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To The Liberty Party Of The State Of Michigan

To The Liberty Party Of The State Of Michigan image
Parent Issue
Day
1
Month
April
Year
1844
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

I hare been requested to discharge a duty whicli, under ordinary circumstances, shoulc properly proceed from the State Central Committee. Circumstances lo be preseatly. stated forbid thie duty to be discharged by them aud have devolved it on me, as Chairman oí the late Central Comrnittee. The object of this communication is, the mode of carrying on the carapaign upon which we are about to enter preporatory to the fall election. No statement is requisite to convince Of the importance of the present crisis. The energetic activity of our opponents is in itselí a volume of iiistnictive comment. Nev er has democratie and wbig rivalry been more keenly stimulated. TJie one parfy, smarting tinder the defeat of 1840,- grieved by the loss of 6upremacy, which had been regarded as permanent, - encouraged by the speedy reaction of 1841, - and excited by the importanee of the issue, omit no eíTort to achieve victory. The other, enraged by losing the fruit s of their victory in 1840, even in their very blooai and matnriiy, - inetigated by old emulation - pervaded by an nimost tvorship of their lead - er, and nerved by the certainty, that it is their last and dying etruggle, are throwing the very soul of eífbrt inlo the contest. Clay clubs flood the lnd; Clay Jivee, - Clay tracts -Clay panegyrica teemjon all sides. Insidious banners; artful moltoes, and same of theparaphernnlia of the 1840 burrah are protruding their inc'pient features. If the democrats have not as yet gone to equal lenglh, it is merely bccause their candidate is still undecided; but to suppose they will be behind their adversaries in art or eöbrt is to be slupidly dull to the past, and blind to the present. Nor íp it without reason, that these partiee instigated merely by a desire tbr supremacy, Bhould feel extreme excitement. For 16 years they have fought; and thecandid reader of theee 16 years' history will feel that tbeir contest has been mainly for office. - Many - very many - no doubf, bighly reepectable individuals in both have been actuated by principie, and labored for objects, they held in cherlshed honor. But the party acUon bas beenanother and far different matter. A few ambitieus and prominent individuáis; clu8tered in Washington, have given tone and principie to the party at large, and enjoyed the iruks of Inbors put forth in honest faith. The ensning contest may - and most probobly will, be the last in which the whigs wil!pear nnder Ihat name. They generally avow tliat defeat will be annihíktion. They have been gradually smking under conünued deteat. Even the spaimodic action of 1840, and the prevalent desire of the people for changed rulers failed to benefit them. Their idol "bank"' is dead, - pronounced by their own very highest leaders as already being "an obsolete idea :" so decisiveíy has adverse action bufied with the bygone of time, the cherished cre3ture of yesterday. The resolution of 1240 isgone: its like will perhaps never be again eeen. - Like the sudden flash of ihe expiring light, it precluded the darkness that followed. Nor will the party be saved by the allegation, that Tyler was a traitor, for it is well known that the Harrisburgh Convention was noí unanimous on the ciirrency and other questions, and that the Vice Presidency was giyen to the minority, whose opinions Mr. Tyler represented . No! itcannotbe concealed ihat in this State at least we are to have a new party organization after the next election. The laat Fall elección was virtually a tnal of the present qnestion. It was feught avowedJy on the ttriff and Clay. The ground the Advertiser took was th is: "ïf Jacob M. Howard, Jöseph R. Williams, and Thcmas J. Drake, or any two of ihem ahall be elected this fall, THEN Henrt Cl.AT WILL H4VE THB VOTE OF MlCHIGAN; but if Robert McClellaru], LucinB Lyon, and James B. Hunt, or any two of them s'hall be choeen, thek Martín Vat Buren will get it." Mcssre. Williams and Harding, (present edHors of the Advertiser,) with others, wrote private circulara through the State, urging the whigs to raertion on the sanje ground that the election of 1848 would in fact decide that of 1844: in ittheyoaid, "Let va give an earnesl that we mean íhe vote of Micliigan to be given to Hfi.vaT Clay fa 1844!" Such are some of the causes which now excite whigs and demócrata to unusual effort. The crisis undoubtedly jb important to them, but far more so is it to ue. Principie- sacred and patriotic, - that lies at the base of our social end politicnl institutions,- .Jhat sustoins a fabric, which with all its faulte, we love,- that governs the grcat rights of man, and decides the destiniea of millions in time and during eternity- gives to us in the ensuing election, that interest which other motives furnish to our opponems. I will be our first president ial contesr, for in 1840 there was neither organization nor party in fact; the few votes cast spoke but individual aclion. For the first time in this State, we can on a direct issue record our votes, for or against slavery,- roror agciinsta continued occupation of the preeidential chair by a slaveholder,- for or against a continuation of that system, which for the last half century has prostrated the resources and energies of otir young republic to upbuild slavery, and at the expense of all others to promote the interetis of the one or two hnndrcd thousand persons, who enjoyed the bad privilege of this unholy species of property- man.' During 43 out of 55 years, our presiden ial chair has exahed slavery before the worJd in the persons of slavehülders. At rare intervals, and then but for a sino le term, lileity has "chancea" into this post, but soon ÏO becH thrust out. Ijj this year , for the first Itime, we aretosny, - shall tbis continué;- siiall our natioifs sumniit be capped by Libcrtjr or by Slavery :- shali the heaven's sun shine upon frectlom or úon its antagonist, - and shall the world's nations, they look to the continent of the We?t behold freedom or slavery us tlio dominant spirit of our mstitutioiifi? To us it makes no difference whether this issue is presented in the peraon of Henry Clay the slaveholder, or Martin Van Buren, of Amistead memory, the unexcellable devolee to the slavery spint: the contest is the same wjth eitfaer; t is bei ween Birney Ihe devotee to Liberty on the one e ide and Clay or Van Buren, the devotee to slavery on the other, - BiRNKr, whofrom the rich alaveholder of the eouth has become the emancipationist and the poor farmer of the north, - Clay who from the poor farmer of "the slathes' has swelled into the rich and ambitious'slaveholdfr of Ashland, and whose early sentiments of liberty - the noble impulses of a God-Liven spirit, yét untainted by the world, are novv Jot in the declaration of unqualified and undying hostility to every "scheme of emancipation, gradual or immediate," - and Van Burbn, whofe very presidential soul and faeulties were instinct, but wilh devotion to the tyrant -slavery.Fellows citizena, say - do you realize thf importance of this crisis? Are you ready oach one, to put forth your effort for the occasion? Are you willing that wbig and democratie clubs should e.vist in every vilJoge at your very duorc, while you do nothing? that thcre would be uttered and echoed around you every sentiment and every principie, but that of Liberty? Do you pant for the opportunity to let loóse Liberty's resistiese power, and to speed over the land tbis blessed and too long denied spirit, - to give to our country vvhat Washington and the Martyrs of 76 fondly hoped to do? I anticípate your response, and invite your attention to the therefore necessity of eflbrl, - one real, good, licartij and united effórt.- Let us in Michigan for once be true to the cause: for once give it a fair trial: for once deny ourselves, and work as our opponents do; let us show that principie is as potent a stimulant to act ion, as is party zeal, and oh! how cheering will be the result. I need not comment on the absurdity of nierely wishing a desired end, yet not working for it. We may wish to the world's end - until our very spirit fails because of its intensity, - but one oujice of work is worth it all. To procure this on the part of liberty friends, and to organize the S'ate effeciually, is the object of this letter. To instígate every man and woraan ío individual elïbrt, - not waiting for neighborsi - but in thorough self dependence, - is the motive which induced many friends to solicit me to be the medium of conveying their feelings and intentions through every quarter of the State, and m anothsr communication next week, I will spread out in detail the necessary steps for a general o.-ganization.

Article

Subjects
Signal of Liberty
Old News