USA > Kansas > A standard history of Kansas and Kansans, Volume II > Part 5
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Resolved, That with our republican fathers we hold it to be a self- evident truth that all men are endowed with the inalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and that the primary object and ulterior designs of our federal government were to secure these
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rights to all persons within its exclusive jurisdiction ; that as our repub- lican fathers, when they had abolished slavery in all our national terri- tory, ordained that no person should be deprived of life, liberty or prop- erty without due process of law it becomes our duty to maintain this provision of the Constitution against all attempts to violate it for the purpose of establishing slavery in any territory of the United States, by positive legislation, prohibiting its existence or extension therein. That we deny the authority of Congress, of a territorial legislature, of any individual or association of individuals, to give legal existence to slavery in any territory of the United States, while the present Con- stitution shall be maintained.
Resolved, That the Constitution confers upon Congress sovereign power over the territories of the United States for their government, and that in the exercise of this power it is both the right and the duty of Congress to prohibit in the Territories those twin relics of barbarism- polygamy and slavery.
Resolved, That while the Constitution of the United States was ordained and established by the people in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, and secure the blessings of liberty, and contains ample provisions for the protection of life, liberty and property of every citizen, the dearest constitutional rights of the people of Kansas have been fraudulently and violently taken from them-their territory has been invaded by an armed force-spurious and pretended legislative, judicial and executive officers have been set over them, by whose usurped author- ity, sustained by the military power of the Government, tyrannical and unconstitutional laws have been enacted and enforced-the rights of the people to keep and bear arms have been infringed-test oaths of an extraordinary and entangling nature have been imposed, as a condition of exercising the right of suffrage and holding office-the right of an accused person to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury has been denied-the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures has been violated-they have been deprived of life, liberty and property without due process of law-that the freedom of speech and of the press has been abridged-the right to choose their representatives has been made of no effect-murders, robberies and arsons have been instigated and encouraged, and the offenders have been allowed to go unpunished- that all these things have been done with the knowledge, sanction and procurement of the present Administration, and that for this high crime against the Constitution. the Union and Humanity, we arraign the Administration, the President, his advisers, agents, supporters, apologists and accessories, either before or after the facts, before the country and before the world, and that it is our fixed purpose to bring the actual perpetrators of these atrocious outrages and their accomplices to a sure and condign punishment hereafter.
Resolved, That Kansas should be immediately admitted as a State of the Union, with her present free Constitution, as at once the most effectual way of securing to her citizens the enjoyment of the rights and privileges to which they are entitled, and of ending the civil strife now raging in her territory.
Resolved, That the highwayman's plea, that "might makes right," embodied in the Ostend Circular, was in every respect unworthy of American diplomacy, and would bring shame and dishonor upon any government or people that gave it their sanction.
Resolved, That a railroad to the Pacific Ocean, by the most central and practicable ronte, is imperatively demanded by the interests of the
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whole country, and that the Federal Government ought to render immedi- ate and efficient aid in its construction : and, as an auxiliary thereto, the immediate construction of an emigrant route on the line of the railroad.
Resolved, That appropriations by Congress for the improvement of rivers and harbors, of a national character, required for the aecommoda- tion and security of our existing commeree, are authorized by the Con- stitution, and justified by the obligation of government to protect the lives and property of its citizens.
Resolved, That we invite the affiliation and co-operation of freemen of all parties, however differing from us in other respects, in support of the principles herein declared; and, believing that the spirit of our institutions, as well as the Constitution of our country, guarantee liberty of conseience and equality of rights among citizens, we oppose all legis- lation impairing their security.
Kansas also furnished a part of the Democratic platform in 1856. The National Convention of the Democratic party was held at Cincin- nati on the 2d of June. The course of the party in Kansas could not be endorsed before the country, and the Democratic party was com- pelled to adopt generalities rather than point to its course in Kansas Territory.
As to Slavery, the Convention resolved that Congress has no power to interfere with it in the States; that all efforts to induce Congress to interfere with questions of slavery ought to be discountenanced, as they lead to dangerous consequences. That the Democratic party will abide by a faithful execution of the compromise measures of 1850, ineluding the fugitive slave law, "which act cannot, with fidelity to the Constitution, be repealed, or so amended as to destroy its efficieney." That the Demo- cratie party will resist all slavery agitation in or out of Congress. That they will uphold the resolutions of 1798. That, repudiating all sectional- ism, they adopt the principles of the Kansas-Nebraska bill-that is, the non-interference of the general government with slavery. which was the basis of the compromise measures. That they recognize the right of new States to regulate their domestic institutions. with or without slavery, as they please. That the party is in favor of State Rights, and against monopolies and special legislation for sectional benefit.
The contrast between the evasive, time-serving paragraph in the Democratic platform, and the stirring and magnificent appeal to moral sentiment of the country to be found in the Republican platform, has seldom been equaled in party declarations in the United States. The assertion of Abelard Guthrie that the Republican party was the result of the efforts to combat the course of the Democratic party in regard to Nebraska Territory, later Kansas Territory, is well established. The national character of Kansas history is in no other way so well proven as in a study of the political conditions in America from 1845 to 1860. The great questions of the day in all that period touched Kansas, and for nearly ten years of that time, Kansas was the paramount question in American politics. And the Civil War resulted from the success of the Free-State men in Kansas. There the two national parties were struggling-one for the supremacy of Freedom, the other for Slavery.
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When Freedom won, Slavery endeavored to destroy the Union. The same struggle that had raged in Kansas was transferred to the whole country, with the life of the Union at stake. And the Kansas princi- ples triumphed in the nation. Kansas has a national history-no other State has such a history.
CHAPTER XXXIV
JOHN W. GEARY
The third Governor of Kansas Territory was John White Geary. He was born in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, December 30, 1819; died in the city of Harrisburg in the same State, February 8, 1873, in his fifty-fourth year. He was of Scotch-Irish extraction, and a man of great force of character, undoubted courage, and possessed of execu- tive ability of high order.
The death of his father made it necessary for him to quit college and labor for the support of his widowed mother and family. For a time he engaged in teaching, and was afterwards a clerk in a store in Pittsburgh. He studied law and civil engineering. The latter profes- sion he practiced in Kentucky and Pennsylvania. He entered the mil- itary service in the Mexican War, and was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the Second Pennsylvania Regiment Volunteers. He fought under command of General Scott, and was made a Colonel for bravery. Upon the capture of the City of Mexico he was appointed its commandant. In 1848 he was appointed postmaster of San Francisco, with power to establish postoffices and postroads on the Pacific coast. He was the Alcalde of the city, and in 1850 he was elected the first Mayor of San Francisco. He bore a prominent part in the work of establishing the government of California. In 1852 he returned to Pennsylvania and retired to his farm.
The disorders which marked the closing weeks of Governor Shan- non's administration of Kansas affairs aroused deep indignation in the North. This feeling was not confined to the opposition to the Demo- cratie party. Many Democrats cried out against the evils of the course of the national Administration in relation to Kansas. In fact, it began to be feared that if these matters were not mended they would mend themselves in the defeat of the Democratic party in the Presidential election in the following autumn. It became necessary to suppress the disorders in Kansas as a political measure. Colonel Geary was appointed Governor of Kansas Territory July 31, 1856. He was selected for the position because of his firmness and recognized executive ability. He was not an applicant for the office. He spent a month in arranging his private affairs, and in consultation with the President. He departed for his field of labor about September 1st. He came armed with greater discretionary powers than had been given to either of his predecessors.
The condition of Kansas was at this time truly deplorable. For a
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year last past the executive power and authority had been so weakly wielded that they were virtually a means for the oppression of a majority of the actual residents of Kansas, and often this oppression was better termed persecution. This was by design, and with the approval of the cabal of conspirators having in hand the Federal Admin- istration. When Governor Shannon let the executive authority slip from his nerveless grasp and fled in terror of his life, it fell into the hands of the mob. Indeed, it was even worse. Had it been into the hands of the mob alone that the executive power of Kansas had fallen, the blindness of those exercising it would have rendered it a compara- tively harmless weapon. But it had been seized by the cunning lead- ers of a gross and brutal mob in a foreign State. In addition to its incendiary inclinations and ferocious tendencies, this mob was skillfully played upon and manipulated against the representatives of freedom and free institutions in Kansas. The conditions producing this mob made it one of extermination, moved by a hatred stimulated to a thirst for blood by those now in possession of the executive power of the Ter- ritory, flung away by an agitated old man fleeing for his life.
The formative period was now past in Kansas Territory. Matters had drawn themselves to hard and inflexible issues. The energies of parties fixed by recent events exhausted themselves in fortifying posi- tions already seized. With the Free-State party this course was a matter of necessity, and its position was one of self-defense purely. This was forced upon it by the action of the bogus Legislature when it made the issue for itself and its adherent Slavery-Slavery alone. The test laws had so aroused the Free-State men that at the Big Springs convention they not only met the issue, Slavery, and set opposite that barbaric institution, Freedom, but they did more. Stung to indigna- tion, they avowed resistance to all the bogus laws. This new issue was met by the advocates of slavery by the organization of the Law and Order party-a vigilance committee or assassination society as vicious and bloodthirsty as ever walked a Paris street or stole through the darkness of a Corsican waste. At the head of this party stood Governor Shannon, sustained by the President of the United States and his political party. The attempts to enforce this issue drenched the land in blood and made lurid the sky blackened with the smoke of burning homes, and finally sent the Governor away in panic, horror and despair, and with assassins in close pursuit.
This was the condition awaiting Governor Geary. It is well that he was a soldier, and came determined to bravely do a soldier's duty. He interviewed Governor Price of Missouri while on the way to his hopeful government, and prevailed upon that functionary to take steps to reduce or terminate the piracy practiced by the Border-Ruffians on the vessels navigating the Missouri river.
The leaders of the Missouri mob were at this time hopeful that the Governor would delay his arrival. Their most willing and trusted tool was now the Acting Governor. No plan could be proposed for murder or rapine that he would not sanction, could he be brought to
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believe that the establishment of slavery in Kansas would be forwarded by it. Under a few days of his pernicious and mischievous direction of Kansas Territorial affairs anarchy sprang spontaneously from the disorders of the border and terror took hold upon the people. On the 25th of August he had issued a proclamation "declaring the said Ter- ritory to be in a state of open insurrection and rebellion," and ealling upon all "law-abiding citizens of the Territory to rally to the support of the country and its laws." This proclamation opened the gates of
Gov. JOHN W. GEARY
[Copy by Willard of Portrait in Library of Kansas State Historieal Society]
the border. Urged by their leaders under this sanetion of authority, the hordes were hurrying from Missouri into Kansas Territory. At points too remote from the border for the inhabitants to feel interest enough to come over and help at their own expense, companies were solicited and raised at so much per diem, and whisky, per head. The incoming Governor's introduction to the "Kansas militia" was at Glasgow, Missouri, where a company of it embarked for Kansas. The incident is thus described by Dr. Gihon :
On approaching this town a most stirring scene was presented. The entire population of the city and surrounding neighborhood was
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assembled upon the high bank overlooking the river, and all appeared to be laboring under a state of extraordinary excitement. Whites and blaeks, men, women and children of all ages, were crowded together in one confused mass, or hurrying hither and yon, as though some ter- rible event was about to transpire. A large brass field-piece was mounted in a prominent position, and ever and anon belched forth a fiery flame and deafened the ear with its thundering war-like sounds. When the Keystone touched the landing a party of about sixty, comprising Cap- tain Jackson's company of Missouri volunteers for the Kansas militia, descended the hill, dragging their eannon with them, and ranged them- selves along the shore. The captain, after numerous attempts, failing to get them into what might properly be termed a line, got them into as good a military position as possible by backing them up against the foot of the hill. They were as raw aud undisciplined a set of recruits as ever shouldered arms. Their ages varied, through every gradation, from the smooth-faced, half grown boy to the gray-bearded old man; whilst their dresses, which differed as much as their ages, gave unmistakable evi- dence that they belonged to any elass of society except that usually termed respectable. Each one carried some deseription of fire-arms, no two of which were alike. These were muskets, earbines, rifles, shotguns, and pistols of every size, quality, shape and style. Some of them were in good condition, but others were never intended for nse, and still others unfit to shoot rohins or tomtits. It would have been an afflictive sight to witness the numerous friends of this patriotic band, shaking them affec- tionately by the hand and pronouneing their blessings and benedietions, had they been enlisted in their country's cause, to repel invasion, or battle with a foreign foe; but knowing the character of their enterprise. the feeling inspired was anything but one of admiration or even sympathy.
Captain Jackson embarked his company, cannon, wagons, arms and ammunition on board the Keystone, and soon after she was on her way. Opportunities now coeurred for conversation with the volunteers. Very few of them had any definite idea of the nature of the enterprise in which they had embarked. The most they seemed to understand about the matter was, that they were to receive so much per diem for going to Kansas to hunt and kill abolitionists. What this latter word meant they could not elearly define. They had been informed that the abolitionists were enemies to Missonrians, some of whom had been killed, and they were hired to avenge their deaths. More than this they neither knew nor cared to know. A vague notion prevailed among them that what- ever an abolitionist was, it was a virtue to kill him and take possession of his property. They seemed to apprehend no danger to themselves, as they had been told the abolitionists would not fight; but being overawed by the number and warlike appearance of their adversaries, would escape as rapidly as possible out of the Territory, leaving behind them any quan- tity of land, horses, elothing, arms, goods and chattels, all of which was to be divided among the victors. They crowded around Governor Geary, wherever he might chance to be, eager to ask questions, volunteer advice, and ascertain satisfactorily, whether, in their own chaste phrase, he was "sonnd on the goose." One, more importnnate than the rest, and who was a sort of spokesman for his companions, having made sundry efforts to receive convincing proofs of the latter-named faet, very knowingly remarked, after putting an unusually large plug of tobacco into his month, and winking to those around him, as though he would say, "I'll cateh him now; just listen." --
"Wal. Govner, as yer gwoin to Kanzies to be govner. I hope ye'll not do what Reeder done."
The Governor very quietly asked, "What was it that Reeder did ?"
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This was a poser.
"Whoy," said the inquisitor, breathing less freely, and shifting the plug of tobacco to the opposite side of his huge jaws, as if to awaken a new thought,-"whoy, Reeder, you see-Reeder, he-wall, Reeder, he didn't do nothin'."
The following description of the Border-Ruffian is also by Dr. Gihon; It is the best I have been able to find :
Imagine a man standing in a pair of long boots, covered with dust and mud, drawn over his trousers, the latter made of coarse, fancy- colored cloth, well soiled; the handle of a large bowie-knife projecting from one or both boot-tops; a leathern belt buckled around his waist, on each side of which is fastened a large revolver; a red or blue shirt, with a heart, anchor, eagle or some other favorite device braided on the breast and back, over which is swung a rifle or carbine; a sword dangling by his side; an old slouched hat, with a cockade or brass star on the front or side, and a chicken, goose or turkey feather sticking in the top; hair uneut and uncombed, covering his neck and shoulders; an unshaved face and unwashed hands. Imagine such a picture of humanity, who can swear any given number of oaths in any specified time, drink any quantity of bad whisky without getting drunk, and boast of having stolen half a dozen horses and killed one or more abolitionists, and you will have a pretty fair conception of a border-ruffian as he appears in Mis- souri and in Kansas.
While Captain Jackson's company was being embarked at Glas- gow a boat came down the river bearing Governor Shannon. The boat stopped and the two Governors met. One was hurrying out of Kansas, pursued by avengers; the other hurrying in, to be pursued out in the same manner a little later. They had time for a short interview. It is described by Dr. Gihon :
The ex-Governor was greatly agitated. He had fled in haste and terror from the Territory, and seemed still to be laboring under an apprehension for his personal safety. His description of Kansas was suggestive of everything that is frightful and horrible. Its condition was deplorable in the extreme. The whole Territory was in a state of insurrection, and a destructive civil war was devastating the country. Murder ran ram- pant, and the roads were everywhere strewn with the bodies of slangh- tered men. No language can exaggerate the awful picture that was drawn ; and a man of less nerve than Governor Geary, believing it not too highly colored, would instantly have taken the backward track, rather than rush upon the dangers so eloquently and fearfully portrayed.
Governor Geary arrived at Leavenworth on the morning of Septem- ber 9th. He found the town under military control. At Fort Leaven- worth he saw refugees seeking the protection of the military, and hand- bills warning them to depart on the following day. They were Free- State people fleeing from the mobs of Ruffians pouring into Kansas from Missouri on the call of Acting-Governor Woodson. Governor Geary found no abatement in the outrages then being perpetrated on the Free-State people. He believed it his duty to report conditions to the President and wrote a letter, from which the following extracts are taken :
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I find that I have not simply to contend against bands of armed ruffians and brigands, whose sole aim and end is assassination and rob- bery; infatuated adherents and advocates of conflicting political senti- ments and local institutions, and evil-disposed persons actuated by a desire to obtain elevated positions, but, worst of all, against the influence of men who have been placed in authority, and have employed all the destructive agents around them to promote their own personal inter- ests at the sacrifice of every just, honorable, and lawful consideration.
I have barely time to give you a brief statement of facts as I find them. The town of Leavenworth is now in the hands of armed bodies of men, who, having been enrolled as militia, perpetrate outrages of the most atrocious character under the shadow of authority from the Terri- torial Government.
Within a few days these men have robbed and driven from their homes unoffending citizens, have fired upon and killed others in their own dwellings, and stolen horses and property, under the pretense of employing them in the public service. They have seized persons who had committed no offense, and after stripping them of all their valuables, placed them on steamers and sent them ont of the Territory.
In isolated or country places no man's life is safe. The roads are filled with armed robbers, and murders for mere plunder are of daily occurrence. Almost every farmhouse is deserted, and no traveler has the temerity to venture upon the highways without an escort.
A paragraph in his farewell to the people of Kansas throws addi- tional light on the conditions existing in Kansas when he arrived to take charge of the government:
Desolation and ruin reigned on every hand; homes and firesides were deserted; the smoke of burning dwellings darkened the atmosphere; women and children, driven from their habitations, wandered over the prairies and among the woodlands, or sought refuge and protection even among the Indian tribes.
The Governor set out for Lecompton on the 10th of September. On the road he detected one member of the bogus Legislature at the head of a band of robbers, coming upon them shortly after they had robbed the store and postoffice at the Stranger Crossing. He arrived at eleven o'clock.
This town of Lecompton he found "debased to a lamentable degree. It was the residence of Sheriff Jones (who was one of the leading mem- bers of the town association), and the resort of horse-thieves and ruf- fians of the most desperate character. Its drinking saloons were infested by these characters, where drunkenness, gambling, fighting, and all sorts of crimes were indulged in with entire impunity."
The inhabitants of the place immediately volunteered to give the Governor information. He was told that all the crimes committed in the Territory were rightly chargeable to the Free-State men. He was not convinced that that was true. He issued an address, in which he counseled reason, and asking that all bloodshed be stopped. He issned two proclamations, one disbanding the "Kansas militia" called out by Acting-Governor Woodson, and the other directing the enrollment of the lawful militia of the Territory. The Adjutant-General of the Ter-
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