Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/258

224 should be glad to have your view of the case as it presents [itself] to you on fuller information. 



which I have been honored, I stand here in behalf of Republicans opposing the Presidential candidates of the Republican party. You may well believe me when I say that it is no pleasure to me to enter upon a campaign like this. But a candid statement of our reasons for the step we have taken is due to those whose companionship in the pending contest we have left. It is, therefore, to Republicans that I address myself. I shall, of course, not waste any words upon politicians who follow the name of the party, right or wrong; but to the men of reason and conscience will I appeal, who loved their party for the good ends it was serving, and who were faithful to it in the same measure as it was faithful to the honor and the true interests of the Republic. Let them hear me, and then decide whether the same fidelity will not irresistibly lead them where we stand now.
 * —In obedience to the invitation with

At the threshold I have to meet a misapprehension of our motives. It has been said, and, I suppose, believed by some, that we were dissatisfied with the Republican party because its present candidates were protectionists. This is easily answered. Is Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, a free-trader? On the contrary, he is well known to be as strong a protectionist as any member of the Senate. And who among the candidates before the Republican National Convention was the favorite of the same “Independent Republicans” now opposing the