Excerpt from Address by the Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, at the Memorial Service by the Legislature of the State of New York: For President Chester An; Arthur, in the Assembly Chamber, at Albany, Wednesday Evening, April, 20, 1887 In paving the way for their dissolution it opened the road for the union of men, hitherto arrayed against each other in hostile camps, upon this vital issue. With Van Buren as its leader the anti-slav ery sentiment crystallized into a' powerful and ag gressive organization. It broke up associations which had existed since the formation of the gov ernment, alarmed and infuriated the adherents of slavery and prepared the way for the inevitable conflict. Millard Fillmore sought to stay the storm by compromise, but when he signed the Fugitive Slave Law the storm be came a cyclone. The enforcement of the law brought the horrors of slavery to every door. It aroused the old fire which had charged with Cromwell on the field and expounded liberty through Mansfield on the bench. It united the North in a solemn determination to save the Coun try and free the constitution from the dangers and disgrace of the system. It consolidated the South for a struggle to the death for its preservation. The years following of agitation and preparation the appeal to arms, the civil war with its frightful sacrifices 01 blood and treasure; the triumph of na. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.