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SPEECH AT CHICAGO.

On the 2d day of June, 1863, a Mass Convention assembled in the City of Chicago, to promote the construction of a Ship Canal connecting the waters of Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River. On the afternoon of that day, the Convention having no business ready for its action, a motion was made by a member from Iowa, that the remainder of the afternoon session should be occupied in hearing remarks from distinguished gentlemen present; which motion was carried. Gen. HIRAM WALBRIDGE, of New York, was first called upon, and addressed the Convention for a short time.

At the conclusion of his remarks, there were loud calls for Mr. DRAKE, who appeared upon the stand, and was introduced by the President of the Convention, Hon. HANNIBAL HAMLIN, of Maine, Vice Presi dent of the United States, in these words:

"I take pleasure in presenting to you our friend Mr. DRAKE, from that noble and loyal city of the West, St. Louis, that bright star which shall shine brighter and brighter unto the perfect day.""

Mr. DRAKE said:

Mr. President, in behalf of that noble city which I

have the honor to represent in part here, I thank you for the testimony you have so kindly borne to her tried and steadfast loyalty. You have not said too much in her praise. If you were acquainted with, and would consider, all the circumstances that have surrounded St. Louis, from the day that the traitor Governor of Missouri was installed, in January, 1861, to the present time; if you could know them as we who live there have known them, you would say, with me, that no city in this land deserves higher praise for loyalty, than St. Louis.

Sir, St. Louis, in the persons of her delegation here, greets the loyal men of the land in this assemblage, convened under such circumstances as have probably hardly been known in the past history of the world. She extends to you the hand of friendship and fraternity, feeling that her interests are bound up with yours, and resolved to live with you, and, if need be, to die with you. Never, I say, was a body like this convened under such circumstances as have brought us together here, on the margin of this fair lake, in this young but queenly city of the valley of the St. Lawrence. One part of the nation, covered with blood, is waging a conflict with the nation's deadly domestic foes, while another part is assembled here, by its representative men, to consider measures which are to promote the enduring prosperity, in peace and in war, of our noble and beloved country. With other people, Could any other nation

any

would such a thing be possible? fight, with one hand, a battle for its life, and, with the other, so fashion and dispense the blessings of peace?

If I had never before been proud of the title of an American citizen, I ought to be proud of it now, and so ought every one of you. We have a right to be proud of that title. We have a right, too, to be proud of this glorious valley, which casts its watery wealth over Niagara; and of that other and greater valley, which extending nearly across the continent, pours its tide of living waters from the high North into the sea beneath the sun of the tropics; and we look for the day when these two continental vales shall, in their mingling waters, be blended, as it were, into one. We have a right to be proud of every development of enegy, enterprise, and improvement; for they all dignify and elevate us as a people, and give us power at home, and consideration, yes, and power, too, abroad. And among all the developments productive of these results, few have exceeded the simultaneous exhibitions, warlike and peaceful, of this day.

Is it not wonderful, in view of the last thirty years' history of this country, that so many separate States, so many classes of men, so many diverse, if not conflicting, interests, and so many forms of political opinion, should be harmoniously represented in such a body as this? Not long ago, the scowl of the South would have rested upon this assembly, either in the persons of delegates from that region, or of those who feared that scowl whenever and wherever it fell upon them. This body could not then have come here, as it does now, with one mind and one heart, because, forsooth, South Carolina, or Virginia, or Arkansas, and others of those strict-construction, treason-brew

ing States, would have frowned upon the attempt; and your politicians would not have dared to come. Now, unshackled, we stand here freemen-free from Southern domination, and intending to sweep it, with its authors, into the Gulf of Mexico. Its day is done. Never again are we to hear in the Councils of the nation such words of overbearing defiance of our efforts to develop the resources of this great country through its national power, as we have heard in times past. Never more are the freemen of the North to be browbeaten and humiliated by the slave-driving tyrants of the South. One of the glorious results of this war, itself largely compensating for all the blood the war pours out, and for all the treasure it exhausts, is our perpetual freedom from Southern dictation and control. Henceforth we can talk and act about such things as have brought us here to-day, exactly as it pleases ourselves.

I do not propose just now to discuss the matter of Canals. That will come up in order to-morrow. This is, as I understand it, a "free fight" here this afternoon. I suppose, Mr. President, we may consider ourselves as in some sense in "Committee of the Whole," to use a Congressional phrase?

THE PRESIDENT. Every latitude of debate is allowed. MR. DRAKE. The President says that we may say exactly what we please and introduce just such topics as we choose.

I know of nothing more likely to interest an American audience,—I mean a patriotic American audience— than some remarks about the war, which has now been

waged more than two years against all that we value, and all that makes our country a blessing to us or a hope to our posterity. And in the outset of such remarks, I would take leave to suggest that if there are any of those interesting characters called Copperheads in this assembly, it were perhaps as well for them to retire, if they do not wish to hear some plain truth about themselves. I do not intend to pay any particular respect to their feelings.

ence.

[At this point there was some disturbance at the end of the tent, caused by some offensive remarks made by one of the audiThere were calls to "put him out, put him out!" while some one else was in favor of letting him stay and be converted. At length order was restored, and several persons called out to the speaker to "go on."]

MR. DRAKE (resuming). I am going on, gentlemen. I do not come from a place where men are afraid to speak their minds. I come from a place where Union men have spoken their minds, in peril, for more than two years; and I am going to speak my mind here.

The great point in connection with this war to which I will call your attention, is one which, for some cause or other, millions of the people of this country seem to be totally unconscious of, or else are shoving it behind them, so that they shall not look at it. This is, that we are at this time sustaining a conflict for the life of this Nation with the institution of Slavery, as it exists and acts in the Southern States. Yes, it is Slavery that is battling to destroy our country and its Constitution! And when I tell you that in 1860 I was a Douglas Democrat, and that I never in my

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