Near the beginning of Mr. Conway's small volume entitled "Barons of the Potomack and Rappahannock" occurs the sententious remark that "a true history of tobacco would be the history of English and American Liberty." With whatever truth there is in such sweeping statements it may also be said that "a history of Slavery in this country would be the history of the Republican Party." This is distinctly so, at least to the close of the Civil War, for we are to notice that while the party originated in a desire to oppose the extension of slavery, the cause of its origin disappeared in less than ten years after the birth of the organization. But the results of that cause remained for many years, and justified the assertion in the Republican platform of 1860 that "a history of the nation during the last four years has fully established the propriety and necessity of the organization and perpetuation of the Republican Party, and that the causes which called it into existence are permanent in their nature." From its primary position as an opponent of slavery extension, the new party became the champion of abolition, and in the chaos brought on by the Civil War, and in the Reconstruction period which followed, it was kept in power, notwithstanding the disappearance of its direct formative cause, and the justification for its continued existence was found in the urgent necessity of the hour. Gradually but firmly it became a strong State and National Party, solving the many vexed problems which followed the great conflict, restoring public credit, reducing the enormous war debt; and when the slavery question and its direct consequences had been eliminated from national politics, taking up new political ideas and economic policies, for the welfare of the entire country, until now, after half a century of existence, during which time it has written some of the brightest pages of American history, the Republican Party stands out as one of the greatest and most consistent of political parties in all the world's history. Taking the popular vote as a criterion of permanent growth, the vote for the Republican presidential candidates, beginning with 1,341,264 for Fremont in 1856, reached the maximum of 7,208,244 for McKinley in 1900, and only once (in 1892) during this entire period did the popular vote for the Republican presidential candidate fail to show an increase over the vote of the preceding election.