Cut off from the main body, it may show a brief vitality, as the head of a tortoise still bites for some days after it is severed from the neck; but it can have no permanent existence.

Surely this is not the party of Freedom which we seek.

The incompetency of this party, as organ of our cause, is enhanced by the uncongenial secrecy in which it had its origin and yet shrouds itself.

Even if justifiable on any ground of public policy, they should not be associated with our cause: but I am unwilling to allude to them without expressing my frank dissent.

It is proposed to attaint men for religion, and also for birth.

If this object can prevail, vain are the triumphs of Civil Freedom in its many hard-fought fields, vain is that religious toleration which we profess.

Slowly among the struggling sects was evolved that great idea of the equality of all men before the law without regard to religious belief; nor can any party now organize a proscription merely for religious belief, without calling in…

Originally settled from England, the Republic has been strengthened and enriched by generous contributions of population from Scotland, Ireland, Switzerland, Sweden, France, and Germany; and the cry is, Still they come!

All will admit that any influence which they bring, hostile to our institutions, calculated to substitute priestcraft for religion and bigotry for Christianity, must be deprecated and opposed.

All will admit, too, that there must be some assurance of their purpose to become not merely consumers of the fruits of our soil, but useful, loyal, and permanent members of our community, upholders of the general welfare.

There are our broad lands, stretching towards the setting sun; let them come and take them.

Ourselves children of the Pilgrims of a former generation, let us not turn from the Pilgrims of the present.

Let the home founded by our emigrant fathers continue open in its many mansions to the emigrants of to-day.

The history of our country, in its humblest as well as most exalted spheres, testifies to the merit of foreigners.

Their strong arms have helped furrow our broad territory with canals, and stretch in every direction the iron rail.

They fill our workshops, navigate our ships, and even till our fields.

Go where you will among the hardy sons of toil on land or sea, and there you find industrious and faithful foreigners bending their muscles to the work.

A party, which, beginning in secrecy, interferes with religious belief, and founds a discrimination on the accident of birth, is not the party for us.

Where Liberty is, there is my country,” was the sentiment of that great Apostle of Freedom, Benjamin Franklin, uttered during the trials of the Revolution.

In similar strain, I would say, “Where Liberty is, there is my party.” Such an organization is now happily constituted here in Massachusetts, and in all the Free States, under the name of REPUBLICAN PARTY.

The early opposition to Slavery was simply a sentiment, outgushing from the hearts of the sensitive and humane.

Vowing ourselves against Slavery, wherever it exists, whether enforced by Russian knout, Turkish bastinado, or lash of Carolina planter, we do not seek to interfere with it at Petersburg, Constantinople, or Charleston; nor does any such…

But wherever we are responsible for the wrong, there our duty begins.

To its repeal of the Missouri Compromise, and its imperious demand that Kansas shall be surrendered to Slavery, we reply, that Freedom shall be made the universal law of all the national domain, without compromise, and that hereafter no…

Let us at all hazards prevent the extension of Slavery and the increase of the Slave Power.