ines of
action has been generally conceded.

Abolitionists were pioneers in the formulation of political platforms.
The declaration of principles drawn up by Garrison in 1833 and adopted
by the American Anti-Slavery Society was of the nature of a political
platform. The duty of voting in furtherance of the policy of
emancipation was inculcated. No platform was adopted for the first
political campaign, that of 1840; but four years later there was an
elaborate party platform of twenty-one resolutions. Many things had
happened in the eleven years intervening since the declaration of
principles of the American Anti-Slavery Society. In the earlier platform
the freedom of the slave appears as the primary object. That of the
Liberty party assumes the broad principle of human brotherhood as the
foundation for a democracy or a republic. It denies that the party is
organized merely to free the slave. Slaveholding as the grossest form of
despotism must indeed be attacked first, but the aim of the party is to
carry the principle of equal rights into all social relations. It is not
a sectional party nor a party organized for a single purpose. "It is not
a new party, nor a third party, but it is the party of 1776, reviving
the principles of that memorable era, and striving to carry them into
practical application." The spirit of '76 rings, indeed, throughout
the document, which declares that it was understood at the time of the
Declaration and the Constitution that the existence of slavery was in
derogation of the principles of American liberty. The implied faith
of the Nation and the States was pledged to remove this stain upon the
national character. Some States had nobly fulfilled that pledge; others
shamelessly had neglected to do so.

These principles are reasserted in succeeding platforms. The later
opponents of slavery in their principles and policies thus allied
themselves with the founders of the republic. They claimed the right to
continue to repeat the words of Washington and Jefferson and those of
the members of the Virginia Legislature of 1832. No new doctrines were
required. It was enough simply to reaffirm the fundamental principles of
democracy.

The names attached to the party are significant. It was at first
popularly styled the Abolition party, then officially in turn the
Liberty party, the Freesoil party, and finally the Republican party.
Republican was the name first applied to the Democratic party--the party