tones of whose splendid triumphs are yet heard through the land. Let us bravely defend the purity of the ballot-box on the day of our trial, and, I believe, of our victory. Guard the polls on that day, to the last extremity, against illegal voting. See that no man votes who does not take the oath prescribed by law; and remember that every vote illegally given robs a loyal citizen of his franchise. Mark every man who has taken part in the rebellion, and yet takes the oath; and bring him to justice afterward for perjury. Pass the word over the whole State, that every Radical Union man is ready to sacrifice his life, if need be, in defense of the purity of the election, and these traitors will slink away, and patriots will resume their just control in our Government. Proclaim anew as our watchword-Loyalty shall govern Missouri! Make it good by your acts, your words, and your votes, and then will Missouri stand forth as noble in accomplished results, as she is in the spirit of her loyal people.

SLAVERY'S DESTRUCTION,

THE UNION'S SAFETY.*

The presence of this Convention in this city betokens progress, signals deliverance, and heralds freedom; progress in patriotism and fraternity, deliverance of the white man's mind and conscience from long thralldom to a despotic system of human Slavery, and freedom— universal freedom-to the American black man, after more than two centuries of bondage. The great mission of the nineteenth century to America approaches its fruition; and the first centenary of American Independence, which many here may live to witness, will resound with the rejoicings of white and black men, over a land from which the stain of Slavery has been wiped out. We could not have come here in peace three years ago on such an errand: we shall not need to come again three years hence; for before that day the mighty work will be done; Slavery will have ceased to be in this land; and every foot of American soil,

*A speech before the Freedom Convention in Louisville, Kentucky, February 22, 1864.

purified by fire and blood, will be Liberty's consecrated home for all the ages to come.

Such is the glorious prospect, as we stand to-day on this "Lookout Mountain" of time, and high above the clouds through which we have fought our way to its summit, peer into the near future, from which the veil is being rent. Simple words and few, in the expression of emotions, befit this hour. We should first ascribe to HIM the glory, whose mighty arm has thus far held the American Nation up, and whose purpose that the wrath of man shall praise Him was never more manifest in the history of nations, than in the swift vengeance He is taking of the idol. for which the aristocrats of Southern Slavery shrouded this land in gloom. But as there is no night in heaven, so man can make no gloom on earth that Omnipotence can not pierce. The sun is rising; the mists of error are drifting away; the Nation throws off the shackles of enslavement to Slavery; and to-morrow, as it were, the noontide of freedom will blaze over a country where no man shall ever again be called, or be, a slave.

It is fit, my friends, that we meet here on the soil of Kentucky-Old Kentucky-brave and generous Kentucky-but, alas! in the hour of her country's dire need," Armed Neutrality" Kentucky. She stood neutral once between treason and loyalty, and dreamed that the fires of war could sweep all around her, and yet leave her gardens unscathed. She thought to arm her noble sons for herself, but hosts of them armed themselves for the Union and Liberty. She looked

upon her country, and remembered her warriors' glory on many a bloody field under the Stars and Stripes, and her mighty heart would have yearned to that old flag again; but in an evil hour she looked upon herself, and the grand Union throb of that heart dwindled, for within herself was Slavery! She hesitated to be loyal, for Slavery was disloyal; she wavered in the path of duty for Slavery jostled her; she well-nigh chose to be conquered by force; but at last she stood erect and firm, and so she will stand to the end. Let us not too severely censure this good old State, for the indecision of that trying day. No man knows, but by experience, the power of Slavery over a people among whom it is a fixed institution; or can otherwise comprehend the bondage of thought and feeling it imposes on those who have been reared in its presence, and under its influence. I have experienced it in my youth in this very State, and afterward, for many years, in Missouri and it makes me charitable toward indecision and hesitancy, there or here, in the first onset of the rebellion. But that day is past. Three years of Slavery's war upon the Union are enough to wean a world from Slavery; and old Kentucky must, like Missouri and Arkansas, and Maryland, be weaned from it must cast off its traitorous embrace-must help to slay and bury it out of sight forever. Kentuckians, this is no idle talk. In all sincerity I say again, yet not as an individual, but as the interpreter of passing events,-I say again, Kentucky must. She can not abide as she is; she must rise into complete and absolute freedom; for she can not, if she would,

become a part of the Empire of Slavery for which the, South is fighting, but which, instead, is this hour as certain to be a region of freedom as if no slave had ever trod its soil; and out of that empire, and in the Union, and hemmed in, as she soon will be, on every side, by soil devoted to freedom, it were the miracle of all history, if she alone of all the sisterhood of States could defy the power of events, and hold to her bosom an institution, which everywhere else withers under the ban of the human race and the frown of outraged heaven.

But I am not here to speak to Kentuckians, so much as to Americans. Nor do I come to speak of Kentucky Slavery, so much as of American Slavery. This war has stripped the Slavery question of its local and State character, and made it a national matter. The point is no longer whether Slavery shall be a local institution, but whether it shall be at all. The issue is not now whether State policy, State Constitutions, and State laws shall protect and perpetuate Slavery in spite of the Nation; but whether, having proved itself a traitor, and steeped itself to the very lips in the blood of patriots, the Nation shall permit it to live. The other day this question could not have been safely discussed here; to-day it can. Treason and rebellion have left no "sacred soil" of Slavery on this continent. Freedom to assail Slavery is now as irrefragable a right, as freedom to worship God according to the dictates of conscience. Slavery is one and indivisible; and to assail it in Missouri or Maryland, is to assail it in Kentucky or Tennessee.