It may live to ravage our heritage for a few days, but there is a spirit of liberty that lives among us, and that shall live.
Henry Ward Beecher
The Public Record
Henry Ward Beecher was an American Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, and speaker, known for his support of the abolition of slavery, his emphasis on God's love, and his 1875 adultery trial. His rhetorical focus on the love of Christ has influenced mainstream Christianity through the 21st century.
gutenberg.org
If a National American party is ever formed, by leaving out the whole question of Human Rights, it will be what a man would be--his soul left out!
That which organizes Society as a Democracy and Government, and Republic--or that which organizes Society as an Aristocracy, and Government as an Oligarchy?
That which ordains popular education, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, public discussion--or that which makes these a prerogative, yielded to a class but denied to masses?
That which declares the right of every man to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness--or that which declares the right of strength and intelligence to subordinate weakness and ignorance?
That which declares all men free &c., or that which declares the superior races free, and the inferior, Slaves?
The North has one theory, the South another; which of them is to be called the American idea?
If then, a party is American, ought it not to be because it represents those principles which are fundamental to American Institutions and to American policy? principles which stand in contrast with European Institutions and policy!
Ought we not to look a little at what a man is after he is born, as well as at the place where?
But I ask you, fellow-citizens, whether the simple accident of birth is a basis broad enough for a permanent National party?
It is simply a question whether, for fear of these things, they will ignore and rub out of their creed every principle of human rights!
Never was an opening so auspicious for a true American party that, embracing the principles of American institutions, should enter our Temple of Liberty and drive out thence not merely the interloping Gentiles, but the money-changers, and…