Judge Conway, of Kansas.
CONGRATULATION ON REËLECTION OF ANSON BURLINGAME AS REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS.
Letter to a Banquet at Faneuil Hall, November 24, 1856.
Hancock Street,
Monday Evening, November 24, 1856.
DEAR SIR,—I am sorry to renounce any opportunity of doing honor to Mr. Burlingame; but my careful physician does not allow me yet to take part in the excitement of a public meeting, and I yield to his prescription.
My best wishes attend your distinguished guest to-night and always. His recent triumph is the occasion of special joy, not only in Massachusetts, but everywhere throughout the free North. Many who voted against him must, in their better moments, condemn themselves,—as much as they have been condemned by others. If not entirely dead to generous impulses, they must be glad that they failed. If not entirely insensible to appearances, they must look with regret at the means employed to accomplish the end proposed. If not entirely indifferent to principles, they must look with amazement at the unprecedented, incongruous, and eccentric political conglomerate of which they constituted a part.
It was natural that the propagandists of Slavery, acting under dictation from Washington, should vote against Mr. Burlingame. It was natural that others, who allow themselves to be controlled by the rancors and jealousies of party, should do likewise. But it was hard that this blow at Freedom should be attempted in the name of Trade, and that merchants of Boston should be rallied against a candidate who had done so much to make Boston respectable. And yet this extraordinary conduct is not without parallel in history. The earliest antislavery effort of England was against the Barbary corsairs, and this, it is well known, was opposed by “the mercantile interest.” And this same “mercantile interest,” as you also know, set itself against the great antislavery enterprise of Clarkson and Wilberforce, when they demanded the suppression of the slave-trade. Such examples teach us not to be disappointed, when this interest is invoked against our efforts. But I rejoice to know that in Boston there are honorable exceptions, and, if anything be expected from me to-night, let it be a tribute to one of these. I propose the following toast.