The sun. [volume] (Newberry, S.C.) 1937-1972, April 05, 1940, Image 7
THE SUN, NEWBERRY. S. C„ FRIDAY, APRIL 5, 1940
Birney's Liberty Party, Formed in 1840,
Was Twice Defeated but It Raised an
Issue That Triumphed Twenty Years Later
By ELMO SCOTT WATSON
(Released by Western Newspaper Union.)
O NE hundred years ago
the United States was
engaged in its most
uproarious Presidential con
test. It has come down in his
tory as the “Log Cabin-Hard
Cider” campaign of 1840, in
which emotion almost com
pletely replaced reason, is
sues were totally ignored and
a tired old man, who was lit
tle fitted for the office of
President, was swept into the
White House on a tide of
slogans and songs. When it
ended, the country learned
that the “singing Whigs”
roaring out to the tune of
"The Little Pig’s Tail,” this
song:
What has caused this great com
motion-motion-motion
Our country through?
It is the ball a-rolling on
For Tippecanoe and Tyler, too.
And with them we’ll beat little
Van.
Van, Van, is a used-up man.
were true prophets. For
President Martin Van Buren,
seeking re-election as the
Democratic candidate, was
indeed a “used-up man.” He
had captured only 60 elector
al votes to 234 for Gen. Wil
liam Henry Harrison, “Old
Tippecanoe.”
Almost forgotten in the midst
of all this hurly-burly, because he
had failed to win a single elec
toral vote and had mustered only
T,059 popular votes (compared to
Harrison’s 1,275,017 and Van Bur-
en’s 1,128,702), was another can
didate for President. Yet he was
a significant figure in American
history because he stood for a
principle which would provide the
most important issue in Ameri
can politics during the next two
decades, result eventually in the
greatest civil war in history and
be one of the cornerstones in the
foundation of a new political’par
ty which would rule this country
for 56 of the next 72 years. His
name was James Gillespie Bir-
ney and he was the candidate of
the Liberty party, organized on
April 1, 1840.
Bimey was born at Danville,
Ky., on February 4, 1792, the
son of one of the richest men in
the Bluegrass state. At the age
of 11 he was sent to Transylvania
college at Lexington and after fin
ishing there studied at the Col
lege of New Jersey, now Prince
ton university, where he was
graduated in 1810. After studying
law for three years under Alex
ander J. Dallas, he was admitted
to the bSr and returned to his
home in Kentucky to practice. In
1814 he became a member of the
town council and two years later,
although he was barely the con
stitutional age for membership,
was elected to the lower house of
the Kentucky assembly.
Birney’s people were slavehold
ers but disapproved of the insti
tution of slav
ery and were
willing to
emancipate
their Negroes
if Kentucky
could be made
a free state.
Therefore it
was only nat
ural that the
young legisla
tor, early in
his term in of-
fice should
lead the move
ment to pre
vent the gover
nor of Kentucky from entering
into correspondence with the gov
ernors of neighboring states to
make an arrangement for the cap
ture and return of runaway slaves.
Moves to Alabama.
Evidently Birney’s action made
him unpopular with the voters in
his district for he did not run for
the legislature again but moved
to Huntsville, Ala., in 1818 and
had a prominent part in shaping
the constitution under which Ala
bama came into the Union. He
was a member of the state’s first
legislature but wrecked his po
litical career in 1819 by opposing
the legislature’s indorsement of
Andrew Jackson for President.
Having run into debt, Birney
was forced to return to the prac
tice of law and was soon elected
by the legislature as solicitor of
the Fifth Alabama district. He
next disposed of his plantation
and slaves to a friend who, he
was confident, would treat them
kindly. By devoting all of his
time and energy to his law prac
tice he was soon prosperous
again.
While serving as attorney for
the Cherokee Indians who occu
pied the northeastern part of Ala
bama, he began the first of the
humanitarian enterprises which
were to characterize his whole
Martin
Van Buren
career. He helped the Chero-
kees adopt a more civilized way
of life and paid the expenses of
many of the Indian girls who en
tered the Huntsville Female sem
inary to get an education. To
aid the movement to colonize
emancipated slaves in Africa Bir
ney raised funds for the Ameri
can Colonization society and he
also used his influence to secure
the passage of an act by the Ala
bama legislature forbidding the
importation of slaves into that
state.
In 1830 Bimey organized a col
onization society in Huntsville and
acted as its treasurer for several
years. Meanwhile he was busy
with plans for uniting in one par
ty all men, both Northern and
Southern, who were in favor of
preventing the extension of slav
ery. Finding that there was lit
tle support for such an idea in
the South, he decided to move to
a free state but his appointment
as agent of the
American
Colonization so
ciety kept him
in Huntsville
for nearly two
years longer.
Then he re
signed and
bought a farm
adjoining his
father’s near
Danville, Ky.,
declaring that
that state was
the best in the
John P. Hale
Union for taking a stand against
slavery.
In December, -1832, he helped
promote a convention in Lexing
ton to form a society for the
gradual emancipation of the
slaves. But he learned to his sor
row that his old Kentucky friends
were turning against him and
only nine persons attended his
convention. Undiscouraged by
this fact, Birney next organized a
society to attempt the emancipa
tion of the children of slaves
when they reached the age of 21.
He Becomes an Abolitionist.
Birney’s efforts to extend the
membership of this society re
sulted in his making a thorough
study of the whole problem of
slavery and he reached the con
clusion that its immediate aboli
tion would be less harmful to the
slave states than the gradual
emancipation which he had for
merly favored. To set an exam
ple, he gave free papers to his
six former slaves who had re
mained with him and worked for
wages. He also resigned his con
nection with the colonization soci
ety and became an out-and-out
abolitionist.
During the next few years Bir
ney devoted his time to the anti-
slavery cause and traveled about
the country making speeches for
it. In 1835 he made the principal
address at the meeting of the
American Anti-Slavery society
and laid down the rules for the
abolitionists to observe in carry
ing on their work. Next he an
nounced his intention of returning
to Danville and establishing an
abolitionist newspaper, the Phi
lanthropist. But when he arrived
in his native state, he found him
self regarded as a renegade and
the persecutions of his neighbors
and officials forced him to move
to Cincinnati where he promised
to keep up his agitation against
slavery until it was destroyed.
The mayor of Cincinnati
warned him that the city authori
ties could not promise to protect
him if he persisted in his inten
tion of publishing an anti-slavery
paper in a city just across the
river from the slave state of Ken
tucky. Despite this warning, Bir
ney issued the first number of the
Philanthropist and immediately
discovered that the mayor’s
warning had not been an idle
one. For the pro-slavery men
started a campaign of persecu
tion against him until finally a
mob formed to destroy his prop
erty and tar and feather him. In
stead of fleeing, Birney boldly
faced the mob and made such a
stirring plea for the principle of
freedom of the press and free
dom of speech that the mob
was dissuaded from its purpose.
In 1837 Birney moved to New
York to become secretary of the
National Anti-Slavery society and
as such was its guiding genius.
Within two years he had organ
ized 644 auxiliary societies in ad
dition to the 1,009 which had been
in existence when he became sec
retary of the national society. In
one year he issued more than
725,000 copies of the society’s
publications, all spreading the
gospel of abolition.
As a part of his work Birney
visited every state legislature in
the North to secure the passage
of resolutions against the exten
sion of slavery or to gain the right
of trial by jury for those charged
with breaking the slavery laws.
In 1839 ex-President John Quincy
Adams, who was then serving in
congress, declared in favor of the
abolition of slavery in the Dis
trict of Columbia and Birney,
seeing in this measure an enter
ing wedge for a national aboli
tion law actively campaigned for
the election of congressmen
pledged to vote for the Adams
proposal. i
A New Party Is Formed.
As the presidential campaign of
1840 approached and it became
evident that neither the Whigs
nor the Democrats would take
any decisive stand on the slavery
question, Bimey decided that the
time had come to put an anti
slavery presidential candidate in
the field. Accordingly he called
for a convention to be held in
Albany, N. Y., in April, 1840.
Delegates from six states met
there and their unanimous choice
for the nominee of the new Lib
erty party was Birney. As men
tioned earlier in this article, he
ran a poor third in the race with
Harrison and Van Buren, polling
only 7,059 popular votes and fail
ing to get a single one in the elec
toral college.
Despite the poor showing made
by this party in the “Log Cabin-
Hard Cider” campaign which
sent Harrison to the White House,
Birney was not discouraged. He
kept the party alive and four
years later he was again its nom
inee for President. This time he
polled 62,300 popular votes (near
ly nine times the number he had
received in 1840) but again failed
to get a single electoral vote.
As a matter of fact he would
probably have received more
than 100,000 votes had it not been
for the “Garland Forgery,” a
faked document purporting to be
Birney’s formal withdrawal from
the race and his advice to the
anti-slavery voters to support
Henry Clay. After this campaign,
which resulted in the election of
James K. Polk, Bimey withdrew
from further national political ac
tivity. But the seed which he
had sown had fallen on fertile
ground.
In the campaign of 1848 the
banner which Bimey had first
lifted was carried on by the Free
Soil party with ex-President Mar
tin Van Buren as the candidate
for President and Charles Fran
cis Adams, son of ex-President
John Quincy Adams, for vice
president. Campaigning on a
platform which called for “Free
Soil, Free Speech, Free Labor
and Free Men” this ticket, even
though it received only 291,000
votes, was sufficient to defeat
Lewis Cass, the Democratic can
didate, and elect Gen. Zachary
Taylor, the
Whig, thereby
stimulating the
anti - slavery
forces through
out the country
to renewed ac
tivity.
In 1852 the
Free Soil party
was again in the
race with Sen.
John P. Hale of
New H a m p-
shire as its can
didate. He had
quit the party
over the slavery issue. Although
the Free Soilers’ vote dropped
from 291,000 to 157,000 the issue
which they had kept alive would
not dov/n. The “irrepressible con
flict” with slavery was on. Four
years later, by welding together
all of the anti-slavery men—Free |
Soilers, Old Line Whigs and
Know Nothings—into a new party,
the Republican, the victory which
Birney had foreseen was nearly
in sight. For Gen. John C. Fre
mont, the Republican candidate,
polled more than 1,000,000 votes
and began sounding the death
knell of slavery.
Bimey did not live to see the
final note sounded. He died near
Perth Amboy, N. J., on Novem
ber 25, 1857. Three years and
three weeks )ater the Republi
can party triumphed over the di
vided Democratic party and sent
its candidate, Abraham Lincoln,
to Washington. In a little more |
than a month after he took the
oath of office the guns in Charles
ton harbor heralded the opening
of a conflict in whose fires slav
ery in the United States was de
stroyed forever.
IS? ~
John C.
Fremont
Style-Right Outfits to Suit
Fashion Wise Little Folks
By CHERIE NICHOLAS
V/f OST amusing, this thought
of modem children grow
ing to be regular fashion
sophisticates, but neverthe
less, it is literally true. They
know and mother knows that
they know more about style
than their elders dared dream
of in their childhood days. In
this generation it is not so
easy as it was in the past to
satisfy little daughter or
junior with made-overs and
hand-me-downs. Anyway, what’s
the use of trying with ready-mades
available that are amazingly prac
tical and inexpensive and so alto
gether attractive little folks delight
in them.
With play clothes for youngsters
and pretty frocks for little daughter
being sold “for a song” these days,
the idea of making over loses much
of its zest. However, what is being
done ir this modernized world of
ours is that mothers of good judg
ment are entrusting the matter of
outfitting their children to skilled
designers who make a study of
juvenile apparel needs not only
from a style standpoint, but from
a view to real economy and prac
ticality.
In line with the thought that chil
dren’s fashions be given as sincere
and careful consideration as those
of grownups, it is becoming a cus
tom in leading style centers to hold
fashion shows devoted exclusively
to the little folks. The cunning
spring styles here pictured were
shown recently at a style clinic pre
sented in the Merchandise Mart of
Chicago, before an appreciative
gathering of visiting merchants.
The handsome coat worn by the
girl to the right in the picture is
tailored of a Kenwood tweed in a
charming berry-red tone. It is the
smart new princess type that is an
outstanding favorite this season.
The white silk pique collar tells you
that white accents on dark is a most
important trend for spring. Here
you see the ensemble idea carried
out in a matching beret that comes
with the coat, thus happily solving
mother’s problem of hatting little
daughter fashionably and becoming
ly. Her wee companion is in navy
blue, with a bonnet matched to her
cunning coat.
There’s something about a soldier
and about military - influenced
clothes that lends smartness and
proves alluring to young misses as
well as to sentimental big sister.
The little lady to the left in the
group wears one of the new mili
tary-type cape suits such as prom
ise widespread vogue this season.
The suit is of alert blue wool with
fitted jacket in bright red. The long
cape theme is highly important.
This ensemble is so completely
matched up it includes a military
looking hat with a red feather with
a handbag worked out in the red
and the blue.
And now for cunning fashions for
junior and his buddy for little boys
take delight in smart attire every
whit as much as does little sister.
Whistle while you walk, if it’s in
coats like these, think these two
young men whom you see pictured
in the group. The whistler in the
foreground wears a camel’s hair
man-tailored, double-breasted coat
and his pal wears a green tweed
double-breasted coat with slit pock
ets. Caps to match their wear. Too
cunning for words!
(Released by Western Newspaper Union.)
Lucky Charms
r -^v .. v'‘ '
It’s smart, in your choice of cos
tume jewelry, to wear a lucky
charm or two. Circle your wrist
with a chain from which dangles a
framed fourleaf clover, saying in
attractive lettering “I bring you
good luck”; as shown in the picture
at the left. On her lapel this lady-
fair flaunts a Monocraft clip of two
scarlet-tipped dancer’s hands posed
down, for luck. With an identifica
tion bracelet that reads, “The key
to my heart,” as worn by the other
young woman, you will set other
hearts fluttering. Note also the
lapel gadget she wears. It’s a Mo
net circus horse complete with col
orful bridle and flowing mane, such
as fashion sophisticates dote on.
Frothy Black Lace
For Evening Wear
Frothy black lace combined with
contrasting colors and fabrics is an
outstanding feature of Heim’s new
evening collection. A dinner gown
cut in shirtwaist style is effectively
trimmed with white linen collar and
cuffs. Magenta ribbon, at the hem
and for the belt, is the sophisticated
accent for a very formal sleeveless
black lace gown.
Lingerie Blouses
Simply Entrancing
Simply entrancing are the new
lingerie blouses that we will all be
wearing with our spring suits. In
fact a wardrobe of blouses is about
the most important theme we know
of on the style program for the
coming months. You will be need
ing a whole wardrobe of blouses
to carry you through triumphantly
from a “style” standpoint.
While the biggest play is made on
the dainty lace-trimmed sheer
frothy white blouse with its fluttery
jabots, its finely tucked detail and
its lacy loveliness, swank blouses of
pique eyelet embroidered or plain-
tailored are just as essential. Add
to the collection a cunning sweater-
blouse or so, also several washable
crepes in pastel colors. As to a
blouse in sprightly and now so very
fashionable polka dot, you really
must have at least one.
Jewelry Designed
To Suit Costumes
For Bruyere’s new shepherd plaid
suit, a firm of Paris jewelers creat
ed a pair of huge, golden leaf coat-
clips veined in brilliants, with dupli
cate clips of much smaller leaves
for the earlobes.
For a beige tweed costume, they
designed a realistic leaf of slender,
baguette-cut emeralds with the
gems set solid, stone to stone, and
the veining of the leaf in diamonds.
This same ivy-like leaf also comes
in red, paved with rubies in the new
way, each stone cut to exactly fil
its neighbor.
Dr. Barton
Turkish Bazaar
An evening bag that will make
you think of fakirs and bazaars and
high thin music from pipes, is a
small pouch bag in red, black, sil
ver and gold.
Cancer Cures
Increased by
Alert Clinics
By DR. JAMES W. BARTON
(Released by Western Newspaper Union.)
O NE of thp reasons that there
are so many cases of can
cer seen today is because mid
dle-aged individuals know that
cancer is a dis
ease that makes
itself known at
this time. The gen
eral practitioner
is now alert to dis
cover cancer among his pa
tients, knowing that early can
cer is curable and late cancer
is fatal.
However, the big advance
from the standpoint of recog
nizing cancer is that medical
students of today can now
see more cases of cancer in
a week than the medical stu
dents of less than 20 years
ago saw in a year.
Dr. John Garnett Howell, Phila
delphia, as guest editor of the Medi
cal World, says:
“Educational standards of cancer
offered to medical students have
been improved at the University of
Pennsylvania in the last several
years by offering them the oppor
tunity of reviewing
cases in a general
hospital which hous
es 80 to 100 cases
of varied types of
cancer as a daily
census and treats or
observes 142 cases
per week in the out
patient department.”
When a student re-
alizes the great num-
ii*. of cancer caS es
which exist, he be
comes “cancer-con-
scious,” and does not allow a per
sistent somach-ache in a middle-
aged person to pass until an X-ray
of the stomach and intestines has
been made. Similarly with other
conditions which may develop into
cancer.
As showing how interns (final year
medical students) and young phy
sicians are always on the lookout
for cancer even in cases where the
patients have entered hospital for
treatment of other ailments. Dr.
Howell says: “We receive 6 to 12
cases a year of breast cancer in
our X-ray wards at the Philadelphia
General hospital, in whose breasts
the disease was not reported by the
patient and was discovered by the
interns in their routine physical ex
amination.”
* * •
X-Ray Treatments
May Be Sinus Aid
HEN a patient suffering with
” sinus infection has had little or
no relief from nose drops, inhaling
preparations to dry up and shrink
the lining of nose and sinus and
even has had an “operation” to give
better drainage to the sinus, he nat
urally brightens up when he reads
of the results obtained by X-ray
treatment.
Drs. F. M. Hodges and L. O.
Snead, Richmond, Va., in Radiology,
Syracuse, N. Y., state that sinus
disease is far more common than is
usually realized. They have befen
using the X-ray treatment for sinus
ailments for some time and are
obtaining gratifying results. The
following are some of their find
ings:
Tabulated Investigation.
1. In acute sinusitis (inflammation
of the lining of the sinus), if mucous
(or pus) cpn drain away properly
the inflammation will generally
clear up rather quickly under the
usual treatment of astringents (salt
solutions, adrenalin, ephedrine),
packings and washings. In these
cases. X-ray treatments are not nec
essary unless to hasten recovery.
2. Cases that are subacute or sub-
chronic (where inflammation is not
severe but has lasted for some time)
respond well to X-ray treatment.
Symptoms may have been present
for months or years.
3. In old or chronic cases where
there was thickening of the mucous
membrane lining the sinuses, the
majority were helped by X-ray
treatment.
4. In cases accompanied by soft,
enlarged growths—polyps—in sinus
and nose, the X-ray gave marked
relief and prevented a return of the
growths in several cases.
5. In very old cases with wide
spread polyp formation, the X-ray
gave little or no benefit.
• * •
QUESTION BOX
Q.—Will you please tell me what
kind of foods are acid and what are
alkaline?
A.—Foods having an acid effect on
system are: Eggs, meat, fish, poul
try, breads of all kinds (both white
and whole wheat), cereals, pastries,
puddings, etc. Foods having an al
kaline effect on the system are:
Milk, nuts, fruits (except rhubarb,
plums, cranberries and prunes) and
vegetaoles.
Strange Facts
!
Cheer Warriors
The Praying Mantis
Good Warriors
1
The Chinese people recently re
sponded to a government move
ment find wrote 500,000 letters to
their fighting men to cheer, en
courage and assure them that
their countrymen appreciated
their efforts and were solidly be
hind them.
Of the numerous superstitions
connected with the praying man
tis, Mantis religiose, few are older
or more widespread than the be
lief that, when it assumes a kneel
ing position, it either sees an
angel or hears the rustle of its
wings.
Some years ago, an artist, upon
presenting elaborate credentials
and other papers concerning his
reputation, was permitted to paint
a portrait of the wife of an Amer
ican President. After he had
gone, it was discovered that his
most important work, before com
ing to the White House, was a
painting of a group of cows for an
advertisement.
Through its Good Neighbor Pol
icy, the United States now has
military and naval missions or
military advisers in Argentina,
Brazil, Colombia, Guatemala,
Haiti, Nicaragua and Peru. A
score of technical experts have
also been lent to nine South Amer
ican republics. Furthermore, both
West Point and Annapolis now
have been opened to students
from these countries.—Collier’s.
Nina—You were seen with Mr. X
on the night of the storm. His wife
knows everything. See page 19 of
the May True Story Magazine, now
cm sale.—Adv.
—
Sorrows of Others ^
He who for others’ sorrows care
ho jot, the name of “man” that
mem deserveth not.—Saadi.
INDIGESTION
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burn, sick headache and upsets so often caused by
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tick all over—JUST ONE DOSE of Beil-a
speedy relief. 25o everywhere.
His Luck i
“I’ve been hunting tigers.”
“Had any luck?”
“Rather. I didn’t meet one.”
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F OR over 70 years, countless thousands of
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Don’t suffer one unnecessary moment from
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' VI •
0