a counsellor. He married Abigail Brown, a daughter of Hon. Peter C. Brooks. He was a representative to the Legislature of Massachusetts in 1841-44, a member of the State Senate in 1845-6, when he was chairman of the joint committee on the library, which reported that the New England Historic and Genealogical Society, who had applied to the Legislature for an act of incorporation, have leave to withdraw their petition. This report was rejected, and an act was granted, and approved by the governor, an early member, March 18, 1845. While Charles Francis Adams opposed its incorporation,-being of opinion, it is said, that one historical society for this State was sufficient,- yet, his honored father, who was elected a member Feb. 20, 1845, remarked, in his letter of acknowledgment to this institution, "I accept gratefully this testimonial of esteem, and shall be happy if it may be in my power to contribute in any manner to the laudable purposes of the society." And President Fillmore sent a very cordial letter of acceptance in the same period, giving an outline of his family ancestry. Mr. Adams has since proved his friendly disposition to the society, by a donation of his grandfather's writings. The objects of this historical society cover a ground not embraced by any similar institution; and so popular has it become, that, during a period of five years, it has risen to five hundred members. Its periodical, the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, which has reached its sixth volume, exceeding twenty-five hundred pages, is a work of great public benefit, on topics not viewed in any other work.

The political history of Mr. Adams is identified with the origin and progress of the Free Soil party. He was the president of the Buffalo Convention, Aug. 8, 1848. Nearly all the free States, with several of the slave States, were represented. The deliberations of the convention, continued for three days, were signally harmonious and dignified, and resulted in the nomination of Martin Van Buren for president, and Charles Francis Adams for vice-president. The resolutions of this convention, usually denominated the Buffalo Platform, exhibit an outline of the principles of the Free Soil party.

Mr. Charles Sumner, in a speech at Faneuil Hall, Aug. 22, 1848, when he was moderator, on its ratification by the party, remarked, that the convention "not only propose to guard the territories against slavery, but to relieve the federal government from all responsibility therefor, everywhere within the sphere of its constitutional powers.' "The old and ill-compacted party organizations are broken, and from

their ruins is now formed a new party-the party of freedom. There are good men who longed for this, and have died without the sight. John Quincy Adams longed for it. William Ellery Channing longed for it. Their spirits hover over us, and urge us to persevere." In allusion to Charles Francis Adams, as the candidate for the vice-presidency, Charles Sumner further said, "Standing, as I now do, beneath the images of his father and grandfather, it will be sufficient if I say that he is the heir, not only to their name, but to the virtues, the abilities, and the indomitable spirit, that rendered that name so illustrious.” "We found now a new party. Its corner-stone is freedom. Its broad, all-sustaining arches are, truth, justice and humanity. Like the ancient Roman capitol, at once a temple and a citadel, it shall be the fit shrine of the genius of American institutions."

Mr. Adams was an editor of the Boston Daily Whig, afterwards merged in the Republican, a Free Soil paper, now superseded by the Commonwealth. He was the author of Reflections on the Currency of the United States, a pamphlet of forty pages, published in 1837. He published the Memoir and Letters of Mrs. Abigail Adams, and the Letters of John Adams, with Notes. He is the editor, also, of the Life, Diary and Works of John Adams, with appropriate notes, to comprise nine large volumes, which is, emphatically, an inestimable national acquisition. We find a singular discrepancy in a note of Mr. Adams, the editor, in allusion to a remark of Dr. Johnson in relation to Thomas Cushing, Speaker of the House, in the period of the Revolution, wherein Mr. Adams states that "He is the person, concerning whose position Dr. Johnson, in 'Taxation no Tyranny,' made his singular blunder. One object of the Americans is said to be, to adorn the brows of Mr. Cg with a diadem." " We have examined the first and third London editions of Dr. Johnson's production, published in 1775, by Cadell; and we copy the paragraph verbatim, as it stands in both editions. In a vein of sarcasm, the great lexicographer says: "Since the Americans have discovered that they can make a parliament, whence comes it that they do not think themselves equally empowered to make a king? If they are subjects, whose government is constituted by a charter, they can form no body of independent legislature. If their rights are inherent and underived, they may by their own suffrages encircle with a diadem the brows of Mr. Cushing." Thus, it is evident that, instead of Dr. Johnson asserting that it was the intention of the people to make Cushing the king of America, he

merely expressed the opinion that, if their rights were underived, they might, by their own votes, elevate Cushing to an American throne.

PELEG WHITMAN CHANDLER.

JULY 4, 1844. FOR THE CITY AUTHORITIES.

IN the very superior performance of Mr. Chandler appears a passage on the dangers of party organizations, abounding in conceptions of political wisdom. "I do not deprecate party spirit as the worst of evils. In a form of government like our own, it is necessary that political principles should be earnestly discussed, and the claims of candidates thoroughly canvassed,—and this may be done with zeal, energy, enthusiasm, and yet the kindest feelings preserved. I have no sympathy with those who are continually lamenting the party spirit of our day, and at the same time join themselves to other organizations, in which it is easier to obtain power and influence. There are always disappointed men who constantly complain of party discipline, without lifting a finger to improve it. Too selfish to devote their time to accomplish a reform, they are contented with sounding a perpetual alarm. Too feeble to lead, and too proud to serve, they watch, with an impatient eye, the movements of others, but are always ready to accept of favors from either side. Nor do I believe that party spirit is so extensively felt, and party organizations so strict, as is generally supposed. On this point we are liable to be deceived by appearances. Active politicians, partisan leaders, are comparatively few, although they usually make the noise of many. To hear their harangues on the eve of an election, one would suppose that the fable of Chicken Little was about to become a truth, and that the sky was actually falling; and so, from the statements in party newspapers, we often seem to be on the eve of a revolution; but the great mass of the people, in reality, take very little interest in the matter. Because half a dozen grasshoppers under a fern,' says Burke, 'make the field ring with their importunate chink, while thousands of great cattle, reposed beneath the shade, chew the cud, and are silent, do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the fields; that they are, of course, many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the

little, shrivelled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour.'

"It is also to be taken into the account, that selfish party politicians operate as a check upon each other. The ins are exerting all their strength to keep in, and the outs are doing all they can to get in; meanwhile, sober and industrious citizens are ordinarily too much occupied with their own practical concerns to give much attention to either; and I apprehend more danger from this indifference to politics on the part of the people, than from the excess of party spirit. They who are familiar with election returns are aware that most great political revolutions are effected, not so much by the change of opinion among those who ordinarily exercise the elective franchise, as by the votes of those who do not usually perform this duty. There is, in this country, an immense reserved corps of voters, who only come out upon extraordinary occasions; and, so far as party discipline tends to bring out these voters, it is a positive good, and they who, from good motives, engage in political organizations of this sort, are really entitled to great credit.

'Infinitely more danger is to be apprehended from those organizations which involve the consideration of great moral questions, which are hurrying forward with a zeal that knows no reason, and an enthusiasm that cannot be restrained. The doctrine is practically maintained, that men may do acts as a society, for the accomplishment of a good object, which it would not be lawful for them to do as individuals. Such a principle as this is dangerous to the State; it is disorganizing in its tendency, and destructive of all true freedom. An association founded upon such a principle is, in effect, a moral mob,—a conspiracy upon the rights and happiness of the people. What is a riot more than this? Here, if the end will justify the means,-if men in a society may do what it would not be right for them to do as individuals, a perfect defence is made out,- for there has hardly been a riot, within the memory of man, where the end proposed was not regarded by those engaged in it as plausible and just. What is a riot, but the joining together of men to accomplish some good object in a less space of time than it could otherwise be effected; to hasten that which the laws will too slowly reach; to act in aid of Divine justice in the punishment of some crime, or attempt,- to borrow a daring German expression,-to grind down the gaps in the sword of Almighty justice?

"It will be found that the riots of our day differ, in an important

particular, from those of an earlier date; and the fact is remarkable, as tending to show that these lawless outbreaks are only the external and gross manifestation of the principles advocated by other associations. They are no longer the sudden ebullitions of passion and rage, rushing forward without aim or end, and rendered comparatively harmless by the want of system and skilful directors, but they have become organized bodies, with conspicuous leaders, and with plans deliberately made. They go forward to the accomplishment of their object with a coolness and deliberation, that wins for them, in some instances, the title of respectability. We sometimes hear of a mob of gentlemen,quiet assemblage,—a peaceable gathering, which calmly accomplished its object, and dispersed. We read of courts regularly conducted to try culprits by Lynch law; and a tribunal of this sort, which orders. the burning of a negro, or the public whipping of a thief, or the expulsion of gamblers from a town, or the destruction of a newspaper press, is not seldom praised, by implication at least, for the order and regularity of its proceedings."

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Peleg Whitman Chandler was born at New Gloucester, Maine, April 12, 1816; fitted for college at Bangor Seminary, in the classical department; graduated at Bowdoin College in 1834, when his subject was the Character and Genius of Byron; entered the Dane Law School, at Cambridge; and pursued legal studies in the office of Theophilus Parsons, Esq., at Boston. He was admitted to the bar in Boston, 1837. Before Mr. Chandler was admitted to the bar, he was reporter, for the Boston Daily Advertiser, of law cases in the higher courts, and was, during ten years, connected with that paper. He is a counsellor eminent for chamber advice; was three years a member of the city Council, and its president in 1844-5. He married, Nov. 30, 1837, Martha Ann Bush, daughter of Professor Parker Cleaveland; and was a State representative from 1840 to 1846. In the important station of city solicitor, which he has occupied since 1848, Mr. Chandler has sustained himself with a prompt energy and wise forecast.

"The fulsome flattery," remarks the North American Review, "with which Fourth-of-July orators have been very generally in the habit of entertaining their audiences, has been made to give place to wiser and better views; to the lessons and warnings of experience; to admonitions upon our national faults, and to the circulation of a higher system of national morality and honor. While, on the one hand, the orator does not fail to see the faults and follies which our popular organizations