The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll Volume IX Part 16

You cannot make it, as the Democratic party does, by pa.s.sing a resolution.

If your father voted the Democratic ticket, that is disgrace enough for one family. Tell the old man you can stand it no longer. Tell the old gentleman that you have made up your mind to stand with the party of human progress; and if he asks you why you cannot vote the Democratic ticket you tell him: "Every man that tried to destroy the Government, every man that shot at the holy flag in heaven, every man that starved our soldiers, every keeper of Libby, Andersonville and Salisbury, every man that wanted to burn the negro, every one that wanted to scatter yellow fever in the North, every man that opposed human liberty, that regarded the auction-block as an altar and the howling of the bloodhound as the music of the Union, every man who wept over the corpse of slavery, that thought lashes on the naked back were a legal tender for labor performed, every one willing to rob a mother of her child--every solitary one was a Democrat."

Tell him you cannot stand that party. Tell him you have to go with the Republican party, and if he asks you why, tell him it destroyed slavery, it preserved the Union, it paid the national debt; it made our credit as good as that of any nation on the earth.

Tell him it makes every dollar in a four per cent, bond worth a dollar and ten cents; that it satisfies the demands of the highest civilization. Tell the old man that the Republican party preserved the honor of the Nation; that it believes in education; that it looks upon the schoolhouse as a cathedral. Tell him that the Republican party believes in absolute intellectual liberty; in absolute religious freedom; in human rights, and that human rights rise above States.

Tell him that the Republican party believes in humanity, justice, human equality, and that the Republican party believes this is a Nation and will be forever and ever; that an honest ballot is the breath of the Republic's life; that honest money is the blood of the Republic; and that nationality is the great throbbing beat of the heart of the Republic. Tell him that. And tell him that you are going to stand by the flag that the patriots of the North carried upon the battle-field of death. Tell him you are going to be true to the martyred dead; that you are going to vote exactly as Lincoln would have voted were he living.

Tell him that if every traitor dead were living now, there would issue from his lips of dust, "Hurrah for Hanc.o.c.k!" that could every patriot rise, he would cry for Garfield and liberty; for union and for human progress everywhere. Tell him that the South seeks to secure by the ballot what it lost by the bayonet; to whip by the ballot those who fought it in the field. But we saved the country; and we have the heart and brains to take care of it. I will tell you what we are going to do.

We are going to treat them in the South just as well as we treat the people in the North. Victors cannot afford to have malice. The North is too magnanimous to have hatred. We will treat the South precisely as we treat the North. There are thousands of good people there. Let us give them money to improve their rivers and harbors; I want to see the sails of their commerce filled with the breezes of prosperity; their fences rebuilt; their houses painted. I want to see their towns prosperous; I want to see schoolhouses in every town; I want to see books in the hands of every child, and papers and magazines in every house; I want to see all the rays of light, of civilization of the nineteenth century, enter every home of the South; and in a little while you will see that country full of good Republicans. We can afford to be kind; we cannot afford to be unkind.

I will shake hands cordially with every believer in human liberty; I will shake hands with every believer in Nationality; I will shake hands with every man who is the friend of the human race. That is my doctrine.

I believe in the great Republic; in this magnificent country of ours.

I believe in the great people of the United States. I believe in the muscle and brain of America, in the prairies and forests. I believe in New York. I believe in the brains of your city. I believe that you know enough to vote the Republican ticket. I believe that you are grand enough to stand by the country that has stood by you. But whatever you do, I never shall cease to thank you for the great honor you have conferred upon me this day.

Note.--This being a newspaper report it is necessarily incomplete.

BROOKLYN SPEECH.

* The Rev. Henry Ward Beecher and Colonel Robert G.

Ingersoll spoke from the same platform last night, and the great preacher introduced the great orator and free-thinker to the grandest political audience that was ever a.s.sembled in Brooklyn. The reverend gentleman presided over the Republican ma.s.s meeting held in the Academy of Music. When he introduced Ingersoll he did it with a warmth and earnestness of compliment that brought the six thousand lookers-on to their feet to applaud. When the expounder of the Gospel of Christ took the famous atheist by the hand, and shook it fervently, saying that while he respected and honored him for the honesty of his convictions and his splendid labors for patriotism and the country, the enthusiasm knew no bounds, and the great building trembled and vibrated with the storm of applause. With such a scene to harmonize the mult.i.tude at the outstart it is not strange that the meeting continued to the end such a one as has no parallel even in these days of feverish political excitement and turmoil. The orator spoke in his best vein and his audience was responsive to the wonderful magical spell of his eloquence. And when his last glowing utterance had lost its echo in the wild storm of applause that rewarded him at the close, Mr. Beecher again stepped forward and, as if to emphasize the earnestness of his previous compliments, proposed a vote of thanks to the distinguished speaker. The vote was a roar of affirmation, whose voice was not stronger when Mr. Ingersoll in turn called upon the audience to give three cheers for the great preacher. They were given, and repeated three times over. Men waved their ats and umbrellas, ladies, of whom there were many hundreds present, waved their handkerchiefs, and men, strangers to each other, shook hands with the fervency of brotherhood. It was indeed a strange scene, and the princ.i.p.al actors in it seemed not less than the most wildly excited man there to appreciate its peculiar import and significance. Standing at the front of the stage, underneath a canopy of nags, at either side great baskets of flowers, they clasped each other's hands, and stood thus for several minutes, while the excited thousands cheered themselves hoa.r.s.e and applauded wildly.

As Mr. Beecher began to speak, however, the applause that broke out was deafening.

In substance Mr. Beecher spoke as follows:--"I am not accustomed to preside at meetings like this; only the exigency of the times could induce me to do It. I am not here either to make a speech, but more especially to introduce the eminent orator of the evening. * * * I stand not as a minister, but as a man among men, pleading the cause of fellowship and equal rights. We are not here as mechanics, as artists, merchants, or professional men, but as fellow-citizens. The gentleman who will speak to-night is in no Conventicle or Church. He is to speak to a great body of citizens, and I take the liberty of saying that I respect him as the man that for a full score and more of years has worked for the right in the great, broad field of humanity, and for the cause of human rights. I consider it an honor to extend to him, as I do now, the warm, earnest, right hand of fellowship." (As Mr. Beecher said this he turned to Mr.

Ingersoll and extended his hand. The palms of the two men met with a clasp that was heard all over the house, and was the signal for tumultuous cheering and applause, which continued for several minutes.)

"I now introduce to you," continued Mr. Beecher, leading Mr.

Ingersoll forward, "a man who--and I say it not flatteringly--is the most brilliant speaker of the English tongue of all men on this globe. But as under the brilliancy of the blaze or light we find the living coals of fire, under the lambent flow of his wit and magnificent ant.i.thesis we find the glorious flame of genius and honest thought.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Ingersoll."--New York Herald, October 81st, 1880.

(Garfield Campaign.)

1880.

LADIES and Gentlemen: Years ago I made up my mind that there was no particular argument in slander. I made up my mind that for parties, as well as for individuals, honesty in the long-run is the best policy.

I made up my mind that the people were ent.i.tled to know a man's honest thoughts, and I propose to-night to tell you exactly what I think. And it may be well enough, in the first place, for me to say that no party has a mortgage on me. I am the sole proprietor of myself. No party, no organization, has any deed of trust on what little brains I have, and as long as I can get my part of the common air I am going to tell my honest thoughts. One man in the right will finally get to be a majority. I am not going to say a word to-night that every Democrat here will not know is true, and, whatever he may say, I will compel him in his heart to give three cheers.

In the first place, I wish to admit that during the war there were hundreds of thousands of patriotic Democrats. I wish to admit that if it had not been for the War Democrats of the North, we never would have put down the Rebellion. Let us be honest. I further admit that had it not been for other than War Democrats there never would have been a rebellion to put down. War Democrats!

Why did we call them War Democrats? Did you ever hear anybody talk about a War Republican? We spoke of War Democrats to distinguish them from those Democrats who were in favor of peace upon any terms.

I also wish to admit that the Republican party is not absolutely perfect. While I believe that it is the best party that ever existed, while I believe it has, within its organization, more heart, more brain, more patriotism than any other organization that ever existed beneath the sun, I still admit that it is not entirely perfect. I admit, in its great things, in its splendid efforts to preserve this nation, in its grand effort to keep our flag in heaven, in its magnificent effort to free four millions of slaves, in its great and sublime effort to save the financial honor of this Nation, I admit that it has made some mistakes. In its great effort to do right it has sometimes by mistake done wrong. And I also wish to admit that the great Democratic party, in its effort to get office has sometimes by mistake done right. You see that I am inclined to be perfectly fair.

I am going with the Republican party because it is going my way; but if it ever turns to the right or left, I intend to go straight ahead.

In every government there is something that ought to be preserved, in every government there are many things that ought to be destroyed.

Every good man, every patriot, every lover of the human race, wishes to preserve the good and destroy the bad; and every one in this audience who wishes to preserve the good will go with that section of our common country--with that party in our country that he honestly believes will preserve the good and destroy the bad. It takes a great deal of trouble to raise a good Republican. It is a vast deal of labor. The Republican party is the fruit of all ages--of self-sacrifice and devotion. The Republican party is born of every good thing that was ever done in this world. The Republican party is the result of all martyrdom, of all heroic blood shed for the right. It is the blossom and fruit of the great world's best endeavor. In order to make a Republican you have to have schoolhouses. You have to have newspapers and magazines. A good Republican is the best fruit of civilization, of all there is of intelligence, of art, of music and of song. If you want to make Democrats, let them alone. The Democratic party is the settlings of this country. n.o.body hoes weeds. n.o.body takes especial pains to raise dog-fennel, and yet it grows under the very hoof of travel, The seeds are sown by accident and gathered by chance. But if you want to raise wheat and corn you must plough the ground. You must defend and you must harvest the crop with infinite patience and toil. It is precisely that way--if you want to raise a good Republican you must work. If you wish to raise a Democrat give him wholesome neglect. The Democratic party flatters the vices of mankind. That party says to the ignorant man, "You know enough." It says to the vicious man, "You are good enough."

The Republican party says, "You must be better next year than you are this." A Republican takes a man by the collar and says, "You must do your best, you must climb the infinite hill of human progress as long as you live." Now and then one gets tired. He says, "I have climbed enough and so much better than I expected to do that I do not wish to travel any farther." Now and then one gets tired and lets go all hold, and he rolls down to the very bottom, and as he strikes the mud he springs upon his feet transfigured, and says: "Hurrah for Hanc.o.c.k!"

There are things in this Government that I wish to preserve, and there are things that I wish to destroy; and in order to convince you that you ought to go the way that I am going: it is only fair that I give to you my reasons. This is a Republic founded upon intelligence and the patriotism of the people, and in every Republic it is absolutely necessary that there should be free speech. Free speech is the gem of the human soul. Words are the bodies of thought, and liberty gives to those words wings, and the whole intellectual heavens are filled with light. In a Republic every individual tongue has a right to the general ear. In a Republic every man has the right to give his reasons for the course he pursues to all his fellow-citizens, and when you say that a man shall not speak, you also say that others shall not hear. When you say a man shall not express his honest thought you say his fellow-citizens shall be deprived of honest thoughts; for of what use is it to allow the attorney for the defendant to address the jury if the jury has been bought? Of what use is it to allow the jury to bring in a verdict of "not guilty," if the defendant is to be hung by a mob? I ask you to-night, is not every solitary man here in favor of free speech? Is there a solitary Democrat here who dares say he is not in favor of free speech? In which part of this country are the lips of thought free--in the South or in the North? Which section of our country can you trust the inestimable gem of free speech with? Can you trust it to the gentlemen of Mississippi or to the gentlemen of Ma.s.sachusetts? Can you trust it to Alabama or to New York? Can you trust it to the South or can you trust it to the great and splendid North? Honor bright--honor bright, is there any freedom of speech in the South? There never was and there is none to-night--and let me tell you why.

They had the inst.i.tution of human slavery in the South, which could not be defended at the bar of public reason. It was an inst.i.tution that could not be defended in the high forum of human conscience. No man could stand there and defend the right to rob the cradle--none to defend the right to sell the babe from the breast of the agonized mother--none to defend the claim that lashes on a bare back are a legal tender for labor performed. Every man that lived upon the unpaid labor of another knew in his heart that he was a thief. And for that reason he did not wish to discuss that question. Thereupon the inst.i.tution of slavery said, "You shall not speak; you shall not reason," and the lips of free thought were manacled. You know it. Every one of you. Every Democrat knows it as well as every Republican. There never was free speech in the South.

And what has been the result? And allow me to admit right here, because I want to be fair, there are thousands and thousands of most excellent people in the South--thousands of them. There are hundreds and hundreds of thousands there who would like to vote the Republican ticket. And whenever there is free speech there and whenever there is a free ballot there, they will vote the Republican ticket. I say again, there are hundreds of thousands of good people in the South; but the inst.i.tution of human slavery prevented free speech, and it is a splendid fact in nature that you cannot put chains upon the limbs of others without putting corresponding manacles upon your own brain. When the South enslaved the negro, it also enslaved itself, and the result was an intellectual desert. No book has been produced, with one exception, that has added to the knowledge of mankind; no paper, no magazine, no poet, no philosopher, no philanthropist, was ever raised in that desert. Now and then some one protested against that infamous inst.i.tution, and he came as near being a philosopher as the society in which he lived permitted. Why is it that New England, a rock-clad land, blossoms like a rose? Why is it that New York is the Empire State of the great Union?

I will tell you. Because you have been permitted to trade in ideas.

Because the lips of speech have been absolutely free for twenty years.

We never had free speech in any State in this Union until the Republican party was born. That party was rocked in the cradle of intellectual liberty, and that is the reason I say it is the best party that ever existed in the wide, wide world. I want to preserve free speech, and, as an honest man, I look about me and I say, "How can I best preserve it?" By giving it to the South or North; to the Democracy or to the Republican party? And I am bound, as an honest man, to say free speech is safest with its earliest defenders. Where is there such a thing as a Republican mob to prevent the expression of an honest thought? Where?

The people of the South are allowed to come to the North; they are allowed to express their sentiments upon every stump in the great East, the great West, and in the great Middle States; they go to Maine, to Vermont, and to all our States, and they are allowed to speak, and we give them a respectful hearing, and the meanest thing we do is to answer their arguments.

I say to-night that we ought to have the same liberty to discuss these questions in the South that Southerners have in the North. And I say more than that, the Democrats of the North ought to compel the Democrats of the South to treat the Republicans of the South as well as the Republicans of the North treat them. We treat the Democrats well in the North; we treat them like gentlemen in the North; and yet they go into partnership with the Democracy of the South, knowing that the Democracy of the South will not treat Republicans in that section with fairness. A Democrat ought to be ashamed of that.

If my friends will not treat other people as well as the friends of the other people treat me, I'll swap friends.

First, then, I am in favor of free speech, and I am going with that section of my country that believes in free speech; I am going with that party that has always upheld that sacred right. When you stop free speech, when you say that a thought shall die in the womb of the brain,--why, it would have the same effect upon the intellectual world that to stop springs at their sources would have upon the physical world. Stop the springs at their sources and they cease to gurgle, the streams cease to murmur, and the great rivers cease rushing to the embrace of the sea. So you stop thought. Stop thought in the brain in which it is born, and theory dies; and the great ocean of knowledge to which all should be permitted to contribute, and from which all should be allowed to draw, becomes a vast desert of ignorance.

I have always said, and I say again, that the more liberty there is given away, the more you have. I endeavor to be consistent in my life and action. I am a believer in intellectual liberty, and wherever the torch of knowledge burns the whole horizon is filled with a glorious halo. I am a free man. I would be less than a man if I did not wish to hand this flame to my child with the flame increased rather than diminished.

Whom will we trust to take care of free speech? Let us consider and be honest with one another. The gem of the brain is the innocence of the soul.

I am not only in favor of free speech, but I am also in favor of an absolutely honest ballot. There is only one emperor in this country; there is one czar; only one supreme crown and king, and that is the will, the legally expressed will of the majority. Every American citizen is a sovereign. The poorest and humblest may wear that crown, the beggar holds in his hand that sceptre equally with the proudest and richest, and so far as his sovereignty is concerned, the poorest American, he who earns but one dollar a day, has the same voice in controlling the destiny of the United States as the millionaire. The man who casts an illegal vote, the man who refuses to count a legal vote, poisons the fountain of power, poisons the springs of justice, and is a traitor to the only king in this land. The Government is upon the edge of Mexicanization through fraudulent voting. The ballot-box is the throne of America; the ballot-box is the ark of the covenant. Unless we see to it that every man who has a right to vote, votes, and unless we see to it that every honest vote is counted, the days of this Republic are numbered.

When you suspect that a Congressman is not elected; when you suspect that a judge upon the bench holds his place by fraud, then the people will hold the law in contempt and will laugh at the decisions of courts, and then come revolution and chaos.

It is the duty of every good man to see to it that the ballot-box is kept absolutely pure. It is the duty of every patriot, whether he is a Democrat or Republican--and I want further to admit that I believe a large majority of Democrats are honest in their opinions, and I know that all Republicans _must_ be honest in their opinions. It is the duty, then, of all honest men of both parties to see to it that only honest votes are cast and counted. Now, honor bright, which section of this Union can you trust the ballot-box with?

Do you wish to trust Louisiana, or do you wish to trust Alabama that gave, in 1872, thirty-four thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight Republican majority and now gives ninety-two thousand Democratic majority? And of that ninety-two thousand majority, every one is a lie!

A contemptible, infamous lie! Because if every voter had been allowed to vote, there would have been forty thousand Republican majority.

Honor bright, can you trust it with the masked murderers who rode in the darkness of night to the hut of the freedman and shot him down, notwithstanding the supplication of his wife and the tears of his babe?

Can you trust it to the men who since the close of our war have killed more men, simply because those men wished to vote, simply because they wished to exercise a right with which they had been clothed by the sublime heroism of the North--who have killed more men than were killed on both sides in the Revolutionary war; than were killed on both sides during the War of 1812; than were killed on both sides in both wars?

Can you trust them? Can you trust the gentlemen who invented the tissue ballot? Do you wish to put the ballot-box in the keeping of the shot-gun, of the White-Liners, of the Ku Klux? Do you wish to put the ballot-box in the keeping of men who openly swear that they will not be ruled by a majority of American citizens if a portion of that majority is made of black men? And I want to tell you right here, I like a black man who loves this country better than I do a white man who hates it. I think more of a black man who fought for our flag than for any white man who endeavored to tear it out of heaven!

I say, can you trust the ballot-box to the Democratic party? Read the history of the State of New York. Read the history of this great and magnificent city--the Queen of the Atlantic--read her history and tell us whether you can implicitly trust Democratic returns? Honor bright!

I am not only, then, for free speech, but I am for an honest ballot; and in order that you may have no doubt left upon your minds as to which party is in favor of an honest vote, I will call your attention to this striking fact. Every law that has been pa.s.sed in every State of this Union for twenty long years, the object of which was to guard the American ballot-box, has been pa.s.sed by the Republican party, and in every State where the Republican party has introduced such a bill for the purpose of making it a law; in every State where such a bill has been defeated, it has been defeated by the Democratic party. That ought to satisfy any reasonable man to satiety.

I am not only in favor of free speech and an honest ballot, but I am in favor of collecting and disbursing the revenues of the United States. I want plenty of money to collect and pay the interest on our debt. I want plenty of money to pay our debt and to preserve the financial honor of the United States. I want money enough to be collected to pay pensions to widows and orphans and to wounded soldiers. And the question is, which section in this country can you trust to collect and disburse that revenue? Let us be honest about it. Which section can you trust? In the last four years we have collected four hundred and sixty-eight million dollars of the internal revenue taxes. We have collected princ.i.p.ally from taxes upon high wines and tobacco, four hundred and sixty-eight million dollars, and in those four years we have seized, libeled and destroyed in the Southern States three thousand eight hundred and seventy-four illicit distilleries. And during the same time the Southern people have shot to death twenty-five revenue officers and wounded fifty-five others, and the only offence that the wounded and dead committed was an honest effort to collect the revenues of this country.

Recollect it--don't you forget it. And in several Southern States to-day every revenue collector or officer connected with the revenue is furnished by the Internal Revenue Department with a breech-loading rifle and a pair of revolvers, simply for the purpose of collecting the revenue.

I don't feel like trusting such people to collect the revenue of my Government.

During the same four years we have arrested and have indicted seven thousand and eighty-four Southern Democrats for endeavoring to defraud the revenue of the United States. Recollect--three thousand eight hundred and seventy-four distilleries seized. Twenty-five revenue officers killed, fifty-five wounded, and seven thousand and eighty-four Democrats arrested. Can we trust them?