AMESBURY, 4th mo., 1883.
I REGRET that I cannot be present at the meeting called in reference to the pressing question of the day, the present condition and future prospects of the Indian race in the United States. The old policy, however well intended, of the government is no longer available. The westward setting tide of immigration is everywhere sweeping over the lines of the reservations. There would seem to be no power in the government to prevent the practical abrogation of its solemn treaties and the crowding out of the Indians from their guaranteed hunting grounds. Outbreaks of Indian ferocity and revenge, incited by wrong and robbery on the part of the whites, will increasingly be made the pretext of indiscriminate massacres. The entire question will soon resolve itself into the single alternative of education and civilization or extermination.
The school experiments at Hampton, Carlisle, and Forest Grove in Oregon have proved, if such proof were ever needed, that the roving Indian can be enlightened and civilized, taught to work and take interest and delight in the product of his industry, and settle down on his farm or in his workshop, as an American citizen, protected by and subject to the laws of the republic. What is needed is that not only these schools should be more liberally supported, but that new ones should be opened without delay. The matter does not admit of procrastination. The work of education and civilization must be done. The money needed must be contributed with no sparing hand. The laudable example set by the Friends and the American Missionary Association should be followed by other sects and philanthropic societies. Christianity, patriotism, and enlightened self interest have a common stake in the matter. Great and difficult as the work may be the country is strong enough, rich enough, wise enough, and, I believe, humane and Christian enough to do it.
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY.
Read at a meeting of the Essex Club, in Boston,
November, 1885.
AMESBURY, 11th Mo., 10, 1885.
I AM sorry that I cannot accept thy invitation to attend the meeting of the Essex Club on the 14th inst. I should be glad to meet my old Republican friends and congratulate them on the results of the election in Massachusetts, and especially in our good old county of Essex.
Some of our friends and neighbors, who have been with us heretofore, last year saw fit to vote with the opposite party. I would be the last to deny their perfect right to do so, or to impeach their motives, but I think they were mistaken in expecting that party to reform the abuses and evils which they complained of. President Cleveland has proved himself better than his party, and has done and said some good things which I give him full credit for, but the instincts of his party are against him, and must eventually prove too strong for him, and, instead of his carrying the party, it will be likely to carry him. It has already compelled him to put his hands in his pockets for electioneering purposes, and travel all the way from Washington to Buffalo to give his vote for a spoilsman and anti-civil service machine politician. I would not like to call it a case of "offensive partisanship," but it looks a good deal like it.
As a Republican from the outset, I am proud of the noble record of the party, but I should rejoice to see its beneficent work taken up by the Democratic party and so faithfully carried on as to make our organization no longer necessary. But, as far as we can see, the Republican party has still its mission and its future. When labor shall everywhere have its just reward, and the gains of it are made secure to the earners; when education shall be universal, and, North and South, all men shall have the free and full enjoyment of civil rights and privileges, irrespective of color or former condition; when every vice which debases the community shall be discouraged and prohibited, and every virtue which elevates it fostered and strengthened; when merit and fitness shall be the conditions of office; and when sectional distrust and prejudice shall give place to well-merited confidence in the loyalty and patriotism of all, then will the work of the Republican party, as a party, be ended, and all political rivalries be merged in the one great party of the people, with no other aim than the common welfare, and no other watchwords than peace, liberty, and union. Then may the language which Milton addressed to his countrymen two centuries ago be applied to the United States, "Go on, hand in hand, O peoples, never to be disunited; be the praise and heroic song of all posterity. Join your invincible might to do worthy and godlike deeds; and then he who seeks to break your Union, a cleaving curse be his inheritance."