failed to see even then that all that there was of permanent importance in those measures, the Fugitive Slave Law,-was an unconditional surrender of the republic to the Slave Power. And at so late a period in his life as that in which he wrote "The American Conflict," he is evidently reluctant in connecting Mr. Clay's reputation with a corrupt monstrosity in legislation and morals which even the great name of his favourite statesman should not be permitted to shield from lasting opprobrium.1

It may well be inferred that if Mr. Greeley would speak of one of Mr. Clay's measures as deserving of lasting opprobrium, and this after years of reflection, he did not at the time speak in honeyed phrase of it. The whole country was agitated, indeed, upon the subject of slavery, and the people of the North, after the passage of the Compromise Measures, gradually cut loose from former political ideas and began to place themselves in readiness for a revolution.

One of the most potent influences in the creation of a thorough anti-slavery sentiment among the people was a work

1 See The American Conflict, Vol. 1, Chap. XV. "It was entirely proper," he here says, "that Congress should provide at once for the temporary gov. ernment of all the territories newly acquired from Mexico; and there was no radical objection to doing this in one bill, if that should seem advisable. As the establishment of a definite boundary between New Mexico and Texas was essential to the tranquillity and security of the Territory, that object might fairly be contemplated in the act providing a civil government therefor. But why Texas should be paid ten millions of dollars for relinquishing her pretensions to territory never possessed by nor belonging to her,—territory which had been first acquired from Mexico by the forces and then bought of her by the money of the Unionis not obvious; and why this payment, if made at all, should be a makeweight in a bargain covering a variety of arrangements with which it had no proper connection, is still less explicable. And when, on the back of this was piled an act to provide new facilities for slave-catching in the Free States, ostensibly balanced by another which required the slavetraders of Washington to remove their jails and auction-rooms across the Potomac to that dull old dwarf of a city which had recently been retroceded to Virginia, as if on purpose to facilitate this arrangement, the net product was a corrupt monstrosity in legislation and morals which even the great name of Henry Clay should not shield from lasting opprobrium."

of America's most illustrious female writer. I can only refer to Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." This was first published as a serial in The National Era newspaper, a weekly journal of the National Capital, edited with great ability and sublime courage by Dr. Gamaliel Bailey. The story ran through considerable portions of the years 1851 and 1852, and attracted wide interest from the beginning. Upon publication in book form it had a vast popularity. The sensation it created has never been approached by an American literary work. So eager were persons to get the thrilling story of "Uncle Tom," that one copy of the book served the purpose of many copies, by being read aloud to parties congregated for the purpose, the demand for the novel being, during many weeks, perhaps months, immensely greater than the supply. This most masterly plea for humanity which genius has produced was unable to lift the nation at once out of the slough of trifling and wrong into which it had been cast by political parties, but it created an anti-slavery sentiment so intense and widely spread, that further encroachments of the Slave Power were thereafter impossible except by means of armed revolution. To the genius of Mrs. Stowe more than to any other one cause, the origin of the Republican party may be assigned.

And by this time, the influence of the public press, as the educator of the masses of the body politic had become palpably manifest. Undoubtedly the means of popular education supplied to most of the children of the republic at the lightest possible cost, to the poor especially, had done incalculable service in behalf of general intelligence. But it is certainly true that the fact of the adult population, in a few years after the remarkable development of the press consequent ħpon the invention of the electric telegraph and the wonderful journalistic enterprise which followed, rapidly reaching a high plane of intelligence and manly independence of thought, is undoubtedly true, that this magnificent fact is largely due to the influence of the public press. As the people became more intelligent, more independent in opinion, the power of party, of course, correspondingly diminished. When the press took position above party it became at once more influential

it

with the people and more truly representative of them. And as amongst an intelligent people there is always more of wisdom and statesmanship than amongst all the politicians, and as they now had representative journals, it did not take them long to perceive that old parties had become obsolete; boyclothes into which it would have been impossible for the now puissant nation to place itself without making of itself a ridiculous spectacle.

Nor will there be any to deny this claim of magnificent power on the part of the press, when they once seriously reflect upon the nature of its operations; its simple yet majestic means of influence. All will readily agree that if a skilful orator were to address large audiences of willing hearers every day, he would acquire vast influence. A great journal speaks to more persons every day of the week, every day of the year, than could be heard by any orator though he had the voice of Jupiter Tonans. And this not upon a single topic but upon a variety of topics, many of which must of necessity be of great value and interest to all the people. Libri cibus animo. Newspapers have become the daily intellectual food of all the citizens of enlightened christendom. The orator, except by the aid of the press, can only influence those who stand round about him. The journalist has a greater immediate audience, but his words. reach afar off, as weighty in the uttermost parts of the land or of the earth, as in the deep basement where they issue from that marvel of modern machinery, the Hoe Press. This orator, with this vast audience, is of a generous nature, and comes to you instead of requiring you to come to him. Thus with the rising and the setting of the sun he visits the hearthstone of every intelligent family — a welcome visitor. When we consider, therefore, the great and varied contents of most of our public journals, and the marvellous means of their diffusion among the people, we cannot help agreeing that the newspaper press is, and must of necessity be, among the greatest of edu

cators.

Horace Greeley, though he finally yielded support to the Whig candidates in the presidential campaign of 1848, did much efficient service against party thraldom. He performed

similar service in 1852, though again supporting the regular nominations. But as we have seen he spat upon the platform and upheld one of his own. He was leading the people on the "new departure;" a departure which eventually led to the formation of the political organization which controlled the affairs of the nation through the most momentous era of its history, conferring vast and lasting benefits upon the republic, but at length undertaking to be scarcely less arbitrary in its trammels than the parties which it had displaced, received, as he deemed was just, his hearty and eminent opposition.

But between the time when the Whig party was dissolved and that when the Republican party was organized, grave questions arose, the agitation of which did much to dismember the Democracy, and prepare the way for a new and better era. Of this formative period of the new era, and the part taken therein by Mr. Greeley, and in the early history of the Republi can party, I shall speak in the next chapter.

CHAPTER XVIII.

1854 TO 1860.

Mr. Greeley in the Political Contests of the Time-The Renewal of Slavery Agitation-The Kansas-Nebraska Struggle-Messrs. Sumner, Chase, Wade, Seward, Fessenden-The Know-Nothing Party- Mr. Greeley opposes it-"The Banks Congress"-Mr. Greeley Assaulted --General Banks - Organization of the Republican Party-The Frémont-Buchanan Campaign — Defeat of the Republicans - The Kansas War--"Lecompton"-Senator Douglas Defends Popular Sovereignty -Senator David C. Broderick, of California-Edward D. Baker - The Lincoln-Douglas Debates-The Tribune on the Side of Douglas - Mr Greeley Travels Overland to California-Extracts from His LettersBuffaloes, Prairie-Dogs, and Indians-Life at Denver in 1859-Brigham Young and Mormonism-Honours in California - Receptions and Addresses-The Yosemite-The Pacific Railroad Return John

Brown.

AFTER the dismemberment of the Whig party came chaos. The dissolving elements at first settled nowhere. The organization was for a time maintained, but it had become fossilized and all attempts to ressurect it and breathe therein a living soul were vain. Its mourners went about the streets undertaking reconstruction; but the silver gray cord was loosed, the golden bowl was broken. The day of small things had not been despised, but it had passed away forever. Mr. Greeley looked on all attempts to revive the Whig party with philosophical indifference, and upon most of the self-constituted architects who proposed to rebuild, using the old materials, with good-natured contempt. It was not long until Mr. B. Gratz Brown, if my memory is not at fault, very correctly described "an old-line Whig as "a very respectable gentleman who took his juleps and voted the Democratic ticket regularly."

as

During this chaotic period of parties, the Temperance reform was forced upon the people as a political question. The State of Maine led off with what was called a Prohibitory Liquor