Monday, December 7, 2009

German Citizens

The Ottumwa Mercury copies a portion of our remarks on the municipal election in this city and then makes an appeal to the Democrats of that county. “Look at it,” it says, “in Scott county where the honest, white portion of the Republican party, who go under the name of ‘Unionists’ for siding in a body with the Democrats, are denounced, and the Abolition organ of Davenport exults over the defeat of the German Unionist, Bleik Peters.” Now, that’s rich! Let us put our contemporary right on the record.

A portion of the Germans left the Republican party last year, because, they said, it was not anti-slavery enough for them, and came out as a separate organization calling themselves “Unionists.” Since then the principles of the republican party have become so intensified – we like to use that word, it is expressive – by the fruition of the curse of slavery, that those Germans have repudiated the name they assumed and are many of them again acting with the Republican party. They find that it is not altogether the best way to advance anti-slavery principles, by patronizing a pro-slavery organ and electing pro-slavery Democrats to office.

The fact of it is, the Germans as a nation are anti-slavery in their sentiments and cannot assimulate [sic] with the Democratic party. They make the best soldiers in Christendom fighting in the Federal army and the poorest in the world fighting under the secesh flag. This may also be taken in a political sense.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Saturday Morning, April 19, 1862, p.2

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