Martinsburg Gazette

To the People of the County of Berkeley opposed to the election of Martin Van Buren to the Presidency.

Fellow Citizens: During the first week of our labors in the post to which we were called by the free suffrages of the People of Berkeley, we have been called on to unite in designating some man as a candidate for the Presidency of the United States, against the nominee of the Baltimore Convention. We felt the peculiar and painful delicacy of our situation, representing as we do, a people who had never bowed to the yoke of tyranny, however hypocritically clothed in the garb of republicanism, or invested with the power to punish & reward. We have carefully reflected upon the principles which have guided you in every contest, &, recognizing them as our own, have sought, by the light of our most deliberate judgement, to apply them to the case which was presented for our action. We met our brethren from every section of the State, and resolved with them, to act in concert and union. We canvassed diligently the claims and merits as well as the objections urged in reference to every candidate; we examined carefully the predilections of every section of the State, and we resolved to sacrifice every preference, and every prejudice, upon the altar of our country. We have seen that it is in vain to battle in the cause of that man who is first in the hearts of the people of Berkeley, as he is in our hearts, and have, therefore, looked for another, who may save our country from the degradation into which she must be plunged if her sons receive and wear the chains which have been prepared for them by the Baltimore Convention. This sacrifice we have made, Fellow Citizens, under the firm conviction that we adopted the only course that can rescue our beloved land from the greedy fangs of an army of one hundred thousand office holders, and double that number of office seekers. We trust that it is unnecessary to tell those who have confided their interests to our care, that our single aim has been the glory of our country, and the salvation of her institutions from imminent danger and pollution; and, in view of these objects, we have concurred in the nomination, unanimously made by the members of both houses of the Assembly opposed to Martin Van Buren, of HUGH LAWSON WHITE, Of Tennessee, for the Chief magistracy of the United States.

Fellow Citizens: We conjure you to forget that Judge White is not the man who would be preferred by you to all others. We beseech you to look upon him as an honest, fearless patriot, who could not be corrupted by any reward that power could bestow-to remember, that manifestations of public sentiment have pointed to him as the only individual who can enlist the popular voice of his countrymen against the violence that is offered to their liberties. Consider that it is unworthy of Virginia to be divided into powerless factions, in opposition to the trained bands of the enemy; and remember that the Freemen of Berkeley have never yet-because disappointed in their first love-stood calmly by, without an effort of defence against the assaults upon their country's institutions. Remember, in a word that if Martin Van Buren shall succeed, his election must establish the power of the office holders over the people, and the principle that a president may, with propriety, nominate his successor. Do not argue that no dishonor is involved in defeat in a struggle in behalf of your first choice, for if defeat shall cover you now, when will you rise from the bed of despair into which it shall cast you, and who shall strike off the chains which the cormorants of the national treasury shall have fastened around you? The arm of every patriot in the land shall be powerless, and after a few faint unsteady struggles, the lamp of American liberty shall expire. Hugh L. White is the candidate whom the people have designated as best fitted to arrest the progress of corruption in the Government, to restore it to the honorable eminence from which it has fallen, to disband the corrupt herd who fatten upon your treasury, to restore harmony to the nation in her foreign relations, to dispense justice, not to a party, but to all his fellow citizens, in a word, to place your Government where Washington left it. We commit, then, Fellow-Citizens, the act in which we have participated, to your wisdom and judgment, in the unshaken belief that the same reasons and the same motives which have guided us, will guide you to an approval of our conduct. That the blessings of Heaven may crown our exertions, and the exertions of all who battle in the cause of their country, for national honor and prosperity, is the ardent prayer of

Your humble servants.

EDMUND P. HUNTER.

LEVI HENSHAW.

Richmond, December 14, 1835.