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party. They saw that they had their origin mainly if not entirely in our naturalization laws. A million and a half of American voters have banded together in one great political brotherhood to cause these laws to be repealed or modified; and roused and animated as they are by the feeling just stated, you can no more defeat them, in their purposes, than you can suppress the feeling itself.

The feature of this remarkable American party that has been deemed most assailable, and accordingly has been attacked with the greatest violence and rancor, is the secret or private character of its organization. Jacobin club, secret conspiracy, underground party, dark-lantern party, and such like epithets, have been unsparingly applied to it. These are very ugly names, intended to awaken popular prejudice, and to render an object hideous which is otherwise comely enough.

The party is composed of numerous societies or councils, dispersed through the country, and established at localities to suit the convenience of its members. These localities are made public, the times of meeting are made public, their membership is public, and, what is of more importance, the result of their deliberations is made public. These councils, or societies, to accomplish the great objects of their institution, went sedulously to work, and their joint efforts, in an incredibly short space of time, have enabled them to lay before the public, the great principles, to the support of which they stand pledged before the American people. Their consultations, as to the details of their platform, were necessarily private; but when their great work was done, they submitted it to public inspection, and if well done, the public will not take the trouble to inquire into the process by which it was accomplished.

The simple question is, are these private associations, formed for great public purposes, hostile in their tendency, as they are asserted to be, to the free institutions of our country, and to the true spirit of the Constitution ?

The right of the people peaceably to meet together and to consult upon public affairs, whether their meetings are private or public, whether in the form of private societies or public assemblies, has never before been questioned in this country, even during periods of the highest political excitement and exasperation.

As evincive of the jealousy and apprehensions of the fathers of the republic, they classed the right of the people peaceably to assemble (privately or publicly and without restraint) with the right of petition, religious freedom, the freedom of speech and of the press, and in the first articles of the amendments of the Constitution, prohibited Congress from passing any law to abridge them in any manner whatever.

These have always been revered by the enlightened friends of free government, as among the great elements of human liberty, and it is to be regretted, that, without reflection it is hoped, they or any of them should be denounced by persons of standing and character, as hostile to our free institutions.

If there is truth in history, private political societies have ever proved them

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want of any one to advocate and plead for them. The times are wonderfully changed. A revolution has been wrought. The sword has not done it, though the sword has been sheathed but little during this long interval ; but it is the silent work of awakened and intelligent public opinion, which no power is able to withstand. It cannot be cajoled from its position; it cannot be bribed; once fixed, it cannot be driven from its place by either force or fear. For

years, the continent of Europe has been the theatre of revolutions, succeeding one another with a rapidity truly astonishing. France seems, from the beginning, to have been the furnace in which all the fires have originated. One ruler has given place in Paris to another, till it has become difficult to keep the various changes in mind. Thrones have been erected and overthrown, as if they were but the baubles and playthings which the greater Napoleon affected to consider them.

Italy has given signs of regeneration. Throughout her line of States, from time to time, encouraging voices have been heard in the name of liberty, and now and then her people have risen upon

their usurpers, to wrest from them the power they have so wrongfully exercised. From far-off shores, the flame has been seen burning in that classic land; and hopes have been entertained that it was a bright and lasting illumination. But such hopes have all been cast down. With Austrian swords at their throats, and French bayonets at their breasts, it was scarcely to be expected that the people of Italy could succeed in so unequal a contest. A guard is quartered now in every house; but no military surveillance can imprison those expansive ideas, or the spirit of those vital principles, that spread so mysteriously over the face of a land. No power is sufficient to overawe those deep and scarcely audible mutterings, which presage the earthquake by which all things are destined to be shaken.

The struggle of Hungary for independence adds a new and bright chapter to the book of the world's history. It was an unsuccessful effort; and some may conclude that its failure established the worthlessness of the cause contended for : but the very unhappiness of the

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issue has had the effect to draw upon that people the sympathies of liberty-loving hearts everywhere, and their example has been recorded as one worthy of imitation, wherever the sound of freedom has been heard. Hungary reposes; but we believe that hers is the rest which recruits the strength, and precedes other and more earnest efforts in the cause for which her energies have been exhausted. She fell by treachery, more than by the combination of foreign enemies; and when her tattered ensigns are lifted again from the dust, the wish of all American hearts will be, that they may lead on her armies to the speedy and successful achievement of her freedom.

The German States from time to time have felt the throes of this mighty convulsion. Of all others, they seemed the least likely to resist the current of liberal ideas. They were the earliest to hail the light that came dancing over the earth, and welcomed it with hearts that had been tutored to the love of liberty. Great things were expected of them, and great things should have been performed. But the spirit was not universal. It had not yet struck deep root in the common heart. The masses had not yet gone far enough in that school of bitter experience which inculcates high resolves in man. The existing order of things carried a preponderating influence which was hard to overcome. The ancient and time-honored barriers it was difficult to remove; but another and a far mightier obstacle was, the close and compact union of absolutism in its own defence. Monarchy was made to feel that upon this one effort might forever depend its existence. The conspiracy was successful. The weary ones, whose faith had been so enduring in behalf of their holy cause, succumbed to the pressure they could no longer resist, and took up their abode in foul prisons,—wandered, sad-hearted, abroad, to eat the bread of exiles,-or laid

,—or laid down and died, desponding forever of freedom. If we scan the history of Europe for the last few years, it will offer us little else than a confused record of struggles and repulses, of efforts and disappointments, of hopes and fears, of popular outbreaks and tyrannical usurpations. Sometimes, indeed, the rulers, trembling for their immediate safety, have granted concessions, in order to ap

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pease the popular clamor; but on regaining power, all these concessions have been blotted out, and tyranny has become more exacting than ever. In this, absolutism was only true to its own nature. As soon as it was safe to lay aside the mask, it never failed to exhibit its true character in all its hideous proportions. Not once has it offered gifts to the people, which it did not, at the time, resolve to take back again, with usurious interest. Austria, Prussia, Russia, France—what else can the

eye fasten itself upon in scanning the history of their more recent acts, but records of murder, of imprisonment, of fines and confiscations, of banishment, of leagues against liberty, of cruelty and tyranny in all their multiplied forms ? Where is the hope to-day that their people are making themselves ready to go forward with the conflict that will reward them with freedom! How many of the population of those empires

? are languishing abroad at this moment, dying lingering deaths far from home and friends, rather than swear away the freedom of their consciences at the dictation of crowned conspirators! Who shall tell the number, or the acuteness of their sufferings ? Who shall estimate the depth of that grief which seems able to consume both body and soul together?

Europe is now a seething caldron. The great game of the kings, carried on so long with impunity, at last appears to be completely blocked. The rulers are at a stand. Events have mastered ambitious men; and the extended laws of cause and effect, running silently through a course of centuries, at length seem about to vindicate their supreme authority. Politics is now another name for confusion. Ministers study and scheme how they may extricate their royal masters fro their dilemma, and give over their efforts with exclamations of mortification and despair. The rulers grasp their sceptres more firmly, fearing that it cannot be long ere they must give them up forever. Cabinets have grown timid, and dare not assert with former boldness the policy of their several courts. There is a manifest want of confidence everywhere. · Armies are called into service, till there are scarcely any men left to recruit them. The treasuries are de

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pleted by enormous drafts, and bankruptcy and ruin threaten nations that but yesterday were prolific in resources.

But in the midst of this inextricable confusion, certain signs are beginning to betoken the increasing interest which foreign countries take in our national welfare. We see, from time to time, symptoms of a more decided leaning to republicanism. Here and there sturdy words are spoken—at the right time and in the right place—in our behalf. The spirit and principles of our government find admiring friends where it was least to be expected. Our institutions are criticised and commented on in an appreciative temper, and without that rancor and prejudice which was once so certain to be excited, by the mere mention of our name.

It is too important a truth for any of us to overlook, that the American Republic is the home of Liberty, and the final hope of the world. Through the efficacy of her example and her teachings, must redemption finally come. We hold the treasure in our own keeping; we are the trustees of a possession that is to enrich mankind. On our soil dwells that living spirit, which is, in time, to overthrow error, tear away the deceits of usurpation, deprive tyranny of its power, and everywhere animate the human soul with the belief that freedom was coeval with its birth.

If the world may not hope in us, then all hope is in vain. The experiment of a free government is one with which we have made ourselves familiar. With the institutions which belong to such a forin of government, we have an acquaintance that is practical, and thus the more valuable. Their spirit has infused itself into our habits, our customs, and our ways of thought. If these privileges are worthy to be perpetuated, none ought to be more eager and earnest in the performance of such a work, than we who have so freely enjoyed them; and it should therefore be a labor of love with us, to publish their blessings to the world.

Foreign rulers no doubt regard us with jealousy, convinced that our system is incompatible with the secure existence of their own. It must be so, in the very nature of things. The work of Republi

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