ction from the good things he had to offer. More than ordinary
reasons existed why the Secretary desired to assist the Steuben
farmer. Dickinson served in the State Senate throughout Seward's two
terms as governor, and during these four years he had fearlessly and
faithfully explained and defended Seward's recommendation of a
division of the school fund, which proved so offensive to many
thousand voters in New York. Indeed, it may be said with truth, that
Seward's record on that one question did more to defeat him at Chicago
than all his "irrepressible conflict" and "higher-law" declarations.
It became the fulcrum of Curtin's and Lane's aggressive resistance,
who claimed that, in the event of his nomination, the American or
Know-Nothing element in Pennsylvania and Indiana would not only
maintain its organisation, but largely increase its strength, because
of its strong prejudices against a division of the school fund.

[Footnote 753: "'Bray Dickinson,' as he was generally and familiarly
called, whose early education was entirely neglected but whose
perceptions and intuitions were clear and ready, was an enterprising
farmer,--too enterprising, indeed, for he undertook more than he could
accomplish. His ambition was to be the largest cattle and produce
grower in his county (Steuben). If his whole time and thoughts had
been given to farming, his anticipations might have been realised,
but, as it was, he experienced the fate of those who keep too many
irons in the fire. In 1839 he was elected to the State Senate, where
for four years he was able, fearless, and inflexibly honest. On one
occasion a senator from Westchester County criticised and ridiculed
Dickinson's language. Dickinson immediately rejoined, saying that
while his difficulty consisted in a want of suitable language with
which to express his ideas, his colleague was troubled with a flood of
words without any ideas to express."--Thurlow Weed Barnes, _Life of
Thurlow Weed_, Vol. 1, pp. 441, 442.]

Dickinson met this issue squarely. He followed the powerful
Pennsylvanian and Indianian from delegation to delegation, explaining
that Seward had sought simply to turn the children of poor foreigners
into the path of moral and intellectual cultivation pursued by the
American born,--a policy, he declared, in which all Republicans and
Christian citizens should concur. He pictured school conditions in New
York City in 1840, the date of Seward's historic message; he showed