A movement to consolidate the cities of Pittsburgh and Allegheny together with some adjacent boroughs, was begun in 1853-54. It failed entirely that year, but in 1867 Lawrenceville, Peebles, Collins, Liberty, Pitt, and Oakland, all lying between the two rivers, were annexed to Pittsburgh, and in 1872 there was a further annexation of a district embracing twenty-seven square miles south of the Monongahela River, while in 1906 Allegheny was also annexed; and, as there was litigation to test the validity of the consolidation, the Supreme Court of the United States on December 6, 1907, declared in favor of the constitutionality of the act.
XIV
The first national convention of the Republican party was held in Pittsburgh on February 22 and 23, 1856. While this gathering was an informal convention, it was made for the purpose of effecting a national organization of the groups of Republicans which had grown up in the States where slavery was prohibited. Pittsburgh was, therefore, in a broad sense, the place where the birth of the Republican party occurred. A digression on this subject, in order that the record may be made clear, will probably not be unwelcome.
In 1620, three months before the landing of the Mayflower at Provincetown, a Dutch vessel carried African slaves up the James River, and on the soil of Virginia there was planted a system of servitude which at last extended throughout the Colonies and flourished with increasing vigor in the South, until, in the War of the Rebellion, Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation put an end forever to slavery in America. When the builders of our Government met in the Constitutional Convention of 1787, slavery was a problem which more than once threatened to wreck the scheme for an indissoluble union of the States. But it was compromised under a suggestion implied in the Constitution itself, that slavery should not be checked in the States in which it existed until 1808. In the meantime the entire labor system of the South was built upon African slavery, while at the North the horror of the public conscience grew against the degrading institution from year to year. By 1854 the men in the free States who were opposed to slavery had begun to unite themselves by political bonds, and in the spring and summer of that year, groups of such men met in more or less informal conferences in Wisconsin, Michigan, New York, Maine, Massachusetts, Iowa, Ohio, and other northern States. But it was at Jackson, Michigan, where the men who were uniting their political fortunes to accomplish the destruction of slavery first assembled in a formal convention on July 6, 1854, nominated a full State ticket, and adopted a platform containing these declarations:
Resolved: That, postponing and suspending all differences with regard to political economy or administrative policy, in view of the imminent danger that Kansas and Nebraska will be grasped by slavery, and a thousand miles of slave soil be thus interposed between the free States of the Atlantic and those of the Pacific, we will act cordially and faithfully in unison to avert and repeal this gigantic wrong and shame.
Resolved: That in view of the necessity of battling for the first principles of Republican government, and against the schemes of an aristocracy, the most revolting and oppressive with which the earth was ever cursed or man debased, we will coöperate and be known as "Republicans" until the contest be terminated.
On January 17, 1856, "the Republican Association of Washington, D. C.," referring to the extension of slavery into Kansas and Nebraska as "the deep dishonor inflicted upon the age in which we live," issued a call, in accordance with what appeared to be the general desire of the Republican party, inviting the Republicans of the Union to meet in informal convention at Pittsburgh on February 22, 1856, for the purpose of perfecting the national organization, and providing for a national delegate convention of the Republican party, at some subsequent day, to nominate candidates for the presidency and vice-presidency, to be supported at the election in November, 1856.
The Republican party met accordingly for the first time in a national convention in Pittsburgh on the date appointed, and was largely attended. Not only were all the free States represented, but there were also delegates from Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Missouri. John A. King was made temporary chairman, and Francis P. Blair permanent chairman. Speeches were made by Horace Greeley, Giddings and Gibson of Ohio, Codding and Lovejoy of Illinois, and others. Mr. Greeley sent a telegraphic report of the first day's proceedings to the New York "Tribune," stating that the convention had accomplished much to cement former political differences and distinctions, and that the meeting at Pittsburgh had marked the inauguration of a national party, based upon the principle of freedom. He said that the gathering was very large and the enthusiasm unbounded; that men were acting in the most perfect harmony and with a unity of feeling seldom known to political assemblages of such magnitude; that the body was eminently Republican in principle and tendency; and that it combined much of character and talent, with integrity of purpose and devotion to the great principles which underlie our Government. He prophesied that the moral and political effect of this convention upon the country would be felt for the next quarter of a century. In its deliberations, he said that everything had been conducted with marked propriety and dignity.
The platform adopted at Pittsburgh demanded the repeal of all laws allowing the introduction of slavery into free territories; promised support by all lawful measures to the Free-State men in Kansas in their resistance to the usurped authority of lawless invaders; and strongly urged the Republican party to resist and overthrow the existing national administration because it was identified with the progress of the slave power to national supremacy.
On the evening of the second day, a mass meeting was held in aid of the emigration to Kansas. The president of the meeting was George N. Jackson, and D. D. Eaton was made secretary. Horace Greeley and others made addresses, and with great enthusiasm promises of aid to the bleeding young sister in the West were made.
This record seems to show beyond question that the Republican party had its national birth at Pittsburgh on February 22, 1856, and that it came into being dedicated, as Horace Greeley described it at that moment, to the principle of human freedom. A later formal convention, as provided for at Pittsburgh, was held at Philadelphia on June 17, 1856, which nominated John C. Fremont, of California, for President, and William L. Dayton, of New Jersey, for Vice-President. This ticket polled a total popular vote of 1,341,264, but was beaten by the Democratic candidates,—James Buchanan, of Pennsylvania, for President, and John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, for Vice-President, who polled 1,838,169 votes. This defeat of a good cause was probably a fortunate piece of adversity, for the men who opposed slavery were not yet strong enough to grapple the monster to its death as they did when Lincoln was nominated four years later. It was the high mission of the party in 1856 and 1860 to stand against the extension of slavery, and in 1864 against all slavery as well as against the destruction of this Union; and in 1868, against those who wished to nullify the results of the war. Its later mission has been full of usefulness and honor.