Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 5.djvu/418

394 and the introduction of rules promising the complete accomplishment of their object in a future not very remote. The obstacles which the advancing reform had to overcome and the boisterous reactionary movement that has now set in vividly recall to my mind the changing fortune of the struggle against slavery. I remember the enthusiastic uprising of the anti-slavery sentiment after the pro-slavery attempt upon Kansas, the high hopes of immediate victory that was set upon the Frémont campaign of 1856, the thick gloom that followed Frémont's defeat, how the slave-power seemed to carry all before it under Buchanan's Administration, how even the highest judiciary of the Republic wrote one of the few dark pages of its history in fortifying slavery by the Dred Scott decision, how all seemed lost and how then those dismal days were speedily followed by the complete and final triumph of freedom.

With proud confidence in the sense of National honor, in the virtue and the wisdom of the American people, I venture to predict that as they wiped out the blot of slavery from the National escutcheon, so they will surely at last sweep away the barbarism and corruption of spoils politics. It is true, a violent and noisy effort is now in progress to wrest from the reform the ground it has conquered. The party in power, which has been most positive in its pledges to support and advance the reform, is urged by some of its members with furious cries to dishonor itself by breaking its word; and timid leaders are frightened by the deafening clamor of a greedy minority as if it were the voice of the people. All this may appear very formidable to-day, but it will not prevent the ultimate consummation. The reform cause may, indeed, meet with temporary obstruction, as the anti-slavery movement did in Buchanan's time. Some men in conspicuous position may disgrace themselves and regret