determi- 
 nation, and every day there come pouring into our 
 camp from the ranks of the enemy, the wise, the virtu- 
 ous and the patriotic, who were long deceived, but 
 are deceived no longer, and soon there will be left to 
 make good the monstrous scheme of tyranny which 
 has been projected, nothing but the rotten carcase of 
 corruption, and an effeminate band of parasites. 
 When we shall have purified the House of Repre- 
 sentatives by a free election, and set this government 
 again upon its proper basis, let us never forget the 
 men nor the body, that stood by our rights, manfully 
 and against all odds. 
 
21 
 
 I believe, that under God, the majority of the 
 Senate, by their wisdom, their firmness, and their 
 fearlessness, have saved us from a convulsion. They 
 have prevented the total prostration of the barriers 
 against arbitrary power; the fabric may again be 
 peacefully resuscitated ; the country will not bleed 
 in civil war. Faithfully have those patriots, worthy 
 of being eulogised on this day — faithfully have they 
 stood to their posts. Their duty has been for the 
 time fulfilled ; the responsibility now rests upon us, 
 THE PEOPLE OF THE United States. We arc to dccide 
 between liberty and slavery. We demand our Con- 
 stitution and our laws, and to be governed by our 
 own representatives ! We demand our Constitution 
 as we understand it, and as our fathers understood it. 
 We will suffer no quibbling glosses on that sacred 
 text ; no strained constructions to suit the purposes 
 of arbitrary power. Show us the man who loves 
 that Constitution, — who will maintain and support it 
 against all opposers,— who will live — who will die for 
 it, — and we show you a brother ! No matter by 
 what name he has been called — no matter by what 
 mutual injuries we may have been estranged, — no 
 matter what wounds may have been festering in our 
 bosoms, — we forget them all ! We lay our feuds, our 
 animosities and our revenge (a holy sacrifice !) on the 
 altar of our country, — and we pledge the hand ol' 
 fellowship and the heart of truth, to every freeman 
 who shall stand with us at this hour by the ark of 
 liberty, and partake our triumph in her cause ! 
 
22 
 
 With such a spirit, and in such a cause, how can 
 we fail ? By that love of liberty, which is set on the 
 inmost shrine of our hearts — by that love of our 
 COUNTRY which lives in all our thoughts — by our recol- 
 lections of her past struggles — by our sense of her 
 present danger — by our hope of her future glory — 
 nay, by that saxon blood which fills our veins, and 
 which always turned to fire at the touch of oppres- 
 sion — we will never pause in this career, nor turn 
 from our direct and forthright course, till we shall 
 have swept away the last vestige of tyranny, and 
 re-asserted and re-established in all its vigour, our 
 
 HEREDITARY FREEDOM ! 
 
 We do not blush for our ancestors, nor shall our 
 children blush for us. May they to the end of 
 time, keep this glorious day as we keep it, and go on 
 from age to age, rejoicing in the buoyant spirit and 
 blessed enjoyment of that liberty which has been 
 already won, and is now to be maintained ! 
 
39 W 
 
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