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+Project Gutenberg's American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4), by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4)
+       Studies In American Political History (1896)
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: March 17, 2005 [EBook #15391]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMERICAN ELOQUENCE, I. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+AMERICAN ELOQUENCE
+
+STUDIES IN AMERICAN POLITICAL HISTORY
+
+
+Edited with  Introduction by Alexander Johnston
+
+Reedited by James Albert Woodburn
+
+
+Volume I (of 4)
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+INTRODUCTORY
+
+
+
+I--COLONIALISM.
+
+
+THE FORMATION OF THE CONSTITUTION
+
+JAMES OTIS
+
+PATRICK HENRY
+
+SAMUEL ADAMS
+
+ALEXANDER HAMILTON
+
+JAMES MADISON
+
+
+
+II--CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT.
+
+ALBERT GALLATIN
+
+FISHER AMES
+
+JOHN NICHOLAS
+
+
+
+III.-THE RISE OF DEMOCRACY.
+
+THOMAS JEFFERSON
+
+JOHN RANDOLPH
+
+JOSIAH QUINCY
+
+HENRY CLAY
+
+
+
+IV.--THE RISE OF NATIONALITY.
+
+ROBERT Y. HAYNE
+
+DANIEL WEBSTER
+
+JOHN C. CALHOUN
+
+THOMAS H. BENTON
+
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF PORTRAITS.
+
+VOL. I.
+
+ALEXANDER HAMILTON -- Frontispiece From a painting by COL. J. TRUMBULL.
+
+PATRICK HENRY From a painting by JAMES B. LONGACRE.
+
+SAMUEL ADAMS From a steel engraving.
+
+JAMES MADISON From a painting by GILBERT STUART.
+
+FISHER AMES From a painting by GILBERT STUART.
+
+THOMAS JEFFERSON From a painting by GILBERT STUART.
+
+JOHN RANDOLPH.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE TO THE REVISED EDITION.
+
+In offering to the public a revised edition of Professor Johnston's
+American Eloquence, a brief statement may be permitted of the changes
+and additions involved in the revision. In consideration of the favor
+with which the compilation of Professor Johnston had been received, and
+of its value to all who are interested in the study of American history,
+the present editor has deemed it wise to make as few omissions as
+possible from the former volumes. The changes have been chiefly in the
+way of additions. The omission, from the first volume, of Washington's
+Inaugural and President Nott's oration on the death of Hamilton is the
+result, not of a depreciation of the value of these, but of a desire to
+utilize the space with selections and subjects which are deemed more
+directly valuable as studies in American political history. Madison's
+speech on the adoption of the Constitution, made before the Virginia
+Convention, is substituted for one of Patrick Henry's on the same
+occasion. Madison's is a much more valuable discussion of the issues and
+principles involved, and, besides, the volume has the advantage of
+Henry's eloquence when he was at his best, at the opening of the
+American Revolution. In compensation for the omissions there are added
+selections, one each from Otis, Samuel Adams, Gallatin, and Benton. The
+completed first volume, therefore, offers to the student of American
+political history chapters from the life and work of sixteen
+representative orators and statesmen of America.
+
+In addition to the changes made in the selections, the editor has added
+brief biographical sketches, references, and textual and historical
+notes which, it is hoped, will add to the educational value of the
+volumes, as well as to the interest and intelligence with which the
+casual reader may peruse the speeches.
+
+As a teacher of American history, I have found no more luminous texts on
+our political history than the speeches of the great men who have been
+able, in their discussions of public questions, to place before us a
+contemporary record of the history which they themselves were helping to
+make. To the careful student the secondary authorities can never supply
+the place of the great productions, the messages and speeches, which
+historic occasions have called forth. The earnest historical reader will
+approach these orations, not with the design of regarding then merely as
+specimens of eloquence or as studies in language, but as indicating the
+great subjects and occasions of our political history and the spirit and
+motives of the great leaders of that history. The orations lead the
+student to a review of the great struggles in which the authors were
+engaged, and to new interest in the science of government from the
+utterances and permanent productions of master participants in great
+political controversies. Certainly, there is no text-book in political
+science more valuable than the best productions of great statesmen, as
+reflecting the ideas of those who have done most to make political
+history.
+
+With these ideas in mind, the editor has added rather extensive
+historical notes, with the purpose of suggesting the use of the speeches
+as the basis of historical study, and of indicating other similar
+sources for investigation. These notes, together with explanations of
+any obscurities in the text, and other suggestions for study, will serve
+to indicate the educational value of the volumes; and it is hoped that
+they may lead many teachers and students to see in these orations a text
+suitable as a guide to valuable studies in American political history.
+
+The omissions of parts of the speeches, made necessary by the exigencies
+of space, consist chiefly of those portions which were but of temporary
+interest and importance, and which would not be found essential to an
+understanding of the subject in hand. The omissions, however, have
+always been indicated so as not to mislead the reader, and in most
+instances the substance of the omissions has been indicated in the
+notes.
+
+The general division of the work has been retained: 1. Colonialism, to
+1789. Constitutional Government, to 1801. 3. The Rise of Democracy, to
+1815. 4. The Rise of Nationality, to 1840. 5. The Slavery Struggle, to
+1860. 6. Secession and Civil War, to 1865. The extension of the studies
+covering these periods, by the addition of much new material has made
+necessary the addition of a fourth volume, which embraces the general
+subjects, (1) Reconstruction; (2) Free Trade and Protection; (3)
+Finance; (4) Civil-Service Reform. Professor Johnston's valuable
+introductions to the several sections have been substantially retained.
+
+By the revision, the volumes will be confined entirely to political
+oratory. Literature and religion have, each in its place, called forth
+worthy utterances in American oratory. These, certainly, have an
+important place in the study of our national life. But it has been
+deemed advisable to limit the scope of these volumes to that field of
+history which Mr. Freeman has called "past politics,"--to the process by
+which Americans, past and present, have built and conducted their state.
+The study of the state, its rise, its organization, and its development,
+is, after all, the richest field for the student and reader of history.
+"History." says Professor Seeley, "may be defined as the biography of
+states. To study history thus is to study politics at the same time. If
+history is not merely eloquent writing, but a serious scientific
+investigation, and if we are to consider that it is not mere
+anthropology or sociology, but a science of states, then the study of
+history is absolutely the study of politics." It is into this great
+field of history that these volumes would direct the reader.
+
+No American scholar had done more, before his untimely death, than the
+original editor of these orations, to cultivate among Americans an
+intelligent study of our politics and political history. These volumes,
+which he designed, are a worthy memorial of his appreciation of the
+value to American students of the best specimens of our political
+oratory.
+
+J. A. W.
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTORY.
+
+All authorities are agreed that the political history of the United
+States, beyond much that is feeble or poor in quality, has given to the
+English language very many of its most finished and most persuasive
+specimens of oratory. It is natural that oratory should be a power in a
+republic; but, in the American republic, the force of institutions has
+been reinforced by that of a language which is peculiarly adapted to the
+display of eloquence. Collections of American orations have been
+numerous and useful, but the copiousness of the material has always
+proved a source of embarrassment. Where the supply is so abundant, it is
+exceedingly difficult to make selections on any exact system, and yet
+impossible to include all that has a fair claim to the distinctive stamp
+of oratory. The results have been that our collections of public
+speeches have proved either unsatisfactory or unreasonably voluminous.
+
+The design which has controlled the present collection has been to make
+such selections from the great orations of American history as shall
+show most clearly the spirit and motives which have actuated its
+leaders, and to connect them by a thread of commentary which shall
+convey the practical results of the conflicts of opinion revealed in the
+selections. In the execution of such a work much must be allowed for
+personal limitations; that which would seem representative to one would
+not seem at all representative to others. It will not be difficult to
+mark omissions, some of which may seem to mar the completeness of the
+work very materially; the only claim advanced is that the work has been
+done with a consistent desire to show the best side of all lines of
+thought which have seriously modified the course of American history.
+Some great names will be missed from the list of orators, and some great
+addresses from the list of orations; the apology for their omission is
+that they have not seemed to be so closely related to the current of
+American history or so operative upon its course as to demand their
+insertion. Any errors under this head have occurred in spite of careful
+consideration and anxious desire to be scrupulously impartial.
+
+Very many of the orations selected have been condensed by the omission
+of portions which had no relevancy to the purpose in hand, or were of
+only a temporary interest and importance. Such omissions have been
+indicated, so that the reader need not be misled, while the effort has
+been made to so manage the omissions as to maintain a complete logical
+connection among the parts which have been put to use. A tempting method
+of preserving such a connection is, of course, the insertion of words or
+sentences which the speaker might have used, though he did not; but such
+a method seemed too dangerous and possibly too misleading, and it has
+been carefully avoided. None of the selections contain a word of foreign
+matter, with the exception of one of Randolph's speeches and Mr.
+Beecher's Liverpool speech, where the matter inserted has been taken
+from the only available report, and is not likely to mislead the reader.
+For very much the same reason, footnotes have been avoided, and the
+speakers have been left to speak for themselves.
+
+Such a process of omission will reveal to any one who undertakes it an
+underlying characteristic of our later, as distinguished from our
+earlier, oratory. The careful elaboration of the parts, the restraint of
+each topic treated to its appropriate part, and the systematic
+development of the parts into a symmetrical whole, are as markedly
+present in the latter as they are absent in the former. The process of
+selection has therefore been progressively more difficult as the
+subject-matter has approached contemporary times. In our earlier
+orations, the distinction and separate treatment of the parts is so
+carefully observed that it has been comparatively an easy task to seize
+and appropriate the parts especially desirable. In our later orations,
+with some exceptions, there is an evidently decreasing attention to
+system. The whole is often a collection of _disjecta membra_ of
+arguments, so interdependent that omissions of any sort are exceedingly
+dangerous to the meaning of the speaker. To do justice to his meaning,
+and give the whole oration, would be an impossible strain on the space
+available; to omit any portion is usually to lose one or more buttresses
+of some essential feature in his argument. The distinction is submitted
+without any desire to explain it on theory, but only as a suggestion of
+a practical difficulty in a satisfactory execution of the work.
+
+The general division of the work has been into (1) Colonialism, to 1789;
+(2) Constitutional Government, to 1801; (5) the Rise of Democracy, to
+1815; (4) the Rise of Nationality, to 1840; (5) the Slavery struggle, to
+1860; (6) Secession and Reconstruction, to 1876; (7) Free Trade and
+Protection. In such a division, it has been found necessary to include,
+in a few cases, orations which have not been strictly within the time
+limits of the topic, but have had a close logical connection with it. It
+is hoped, however, that all such cases will show their own necessity too
+clearly for any need of further ex-planation or excuse.
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+COLONIALISM.
+
+
+THE FORMATION OF THE CONSTITUTION.
+
+
+It has been said by an excellent authority that the Constitution was
+"extorted from the grinding necessities of a reluctant people." The
+truth of the statement is very quickly recognized by even the most
+surface student of American politics. The struggle which began in 1774-5
+was the direct outcome of the spirit of independence. Rather than submit
+to a degrading government by the arbitrary will of a foreign Parliament,
+the Massachusetts people chose to enter upon an almost unprecedented war
+of a colony against the mother country. Rather than admit the precedent
+of the oppression of a sister colony, the other colonies chose to
+support Massachusetts in her resistance. Resistance to Parliament
+involved resistance to the Crown, the only power which had hitherto
+claimed the loyalty of the colonists; and one evil feature of the
+Revolution was that the spirit of loyalty disappeared for a time from
+American politics. There were, without doubt, many individual cases of
+loyalty to "Continental interests"; but the mass of the people had
+merely unlearned their loyalty to the Crown, and had learned no other
+loyalty to take its place. Their nominal allegiance to the individual
+colony was weakened by their underlying consciousness that they really
+were a part of a greater nation; their national allegiance had never
+been claimed by any power.
+
+The weakness of the confederation was apparent even before its complete
+ratification. The Articles of Confederation were proposed by the
+Continental Congress, Nov. 15, 1777. They were ratified by eleven States
+during the year 1778, and Delaware ratified in 1779. Maryland alone held
+out and refused to ratify for two years longer. Her long refusal was due
+to her demand for a national control of the Western territory, which
+many of the States were trying to appropriate. It was not until there
+was positive evidence that the Western territory was to be national
+property that Maryland acceded to the articles, and they went into
+operation. The interval had given time for study of them, and their
+defects were so patent that there was no great expectation among
+thinking men of any other result than that which followed. The national
+power which the confederation sought to create was an entire nonentity.
+There was no executive power, except committees of Congress, and these
+had no powers to execute. Congress had practically only the power to
+recommend to the States. It had no power to tax, to support armies or
+navies, to provide for the interest or payment of the public debt, to
+regulate commerce or internal affairs, or to perform any other function
+of an efficient national government. It was merely a convenient
+instrument of repudiation for the States; Congress was to borrow money
+and incur debts, which the States could refuse or neglect to provide
+for. Under this system affairs steadily drifted from bad to worse for
+some six years after the formal ratification of the articles. There
+seemed to be no remedy in the forms of law, for the articles expressly
+provided that no alteration was to be made except by the assent of every
+State. Congress proposed alterations, such as the temporary grant to
+Congress of power to levy duties on imports; but these proposals were
+always vetoed by one or more states.
+
+In 1780, in a private letter, Hamilton had suggested a convention of the
+States to revise the articles, and as affairs grew worse the proposition
+was renewed by others. The first attempt to hold such a convention, on
+the call of Virginia, was a failure; but five States sent delegates to
+Annapolis, and these wisely contented themselves with recommending
+another convention in the following year. Congress was persuaded to
+endorse this summons; twelve of the States chose delegates, and the
+convention met at Philadelphia, May, 14, 1787. A quorum was obtained,
+May 25th, and the deliberations of the convention lasted until Sept.
+28th, when the Constitution was reported to Congress.
+
+The difficulties which met the convention were mainly the results of the
+division of the States into large and small States. Massachusetts,
+Connecticut, Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia, the States which
+claimed to extend to the Mississippi on the west and cherished
+indefinite expectations of future growth, were the "large" States. They
+desired to give as much power as possible to the new national
+government, on condition that the government should be so framed that
+they should have control of it. The remaining States were properly
+"small" states, and desired to form a government which would leave as
+much power as possible to the States. Circumstances worked strongly in
+favor of a reasonable result. There never were more than eleven States
+in the convention. Rhode Island, a small State, sent no delegates. The
+New Hampshire delegates did not appear until the New York delegates
+(except Hamilton) had lost patience and retired from the convention.
+Pennsylvania was usually neutral. The convention was thus composed of
+five large, five small, and one neutral State; and almost all its
+decisions were the outcome of judicious compromise.
+
+The large States at first proposed a Congress in both of whose Houses
+the State representation should be proportional. They would thus have
+had a clear majority in both Houses, and, as Congress was to elect the
+President, and other officers, the government would thus have been a
+large State government. When "the little States gained their point," by
+forcing through the equal representation of the States in the Senate,
+the unsubstantial nature of the "national" pretensions of the large
+States at once became apparent. The opposition to the whole scheme
+centred in the large States, with very considerable assistance from New
+York, which was not satisfied with the concessions which the small
+States had obtained in the convention. The difficulty of ratification
+may be estimated from the final votes in the following State
+conventions: Massachusetts, 187 to 163; New Hampshire, 57 to 46;
+Virginia, 89 to 79, and New York, 30 to 27. It should also be noted that
+the last two ratifications were only made after the ninth State (New
+Hampshire) had ratified, and when it was certain that the Constitution
+would go into effect with or with-out the ratification of Virginia or
+New York. North Carolina did not ratify until 1789, and Rhode Island not
+until 1790.
+
+The division between North and South also appeared in the convention. In
+order to carry over the Southern States to the support of the final
+compromise, it was necessary to insert a guarantee of the slave trade
+for twenty years, and a provision that three fifths of the slaves should
+be counted in estimating the population for State representation in
+Congress. But these provisions, so far as we can judge from the debates
+of the time, had no influence against the ratification of the
+Constitution; the struggle turned on the differences between the
+national leaders, aided by the satisfied small States, on one side, and
+the leaders of the State party, aided by the dissatisfied States, large
+and small, on the other. The former, the Federalists, were successful,
+though by very narrow majorities in several of the States. Washington
+was unanimously elected the first President of the Republic; and the new
+government was inaugurated at New York, March 4, 1789.
+
+The speech of Henry in the Virginia House of Delegates has been chosen
+as perhaps the best representative of the spirit which impelled and
+guided the American Revolution. It is fortunate that the ablest of the
+national leaders was placed in the very focus of opposition to the
+Constitution, so that we may take Hamilton's argument in the New York
+convention and Madison's in the Virginia convention, as the most
+carefully stated conclusions of the master-minds of the National party.
+
+
+
+
+JAMES OTIS
+
+OF MASSACHUSETTS. (BORN 1725, DIED 1783.)
+
+
+ON THE WRITS OF ASSISTANCE--BEFORE THE SUPERIOR COURT OF MASSACHUSETTS,
+FEBRUARY, 1761.
+
+
+MAY IT PLEASE YOUR HONORS: I was desired by one of the court to look
+into the books, and consider the question now before them concerning
+Writs of Assistance. I have accordingly considered it, and now appear
+not only in obedience to your order, but likewise in behalf of the
+inhabitants of this town, who have presented another petition, and out
+of regard to the liberties of the subject. And I take this opportunity
+to declare, that whether under a fee or not (for in such a cause as this
+I despise a fee), I will to my dying day oppose with all the powers and
+faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the one
+hand, and villainy on the other, as this writ of assistance is.
+
+It appears to me the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most
+destructive of English liberty and the fundamental principles of law,
+that ever was found in an English law-book. I must therefore beg your
+honors' patience and attention to the whole range of an argument, that
+may perhaps appear uncommon in many things, as well as to points of
+learning that are more remote and unusual: that the whole tendency of my
+design may the more easily be perceived, the conclusions better descend,
+and the force of them be better felt. I shall not think much of my pains
+in this cause, as I engaged in it from principle. I was solicited to
+argue this cause as Advocate-General; and because I would not, I have
+been charged with desertion from my office. To this charge I can give a
+very sufficient answer. I renounced that office, and I argue this cause
+from the same principle; and I argue it with the greater pleasure, as it
+is in favor of British liberty, at a time when we hear the greatest
+monarch upon earth declaring from his throne that he glories in the name
+of Briton, and that the privileges of his people are dearer to him than
+the most valuable prerogatives of his crown; and as it is in opposition
+to a kind of power, the exercise of which in former periods of history
+cost one king of England his head, and another his throne. I have taken
+more pains in this cause than I ever will take again, although my
+engaging in this and another popular cause has raised much resentment.
+But I think I can sincerely, declare, that I cheerfully submit myself to
+every odious name for conscience' sake; and from my soul I despise all
+those whose guilt, malice, or folly has made them my foes. Let the
+consequences be what they will, I am determined to proceed. The only
+principles of public conduct, that are worthy of a gentleman or a man,
+are to sacrifice estate, ease, health, and applause, and even life, to
+the sacred calls of his country.
+
+These manly sentiments, in private life, make the good citizens; in
+public life, the patriot and the hero. I do not say that, when brought
+to the test, I shall be invincible. I pray God I may never be brought to
+the melancholy trial, but if ever I should, it will be then known how
+far I can reduce to practice principles which I know to be founded in
+truth. In the meantime I will proceed to the subject of this writ.
+
+Your honors will find in the old books concerning the office of a
+justice of the peace, precedents of general warrants to search suspected
+houses. But in more modern books, you will find only special warrants to
+search such and such houses, specially named, in which the complainant
+has before sworn that he suspects his goods are concealed; and will find
+it adjudged, that special warrants only are legal. In the same manner I
+rely on it, that the writ prayed for in this petition, being general, is
+illegal. It is a power that places the liberty of every man in the hands
+of every petty officer. I say I admit that special writs of assistance,
+to search special places, may be granted to certain persons on oath; but
+I deny that the writ now prayed for can be granted, for I beg leave to
+make some observations on the writ itself, before I proceed to other
+acts of Parliament. In the first place, the writ is universal, being
+directed "to all and singular justices, sheriffs, constables, and all
+other officers and subjects"; so that, in short, it is directed to every
+subject in the king's dominions. Every one with this writ may be a
+tyrant; if this commission be legal, a tyrant in a legal manner, also,
+may control, imprison, or murder anyone within the realm. In the next
+place, it is perpetual, there is no return. A man is accountable to no
+person for his doings. Every man may reign secure in his petty tyranny,
+and spread terror and desolation around him, until the trump of the
+archangel shall excite different emotions in his soul. In the third
+place, a person with this writ, in the daytime, may enter all houses,
+shops, etc., at will, and command all to assist him. Fourthly, by this
+writ, not only deputies, etc., but even their menial servants, are
+allowed to lord it over us. What is this but to have the curse of Canaan
+with a witness on us: to be the servant of servants, the most despicable
+of God's creation? Now one of the most essential branches of English
+liberty is the freedom of one's house. A man's house is his castle; and
+whilst he is quiet, he is as well guarded as a prince in his castle.
+This writ, if it should be declared legal, would totally annihilate this
+privilege. Custom-house officers may enter our houses when they please;
+we are commanded to permit their entry. Their menial servants may enter,
+may break locks, bars, and everything in their way; and whether they
+break through malice or revenge, no man, no court can inquire. Bare
+suspicion without oath is sufficient. This wanton exercise of this power
+is not a chimerical suggestion of a heated brain. I will mention some
+facts. Mr. Pew had one of these writs, and when Mr. Ware succeeded him,
+he endorsed this writ over to Mr. Ware; so that these writs are
+negotiable from one officer to another; and so your honors have no
+opportunity of judging the persons to whom this vast power is delegated.
+Another instance is this: Mr. Justice Walley had called this same Mr.
+Ware before him, by a constable, to answer for a breach of the
+Sabbath-day acts, or that of profane swearing. As soon as he had
+finished, Mr. Ware asked him if he had done. He replied, "Yes." "Well
+then," said Mr. Ware, "I will show you a little of my power. I command
+you to permit me to search your house for uncustomed goods"; and went on
+to search the house from the garret to the cellar; and then served the
+constable in the same manner! But to show another absurdity in this
+writ: if it should be established, I insist upon it every person, by the
+14th Charles Second, has this power as well as the custom-house
+officers. The words are: "it shall be lawful for any person or persons
+authorized," etc. What a scene does this open! Every man prompted by
+revenge, ill-humor, or wantonness to inspect the inside of his
+neighbor's house, may get a writ of assistance. Others will ask it from
+self-defence; one arbitrary exertion will provoke another, until society
+be involved in tumult and in blood:
+
+
+
+
+PATRICK HENRY
+
+OF VIRGINIA. (BORN 1736, DIED 1799)
+
+
+CONVENTION OF DELEGATES, MARCH 28, 1775
+
+
+MR. PRESIDENT:
+
+No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as
+abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the
+House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights;
+and, therefore, I hope that it will not be thought disrespectful to
+those gentlemen, if, entertaining as I do, opinions of a character very
+opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without
+reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is
+one of awful moment to this country. For my own part I consider it as
+nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to
+the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It
+is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfil the
+great responsibility Which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep
+back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offence, I
+should consider myself as guilty of treason toward my country, and of an
+act of disloyalty toward the majesty of heaven, which I revere above all
+earthly-kings.
+
+Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope.
+We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the
+song of that syren, till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part
+of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we
+disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and
+having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal
+salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am
+willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst and to provide for
+it.
+
+I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided; and that is the lamp of
+experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past.
+And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the
+conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years, to justify those
+hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and
+the House? Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been
+lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet.
+Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how
+this gracious reception of our petition comports with these war-like
+preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and
+armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown
+ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled, that force must be called in to
+win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the
+implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings
+resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array. If its
+purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other
+possible motives for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of
+the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No,
+sir, she has none. They are meant for us; they can be meant for no
+other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which
+the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to
+oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for
+the last ten years. Have we any thing new to offer on the subject?
+Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is
+capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and
+humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been
+already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves
+longer. Sir, we have done every thing that could be done, to avert the
+storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated;
+we have supplicated: we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and
+have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the
+ministry and parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our
+remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our
+supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with
+contempt, from the foot of the throne. In vain, after these things, may
+we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer
+any room for hope. If we wish to be free--if we mean to preserve
+inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long
+contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which
+we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never
+to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained,
+we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to
+the God of Hosts is all that is left us!
+
+They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable
+an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week,
+or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a
+British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather
+strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of
+effectual resistance, by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the
+delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and
+foot? Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper use of the means which
+the God of nature bath placed in our power. Three millions of people,
+armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which
+we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against
+us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just
+God who presides over the destinies of nations; and who will raise up
+friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the
+strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides.
+sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now
+too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat, but in
+submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be
+heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I
+repeat it, sir, let it come!
+
+It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry peace,
+peace--but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale
+that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of
+resounding arms. Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we
+here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life
+so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains
+and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may
+take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!
+
+
+
+
+SAMUEL ADAMS
+
+OF MASSACHUSETTS (BORN 1722, DIED 1803.)
+
+
+ON AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE--IN PHILADELPHIA, AUGUST I, 1776.
+
+
+COUNTRYMEN AND BRETHREN: I would gladly have declined an honor, to which
+I find myself unequal. I have not the calmness and impartiality which
+the infinite importance of this occasion demands. I will not deny the
+charge of my enemies, that resentment for the accumulated injuries of
+our country, and an ardor for her glory, rising to enthusiasm, may
+deprive me of that accuracy of judgment and expression which men of
+cooler passions may possess. Let me beseech you then, to hear me with
+caution, to examine without prejudice, and to correct the mistakes into
+which I may be hurried by my zeal.
+
+Truth loves an appeal to the common sense of mankind. Your unperverted
+understandings can best determine on subjects of a practical nature. The
+positions and plans which are said to be above the comprehension of the
+multitude may be always suspected to be visionary and fruitless. He who
+made all men hath made the truths necessary to human happiness obvious
+to all.
+
+Our forefathers threw off the yoke of Popery in religion; for you is
+reserved the honor of levelling the Popery of politics. They opened the
+Bible to all, and maintained the capacity of every man to judge for
+himself in religion. Are we sufficient for the comprehension of the
+sublimest spiritual truths, and unequal to material and temporal ones?
+Heaven hath trusted us with the management of things for eternity, and
+man denies us ability to judge of the present, or to know from our
+feelings the experience that will make us happy. "You can discern," say
+they, "objects distant and remote, but cannot perceive those within your
+grasp. Let us have the distribution of present goods, and cut out and
+manage as you please the interests of futurity." This day, I trust, the
+reign of political protestantism will commence.
+
+We have explored the temple of royalty, and found that the idol we have
+bowed down to, has eyes which see not, ears that hear not our prayers,
+and a heart like the nether millstone. We have this day restored the
+Sovereign, to whom alone men ought to be obedient. He reigns in heaven,
+and with a propitious eye beholds His subjects assuming that freedom of
+thought and dignity of self-direction which He bestowed on them. From
+the rising to the setting sun, may His kingdom come.
+
+Men who content themselves with the semblance of truth, and a display of
+words, talk much of our obligations to Great Britain for protection. Had
+she a single eye to our advantage? A nation of shopkeepers are very
+seldom so disinterested. Let us not be so amused with words; the
+extension of her commerce was her object. When she defended our coasts,
+she fought for her customers, and convoyed our ships loaded with wealth,
+which we had acquired for her by our industry. She has treated us as
+beasts of burthen, whom the lordly masters cherish that they may carry a
+greater load. Let us inquire also against whom she has protected us?
+Against her own enemies with whom we had no quarrel, or only on her
+account, and against whom we always readily exerted our wealth and
+strength when they were required. Were these colonies backward in giving
+assistance to Great Britain, when they were called upon in 1739, to aid
+the expedition against Carthagena? They at that time sent three thousand
+men to join the British army, although the war commenced without their
+consent. But the last war, 't is said, was purely American. This is a
+vulgar error, which, like many others, has gained credit by being
+confidently repeated. The dispute between the Courts of Great Britain
+and France, related to the limits of Canada and Nova Scotia. The
+controverted territory was not claimed by any in the colonies, but by
+the Crown of Great Britain. It was therefore their own quarrel. The
+infringement of a right which England had, by the treaty of Utrecht, of
+trading in the Indian country of Ohio, was another cause of the war. The
+French seized large quantities of British manufactures, and took
+possession of a fort which a company of British merchants and factors
+had erected for the security of their commerce. The war was therefore
+waged in defence of lands claimed by the Crown, and for the protection
+of British property. The French at that time had no quarrel with
+America; and, as appears by letters sent from their commander-in-chief,
+to some of the colonies, wished to remain in peace with us. The part
+therefore which we then took, and the miseries to which we exposed
+ourselves, ought to be charged to our affection for Britain. These
+colonies granted more than their proportion to the support of the war.
+They raised, clothed, and maintained nearly twenty-five thousand men,
+and so sensible were the people of England of our great exertions, that
+a message was annually sent to the House of Commons purporting: "That
+his majesty, being highly satisfied of the zeal and vigor with which his
+faithful subjects in North America had exerted themselves in defence of
+his majesty's just rights and possessions, recommend it to the House, to
+take the same into consideration, and enable him to give them a proper
+compensation."
+
+But what purpose can arguments of this kind answer? Did the protection
+we received annul our rights as men, and lay us under an obligation of
+being miserable?
+
+Who among you, my countrymen, that is a father, would claim authority to
+make your child a slave because you had nourished him in his infancy?
+
+'T is a strange species of generosity which requires a return infinitely
+more valuable than anything it could have bestowed; that demands as a
+reward for a defence of our property, a surrender of those inestimable
+privileges, to the arbitrary will of vindictive tyrants, which alone
+give value to that very property.
+
+Courage, then, my countrymen! our contest is not only whether we
+ourselves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an
+asylum on earth, for civil and religious liberty? Dismissing, therefore,
+the justice of our cause as incontestable, the only question is, What is
+best for us to pursue in our present circumstances?
+
+The doctrine of dependence on Great Britain is, I believe, generally
+exploded; but as I would attend to the honest weakness of the simplest
+of men, you will pardon me if I offer a few words on that subject.
+
+We are now on this continent, to the astonishment of the world, three
+millions of souls united in one common cause. We have large armies, well
+disciplined and appointed, with commanders inferior to none in military
+skill, and superior in activity and zeal. We are furnished with arsenals
+and stores beyond our most sanguine expectations, and foreign nations
+are waiting to crown our success by their alliances. There are instances
+of, I would say, an almost astonishing Providence in our favor; our
+success has staggered our enemies, and almost given faith to infidels;
+so that we may truly say it is not our own arm which has saved us.
+
+The hand of Heaven appears to have led us on to be, perhaps, humble
+instruments and means in the great Providential dispensation which is
+completing. We have fled from the political Sodom; let us not look back,
+lest we perish and become a monument of infamy and derision to the
+world! For can we ever expect more unanimity and a better preparation
+for defence; more infatuation of counsel among our enemies, and more
+valor and zeal among ourselves? The same force and resistance which are
+sufficient to procure us our liberties, will secure us a glorious
+independence and support us in the dignity of free, imperial states. We
+can not suppose that our opposition has made a corrupt and dissipated
+nation more friendly to America, or created in them a greater respect
+for the rights of mankind. We can therefore expect a restoration and
+establishment of our privileges, and a compensation for the injuries we
+have received from their want of power, from their fears, and not from
+their virtues. The unanimity and valor, which will effect an honorable
+peace, can render a future contest for our liberties unnecessary. He who
+has strength to chain down the wolf, is a mad-man if he lets him loose
+without drawing his teeth and paring his nails.
+
+From the day on which an accommodation takes place between England and
+America, on any other terms than as independent states, I shall date the
+ruin of this country. A politic minister will study to lull us into
+security, by granting us the full extent of our petitions. The warm
+sunshine of influence would melt down the virtue, which the violence of
+the storm rendered more firm and unyielding. In a state of tranquillity,
+wealth, and luxury, our descendants would forget the arts of war, and
+the noble activity and zeal which made their ancestors invincible. Every
+art of corruption would be employed to loosen the bond of union which
+renders our resistance formidable. When the spirit of liberty which now
+animates our hearts and gives success to our arms is extinct, our
+numbers will accelerate our ruin, and render us easier victims to
+tyranny. Ye abandoned minions of an infatuated ministry, if peradventure
+any should yet remain among us!--remember that a Warren and a Montgomery
+are numbered among the dead. Contemplate the mangled bodies of your
+countrymen, and then say, What should be the reward of such sacrifices?
+Bid us and our posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship, and
+plough, and sow, and reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let
+loose on us the dogs of war to riot in our blood, and hunt us from the
+face of the earth? If ye love wealth better than liberty, the
+tranquillity of servitude than the animating contest of freedom--go from
+us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the
+hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may
+posterity, forget that ye were our countrymen.
+
+To unite the Supremacy of Great Britain and the Liberty of America, is
+utterly impossible. So vast a continent and of such a distance from the
+seat of empire, will every day grow more unmanageable. The motion of so
+unwieldy a body cannot be directed with any dispatch and uniformity,
+without committing to the Parliament of Great Britain, powers
+inconsistent with our freedom. The authority and force which would be
+absolutely necessary for the preservation of the peace and good order of
+this continent, would put all our valuable rights within the reach of
+that nation.
+
+*     *     *     *     *     *     *
+
+Some who would persuade us that they have tender feelings for future
+generations, while they are insensible to the happiness of the present,
+are perpetually foreboding a train of dissensions under our popular
+system. Such men's reasoning amounts to this--give up all that is
+valuable to Great Britain, and then you will have no inducements to
+quarrel among yourselves; or suffer yourselves to be chained down by
+your enemies, that you may not be able to fight with your friends.
+
+This is an insult on your virtue as well as your common sense. Your
+unanimity this day and through the course of the war is a decisive
+refutation of such invidious predictions. Our enemies have already had
+evidence that our present constitution contains in it the justice and
+ardor of freedom, and the wisdom and vigor of the most absolute system.
+When the law is the will of the people, it will be uniform and coherent;
+but fluctuation, contradiction, and inconsistency of councils must be
+expected under those governments where every revolution in the ministry
+of a court produces one in the state. Such being the folly and pride of
+all ministers, that they ever pursue measures directly opposite to those
+of their predecessors.
+
+We shall neither be exposed to the necessary convulsions of elective
+Monarchies, nor to the want of wisdom, fortitude, and virtue, to which
+hereditary succession is liable. In your hands it will be to perpetuate
+a prudent, active, and just legislature, and which will never expire
+until you yourselves lose the virtues which give it existence.
+
+And, brethren and fellow-countrymen, if it was ever granted to mortals
+to trace the designs of Providence, and interpret its manifestations in
+favor of their cause, we may, with humility of soul, cry out, "Not unto
+us, not unto us, but to thy Name be the praise." The confusion of the
+devices among our enemies, and the rage of the elements against them,
+have done almost as much towards our success as either our councils or
+our arms.
+
+The time at which this attempt on our liberties was made, when we were
+ripened into maturity, had acquired a knowledge of war, and were free
+from the incursions of enemies in this country, the gradual advances of
+our oppressors enabling us to prepare for our defence, the unusual
+fertility of our lands and clemency of the seasons, the success which at
+first attended our feeble arms, producing unanimity among our friends
+and reducing our internal foes to acquiescence,--these are all strong
+and palpable marks and assurances, that Providence is yet gracious unto
+Zion, that it will turn away the captivity of Jacob.
+
+We have now no other alternative than independence, or the most
+ignominious and galling servitude. The legions of our enemies thicken on
+our plains; desolation and death mark their bloody career; whilst the
+mangled corpses of our countrymen seem to cry out to us as a voice from
+heaven: "Will you permit our posterity to groan under the galling chains
+of our murderers? Has our blood been expended in vain? Is the only
+reward which our constancy, till death, has obtained for our country,
+that it should be sunk into a deeper and more ignominious vassalage?"
+Recollect who are the men that demand your submission; to whose decrees
+you are invited to pay obedience! Men who, unmindful of their relation
+to you as brethren, of your long implicit submission to their laws; of
+the sacrifice which you and your forefathers made of your natural
+advantages for commerce to their avarice,--formed a deliberate plan to
+wrest from you the small pittance of property which they had permitted
+you to acquire. Remember that the men who wish to rule over you are they
+who, in pursuit of this plan of despotism, annulled the sacred contracts
+which had been made with your ancestors; conveyed into your cities a
+mercenary soldiery to compel you to submission by insult and murder--who
+called your patience, cowardice; your piety, hypocrisy.
+
+Countrymen! the men who now invite you to surrender your rights into
+their hands are the men who have let loose the merciless savages to riot
+in the blood of their brethren--who have dared to establish popery
+triumphant in our land--who have taught treachery to your slaves, and
+courted them to assassinate your wives and children.
+
+These are the men to whom we are exhorted to sacrifice the blessings
+which Providence holds out to us--the happiness, the dignity of
+uncontrolled freedom and independence.
+
+Let not your generous indignation be directed against any among us who
+may advise so absurd and madd'ning a measure. Their number is but few
+and daily decreased; and the spirit which can render them patient of
+slavery, will render them contemptible enemies.
+
+Our Union is now complete; our Constitution composed, established, and
+approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties. We may justly
+address you, as the _Decemviri_ did the Romans, and say: "Nothing that
+we propose, can pass into a law without your consent. Be yourselves, O
+Americans, the authors of those laws on which your happiness depends."
+
+You have now, in the field, armies sufficient to repel the whole force
+of your enemies, and their base and mercenary auxiliaries. The hearts of
+your soldiers beat high with the spirit of freedom--they are animated
+with the justice of their cause, and while they grasp their swords, can
+look up to Heaven for assistance. Your adversaries are composed of
+wretches who laugh at the rights of humanity, who turn religion into
+derision, and would, for higher wages, direct their swords against their
+leaders or their country. Go on, then, in your generous enterprise, with
+gratitude to Heaven for past success, and confidence of it in the
+future. For my own part, I ask no greater blessing than to share with
+you the common danger and common glory. If I have a wish dearer to my
+soul, than that my ashes may be mingled with those of a Warren and a
+Montgomery, it is--that these American States may never cease to be free
+and independent!
+
+
+
+
+ALEXANDER HAMILTON,
+
+OF NEW YORK. (BORN 1757, DIED 1804.)
+
+
+ON THE EXPEDIENCY OF ADOPTING THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION
+
+--CONVENTION OF NEW YORK,
+
+JUNE 24, 1788.
+
+
+I am persuaded, Mr. Chairman, that I in my turn shall be indulged, in
+addressing the committee. We all, in equal sincerity, profess to be
+anxious for the establishment of a republican government, on a safe and
+solid basis. It is the object of the wishes of every honest man in the
+United States, and I presume that I shall not be disbelieved, when I
+declare, that it is an object of all others, the nearest and most dear
+to my own heart. The means of accomplishing this great purpose become
+the most important study which can interest mankind. It is our duty to
+examine all those means with peculiar attention, and to choose the best
+and most effectual. It is our duty to draw from nature, from reason,
+from examples, the best principles of policy, and to pursue and apply
+them in the formation of our government. We should contemplate and
+compare the systems, which, in this examination, come under our view;
+distinguish, with a careful eye, the defects and excellencies of each,
+and discarding the former, incorporate the latter, as far as
+circumstances will admit, into our Constitution. If we pursue a
+different course and neglect this duty, we shall probably disappoint the
+expectations of our country and of the world.
+
+In the commencement of a revolution, which received its birth from the
+usurpations of tyranny, nothing was more natural, than that the public
+mind should be influenced by an extreme spirit of jealousy. To resist
+these encroachments, and to nourish this spirit, was the great object of
+all our public and private institutions. The zeal for liberty became
+predominant and excessive. In forming our confederation, this passion
+alone seemed to actuate us, and we appear to have had no other view than
+to secure ourselves from despotism. The object certainly was a valuable
+one, and deserved our utmost attention. But, sir, there is another
+object equally important, and which our enthusiasm rendered us little
+capable of regarding: I mean a principle of strength and stability in
+the organization of our government, and vigor in its operations. This
+purpose can never be accomplished but by the establishment of some
+select body, formed peculiarly upon this principle. There are few
+positions more demonstrable than that there should be in every republic,
+some permanent body to correct the prejudices, check the intemperate
+passions, and regulate the fluctuations of a popular assembly. It is
+evident, that a body instituted for these purposes, must be so formed as
+to exclude as much as possible from its own character, those infirmities
+and that mutability which it is designed to remedy. It is therefore
+necessary that it should be small, that it should hold its authority
+during a considerable period, and that it should have such an
+independence in the exercise of its powers, as will divest it as much as
+possible of local prejudices. It should be so formed as to be the centre
+of political knowledge, to pursue always a steady line of conduct, and
+to reduce every irregular propensity to system. Without this
+establishment, we may make experiments without end, but shall never have
+an efficient government.
+
+It is an unquestionable truth, that the body of the people in every
+country desire sincerely its prosperity; but it is equally
+unquestionable, that they do not possess the discernment and stability
+necessary for systematic government. To deny that they are frequently
+led into the grossest errors by misinformation and passion, would be a
+flattery which their own good sense must despise. That branch of
+administration especially, which involves our political relations with
+foreign states, a community will ever be incompetent to. These truths
+are not often held up in public assemblies: but they cannot be unknown
+to any who hear me. From these principles it follows, that there ought
+to be two distinct bodies in our government: one, which shall be
+immediately constituted by and peculiarly represent the people, and
+possess all the popular features; another, formed upon the principle,
+and for the purposes, before explained. Such considerations as these
+induced the convention who formed your State constitution, to institute
+a Senate upon the present plan. The history of ancient and modern
+republics had taught them, that many of the evils which these republics
+had suffered, arose from the want of a certain balance and mutual
+control indispensable to a wise administration; they were convinced that
+popular assemblies are frequently misguided by ignorance, by sudden
+impulses, and the intrigues of ambitious men; and that some firm barrier
+against these operations was necessary; they, therefore, instituted your
+Senate, and the benefits we have experienced have fully justified their
+conceptions.
+
+Gentlemen, in their reasoning, have placed the interests of the several
+States, and those of the United States in contrast; this is not a fair
+view of the subject; they must necessarily be involved in each other.
+What we apprehend is, that some sinister prejudice, or some prevailing
+passion, may assume the form of a genuine interest. The influence of
+these is as powerful as the most permanent conviction of the public
+good; and against this influence we ought to provide. The local
+interests of a State ought in every case to give way to the interests of
+the Union; for when a sacrifice of one or the other is necessary, the
+former becomes only an apparent, partial interest, and should yield, on
+the principle that the small good ought never to oppose the great one.
+When you assemble from your several counties in the Legislature, were
+every member to be guided only by the apparent interests of his county,
+government would be impracticable. There must be a perpetual
+accommodation and sacrifice of local advantages to general expediency;
+but the spirit of a mere popular assembly would rarely be actuated by
+this important principle. It is therefore absolutely necessary that the
+Senate should be so formed, as to be unbiased by false conceptions of
+the real interests, or undue attachment to the apparent good of their
+several States.
+
+Gentlemen indulge too many unreasonable apprehensions of danger to the
+State governments; they seem to suppose that the moment you put men into
+a national council, they become corrupt and tyrannical, and lose all
+their affection for their fellow-citizens. But can we imagine that the
+Senators will ever be so insensible of their own advantage, as to
+sacrifice the genuine interest of their constituents? The State
+governments are essentially necessary to the form and spirit of the
+general system. As long, therefore, as Congress has a full conviction of
+this necessity, they must, even upon principles purely national, have as
+firm an attachment to the one as to the other. This conviction can never
+leave them, unless they become madmen. While the constitution continues
+to be read, and its principle known, the States must, by every rational
+man, be considered as essential, component parts of The Union; and
+therefore the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is wholly
+inadmissible.
+
+The objectors do not advert to the natural strength and resources of
+State governments, which will ever give them an important superiority
+over the general government. If we compare the nature of their different
+powers, or the means of popular influence which each possesses, we shall
+find the advantage entirely on the side of the States. This
+consideration, important as it is, seems to have been little attended
+to. The aggregate number of representatives throughout the States may be
+two thousand. Their personal influence will, therefore, be
+proportionably more extensive than that of one or two hundred men in
+Congress. The State establishments of civil and military officers of
+every description, infinitely surpassing in number any possible
+correspondent establishments in the general government, will create such
+an extent and complication of attachments, as will ever secure the
+predilection and support of the people. Whenever, therefore, Congress
+shall meditate any infringement of the State constitutions, the great
+body of the people will naturally take part with their domestic
+representatives. Can the general government withstand such an united
+opposition? Will the people suffer themselves to be stripped of their
+privileges? Will they suffer their Legislatures to be reduced to a
+shadow and a name? The idea is shocking to common-sense.
+
+From the circumstances already explained, and many others which might be
+mentioned, results a complicated, irresistible check, which must ever
+support the existence and importance of the State governments. The
+danger, if any exists, flows from an opposite source. The probable evil
+is, that the general government will be too dependent on the State
+Legislatures, too much governed by their prejudices, and too obsequious
+to their humors; that the States, with every power in their hands, will
+make encroachments on the national authority, till the Union is weakened
+and dissolved.
+
+Every member must have been struck with an observation of a gentleman
+from Albany. Do what you will, says he, local prejudices and opinions
+will go into the government.
+
+What! shall we then form a constitution to cherish and strengthen these
+prejudices? Shall we confirm the distemper, instead of remedying it. It
+is undeniable that there must be a control somewhere. Either the general
+interest is to control the particular interests, or the contrary. If the
+former, then certainly the government ought to be so framed, as to
+render the power of control efficient to all intents and purposes; if
+the latter, a striking absurdity follows; the controlling powers must be
+as numerous as the varying interests, and the operations of the
+government must therefore cease; for the moment you accommodate these
+different interests, which is the only way to set the government in
+motion, you establish a controlling power. Thus, whatever constitutional
+provisions are made to the contrary, every government will be at last
+driven to the necessity of subjecting the partial to the universal
+interest. The gentlemen ought always, in their reasoning, to distinguish
+between the real, genuine good of a State, and the opinions and
+prejudices which may prevail respecting it; the latter may be opposed to
+the general good, and consequently ought to be sacrificed; the former is
+so involved in it, that it never can be sacrificed.
+
+There are certain social principles in human nature from which we may
+draw the most solid conclusions with respect to the conduct of
+individuals and of communities. We love our families more than our
+neighbors; we love our neighbors more than our countrymen in general.
+The human affections, like the solar heat, lose their intensity as they
+depart from the centre, and become languid in proportion to the
+expansion of the circle on which they act. On these principles, the
+attachment of the individual will be first and forever secured by the
+State governments; they will be a mutual protection and support. Another
+source of influence, which has already been pointed out, is the various
+official connections in the States. Gentlemen endeavor to evade the
+force of this by saying that these offices will be insignificant. This
+is by no means true. The State officers will ever be important, because
+they are necessary and useful. Their powers are such as are extremely
+interesting to the people; such as affect their property, their liberty,
+and life. What is more important than the administration of justice and
+the execution of the civil and criminal laws? Can the State governments
+become insignificant while they have the power of raising money
+independently and without control? If they are really useful; if they
+are calculated to promote the essential interests of the people; they
+must have their confidence and support. The States can never lose their
+powers till the whole people of America are robbed of their liberties.
+These must go together; they must support each other, or meet one common
+fate. On the gentleman's principle, we may safely trust the State
+governments, though we have no means of resisting them; but we cannot
+confide in the national government, though we have an effectual
+constitutional guard against every encroachment. This is the essence of
+their argument, and it is false and fallacious beyond conception.
+
+With regard to the jurisdiction of the two governments, I shall
+certainly admit that the Constitution ought to be so formed as not to
+prevent the States from providing for their own existence; and I
+maintain that it is so formed; and that their power of providing for
+themselves is sufficiently established. This is conceded by one
+gentleman, and in the next breath the concession is retracted. He says
+Congress has but one exclusive right in taxation--that of duties on
+imports; certainly, then, their other powers are only concurrent. But to
+take off the force of this obvious conclusion, he immediately says that
+the laws of the United States are supreme; and that where there is one
+supreme there cannot be a concurrent authority; and further, that where
+the laws of the Union are supreme, those of the States must be
+subordinate; because there cannot be two supremes. This is curious
+sophistry. That two supreme powers cannot act together is false. They
+are inconsistent only when they are aimed at each other or at one
+indivisible object. The laws of the United States are supreme, as to all
+their proper, constitutional objects; the laws of the States are supreme
+in the same way. These supreme laws may act on different objects without
+clashing; or they may operate on different parts of the same common
+object with perfect harmony. Suppose both governments should lay a tax
+of a penny on a certain article; has not each an independent and
+uncontrollable power to collect its own tax? The meaning of the maxim,
+there cannot be two supremes, is simply this--two powers cannot be
+supreme over each other. This meaning is entirely perverted by the
+gentlemen. But, it is said, disputes between collectors are to be
+referred to the federal courts. This is again wandering in the field of
+conjecture. But suppose the fact is certain; is it not to be presumed
+that they will express the true meaning of the Constitution and the
+laws? Will they not be bound to consider the concurrent jurisdiction; to
+declare that both the taxes shall have equal operation; that both the
+powers, in that respect, are sovereign and co-extensive? If they
+transgress their duty, we are to hope that they will be punished. Sir,
+we can reason from probabilities alone. When we leave common-sense, and
+give ourselves up to conjecture, there can be no certainty, no security
+in our reasonings.
+
+I imagine I have stated to the committee abundant reasons to prove the
+entire safety of the State governments and of the people. I would go
+into a more minute consideration of the nature of the concurrent
+jurisdiction, and the operation of the laws in relation to revenue; but
+at present I feel too much indisposed to proceed. I shall, with leave of
+the committee, improve another opportunity of expressing to them more
+fully my ideas on this point. I wish the committee to remember that the
+Constitution under examination is framed upon truly republican
+principles; and that, as it is expressly designed to provide for the
+common protection and the general welfare of the United States, it must
+be utterly repugnant to this Constitution to subvert the State
+governments or oppress the people.
+
+
+
+
+JAMES MADISON,
+
+OF VIRGINIA. (BORN 1751, DIED 1836.)
+
+
+ON THE EXPEDIENCY OF ADOPTING THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION--CONVENTION OF
+VIRGINIA,
+
+JUNE 6, 1788.
+
+
+MR. CHAIRMAN:
+
+In what I am about to offer to this assembly, I shall not attempt to
+make impressions by any ardent professions of zeal for the public
+welfare. We know that the principles of every man will be, and ought to
+be, judged not by his professions and declarations, but by his conduct.
+By that criterion, I wish, in common with every other member, to be
+judged; and even though it should prove unfavorable to my reputation,
+yet it is a criterion from which I by no means would depart, nor could
+if I would. Comparisons have been made between the friends of this
+constitution and those who oppose it. Although I disapprove of such
+comparisons, I trust that in everything that regards truth, honor,
+candor, and rectitude of motives, the friends of this system, here and
+in other States, are not inferior to its opponents. But professions of
+attachment to the public good, and comparisons of parties, at all times
+invidious, ought not to govern or influence us now. We ought, sir, to
+examine the Constitution exclusively on its own merits. We ought to
+inquire whether it will promote the public happiness; and its aptitude
+to produce that desirable object ought to be the exclusive subject of
+our researches. In this pursuit, we ought to address our arguments not
+to the feelings and passions, but to those understandings and judgments
+which have been selected, by the people of this country, to decide that
+great question by a calm and rational investigation. I hope that
+gentlemen, in displaying their abilities on this occasion, will, instead
+of giving opinions and making assertions, condescend to prove and
+demonstrate, by fair and regular discussion. It gives me pain to hear
+gentlemen continually distorting the natural construction of language.
+Assuredly, it is sufficient if any human production can stand a fair
+discussion. Before I proceed to make some additions to the reasons which
+have been adduced by my honorable friend over the way, I must take the
+liberty to make some observations on what was said by another gentleman
+(Mr. Henry). He told us that this constitution ought to be rejected,
+because, in his opinion, it endangered the public liberty in many
+instances. Give me leave to make one answer to that observation--let the
+dangers with which this system is supposed to be replete, be clearly
+pointed out. If any dangerous and unnecessary powers be given to the
+general legislature, let them be plainly demonstrated, and let us not
+rest satisfied with general assertions of dangers, without proof,
+without examination. If powers be necessary, apparent danger is not a
+sufficient reason against conceding them. He has suggested, that
+licentiousness has seldom produced the loss of liberty; but that the
+tyranny of rulers has almost always effected it. Since the general
+civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the
+abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent
+encroachments of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations;
+but on a candid examination of history, we shall find that turbulence,
+violence, and abuse of power, by the majority trampling on the rights of
+the minority, have produced factions and commotions which, in republics,
+have, more frequently than any other cause, produced despotism. If we go
+over the whole history of ancient and modern republics, we shall find
+their destruction to have generally resulted from those causes. If we
+consider the peculiar situation of the United States, and go to the
+sources of that diversity of sentiment which pervades its inhabitants,
+we shall find great danger to fear that the same causes may terminate
+here in the same fatal effects which they produced in those republics.
+This danger ought to be wisely guarded against. In the progress of this
+discussion, it will perhaps appear, that the only possible remedy for
+those evils, and the only certain means of preserving and protecting the
+principles of republicanism, will be found in that very system which is
+now exclaimed against as the parent of oppression. I must confess that I
+have not been able to find his usual consistency in the gentleman's
+arguments on this occasion. He informs us that the people of this
+country are at perfect repose; that every man enjoys the fruits of his
+labor peaceably and securely, and that everything is in perfect
+tranquillity and safety. I wish sincerely, sir, this were true. But if
+this be really their situation, why has every State acknowledged the
+contrary? Why were deputies from all the States sent to the general
+convention? Why have complaints of national and individual distresses
+been echoed and re-echoed throughout the continent? Why has our general
+government been so shamefully disgraced, and our Constitution violated?
+Wherefore have laws been made to authorize a change, and wherefore are
+we now assembled here? A federal government is formed for the protection
+of its individual members. Ours was itself attacked with impunity. Its
+authority has been boldly disobeyed and openly despised. I think I
+perceive a glaring inconsistency in another of his arguments. He
+complains of this Constitution, because it requires the consent of at
+least three fourths of the States to introduce amendments which shall be
+necessary for the happiness of the people. The assent of so many, he
+considers as too great an obstacle to the admission of salutary
+amendments, which he strongly insists ought to be at the will of a bare
+majority, and we hear this argument at the very moment we are called
+upon to assign reasons for proposing a Constitution which puts it in the
+power of nine States to abolish the present inadequate, unsafe, and
+pernicious confederation! In the first case, he asserts that a majority
+ought to have the power of altering the government, when found to be
+inadequate to the security of public happiness. In the last case, he
+affirms that even three fourths of the community have not a right to
+alter a government which experience has proved to be subversive of
+national felicity; nay, that the most necessary and urgent alterations
+cannot be made without the absolute unanimity of all the States. Does
+not the thirteenth article of the confederation expressly require, that
+no alteration shall be made without the unanimous consent of all the
+States? Can any thing in theory be more perniciously improvident and
+injudicious than this submission of the will of the majority to the most
+trifling minority? Have not experience and practice actually manifested
+this theoretical inconvenience to be extremely impolitic? Let me mention
+one fact, which I conceive must carry conviction to the mind of any
+one,--the smallest State in the Union has obstructed every attempt to
+reform the government; that little member has repeatedly disobeyed and
+counteracted the general authority; nay, has even supplied the enemies
+of its country with provisions. Twelve States had agreed to certain
+improvements which were proposed, being thought absolutely necessary to
+preserve the existence of the general government; but as these
+improvements, though really indispensable, could not, by the
+confederation, be introduced into it without the consent of every State,
+the refractory dissent of that little State prevented their adoption.
+The inconveniences resulting from this requisition of unanimous
+concurrence in alterations of the confederation, must be known to every
+member in this convention; it is therefore needless to remind them of
+them. Is it not self-evident, that a trifling minority ought not to bind
+the majority? Would not foreign influence be exerted with facility over
+a small minority? Would the honorable gentleman agree to continue the
+most radical defects in the old system, because the petty State of Rhode
+Island would not agree to remove them?
+
+He next objects to the exclusive legislation over the district where the
+seat of the government may be fixed. Would he submit that the
+representatives of this State should carry on their deliberations under
+the control of any one member of the Union? If any State had the power
+of legislation over the place where Congress should fix the general
+government, it would impair the dignity and hazard the safety of
+Congress. If the safety of the Union were under the control of any
+particular State, would not foreign corruption probably prevail in such
+a State, to induce it to exert its controlling influence over the
+members of the general government? Gentlemen cannot have forgotten the
+disgraceful insult which Congress received some years ago. And, sir,
+when we also reflect, that the previous cession of particular States is
+necessary, before Congress can legislate exclusively anywhere, we must,
+instead of being alarmed at this part, heartily approve of it.
+
+But the honorable member sees great danger in the provision concerning
+the militia. Now, sir, this I conceive to be an additional security to
+our liberties, without diminishing the power of the States in any
+considerable degree; it appears to me so highly expedient, that I should
+imagine it would have found advocates even in the warmest friends of the
+present system. The authority of training the militia and appointing the
+officers is reserved to the States. But Congress ought to have the power
+of establishing a uniform system of discipline throughout the States;
+and to provide for the execution of the laws, suppress insurrections,
+and repel invasions. These are the only cases wherein they can interfere
+with the militia; and the obvious necessity of their having power over
+them in these cases must flash conviction on any reflecting mind.
+Without uniformity of discipline, military bodies would be incapable of
+action; without a general controlling power to call forth the strength
+of the Union, for the purpose of repelling invasions, the country might
+be overrun and conquered by foreign enemies. Without such a power to
+suppress insurrections, our liberties might be destroyed by intestine
+faction, and domestic tyranny be established.
+
+Give me leave to say something of the nature of the government, and to
+show that it is perfectly safe and just to vest it with the power of
+taxation. There are a number of opinions; but the principal question is,
+whether it be a federal or a consolidated government. In order to judge
+properly of the question before us, we must consider it minutely, in its
+principal parts. I myself conceive that it is of a mixed nature; it is,
+in a manner, unprecedented. We cannot find one express prototype in the
+experience of the world: it stands by itself. In some respects, it is a
+government of a federal nature; in others, it is of a consolidated
+nature. Even if we attend to the manner in which the Constitution is
+investigated, ratified, and made the act of the people of America, I can
+say, notwithstanding what the honorable gentleman has alleged, that this
+government is not completely consolidated; nor is it entirely federal.
+Who are the parties to it? The people--not the people as composing one
+great body, but the people as composing thirteen sovereignties. Were it,
+as the gentleman asserts, a consolidated government, the assent of a
+majority of the people would be sufficient for its establishment, and as
+a majority have adopted it already, the remaining States would be bound
+by the act of the majority, even if they unanimously reprobated it. Were
+it such a government as is suggested, it would be now binding on the
+people of this State, without having had the privilege of deliberating
+upon it; but, sir, no State is bound by it, as it is, without its own
+consent. Should all the States adopt it, it will be then a government
+established by the thirteen States of America, not through the
+intervention of the legislatures, but by the people at large. In this
+particular respect, the distinction between the existing and proposed
+governments is very material. The existing system has been derived from
+the dependent, derivative authority of the legislatures of the States;
+whereas this is derived from the superior power of the people. If we
+look at the manner in which alterations are to be made in it, the same
+idea is in some degree attended to. By the new system, a majority of the
+States cannot introduce amendments; nor are all the States required for
+that purpose; three fourths of them must concur in alterations; in this
+there is a departure from the federal idea. The members to the national
+House of Representatives are to be chosen by the people at large, in
+proportion to the numbers in the respective districts. When we come to
+the Senate, its members are elected by the States in their equal and
+political capacity; but had the government been completely consolidated,
+the Senate would have been chosen by the people, in their individual
+capacity, in the same manner as the members of the other house. Thus it
+is of complicated nature, and this complication, I trust, will be found
+to exclude the evils of absolute consolidation, as well as of a mere
+confederacy. If Virginia were separated from all the States, her power
+and authority would extend to all cases; in like manner, were all powers
+vested in the general government, it would be a consolidated government;
+but the powers of the federal government are enumerated; it can only
+operate in certain cases: it has legislative powers on defined and
+limited objects, beyond which it cannot extend its jurisdiction.
+
+But the honorable member has satirized, with peculiar acrimony, the
+powers given to the general government by this Constitution. I conceive
+that the first question on this subject is, whether these powers be
+necessary; if they be, we are reduced to the dilemma of either
+submitting to the inconvenience, or losing the Union. Let us consider
+the most important of these reprobated powers; that of direct taxation
+is most generally objected to. With respect to the exigencies of
+government, there is no question but the most easy mode of providing for
+them will be adopted. When, therefore, direct taxes are not necessary,
+they will not be recurred to. It can be of little advantage to those in
+power, to raise money in a manner oppressive to the people. To consult
+the conveniences of the people, will cost them nothing, and in many
+respects will be advantageous to them. Direct taxes will only be
+recurred to for great purposes. What has brought on other nations those
+immense debts, under the pressure of which many of them labor? Not the
+expenses of their governments, but war. If this country should be
+engaged in war, (and I conceive we ought to provide for the possibility
+of such a case,) how would it be carried on? By the usual means provided
+from year to year? As our imports will be necessary for the expenses of
+government, and other common exigencies, how are we to carry on the
+means of defence? How is it possible a war could be supported without
+money or credit? And would it be possible for government to have credit,
+without having the power of raising money? No, it would be impossible
+for any government, in such a case, to defend itself. Then, I say, sir,
+that it is necessary to establish funds for extraordinary exigencies,
+and give this power to the general government; for the utter inutility
+of previous requisitions on the States is too well known. Would it be
+possible for those countries, whose finances and revenues are carried to
+the highest perfection, to carry on the operations of government on
+great emergencies, such as the maintenance of a war, without an
+uncontrolled power of raising money? Has it not been necessary for Great
+Britain, notwithstanding the facility of the collection of her taxes, to
+have recourse very often to this and other extraordinary methods of
+procuring money? Would not her public credit have been ruined, if it was
+known that her power to raise money was limited? Has not France been
+obliged, on great occasions, to recur to unusual means, in order to
+raise funds? It has been the case in many countries, and no government
+can exist unless its powers extend to make provisions for every
+contingency. If we were actually attacked by a powerful nation, and our
+general government had not the power of raising money, but depended
+solely on requisitions, our condition would be truly deplorable: if the
+revenues of this commonwealth were to depend on twenty distinct
+authorities, it would be impossible for it to carry on its operations.
+This must be obvious to every member here: I think, therefore, that it
+is necessary for the preservation of the Union, that this power should
+be given to the general government.
+
+But it is urged, that its consolidated nature, joined to the power of
+direct taxation, will give it a tendency to destroy all subordinate
+authority; that its increasing influence will speedily enable it to
+absorb the State governments. I cannot bring myself to think that this
+will be the case. If the general government were wholly independent of
+the governments of the particular States, then indeed, usurpation might
+be expected to the fullest extent: but, sir, on whom does this general
+government depend? It derives its authority from these governments, and
+from the same sources from which their authority is derived. The members
+of the federal government are taken from the same men from whom those of
+the State legislatures are taken. If we consider the mode in which the
+federal representatives will be chosen, we shall be convinced, that the
+general never will destroy the individual governments; and this
+conviction must be strengthened by an attention to the construction of
+the Senate. The representatives will be chosen, probably under the
+influence of the State legislatures: but there is not the least
+probability that the election of the latter will be influenced by the
+former. One hundred and sixty members representing this commonwealth in
+one branch of the legislature, are drawn from the people at large, and
+must ever possess more influence than the few men who will be elected to
+the general legislature. Those who wish to become federal
+representatives, must depend on their credit with that class of men who
+will be the most popular in their counties, who generally represent the
+people in the State governments: they can, therefore, never succeed in
+any measure contrary to the wishes of those on whom they depend. So
+that, on the whole, it is almost certain that the deliberations of the
+members of the federal House of Representatives will be directed to the
+interests of the people of America. As to the other branch, the Senators
+will be appointed by the legislatures, and, though elected for six
+years, I do not conceive they will so soon forget the source whence they
+derive their political existence. This election of one branch of the
+federal, by the State legislatures, secures an absolute independence of
+the former on the latter. The biennial exclusion of one third will
+lessen the facility of a combination, and preclude all likelihood of
+intrigues. I appeal to our past experience, whether they will attend to
+the interests of their constituent States. Have not those gentlemen who
+have been honored with seats in Congress often signalized themselves by
+their attachment to their States? Sir, I pledge myself that this
+government will answer the expectations of its friends, and foil the
+apprehensions of its enemies. I am persuaded that the patriotism of the
+people will continue, and be a sufficient guard to their liberties, and
+that the tendency of the Constitution will be, that the State
+governments will counteract the general interest, and ultimately
+prevail. The number of the representatives is yet sufficient for our
+safety, and will gradually increase; and if we consider their different
+sources of information, the number will not appear too small.
+
+Sir, that part of the proposed Constitution which gives the general
+government the power of laying and collecting taxes, is indispensable
+and essential to the existence of any efficient, or well organized
+system of government: if we consult reason, and be ruled by its
+dictates, we shall find its justification there: if we review the
+experience we have had, or contemplate the history of nations, there too
+we shall find ample reasons to prove its expediency. It would be
+preposterous to depend for necessary supplies on a body which is fully
+possessed of the power of withholding them. If a government depends on
+other governments for its revenues; if it must depend on the voluntary
+contributions of its members, its existence must be precarious. A
+government that relies on thirteen independent sovereignties for the
+means of its existence, is a solecism in theory, and a mere nullity in
+practice. Is it consistent with reason, that such a government can
+promote the happiness of any people? It is subversive of every principle
+of sound policy, to trust the safety of a community with a government
+totally destitute of the means of protecting itself or its members. Can
+Congress, after the repeated unequivocal proofs it has experienced of
+the utter inutility and inefficacy of requisitions, reasonably expect
+that they would be hereafter effectual or productive?
+
+Will not the same local interests, and other causes, militate against a
+compliance? Whoever hopes the contrary must for ever be disappointed.
+The effect, sir, cannot be changed without a removal of the cause. Let
+each county in this commonwealth be supposed free and independent: let
+your revenues depend on requisitions of proportionate quotas from them:
+let application be made to them repeatedly, and then ask yourself, is it
+to be presumed that they would comply, or that an adequate collection
+could be made from partial compliances? It is now difficult to collect
+the taxes from them: how much would that difficulty be enhanced, were
+you to depend solely on their generosity? I appeal to the reason of
+every gentleman here, and to his candor, to say whether he is not
+persuaded that the present confederation is as feeble as the government
+of Virginia would be in that case; to the same reason I appeal, whether
+it be compatible with prudence to continue a government of such manifest
+and palpable weakness and inefficiency.
+
+
+
+
+II. -- CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT.
+
+
+Constitutional government in the United States began, in its national
+phase, with the inauguration of Washington, but the experiment was for a
+long time a doubtful one. Of the two parties, the federal and the
+anti-federal parties, which had faced one another on the question of the
+adoption of the Constitution, the latter had disappeared. Its
+conspicuous failure to achieve the fundamental object of its existence,
+and the evident hopelessnesss of reversing its failure in future,
+blotted it out of existence. There was left but one party, the federal
+party; and it, strong as it appeared, was really in almost as precarious
+a position as its former opponent, because of the very completeness of
+its success in achieving its fundamental object. Hamilton and Jefferson,
+two of its representative members, were opposed in almost all the
+political instincts of their natures; the former chose the restraints of
+strong government as instinctively as the latter clung to individualism.
+They had been accidentally united for the time in desiring the adoption
+of the Constitution, though Hamilton considered it only a temporary
+shift for something stronger, while Jefferson wished for a bill of
+rights to weaken the force of some of its implications. Now that the
+Constitution was ratified, what tie was there to hold these two to any
+united action for the future? Nothing but a shadow--the name of a party
+not yet two years old. As soon, therefore, as the federal party fairly
+entered upon a secure tenure of power, the divergent instincts of the
+two classes represented by Hamilton and Jefferson began to show
+themselves more distinctly until there was no longer any pretence of
+party unity, and the democratic (or republican) party assumed its place,
+in 1792-3, as the recognized opponent of the party in power. It would be
+beside the purpose to attempt to enumerate the points in which the
+natural antagonism of the federalists and the republicans came to the
+surface during the decade of contest which ended in the downfall of the
+federal party in 1800-1. In all of them, in the struggles over the
+establishment of the Bank of the United States and the assumption of the
+State debts, in the respective sympathy for France and Great Britain, in
+the strong federalist legislation forced through during the war feeling
+against France in 1798, the controlling sympathy of the republicans for
+individualism and of the federalists for a strong national government is
+constantly visible, if looked for. The difficulty is that these
+permanent features are often so obscured by the temporary media in which
+they appear that the republicans are likely to be taken as a merely
+State-rights party, and the federalists as a merely commercial party.
+
+To adopt either of these notions would be to take a very erroneous idea
+of American political history. The whole policy of the republicans was
+to forward the freedom of the individual; their leader seems to have
+made all other points subordinate to this. There is hardly any point in
+which the action of the individual American has been freed from
+governmental restraints, from ecclesiastical government, from sumptuary
+laws, from restrictions on suffrage, from restrictions on commerce,
+production, and exchange, for which he is not indebted in some measure
+to the work and teaching of Jefferson between the years of 1790 and
+1800. He and his party found the States in existence, understood well
+that they were convenient shields for the individual against the
+possible powers of the new federal government for evil, and made use of
+them. The State sovereignty of Jefferson was the product of
+individualism; that of Calhoun was the product of sectionalism.
+
+On the other hand, if Jeffersonian democracy was the representative of
+all the individualistic tendencies of the later science of political
+economy, Hamiltonian federalism represented the necessary corrective
+force of law. It was in many respects a strong survival of colonialism.
+Together with some of the evil features of colonialism, its imperative
+demands for submission to class government, its respect for the
+interests and desires of the few, and its contempt for those of the
+many, it had brought into American constitutional life a very high ratio
+of that respect for law which alone can render the happiness and
+usefulness of the individual a permanent and secure possession. It was
+impossible for federalism to resist the individualistic tendency of the
+country for any length of time; it is the monument of the party that it
+secured, before it fell, abiding guaranties for the security of the
+individual under freedom.
+
+The genius of the federalists was largely practical. It was shown in
+their masterly organization of the federal government when it was first
+entrusted to their hands, an organization which has since been rather
+developed than disturbed in any of its parts. But the details of the
+work absorbed the attention of the leaders so completely that it would
+be impossible to fix on any public address as entirely representative of
+the party. Fisher Ames' speech on the Jay treaty, which was considered
+by the federalists the most effective piece of oratory in their party
+history, has been taken as a substitute. The question was to the
+federalists partly of commercial and partly of national importance. John
+Jay had secured the first commercial treaty with Great Britain in 1795.
+It not only provided for the security of American commerce during the
+European wars to which Great Britain was a party, and obtained the
+surrender of the military posts in the present States of Ohio and
+Michigan; it also gave the United States a standing in the family of
+nations which it was difficult to claim elsewhere while Great Britain
+continued to refuse to treat on terms of equality. The Senate therefore
+ratified the treaty, and it was constitutionally complete. The
+democratic majority in the House of Representatives, objecting to the
+treaty as a surrender of previous engagements with France, and as a
+failure to secure the rights of individuals against Great Britain,
+particularly in the matter of impressment, raised the point that the
+House was not bound to vote money for carrying into effect a treaty with
+which it was seriously dissatisfied. The speech of Gallatin has been
+selected to represent the republican view. It is a strong reflection of
+the opposition to the Treaty. The reply of Ames is a forcible
+presentation of both the national and the commercial aspects of his
+party; it had a very great influence in securing, though by a very
+narrow majority, the vote of the House in favor of the appropriation.
+
+There is some difficulty in fixing on any completely representative
+oration to represent the republican point of view covering this period.
+Gallatin's speech on the Jay Treaty together with Nicholas' argument for
+the repeal of the sedition law may serve this purpose. The speech of
+Nicholas shows the instinctive sympathy of the party for the individual
+rather than for the government. It shows the force with which this
+sympathy drove the party into a strict construction of the Constitution.
+It seems also to bear the strongest internal indications that it was
+inspired, if not entirely written, by the great leader of the party,
+Jefferson. The federalists had used the popular war feeling against
+France in 1798, not only to press the formation of an army and a navy
+and the abrogation of the old and trouble-some treaties with France, but
+to pass the alien and sedition laws as well. The former empowered the
+President to expel from the country or imprison any alien whom he should
+consider dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States. The
+latter forbade, under penalty of fine and imprisonment, the printing or
+publishing of any "false, scandalous, or malicious writings" calculated
+to bring the Government, Congress, or the President into disrepute, or
+to excite against them the hatred of the good people of the United
+States, or to stir up sedition. It was inevitable that the republicans
+should oppose such laws, and that the people should support them in
+their opposition. At the election of 1800, the federal party was
+overthrown, and the lost ground was never regained. With Jefferson's
+election to the presidency, began the democratic period of the United
+States; but it has always been colored strongly and naturally by the
+federal bias toward law and order.
+
+
+
+
+ALBERT GALLATIN,
+
+OF PENNSYLVANIA. (BORN 1761, DIED 1849.)
+
+
+
+ON THE BRITISH TREATY
+
+--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, APRIL 26, 1796.
+
+
+MR. CHAIRMAN:
+
+I will not follow some of the gentlemen who have preceded me, by
+dwelling upon the discretion of the legislature; a question which has
+already been the subject of our deliberations, and been decided by a
+solemn vote. Gentle-men who were in the minority on that question may
+give any construction they please to the declaratory resolution of the
+House; they may again repeat that to refuse to carry the treaty into
+effect is a breach of the public faith which they conceive as being
+pledged by the President and Senate. This has been the ground on which a
+difference of opinion has existed since the beginning of the discussion.
+It is because the House thinks that the faith of the nation cannot, on
+those subjects submitted to the power of Congress, be pledged by any
+constituted authority other than the legislature, that they resolved
+that in all such cases it is their right and duty to consider the
+expediency of carrying a treaty into effect. If the House think the
+faith of the nation already pledged they can not claim any discretion;
+there is no room left to deliberate upon the expediency of the thing.
+The resolution now under consideration is merely "that it is expedient
+to carry the British treaty into effect," and not whether we are bound
+by national faith to do it. I will therefore consider the question of
+expediency alone; and thinking as I do that the House has full
+discretion on this subject, I conceive that there is as much
+responsibility in deciding in the affirmative as in rejecting the
+resolution, and that we shall be equally answerable for the consequences
+that may follow from either.
+
+It is true, however, that there was a great difference between the
+situation of this country in the year 1794, when a negotiator was
+appointed, and that in which we are at present; and that consequences
+will follow the refusal to carry into effect the treaty in its present
+stage, which would not have attended a refusal to negotiate and to enter
+into such a treaty. The question of expediency, therefore, assumes
+before us a different and more complex shape than when before the
+negotiator, the Senate, or the President. The treaty, in itself and
+abstractedly considered, may be injurious; it may be such an instrument
+as in the opinion of the House ought not to have been adopted by the
+Executive; and yet such as it is we may think it expedient under the
+present circumstances to carry it into effect. I will therefore first
+take a view of the provisions of the treaty itself, and in the next
+place, supposing it is injurious, consider, in case it is not carried
+into effect, what will be the natural consequences of such refusal.
+
+The provisions of the treaty relate either to the adjustment of past
+differences, or to the future intercourse of the two nations. The
+differences now existing between Great Britain and this country arose
+either from non-execution of some articles of the treaty of peace or
+from the effects of the present European war. The complaints of Great
+Britain in relation to the treaty of 1783 were confined to the legal
+impediments thrown by the several States in the way of the recovery of
+British debts. The late treaty provides adequate remedy on that subject;
+the United States are bound to make full and complete compensation for
+any losses arising from that source, and every ground of complaint on
+the part of Great Britain is removed.
+
+Having thus done full justice to the other nation, America has a right
+to expect that equal attention shall be paid to her claims arising from
+infractions of the treaty of peace, viz., compensation for the negroes
+carried away by the British; restoration of the western posts, and
+indemnification for their detention.
+
+On the subject of the first claim, which has been objected to as
+groundless, I will observe that I am not satisfied that the construction
+given by the British government to that article of the treaty is
+justified even by the letter of the article. That construction rests on
+the supposition that slaves come under the general denomination of
+booty, and are alienated the moment they fall into possession of an
+enemy, so that all those who were in the hands of the British when the
+treaty of peace was signed, must be considered as British and not as
+American property, and are not included in the article. It will,
+however, appear by recurring to Vattel when speaking of the right of
+"Postliminium," that slaves cannot be considered as a part of the booty
+which is alienated by the act of capture, and that they are to be ranked
+rather with real property, to the profits of which only the captors are
+entitled. Be that as it may, there is no doubt that the construction
+given by America is that which was understood by the parties at the time
+of making the treaty. The journals of Mr. Adams, quoted by a gentleman
+from Connecticut, Mr. Coit, prove this fully; for when he says that the
+insertion of this article was alone worth the journey of Mr. Laurens
+from London, can it be supposed that he would have laid so much stress
+on a clause, which, according to the new construction now attempted to
+be given, means only that the British would commit no new act of
+hostility--would not carry away slaves at that time in possession of
+Americans? Congress recognized that construction by adopting the
+resolution which has been already quoted, and which was introduced upon
+the motion of Mr. Alexander Hamilton; and it has not been denied that
+the British ministry during Mr. Adams' embassy also agreed to it.
+
+But when our negotiator had, for the sake of peace, waived that claim;
+when he had also abandoned the right which America had to demand an
+indemnification for the detention of the posts, although he had conceded
+the right of a similar nature, which Great Britain had for the detention
+of debts; when he had thus given up everything which might be supposed
+to be of a doubtful nature, it might have been hoped that our last
+claim--a claim on which there was not and there never had been any
+dispute--the western posts should have been restored according to the
+terms of the treaty of peace. Upon what ground the British insisted, and
+our negotiator conceded, that this late restitution should be saddled
+with new conditions, which made no part of the original contract, I am
+at a loss to know. British traders are allowed by the new treaty to
+remain within the posts without becoming citizens of the United States;
+and to carry on trade and commerce with the Indians living within our
+boundaries without being subject to any control from our government. In
+vain is it said that if that clause had not been inserted we would have
+found it to our interest to effect it by our own laws. Of this we are
+alone competent judges; if that condition is harmless at present it is
+not possible to foresee whether, under future circumstances, it will not
+prove highly injurious; and whether harmless or not, it is not less a
+permanent and new condition imposed upon us. But the fact is, that by
+the introduction of that clause, by obliging us to keep within our
+jurisdiction, as British subjects, the very men who have been the
+instruments used by Great Britain to promote Indian wars on our
+frontiers; by obliging us to suffer those men to continue their commerce
+with the Indians living in our territory, uncontrolled by those
+regulations which we have thought necessary in order to restrain our own
+citizens in their intercourse with these tribes, Great Britain has
+preserved her full influence with the Indian nations. By a restoration
+of the posts under that condition we have lost the greatest advantage
+that was expected from their possession, viz.: future security against
+the Indians. In the same manner have the British preserved the
+commercial advantages which result from the occupancy of those posts, by
+stipulating as a permanent condition, a free passage for their goods
+across our portages without paying any duty.
+
+Another article of the new treaty which is connected with the provisions
+of the treaty of 1783 deserves consideration; I mean what relates to the
+Mississippi. At the time when the navigation of that river to its mouth
+was by the treaty of peace declared to be common to both nations, Great
+Britain communicated to America a right which she held by virtue of the
+treaty of 1763, and as owner of the Floridas; but since that cession to
+the United States, England has ceded to Spain her claim on the Floridas,
+and does not own at the present time an inch of ground, either on the
+mouth or on any part of that river. Spain now stands in the place of
+Great Britain, and by virtue of the treaty of 1783 it is to Spain and
+America, and not to England and America, that the navigation of the
+Mississippi is at present to be common. Yet, notwithstanding this change
+of circumstances, we have repeated that article of the former treaty in
+the late one, and have granted to Great Britain the additional privilege
+of using our ports on the eastern side of the river, without which, as
+they own no land thereon, they could not have navigated it. Nor is this
+all. Upon a supposition that the Mississippi does not extend so far
+northward as to be intersected by a line drawn due west from the Lake of
+the Woods, or, in other words, upon a supposition that Great Britain has
+not a claim even to touch the Mississippi, we have agreed, not upon what
+will be the boundary line, but that we will hereafter negotiate to
+settle that line. Thus leaving to future negotiation what should have
+been finally settled by the treaty itself, in the same manner as all
+other differences were, is calculated for the sole purpose, either of
+laying the foundation of future disputes, or of recognizing a claim in
+Great Britain on the waters of the Mississippi, even if their boundary
+line leaves to the southward the sources of that river. Had not that
+been the intention of Great Britain the line would have been settled at
+once by the treaty, according to either of the two only rational ways of
+doing it in conformity to the treaty of 1783, that is to say, by
+agreeing that the line should run from the northernmost sources of the
+Mississippi, either directly to the western extremity of the Lake of the
+Woods, or northwardly till it intersected the line to be drawn due west
+from that lake. But by repeating the article of the treaty of 1783; by
+conceding the free use of our ports on the river, and by the insertion
+of the fourth article, we have admitted that Great Britain, in all
+possible events, has still a right to navigate that river from its
+source to its mouth. What may be the future effects of these provisions,
+especially as they regard our intercourse with Spain, it is impossible
+at present to say; but although they can bring us no advantage, they may
+embroil us with that nation: and we have already felt the effect of it
+in our late treaty with Spain, since we were obliged, on account of that
+clause of the British treaty, to accept as a gift and a favor the
+navigation of that river which we had till then claimed as a right.
+
+But if, leaving commercial regulations, we shall seek in the treaty for
+some provisions securing to us the free navigation of the ocean against
+any future aggressions on our trade, where are they to be found? I can
+add nothing to what has been said on the subject of contraband articles:
+it is, indeed, self-evident, that, connecting our treaty with England on
+that subject with those we have made with other nations, it amounts to a
+positive compact to supply that nation exclusively with naval stores
+whenever they may be at war. Had the list of contraband articles been
+reduced--had naval stores and provisions, our two great staple
+commodities, been declared not to be contra-band, security would have
+been given to the free exportation of our produce; but instead of any
+provision being made on that head, an article of a most doubtful nature,
+and on which I will remark hereafter, has been introduced. But I mean,
+for the present, to confine my observations to the important question of
+free bottoms making free goods. It was with the utmost astonishment that
+I heard the doctrine advanced on this floor, that such a provision, if
+admitted, would prove injurious to America, inasmuch as in case of war
+between this country and any other nation, the goods of that nation
+might be protected by the English flag. It is not to a state of war that
+the benefits of this provision would extend; but it is the only security
+which neutral nations can have against the legal plundering on the high
+seas, so often committed by belligerent powers. It is not for the sake
+of protecting an enemy's property; it is not for the sake of securing an
+advantageous carrying trade; but it is in order effectually to secure
+ourselves against sea aggressions, that this provision is necessary.
+Spoliations may arise from unjust orders, given by the government of a
+belligerent nation to their officers and cruisers, and these may be
+redressed by application to and negotiation with that order. But no
+complaints, no negotiations, no orders of government itself, can give
+redress when those spoliations are grounded on a supposition, that the
+vessels of the neutral nation have an enemy's property on board, as long
+as such property is not protected by the flag of the neutral nation; as
+long as it is liable to be captured, it is not sufficient, in order to
+avoid detention and capture, to have no such property on board. Every
+privateer, under pretence that he suspects an enemy's goods to be part
+of a cargo, may search, vex, and capture a vessel; and if in any corner
+of the dominions of the belligerent power, a single judge can be found
+inclined, if not determined, to condemn, at all events, before his
+tribunal, all vessels so captured will be brought there, and the same
+pretence which caused the capture will justify a condemnation. The only
+nation who persists in the support of this doctrine, as making part of
+the law of nations, is the first maritime power of Europe, whom their
+interest, as they are the strongest, and as there is hardly a maritime
+war in which they are not involved, leads to wish for a continuation of
+a custom which gives additional strength to their overbearing dominion
+over the seas. All the other nations have different sentiments and a
+different interest. During the American war, in the year 1780, so fully
+convinced were the neutral nations of the necessity of introducing that
+doctrine of free bottoms making free goods, that all of them, excepting
+Portugal, who was in a state of vassalage to, and a mere appendage of,
+Great Britain, united in order to establish the principle, and formed
+for that purpose the alliance known by the name of the armed neutrality.
+All the belligerent powers, except England, recognized and agreed to the
+doctrine. England itself was obliged, in some measure, to give, for a
+while, a tacit acquiescence. America, at the time, fully admitted the
+principle, although then at war.
+
+Since the year 1780, every nation, so far as my knowledge goes, has
+refused to enter into a treaty of commerce with England, unless that
+provision was inserted. Russia, for that reason, would not renew their
+treaty, which had expired in 1786; although I believe that, during the
+present war, and in order to answer the ends of the war, they formed a
+temporary convention, which I have not seen, but which, perhaps, does
+not include that provision. England consented to it in her treaty with
+France, in 1788, and we are the first neutral nation who has abandoned
+the common cause, given up the claim, and by a positive declaration
+inserted in our treaty, recognized the contrary doctrine. It has been
+said that, under the present circumstances, it could not be expected
+that Great Britain would give up the point; perhaps so; but the
+objection is not, that our negotiator has not been able to obtain that
+principle, but that he has consented to enter into a treaty of commerce
+which we do not want, and which has no connection with an adjustment of
+our differences with Great Britain, without the principle contended for
+making part of that treaty. Unless we can obtain security for our
+navigation, we want no treaty; and the only provision which can give us
+that security, should have been the _sine qua non_ of a treaty. On the
+contrary, we have disgusted all the other neutral nations of Europe,
+without whose concert and assistance there is but little hope that we
+shall ever obtain that point; and we have taught Great Britain that we
+are disposed to form the most intimate connections with her, even at the
+expense of recognizing a principle the most fatal to the liberty of
+commerce and to the security of our navigation.
+
+But, if we could not obtain anything which might secure us against
+future aggressions, should we have parted, without receiving any
+equivalent, with those weapons of self-defence, which, although they
+could not repel, might, in some degree, prevent any gross attacks upon
+our trade--any gross violation of our rights as a neutral nation? We
+have no fleet to oppose or to punish the insults of Great Britain; but,
+from our commercial relative situation, we have it in our power to
+restrain her aggressions, by restrictions on her trade, by a total
+prohibition of her manufactures, or by a sequestration of the debts due
+to her. By the treaty, not satisfied with receiving nothing, not
+satisfied with obtaining no security for the future, we have, of our own
+accord, surrendered those defensive arms, for fear they might be abused
+by ourselves. We have given up the two first, for the whole time during
+which we might want them most, the period of the present war; and the
+last, the power of sequestration, we have abandoned for ever: every
+other article of the treaty of commerce is temporary; this perpetual.
+
+I shall not enter into a discussion of the immorality of sequestering
+private property. What can be more immoral than war; or plundering on
+the high seas, legalized under the name of privateering? Yet
+self-defence justifies the first, and the necessity of the case may, at
+least in some instances, and where it is the only practicable mode of
+warfare left to a nation, apologize even for the last. In the same
+manner, the power of sequestration may be resorted to, as the last
+weapon of self-defence, rather than to seek redress by an appeal to
+arms. It is the last peace measure that can be taken by a nation; but
+the treaty, by declaring, that in case of national differences it shall
+not be resorted to, has deprived us of the power of judging of its
+propriety, has rendered it an act of hostility, and has effectually
+taken off that restraint, which a fear of its exercise laid upon Great
+Britain.
+
+Thus it appears that by the treaty we have promised full compensation to
+England for every possible claim they may have against us, that we have
+abandoned every claim of a doubtful nature, and that we have consented
+to receive the posts, our claim to which was not disputed, under new
+conditions and restrictions never before contemplated; that after having
+obtained by those concessions an adjustment of past differences, we have
+entered into a new agreement, unconnected with those objects, which have
+heretofore been subjects of discussion between the two nations; and that
+by this treaty of commerce and navigation, we have obtained no
+commercial advantage which we did not enjoy before, we have obtained no
+security against future aggressions, no security in favor of the freedom
+of our navigation, and we have parted with every pledge we had in our
+hands, with every power of restriction, with every weapon of
+self-defence which is calculated to give us any security.
+
+From the review I have taken of the treaty, and the opinions I have
+expressed, it is hardly necessary for me to add, that I look upon the
+instrument as highly injurious to the interests of the United States,
+and that I earnestly wish it never had been made; but whether in its
+present stage the House ought to refuse to carry it into effect, and
+what will be the probable consequences of a refusal, is a question which
+requires the most serious attention, and which I will now attempt to
+investigate.
+
+Should the treaty be finally defeated, either new negotiations will be
+more successful or Great Britain will refuse to make a new arrangement,
+and leave things in the situation in which they now are, or war will be
+the consequence. I will, in the course of my observations, make some
+remarks on the last supposition. I do not think that the first will be
+very probable at present, and I am of opinion that, under the present
+circumstances, and until some change takes place in our own or in the
+relative political situation of the European nations, it is to be
+apprehended that, in such a case, new negotiations will either be
+rejected or prove unsuccessful. Such an event might have perhaps
+followed a rejection of the treaty even by the Senate or by the
+President. After the negotiator employed by the United States had once
+affixed his signature it must have become very problematical, unless he
+had exceeded his powers, whether a refusal to sanction the contract he
+had made would not eventually defeat, at least for a time, the prospect
+of a new treaty. I conceive that the hopes of obtaining better
+conditions by a new negotiation are much less in the present stage of
+the business than they were when the treaty was in its inchoate form
+before the Executive; and in order to form a just idea of the
+consequences of a rejection at present, I will contemplate them upon
+this supposition, which appears to me most probable, to wit, that no new
+treaty will take place for a certain period of time.
+
+In mentioning my objections to the treaty itself, I have already stated
+the advantages which in my opinion would result to the United States
+from the non-existence of that instrument; I will not repeat, but
+proceed at once to examine what losses may accrue that can be set off
+against those advantages.
+
+The further detention of the posts, the national stain that will result
+from receiving no reparation for the spoliations on our trade, and the
+uncertainty of a final adjustment of our differences with Great Britain,
+are the three evils which strike me as resulting from a rejection of the
+treaty; and when to those considerations I add that of the present
+situation of this country, of the agitation of the public mind, and of
+the advantages that will arise from union of sentiments, however
+injurious and unequal I conceive the treaty to be, however repugnant it
+may be to my feelings, and perhaps to my prejudices, I feel induced to
+vote for it, and will not give my assent to any proposition which will
+imply its rejection. But the conduct of Great Britain since the treaty
+was signed, the impressment of our seamen, and their uninterrupted
+spoliations on our trade, especially by seizing our vessels laden with
+provisions, a proceeding which they may perhaps justify by one of the
+articles of the treaty, are such circumstances as may induce us to pause
+awhile, in order to examine whether it is proper, immediately and
+without having obtained any explanation thereon, to adopt the resolution
+on the table, and to pass, at present, all the laws necessary to carry
+the treaty into effect.
+
+Whatever evils may follow a rejection of the treaty, they will not
+attend a postponement. To suspend our proceedings will not throw us into
+a situation which will require new negotiations, new arrangements on the
+points already settled and well understood by both parties. It will be
+merely a delay, until an explanation of the late conduct of the British
+towards us may be obtained, or until that conduct may be altered. If, on
+the contrary, we consent to carry the treaty into effect, under the
+present circumstances, what will be our situation in future? It is by
+committing the most wanton and the most unprovoked aggressions on our
+trade; it is by seizing a large amount of our property as a pledge for
+our good behavior, that Great Britain has forced the nation into the
+present treaty. If by threatening new hostilities, or rather by
+continuing her aggressions, even after the treaty is made, she can force
+us also to carry it into effect, our acquiescence will be tantamount to
+a declaration that we mean to submit in proportion to the insults that
+are offered to us; and this disposition being once known, what security
+have we against new insults, new aggressions, new spoliations, which
+probably will lay the foundation of some additional sacrifices on ours?
+It has been said, and said with truth, that to put up with the
+indignities we have received without obtaining any reparation, which
+will probably be the effect of defeating the treaty, is highly
+dishonorable to the nation.
+
+In my opinion it is still more so not only tamely to submit to a
+continuation of these national insults, but while they thus continue
+uninterrupted, to carry into effect the instrument we have consented to
+accept as a reparation for former ones. When the general conduct of
+Great Britain towards us from the beginning of the present war is
+considered; when the means by which she has produced the treaty are
+reflected on, a final compliance on our part while she still persists in
+that conduct, whilst the chastening rod of that nation is still held
+over us, is in my opinion a dereliction of national interest, of
+national honor, of national independence.
+
+But it is said, that war must be the consequence of our delaying to
+carry the treaty into effect. Do the gentlemen mean, that if we reject
+the treaty, if we do not accept the reparation there given to us, in
+order to obtain redress, we have no alternative left but war? If we must
+go to war in order to obtain reparation for insults and spoliations on
+our trade, we must do it, even if we carry the present treaty into
+effect; for this treaty gives us no reparation for the aggressions
+committed since it was ratified, has not produced a discontinuance of
+those acts of hostility, and gives us no security that they shall be
+discontinued. But the arguments of those gentlemen, who suppose that
+America must go to war, apply to a final rejection of the treaty, and
+not to a delay. I do not propose to refuse the reparation offered by the
+treaty, and to put up with the aggressions committed; I have agreed that
+that reparation, such as it is, is a valuable article of the treaty; I
+have agreed, that under the present circumstances, a greater evil will
+follow a total rejection of, than an acquiescence in, the treaty. The
+only measure which has been mentioned, in preference to the one now
+under discussion, is a suspension, a postponement, whilst the present
+spoliations continue, in hopes to obtain for them a similar reparation,
+and assurances that they shall cease.
+
+But is it meant to insinuate that it is the final intention of those who
+pretend to wish only for a postponement, to involve this country in a
+war? There has been no period during the present European war, at which
+it would not have been equally weak and wicked to adopt such measures as
+must involve America in the contest, unless forced into it for the sake
+of self-defence; but, at this time, to think of it would fall but little
+short of madness. The whole American nation would rise in opposition to
+the idea; and it might at least have been recollected, that war can not
+be declared, except by Congress, and that two of the branches of
+government are sufficient to check the other in any supposed attempt of
+this kind.
+
+If there is no necessity imposed upon America to go to war, if there is
+no apprehension she will, by her own conduct, involve herself in one,
+the danger must arise from Great Britain, and the threat is, that she
+will make war against us if we do not comply. Gentlemen first tell us
+that we have made the best possible bargain with that nation; that she
+has conceded everything, without receiving a single iota in return, and
+yet they would persuade us, that she will make war against us in order
+to force us to accept that contract so advantageous to us, and so
+injurious to herself. It will not be contended that a delay, until an
+amicable explanation is obtained, could afford even a pretence to Great
+Britain for going to war; and we all know that her own interest would
+prevent her. If another campaign takes place, it is acknowledged, that
+all her efforts are to be exerted against the West Indies. She has
+proclaimed her own scarcity of provisions at home, and she must depend
+on our supplies to support her armament. It depends upon us to defeat
+her whole scheme, and this is a sufficient pledge against open
+hostility, if the European war continues. If peace takes place, there
+will not be even the appearance of danger; the moment when a nation is
+happy enough to emerge from one of the most expensive, bloody, and
+dangerous wars in which she ever has been involved, will be the last she
+would choose to plunge afresh into a similar calamity.
+
+But to the cry of war, the alarmists do not fail to add that of
+confusion; and they have declared, even on this floor, that if the
+resolution is not adopted government will be dissolved. Government
+dissolved in case a postponement takes place! The idea is too absurd to
+deserve a direct answer. But I will ask those gentlemen, by whom is
+government to be dissolved? Certainly not by those who may vote against
+the resolution; for although they are not perhaps fortunate enough to
+have obtained the confidence of the gentlemen who voted against them,
+still it must be agreed, that those who succeed in their wishes, who
+defeat a measure they dislike, will not wish to destroy that government,
+which they hold so far in their hands as to be able to carry their own
+measures. For them to dissolve government, would be to dissolve their
+own power. By whom, then, I again ask, is the government to be
+dissolved? The gentlemen must answer--by themselves--or they must
+declare that they mean nothing but to alarm. Is it really the language
+of those men, who profess to be, who distinguish themselves by the
+self-assumed appellation of friends to order, that if they do not
+succeed in all their measures they will overset government--and have all
+their professions been only a veil to hide their love of power, a
+pretence to cover their ambition? Do they mean, that the first event
+which shall put an end to their own authority shall be the last act of
+government? As to myself, I do not believe that they have such
+intentions; I have too good an opinion of their patriotism to allow
+myself to admit such an idea a single moment; but I think myself
+justifiable in entertaining a belief, that some amongst them, in order
+to carry a favorite, and what they think to be an advantageous measure,
+mean to spread an alarm which they do not feel; and I have no doubt,
+that many have contracted such a habit of carrying every measure of
+government as they please, that they really think that every thing must
+be thrown into confusion the moment they are thwarted in a matter of
+importance. I hope that experience will in future cure their fears. But,
+at all events, be the wishes and intentions of the members of this House
+what they may, it is not in their power to dissolve the government. The
+people of the United States, from one end of the continent to the other,
+are strongly attached to their Constitution; they would restrain and
+punish the excesses of any party, of any set of men in government, who
+would be guilty of the attempt; and on them I will rest as a full
+security against every endeavor to destroy our Union, our Constitution,
+or our government.
+
+If the people of the United States wish this House to carry the treaty
+into effect immediately, and notwithstanding the continued aggressions
+of the British, if their will was fairly and fully expressed, I would
+immediately acquiesce; but since an appeal has been made to them, it is
+reasonable to suspend a decision until their sentiments are known. Till
+then I must follow my own judgment; and as I cannot see that any
+possible evils will follow a delay, I shall vote against the resolution
+before the committee, in order to make room, either for that proposed by
+my colleague, Mr. Maclay, or for any other, expressed in any manner
+whatever, provided it embraces the object I have in view, to wit, the
+suspension of the final vote--a postponement of the laws necessary to
+carry the treaty into effect, until satisfactory assurances are obtained
+that Great Britain means, in future, to show us that friendly
+disposition which it is my earnest wish may at all times be cultivated
+by America towards all other nations.
+
+
+
+
+FISHER AMES,
+
+OF MASSACHUSETTS. (BORN 1758, DIED 1808.)
+
+
+ON THE BRITISH TREATY, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, APRIL 28, 1796.
+
+
+It would be strange, that a subject, which has aroused in turn all the
+passions of the country, should be discussed without the interference of
+any of our own. We are men, and therefore not exempt from those
+passions; as citizens and representatives, we feel the interests that
+must excite them. The hazard of great interests cannot fail to agitate
+strong passions. We are not disinterested; it is impossible we should be
+dispassionate. The warmth of such feelings may becloud the judgment,
+and, for a time, pervert the understanding. But the public sensibility,
+and our own, has sharpened the spirit of inquiry, and given an animation
+to the debate. The public attention has been quickened to mark the
+progress of the discussion, and its judgment, often hasty and erroneous
+on first impressions, has become solid and enlightened at last. Our
+result will, I hope, on that account, be safer and more mature, as well
+as more accordant with that of the nation. The only constant agents in
+political affairs are the passions of men. Shall we complain of our
+nature--shall we say that man ought to have been made otherwise? It is
+right already, because He, from whom we derive our nature, ordained it
+so; and because thus made and thus acting, the cause of truth and the
+public good is more surely promoted.
+
+The treaty is bad, fatally bad, is the cry. It sacrifices the interest,
+the honor, the independence of the United States, and the faith of our
+engagements to France. If we listen to the clamor of party intemperance,
+the evils are of a number not to be counted, and of a nature not to be
+borne, even in idea. The language of passion and exaggeration may
+silence that of sober reason in other places, it has not done it here.
+The question here is, whether the treaty be really so very fatal as to
+oblige the nation to break its faith. I admit that such a treaty ought
+not to be executed. I admit that self-preservation is the first law of
+society, as well as of individuals. It would, perhaps, be deemed an
+abuse of terms to call that a treaty, which violates such a principle. I
+waive also, for the present, any inquiry, what departments shall
+represent the nation, and annul the stipulations of a treaty. I content
+myself with pursuing the inquiry, whether the nature of this compact be
+such as to justify our refusal to carry it into effect. A treaty is the
+promise of a nation. Now, promises do not always bind him that makes
+them. But I lay down two rules, which ought to guide us in this case.
+The treaty must appear to be bad, not merely in the petty details, but
+in its character, principle, and mass. And in the next place, this ought
+to be ascertained by the decided and general concurrence of the
+enlightened public.
+
+I confess there seems to be something very like ridicule thrown over the
+debate by the discussion of the articles in detail. The undecided point
+is, shall we break our faith? And while our country and enlightened
+Europe, await the issue with more than curiosity, we are employed to
+gather piecemeal, and article by article, from the instrument, a
+justification for the deed by trivial calculations of commercial profit
+and loss. This is little worthy of the subject, of this body, or of the
+nation. If the treaty is bad, it will appear to be so in its mass. Evil
+to a fatal extreme, if that be its tendency, requires no proof; it
+brings it. Extremes speak for themselves and make their own law. What if
+the direct voyage of American ships to Jamaica with horses or lumber,
+might net one or two per centum more than the present trade to Surinam;
+would the proof of the fact avail any thing in so grave a question as
+the violation of the public engagements?
+
+Why do they complain, that the West Indies are not laid open? Why do
+they lament, that any restriction is stipulated on the commerce of the
+East Indies? Why do they pretend, that if they reject this, and insist
+upon more, more will be accomplished? Let us be explicit--more would not
+satisfy. If all was granted, would not a treaty of amity with Great
+Britain still be obnoxious? Have we not this instant heard it urged
+against our envoy, that he was not ardent enough in his hatred of Great
+Britain? A treaty of amity is condemned because it was not made by a
+foe, and in the spirit of one. The same gentleman, at the same instant,
+repeats a very prevailing objection, that no treaty should be made with
+the enemy of France. No treaty, exclaim others, should be made with a
+monarch or a despot; there will be no naval security while those
+sea-robbers domineer on the ocean; their den must be destroyed; that
+nation must be extirpated.
+
+I like this, sir, because it is sincerity. With feelings such as these,
+we do not pant for treaties. Such passions seek nothing, and will be
+content with nothing, but the destruction of their object. If a treaty
+left King George his island, it would not answer; not if he stipulated
+to pay rent for it. It has been said, the world ought to rejoice if
+Britain was sunk in the sea; if where there are now men and wealth and
+laws and liberty, there was no more than a sand bank for sea monsters to
+fatten on; a space for the storms of the ocean to mingle in conflict.
+
+What is patriotism? Is it a narrow affection for the spot where a man
+was born? Are the very clods where we tread entitled to this ardent
+preference because they are greener? No, sir, this is not the character
+of the virtue, and it soars higher for its object. It is an extended
+self-love, mingling with all the enjoyments of life, and twisting itself
+with the minutest filaments of the heart. It is thus we obey the laws of
+society, because they are the laws of virtue. In their authority we see,
+not the array of force and terror, but the venerable image of our
+country's honor. Every good citizen makes that honor his own, and
+cherishes it not only as precious, but as sacred. He is willing to risk
+his life in its defence, and is conscious that he gains protection while
+he gives it. For, what rights of a citizen will be deemed inviolable
+when a state renounces the principles that constitute their security? Or
+if his life should not be invaded, what would its enjoyments be in a
+country odious in the eyes of strangers and dishonored in his own? Could
+he look with affection and veneration to such a country as his parent?
+The sense of having one would die within him; he would blush for his
+patriotism, if he retained any, and justly, for it would be a vice. He
+would be a banished man in his native land. I see no exception to the
+respect that is paid among nations to the law of good faith. If there
+are cases in this enlightened period when it is violated, there are none
+when it is decried. It is the philosophy of politics, the religion of
+governments. It is observed by barbarians--a whiff of tobacco smoke, or
+a string of beads, gives not merely binding force but sanctity to
+treaties. Even in Algiers, a truce may be bought for money, but when
+ratified, even Algiers is too wise, or too just, to disown and annul its
+obligation. Thus we see, neither the ignorance of savages, nor the
+principles of an association for piracy and rapine, permit a nation to
+despise its engagements. If, sir, there could be a resurrection from the
+foot of the gallows, if the victims of justice could live again, collect
+together and form a society, they would, however loath, soon find
+themselves obliged to make justice, that justice under which they fell,
+the fundamental law of their state. They would perceive, it was their
+interest to make others respect, and they would therefore soon pay some
+respect themselves, to the obligations of good faith.
+
+It is painful, I hope it is superfluous, to make even the supposition,
+that America should furnish the occasion of this opprobrium. No, let me
+not even imagine, that a republican government, sprung, as our own is,
+from a people enlightened and uncorrupted, a government whose origin is
+right, and whose daily discipline is duty, can, upon solemn debate, make
+its option to be faithless--can dare to act what despots dare not avow,
+what our own example evinces, the states of Barbary are unsuspected of.
+No, let me rather make the supposition, that Great Britain refuses to
+execute the treaty, after we have done every thing to carry it into
+effect. Is there any language of reproach pungent enough to express your
+commentary on the fact? What would you say, or rather what would you not
+say? Would you not tell them, wherever an Englishman might travel, shame
+would stick to him--he would disown his country. You would exclaim,
+England, proud of your wealth, and arrogant in the possession of
+power--blush for these distinctions, which become the vehicles of your
+dishonor. Such a nation might truly say to corruption, thou art my
+father, and to the worm, thou art my mother and my sister. We should say
+of such a race of men, their name is a heavier burden than their debt.
+
+The refusal of the posts (inevitable if we reject the treaty) is a
+measure too decisive in its nature to be neutral in its consequences.
+From great causes we are to look for great effects. A plain and obvious
+one will be, the price of the Western lands will fall. Settlers will not
+choose to fix their habitation on a field of battle. Those who talk so
+much of the interest of the United States, should calculate how deeply
+it will be affected by rejecting the treaty; how vast a tract of wild
+land will almost cease to be property. This loss, let it be observed,
+will fall upon a fund expressly devoted to sink the national debt. What
+then are we called upon to do? However the form of the vote and the
+protestations of many may disguise the proceeding, our resolution is in
+substance, and it deserves to wear the title of a resolution to prevent
+the sale of the Western lands and the discharge of the public debt.
+
+Will the tendency to Indian hostilities be contested by any one?
+Experience gives the answer. The frontiers were scourged with war till
+the negotiation with Great Britain was far advanced, and then the state
+of hostility ceased. Perhaps the public agents of both nations are
+innocent of fomenting the Indian war, and perhaps they are not. We ought
+not, however, to expect that neighboring nations, highly irritated
+against each other, will neglect the friendship of the savages; the
+traders will gain an influence and will abuse it; and who is ignorant
+that their passions are easily raised, and hardly restrained from
+violence? Their situation will oblige them to choose between this
+country and Great Britain, in case the treaty should be rejected. They
+will not be our friends, and at the same time the friends of our
+enemies.
+
+But am I reduced to the necesity of proving this point? Certainly the
+very men who charged the Indian war on the detention of the posts, will
+call for no other proof than the recital of their own speeches. It is
+remembered with what emphasis, with what acrimony, they expatiated on
+the burden of taxes, and the drain of blood and treasure into the
+Western country, in consequence of Britain's holding the posts. Until
+the posts are restored, they exclaimed, the treasury and the frontiers
+must bleed.
+
+If any, against all these proofs, should maintain that the peace with
+the Indians will be stable without the posts, to them I urge another
+reply. From arguments calculated to produce conviction, I will appeal
+directly to the hearts of those who hear me, and ask, whether it is not
+already planted there? I resort especially to the convictions of the
+Western gentlemen, whether supposing no posts and no treaty, the
+settlers will remain in security? Can they take it upon them to say,
+that an Indian peace, under these circumstances, will prove firm? No,
+sir, it will not be peace, but a sword; it will be no better than a lure
+to draw victims within the reach of the tomahawk.
+
+On this theme my emotions are unutterable. If I could find words for
+them, if my powers bore any proportion to my zeal, I would swell my
+voice to such a note of remonstrance, it should reach every log-house
+beyond the mountains. I would say to the inhabitants, wake from your
+false security; your cruel dangers, your more cruel apprehensions are
+soon to be renewed; the wounds, yet unhealed, are to be torn open again;
+in the daytime, your path through the woods will be ambushed; the
+darkness of midnight will glitter with the blaze of your dwellings. You
+are a father--the blood of your sons shall fatten your cornfield; you
+are a mother--the war-whoop shall wake the sleep of the cradle.
+
+On this subject you need not suspect any deception on your feelings. It
+is a spectacle of horror, which cannot be overdrawn. If you have nature
+in your hearts, it will speak a language, compared with which all I have
+said or can say will be poor and frigid.
+
+Will it be whispered that the treaty has made me a new champion for the
+protection of the frontiers? It is known that my voice as well as vote
+have been uniformly given in conformity with the ideas I have expressed.
+Protection is the right of the frontiers; it is our duty to give it.
+
+Who will accuse me of wandering out of the subject? Who will say that I
+exaggerate the tendencies of our measures? Will any one answer by a
+sneer, that all this is idle preaching? Will any one deny, that we are
+bound, and I would hope to good purpose, by the most solemn sanctions of
+duty for the vote we give? Are despots alone to be reproached for
+unfeeling indifference to the tears and blood of their subjects? Have
+the principles on which you ground the reproach upon cabinets and kings
+no practical influence, no binding force? Are they merely themes of idle
+declamation introduced to decorate the morality of a newspaper essay, or
+to furnish petty topics of harangue from the windows of that
+state-house? I trust it is neither too presumptuous nor too late to ask.
+Can you put the dearest interest of society at risk without guilt and
+without remorse.
+
+It is vain to offer as an excuse, that public men are not to be
+reproached for the evils that may happen to ensue from their measures.
+This is very true where they are unforeseen or inevitable. Those I have
+depicted are not unforeseen; they are so far from inevitable, we are
+going to bring them into being by our vote. We choose the consequences,
+and become as justly answerable for them as for the measures that we
+know will produce them.
+
+By rejecting the posts we light the savage fires--we bind the victims.
+This day we undertake to render account to the widows and orphans whom
+our decision will make, to the wretches that will be roasted at the
+stake, to our country, and I do not deem it too serious to say, to
+conscience and to God. We are answerable, and if duty be any thing more
+than a word of imposture, if conscience be not a bug-bear, we are
+preparing to make ourselves as wretched as our country.
+
+There is no mistake in this case--there can be none. Experience has
+already been the prophet of events, and the cries of future victims have
+already reached us. The Western inhabitants are not a silent and
+uncomplaining sacrifice. The voice of humanity issues from the shade of
+their wilderness. It exclaims that, while one hand is held up to reject
+this treaty, the other grasps a tomahawk. It summons our imagination to
+the scenes that will open. It is no great effort of the imagination to
+conceive that events so near are already begun. I can fancy that I
+listen to the yells of savage vengeance, and the shrieks of torture.
+Already they seem to sigh in the west wind-already they mingle with
+every echo from the mountains.
+
+It is not the part of prudence to be inattentive to the tendencies of
+measures. Where there is any ground to fear that these will prove
+pernicious, wisdom and duty forbid that we should underrate them. If we
+reject the treaty, will our peace be as safe as if we executed it with
+good faith? I do honor to the intrepid spirits of those who say it will.
+It was formerly understood to constitute the excellence of a man's faith
+to believe without evidence and against it.
+
+But, as opinions on this article are changed, and we are called to act
+for our country, it becomes us to explore the dangers that will attend
+its peace, and to avoid them if we can.
+
+Is there any thing in the prospect of the interior state of the country
+to encourage us to aggravate the dangers of a war? Would not the shock
+of that evil produce another, and shake down the feeble and then
+unbraced structure of our government? Is this a chimera? Is it going off
+the ground of matter of fact to say, the rejection of the appropriation
+proceeds upon the doctrine of a civil war of the departments? Two
+branches have ratified a treaty, and we are going to set it aside. How
+is this disorder in the machine to be rectified? While it exists its
+movements must stop, and when we talk of a remedy, is that any other
+than the formidable one of a revolutionary one of the people? And is
+this, in the judgment even of my opposers, to execute, to preserve the
+constitution and the public order? Is this the state of hazard, if not
+of convulsion, which they can have the courage to contemplate and to
+brave, or beyond which their penetration can reach and see the issue?
+They seem to believe, and they act as if they believed, that our union,
+our peace, our liberty, are invulnerable and immortal--as if our happy
+state was not to be disturbed by our dissentions, and that we are not
+capable of falling from it by our unworthiness. Some of them have, no
+doubt, better nerves and better discernment than mine. They can see the
+bright aspects and the happy consequences of all this array of horrors.
+They can see intestine discords, our government disorganized, our wrongs
+aggravated, multiplied, and unredressed, peace with dishonor, or war
+without justice, union, or resources, in "the calm lights of mild
+philosophy."
+
+But whatever they may anticipate as the next measure of prudence and
+safety, they have explained nothing to the house. After rejecting the
+treaty, what is to be the next step? They must have foreseen what ought
+to be done; they have doubtless resolved what to propose. Why then are
+they silent? Dare they not avow their plan of conduct, or do they wait
+till our progress toward confusion shall guide them in forming it?
+
+Let me cheer the mind, weary, no doubt, and ready to despond on this
+prospect, by presenting another, which it is yet in our power to
+realize. Is it possible for a real American to look at the prosperity of
+this country without some desire for its continuance--without some
+respect for the measures which, many will say, produced, and all will
+confess, have preserved, it? Will he not feel some dread that a change
+of system will reverse the scene? The well-grounded fears of our
+citizens in 1794 were removed by the treaty, but are not forgotten. Then
+they deemed war nearly inevitable, and would not this adjustment have
+been considered, at that day, as a happy escape from the calamity? The
+great interest and the general desire of our people, was to enjoy the
+advantages of neutrality. This instrument, however misrepresented,
+affords America that inestimable security. The causes of our disputes
+are either cut up by the roots, or referred to a new negotiation after
+the end of the European war. This was gaining everything, because it
+confirmed our neutrality, by which our citizens are gaining everything.
+This alone would justify the engagements of the government. For, when
+the fiery vapors of the war lowered in the skirts of our horizon, all
+our wishes were concentred in this one, that we might escape the
+desolation of the storm. This treaty, like a rainbow on the edge of the
+cloud, marked to our eyes the space where it was raging, and afforded,
+at the same time, the sure prognostic of fair weather. If we reject it,
+the vivid colors will grow pale,--it will be a baleful meteor portending
+tempest and war.
+
+Let us not hesitate, then, to agree to the appropriation to carry it
+into faithful execution.
+
+Thus we shall save the faith of our nation, secure its peace, and
+diffuse the spirit of confidence and enterprise that will augment its
+prosperity. The progress of wealth and improvement is wonderful, and,
+some will think, too rapid. The field for exertion is fruitful and vast,
+and if peace and good government should be preserved, the acquisitions
+of our citizens are not so pleasing as the proofs of their industry--as
+the instruments of their future success. The rewards of exertion go to
+augment its power. Profit is every hour becoming capital. The vast crop
+of our neutrality is all seed-wheat, and is sown again to swell, almost
+beyond calculation, the future harvest of prosperity. And in this
+progress, what seems to be fiction is found to fall short of experience.
+
+I rose to speak under impressions that I would have resisted if I could.
+Those who see me will believe that the reduced state of my health has
+unfitted me, almost equally for much exertion of body or mind.
+Unprepared for debate, by careful reflection in my retirement, or by
+long attention here, I thought the resolution I had taken to sit silent,
+was imposed by necesity, and would cost me no effort to maintain. With a
+mind thus vacant of ideas, and sinking, as I really am, under a sense of
+weakness, I imagined the very desire of speaking was extinguished by the
+persuasion that I had nothing to say. Yet, when I come to the moment of
+deciding the vote, I start back with dread from the edge of the pit into
+which we are plunging. In my view, even the minutes I have spent in
+expostulation have their value, because they protract the crisis, and
+the short period in which alone we may resolve to escape it.
+
+I have thus been led, by my feelings, to speak more at length than I
+intended. Yet I have, perhaps, as little personal interest in the event
+as any one here. There is, I believe, no member who will not think his
+chance to be a witness of the consequences greater than mine. If,
+however, the vote shall pass to reject, and a spirit should rise, as it
+will, with the public disorders, to make confusion worse confounded,
+even I, slender and almost broken as my hold upon life is, may outlive
+the government and constitution of my country.
+
+
+
+
+JOHN NICHOLAS
+
+
+ON THE PROPOSED REPEAL OF THE SEDITION LAW
+
+--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, FEB. 25, 1799
+
+
+MR. CHAIRMAN:
+
+
+The Select Committee had very truly stated that only the second and
+third sections of the act are complained of; that the part of the law
+which punishes seditious acts is acquiesced in, and that the part which
+goes to restrain what are called seditious writings is alone the object
+of the petitions. This part of the law is complained of as being
+unwarranted by the Constitution, and destructive of the first principles
+of republican government. It is always justifiable, in examining the
+principle of a law, to inquire what other laws can be passed with equal
+reason, and to impute to it all the mischiefs for which it may be used
+as a precedent.
+
+In this case, little inquiry is left for us to make, the arguments in
+favor of the law carrying us immediately and by inevitable consequence
+to absolute power over the press.
+
+It is not pretended that the Constitution has given any express
+authority, which they claim, for passing this law, and it is claimed
+only as implied in that clause of the Constitution which says: "Congress
+shall have power to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper
+for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers
+vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or
+in any department or officer thereof." It is clear that this clause was
+intended to be merely an auxiliary to the powers specially enumerated in
+the Constitution; and it must, therefore, be so construed as to aid
+them, and at the same time to leave the boundaries between the General
+Government and the State governments untouched. The argument by which
+the Select Committee have endeavored to establish the authority of
+Congress over the press is the following: "Congress has power to punish
+seditious combinations to resist the laws, and therefore Congress must
+have the power to punish false, scandalous, and malicious writings;
+because such writings render the Administration odious and contemptible
+among the people, and by doing so have a tendency to produce opposition
+to the laws." To make it support the construction of the committee, it
+should say that "Congress shall have power over all acts which are
+likely to produce acts which hinder the execution of," etc. Our
+construction confines the power of Congress to such acts as immediately
+interfere with the execution of the enumerated powers of Congress,
+because the power can only be necessary as well as proper when the acts
+would really hinder the execution. The construction of the committee
+extends the power of Congress to all acts which have a relation, ever so
+many degrees removed, to the enumerated powers, or rather to the acts
+which would hinder their execution. By our construction, the
+Constitution remains defined and limited, according to the plain intent
+and meaning of its framers; by the construction of the committee, all
+limitation is lost, and it may be extended over the different actions of
+life as speculative politicians may think fit. What has a greater
+tendency to fit men for insurrection and resistance to government than
+dissolute, immoral habits, at once destroying love of order, and
+dissipating the fortune which gives an interest in society? The doctrine
+that Congress can punish any act which has a tendency to hinder the
+execution of the laws, as well as acts which do hinder it, will,
+therefore, clearly entitle them to assume a general guardianship over
+the morals of the people of the United States. Again, nothing can have a
+greater tendency to ensure obedience to law, and nothing can be more
+likely to check every propensity to resistance to government, than
+virtuous and wise education; therefore Congress must have power to
+subject all the youth of the United States to a certain system of
+education. It would be very easy to connect every sort of authority used
+by any government with the well-being of the General Government, and
+with as much reason as the committee had for their opinion, to assign
+the power to Congress, although the consequence must be the prostration
+of the State governments.
+
+But enough has been said to show the necessity of adhering to the common
+meaning of the word "necessary" in the clause under consideration, which
+is, that the power to be assumed must be one without which some one of
+the enumerated powers cannot exist or be maintained. It cannot escape
+notice, however, that the doctrine contended for, that the
+Administration must be protected against writings which are likely to
+bring it into contempt, as tending to opposition, will apply with more
+force to truth than falsehood. It cannot be denied that the discovery of
+maladministration will bring more lasting discredit on the government of
+a country than the same charges would if untrue. This is not an alarm
+founded merely on construction, for the governments which have exercised
+control over the press have carried it the whole length. This is
+notoriously the law of England, whence this system has been drawn; for
+there truth and falsehood are alike subject to punishment, if the
+publication brings contempt on the officers of government.
+
+The law has been current by the fair pretence of punishing nothing but
+falsehood, and by holding out to the accused the liberty of proving the
+truth of the writing; but it was from the first apprehended, and it
+seems now to be adjudged (the doctrine has certainly been asserted on
+this floor), that matters of opinion, arising on notorious facts, come
+under the law. If this is the case, where is the advantage of the law
+requiring that the writing should be false before a man shall be liable
+to punishment, or of his having the liberty of proving the truth of his
+writing? Of the truth of facts there is an almost certain test; the
+belief of honest men is certain enough to entitle it to great
+confidence; but their opinions have no certainty at all. The trial of
+the truth of opinions, in the best state of society, would be altogether
+precarious; and perhaps a jury of twelve men could never be found to
+agree in any one opinion. At the present moment, when, unfortunately,
+opinion is almost entirely governed by prejudice and passion, it may be
+more decided, but nobody will say it is more respectable. Chance must
+determine whether political opinions are true or false, and it will not
+unfrequently happen that a man will be punished for publishing opinions
+which are sincerely his, and which are of a nature to be extremely
+interesting to the public, merely because accident or design has
+collected a jury of different sentiments.
+
+Is the power claimed proper for Congress to possess? It is believed not,
+and this will readily be admitted if it can be proved, as I think it
+can, that the persons who administer the government have an interest in
+the power to be confided opposed to that of the community. It must be
+agreed that the nature of our government makes a diffusion of knowledge
+of public affairs necessary and proper, and that the people have no mode
+of obtaining it but through the press. The necessity for their having
+this information results from its being their duty to elect all the
+parts of the Government, and, in this way, to sit in judgment over the
+conduct of those who have been heretofore employed. The most important
+and necessary information for the people to receive is that of the
+misconduct of the Government, because their good deeds, although they
+will produce affection and gratitude to public officers, will only
+confirm the existing confidence, and will, therefore, make no change in
+the conduct of the people. The question, then, whether the Government
+ought to have control over the persons who alone can give information
+throughout a country is nothing more than this, whether men, interested
+in suppressing information necessary for the people to have, ought to be
+entrusted with the power, or whether they ought to have a power which
+their personal interest leads to the abuse of. I am sure no candid man
+will hesitate about the answer; and it may also safely be left with
+ingenuous men to say whether the misconduct which we sometimes see in
+the press had not better be borne with, than to run the risk of
+confiding the power of correction to men who will be constantly urged by
+their own feelings to destroy its usefulness. How long can it be
+desirable to have periodical elections for the purpose of judging of the
+conduct of our rulers, when the channels of information may be choked at
+their will?
+
+But, sir, I have ever believed this question as settled by an amendment
+to the Constitution, proposed with others for declaring and restricting
+its powers, as the preamble declares, at the request of several of the
+States, made at the adoption of the Constitution, in order to prevent
+their misconstruction and abuse. This amendment is in the following
+words: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
+religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the
+freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably
+to assemble and petition the Government for a redress of grievances."
+There can be no doubt about the effect of this amendment, unless the
+"freedom of the press" means something very different from what it
+seems; or unless there was some actual restraint upon it, under the
+Constitution of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this
+amendment, commensurate with that imposed by this law. Both are
+asserted, viz., that the "freedom of the press" has a defined, limited
+meaning, and that the restraints of the common law were in force under
+the United States, and are greater than those of the act of Congress,
+and that, therefore, either way the "freedom of the press" is not
+abridged.
+
+It is asserted by the select committee, and by everybody who has gone
+before them in this discussion, that the "freedom of the press,"
+according to the universally received acceptation of the expression,
+means only an exemption from all previous restraints on publication, but
+not an exemption from any punishment Government pleases to inflict for
+what is published. This definition does not at all distinguish between
+publications of different sorts, but leaves all to the regulation of the
+law, only forbidding Government to interfere until the publication is
+really made. The definition, if true, so reduces the effect of the
+amendment that the power of Congress is left unlimited over the
+productions of the press, and they are merely deprived of one mode of
+restraint.
+
+The amendment was certainly intended to produce some limitation to
+legislative discretion, and it must be construed so as to produce such
+an effect, if it is possible. To give it such a construction as will
+bring it to a mere nullity would violate the strongest injunctions of
+common-sense and decorum, and yet that appears to me to be the effect of
+the construction adopted by the committee. The effect of the amendment,
+say the committee, is to prevent Government taking the press from its
+owner; but how is their power lessened by this, when they may take the
+printer from his press and imprison him for any length of time, for
+publishing what they choose to prohibit, although it maybe ever so
+proper for public information? The result is that Government may forbid
+any species of writing, true as well as false, to be published; may
+inflict the heaviest punishments they can devise for disobedience, and
+yet we are very gravely assured that this is the "freedom of the press."
+
+A distinction is very frequently relied on between the freedom and the
+licentiousness of the press, which it is proper to examine. This seems
+to me to refute every other argument which is used on this subject; it
+amounts to an admission that there are some acts of the press which
+Congress ought not to have power to restrain, and that by the amendment
+they are prohibited to restrain these acts. Nov, to justify any act of
+Congress, they ought to show the boundary between what is prohibited and
+what is permitted, and that the act is not within the prohibited class.
+The Constitution has fixed no such boundary, therefore they can pretend
+to no power over the press, without claiming the right of defining what
+is freedom and what is licentiousness, and that would be to claim a
+right which would defeat the Constitution; for every Congress would have
+the same right, and the freedom of the press would fluctuate according
+to the will of the legislature. This is, therefore, only a new mode of
+claiming absolute power over the press.
+
+It is said there is a common law which makes part of the law of the
+United States, which restrained the press more than the act of Congress
+has done, and that therefore there is no abridgment of its freedom. What
+this common law is I cannot conceive, nor have I seen anybody who could
+explain himself when he was talking of it. It certainly is not a common
+law of the United States, acquired, as that of England was, by
+immemorial usage. The standing of the Government makes this impossible.
+It cannot be a code of laws adopted because they were universally in use
+in the States, for the States had no uniform code; and, if they had, it
+could hardly become, by implication, part of the code of a Government of
+limited powers, from which every thing is expressly retained which is
+not given. Is it the law of England, at any particular period, which is
+adopted? But the nature of the law of England makes it impossible that
+it should have been adopted in the lump into such a Government as this
+is, because it was a complete system for the management of all the
+affairs of a country. It regulated estates, punished all crimes, and, in
+short, went to all things for which laws were necessary. But how was
+this law adopted? Was it by the Constitution? If so, it is immutable and
+incapable of amendment. In what part of the Constitution is it declared
+to be adopted? Was it adopted by the courts? From whom do they derive
+their authority? The Constitution, in the clause first cited, relies on
+Congress to pass all laws necessary to enable the courts to carry their
+powers into execution; it cannot, therefore, have been intended to give
+them a power not necessary to their declared powers. There does not seem
+to me the smallest pretext for so monstrous an assumption; on the
+contrary, while the Constitution is silent about it, every fair
+inference is against it.
+
+Upon the whole, therefore, I am fully satisfied that no power is given
+by the Constitution to control the press, and that such laws are
+expressly prohibited by the amendment. I think it inconsistent with the
+nature of our Government that its administration should have power to
+restrain animadversions on public measures, and for protection from
+private injury from defamation the States are fully competent. It is to
+them that our officers must look for protection of persons, estates, and
+every other personal right; and, therefore, I see no reason why it is
+not proper to rely upon it for defence against private libels.
+
+
+
+
+THE RISE OF DEMOCRACY.
+
+The inaugural address of President Jefferson has been given the first
+place under this period, notwithstanding the fact that it was not at all
+an oration. The inaugural addresses of presidents Washington and Adams
+were really orations, although written, depending for much of their
+effect on the personal presence of him who delivered the address; that
+of Jefferson was altogether a business document, sent to be read by the
+two houses of Congress for their information, and without any of the
+adjuncts of the orator.
+
+It is impossible, nevertheless, to spare the inaugural address of the
+first Democratic President, for it is pervaded by a personality which,
+if quieter in its operation, was more potent in results than the most
+burning eloquence could have been. The spirit of modern democracy, which
+has become, for good or evil, the common characteristic of all American
+parties and leaders, was here first put into living words. Triumphant in
+national politics, this spirit now had but one field of struggle, the
+politics of the States, and here its efforts were for years bent to the
+abolition of every remnant of limitation on individual liberty. Outside
+of New England, the change was accomplished as rapidly as the forms of
+law could be put into the necessary direction; remnants of
+ecclesiastical government, ecclesiastical taxes of even the mildest
+description, restrictions on manhood suffrage, State electoral systems,
+were the immediate victims of the new spirit, and the first term of Mr.
+Jefferson saw most of the States under democratic governments. Inside of
+New England, the change was stubbornly resisted, and, for a time, with
+success. For about twenty years, the general rule was that New England
+and Delaware were federalist, and the rest of the country was
+democratic. But even in New England, a strong democratic minority was
+growing up, and about 1820 the last barriers of federalism gave way;
+Connecticut, the federalist "land of steady habits," accepted a new and
+democratic constitution; Massachusetts modified hers; and the new and
+reliably democratic State of Maine was brought into existence. The "era
+of good feeling" signalized the extinction of the federal party and the
+universal reign of democracy. The length of this period of contest is
+the strongest testimony to the stubbornness of the New England fibre.
+Estimated by States, the success of democracy was about as complete in
+1803 as in 1817; but it required fifteen years of persistent struggle to
+convince the smallest section of the Union that it was hopelessly
+defeated.
+
+The whole period was a succession of great events. The acquisition of
+Louisiana, stretching from the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains, laid,
+in 1803, the foundations of that imperial domain which the steamboat and
+railroad were to convert to use in after-years. The continental empire
+of Napoleon and the island empire of Great Britain drifted into a
+struggle for life or death which hardly knew a breathing space until the
+last charge at Waterloo, and from the beginning it was conducted by both
+combatants with a reckless disregard of international public opinion and
+neutral rights which is hardly credible but for the official records.
+Every injury inflicted on neutral commerce by one belligerent was
+promptly imitated or exceeded by the other, and the two were perfectly
+in accord in insisting on the convenient doctrine of international law,
+that, unless neutral rights were enforced by the neutral against one
+belligerent, the injury became open to the imitation of the other. In
+the process of imitation, each belligerent took care to pass at least a
+little beyond the precedent; and thus, beginning with a paper blockade
+of the northern coast of the continent by the British Government, the
+process advanced, by alternate "retaliations," to a British proclamation
+specifying the ports of the world to which American vessels were to be
+allowed to trade, stopping in England or its dependencies to pay taxes
+en route. These two almost contemporary events, the acquisition of
+Louisiana and the insolent pretensions of the European belligerents,
+were the central points of two distinct influences which bore strongly
+on the development of the United States.
+
+The dominant party, the republicans, had a horror of a national debt
+which almost amounted to a mania. The associations of the term, derived
+from their reading of English history, all pointed to a condition of
+affairs in which the rise of a strong aristocracy was inevitable; and,
+to avoid the latter, they were determined to pay off the former. The
+payment for Louisiana precluded, in their opinion, the support of a
+respectable navy; and the remnants of colonialism in their party
+predisposed them to adopt an ostrich policy instead. The Embargo act was
+passed in 1807, forbidding all foreign commerce. The evident failure of
+this act to influence the belligerents brought about its repeal in 1809,
+and the substitution of the Non-intercourse act. This prohibited
+commercial intercourse with England and France until either should
+revoke its injurious edicts. Napoleon, by an empty and spurious
+revocation in 1810, induced Congress to withdraw the act in respect to
+France, keeping it alive in respect to England. England refused to admit
+the sincerity of the French revocation, to withdraw her Orders in
+Council, or to cease impressing American seamen. The choice left to the
+United States was between war and submission.
+
+The federalist leaders saw that, while their party strength was confined
+to a continually decreasing territory, the opposing democracy not only
+had gained the mass of the original United States, but was swarming
+toward and beyond the Mississippi. They dropped to the level of a mere
+party of opposition; they went further until the only article of their
+political creed was State sovereignty; some of them went one step
+further, and dabbled in hopeless projects for secession and the formation
+of a New England republic of five States. It is difficult to perceive
+any advantage to public affairs in the closing years of the federal
+party, except that, by impelling the democratic leaders to really
+national acts and sympathies, it unwittingly aided in the development of
+nationality from democracy.
+
+If the essential characteristic of colonialism is the sense of
+dependence and the desire to imitate, democracy, at least in its earlier
+phases, begets the opposite qualities. The Congressional elections of
+1810-11 showed that the people had gone further in democracy than their
+leaders. "Submission men" were generally defeated in the election; new
+leaders, like Clay, Calhoun, and Crawford, made the dominant party a war
+party, and forced the President into their policy; and the war of 1812
+was begun. Its early defeats on land, its startling successes at sea,
+its financial straits, the desperation of the contest after the fall of
+Napoleon, and the brilliant victory which crowned its close, all
+combined to raise the national feeling to the highest pitch; and the
+federalists, whose stock object of denunciation was "Mr. Madison's war,"
+though Mr. Madison was about the most unwilling participant in it, came
+out of it under the ban of every national sympathy.
+
+The speech of Mr. Quincy, in many points one of the most eloquent of our
+political history, will show the brightest phase of federalism at its
+lowest ebb. One can hardly compare it with that of Mr. Clay, which
+follows it, without noticing the national character of the latter, as
+contrasted with the lack of nationality of the former. It seems, also,
+that Mr. Clay's speech carries, in its internal characteristics,
+sufficient evidence of the natural forces which tended to make democracy
+a national power, and not a mere adjunct of State sovereignty, wherever
+the oblique influence of slavery was absent. For this reason, it has
+been taken as a convenient introduction to the topic which follows, the
+Rise of Nationality.
+
+
+
+
+THOMAS JEFFERSON,
+
+OF VIRGINIA, (BORN 1743, DIED 1826.)
+
+
+INAUGURAL ADDRESS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON, AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED
+STATES,
+
+MARCH 4, 1801
+
+
+FRIENDS AND FELLOW-CITIZENS:
+
+Called upon to undertake the duties of the first executive office of our
+country, I avail myself of the presence of that portion of my
+fellow-citizens which is here assembled, to express my grateful thanks
+for the favor with which they have been pleased to look toward me, to
+declare a sincere consciousness, that the task is above my talents, and
+that I approach it with those anxious and awful presentiments, which the
+greatness of the charge, and the weakness of my powers, so justly
+inspire. A rising nation, spread over a wide and fruitful land,
+traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their industry,
+engaged in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right,
+advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye; when I
+contemplate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the
+happiness, and the hopes of this beloved country committed to the issue
+and the auspices of this day, I shrink from the contemplation, and
+humble myself before the magnitude of the undertaking. Utterly, indeed,
+should I despair, did not the presence of many, whom I see here, remind
+me, that, in the other high authorities provided by our Constitution, I
+shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal, on which to rely
+under all difficulties. To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged with
+the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associated with
+you, I look with encouragement for that guidance and support which may
+enable us to steer with safety the vessel in which we are all embarked,
+amidst the conflicting elements of a troubled world.
+
+During the contest of opinion through which we have passed, the
+animation of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect
+which might impose on strangers unused to think freely, and to speak and
+to write what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of the
+nation, announced according to the rules of the Constitution, all will
+of course arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in
+common efforts for the common good. All too will bear in mind this
+sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases
+to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable; that the
+minority possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and
+to violate which would be oppression. Let us then, fellow-citizens,
+unite with one heart and one mind, let us restore to social intercourse
+that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself
+are but dreary things. And let us reflect, that having banished from our
+land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and
+suffered, we have yet gained little, if we countenance a political
+intolerance, as despotic, as wicked, and as capable of as bitter and
+bloody persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the ancient
+world, during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through
+blood and slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the
+agitation of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful
+shore; that this should be more felt and feared by some, and less by
+others, and should divide opinions as to measures of safety; but every
+difference of opinion is not a difference of principle. We have called
+by different names brethren of the same principle. We are all
+Republicans; we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who wish
+to dissolve this Union, or to change its republican form, let them stand
+undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may
+be tolerated, where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed,
+that some honest men fear that a republican government cannot be strong;
+that this government is not strong enough. But would the honest patriot,
+in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which
+has so far kept us free and firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear,
+that this government, the world's best hope, may, by possibility, want
+energy to preserve itself? I trust not. I believe this, on the contrary,
+the strongest government on earth. I believe it the only one where every
+man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard of the law, and
+would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal concern.
+Sometimes it is said, that man cannot be trusted with the government of
+himself. Can he then be trusted with the government of others? Or, have
+we found angels in the form of kings, to govern him? Let history answer
+this question.
+
+Let us then, with courage and confidence, pursue our own federal and
+republican principles; our attachment to union and representative
+government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the
+exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to
+endure the degradation of the others, possessing a chosen country, with
+room enough for our descendants to the thousandth and thousandth
+generation, entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of
+our own faculties, to the acquisition of our own industry, to honor and
+confidence from our fellow-citizens, resulting not from birth, but from
+our actions and their sense of them, enlightened by a benign religion,
+professed indeed and practised in various forms, yet all of them
+inculcating honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man,
+acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which, by all its
+dispensations, proves that it delights in the happiness of man here, and
+his greater happiness hereafter; with all these blessings, what more is
+necessary to make us a happy and prosperous people? Still one thing
+more, fellow-citizens, a wise and frugal government, which shall
+restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free
+to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall
+not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the
+sum of good government; and this is necessary to close the circle of our
+felicities.
+
+About to enter, fellow-citizens, upon the exercise of duties which
+comprehend every thing dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should
+understand what I deem the essential principles of our government, and
+consequently, those which ought to shape its administration. I will
+compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the
+general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice
+to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political;
+peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling
+alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their
+rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns,
+and the surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies; the
+preservation of the general government in its whole constitutional
+vigor, as the sheet-anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a
+jealous care of the right of election by the people, a mild and safe
+corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where
+peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the
+decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which
+there is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate
+parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in
+peace, and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them;
+the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the
+public expense, that labor may be lightly burdened; the honest payment
+of our debts, and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement
+of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of
+information, and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public
+reason; freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of
+person, under the protection of the _habeas corpus_, and trial by juries
+impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation,
+which has gone before us, and guided our steps through an age of
+revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages, and blood of our
+heroes, have been devoted to their attainment; they should be the creed
+of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by
+which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from
+them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our
+steps, and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and
+safety.
+
+I repair, then, fellow-citizens, to the post you have assigned me. With
+experience enough in subordinate offices to have seen the difficulties
+of this, the greatest of all, I have learned to expect that it will
+rarely fall to the lot of imperfect man, to retire from this station
+with the reputation and the favor which bring him into it. Without
+pretensions to that high confidence you reposed in our first and
+greatest revolutionary character, whose pre-eminent services had
+entitled him to the first place in his country's love, and destined for
+him the fairest page in the volume of faithful history, I ask so much
+confidence only as may give firmness and effect to the legal
+administration of your affairs. I shall often go wrong through defect of
+judgment. When right, I shall often be thought wrong by those whose
+positions will not command a view of the whole ground. I ask your
+indulgence for my own errors, which will never be intentional; and your
+support against the errors of others, who may condemn what they would
+not, if seen in all its parts. The approbation implied by your suffrage,
+is a great consolation to me for the past; and my future solicitude will
+be, to retain the good opinion of those who have bestowed it in advance,
+to conciliate that of others, by doing them all the good in my power,
+and to be instrumental to the happiness and freedom of all.
+
+Relying then on the patronage of your good-will, I advance with
+obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become
+sensible how much better choices it is in your power to make. And may
+that infinite Power which rules the destinies of the universe, lead our
+councils to what is best, and give them a favorable issue for your peace
+and prosperity.
+
+
+
+
+JOHN RANDOLPH,
+
+--OF VIRGINIA' (BORN 1773, DIED 1833.)
+
+
+ON THE MILITIA BILL--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, DEC. 10, 1811.
+
+
+
+MR. SPEAKER:
+
+This is a question, as it has been presented to this House, of peace or
+war. In that light it has been argued; in no other light can I consider
+it, after the declarations made by members of the Committee of Foreign
+Relations.
+
+The Committee of Foreign Relations have, indeed, decided that the
+subject of arming the militia (which has been pressed upon them as
+indispensable to the public security) does not come within the scope of
+their authority. On what ground, I have been, and still am, unable to
+see, they have felt themselves authorized to recommend the raising of
+standing armies, with a view (as has been declared) of immediate war--a
+war not of defence, but of conquest, of aggrandizement, of ambition--a
+war foreign to the interests of this country; to the interests of
+humanity itself. * * *
+
+I cannot refrain from smiling at the liberality of the gentleman in
+giving Canada to New York in order to strengthen the northern balance of
+power; while, at the same time, he forewarns her that the western scale
+must preponderate. I can almost fancy that I see the Capitol in motion
+toward the falls of Ohio; after a short sojourn, taking its flight to
+the Mississippi, and finally alighting at Darien; which, when the
+gentleman's dreams are realized, will be a most eligible seat of
+government for the new republic (or empire) of the two Americas! But it
+seems that in 1808 we talked and acted foolishly, and to give some color
+of consistency to that folly we must now commit a greater.
+
+I hope we shall act a wise part; take warning by our follies since we
+have become sensible of them, and resolve to talk and act foolishly no
+more. It is, indeed, high time to give over such preposterous language
+and proceedings. This war of conquest, a war for the acquisition of
+territory and subjects, is to be a new commentary on the doctrine that
+republicans are destitute of ambition; that they are addicted to peace,
+wedded to the happiness and safety of the great body of their people.
+But it seems this is to be a holiday campaign; there is to be no expense
+of blood, or of treasure on our part; Canada is to conquer herself; she
+is to be subdued by the principles of fraternity! The people of that
+country are first to be seduced from their allegiance and converted into
+traitors, as preparatory to making them good citizens! Although I must
+acknowledge that some of our flaming patriots were thus manufactured, I
+do not think the process would hold good with a whole community. It is a
+dangerous experiment. We are to succeed in the French mode, by the
+system of fraternization--all is French. But how dreadfully it might be
+retorted on the southern and western slave-holding States. I detest this
+subornation of treason. No; if we must have them, let them fall by the
+valor of our arms; by fair, legitimate conquest; not become the victims
+of treacherous seduction.
+
+I am not surprised at the war spirit which is manifesting itself in
+gentlemen from the South. In the year 1805-6, in a struggle for the
+carrying trade of belligerent colonial produce, this country was most
+unwisely brought into collision with the great powers of Europe. By a
+series of most impolitic and ruinous measures, utterly incomprehensible
+to every rational, sober-minded man, the Southern planters, by their own
+votes, have succeeded in knocking down the price of cotton to seven
+cents, and of tobacco (a few choice crops excepted) to nothing; and in
+raising the price of blankets (of which a few would not be amiss in a
+Canadian campaign), coarse woollens, and every article of first
+necessity, three or four hundred per centum. And now, that by our own
+acts, we have brought ourselves into this unprecedented condition, we
+must get out of it in any way, but by an acknowledgment of our own want
+of wisdom and forecast. But is war the true remedy? Who will profit by
+it? Speculators; a few lucky merchants, who draw prizes in the lottery;
+commissaries and contractors. Who must suffer by it? The people. It is
+their blood, their taxes that must flow to support it.
+
+I am gratified to find gentlemen acknowledging the demoralizing and
+destructive consequences of the non-importation law; confessing the
+truth of all that its opponents foretold, when it was enacted. And will
+you plunge yourselves in war, because you have passed a foolish and
+ruinous law, and are ashamed to repeal it? But our good friend, the
+French emperor, stands in the way of its repeal, and we cannot go too
+far in making sacrifices to him, who has given such demonstration of his
+love for the Americans; we must, in point of fact, become parties to his
+war. Who can be so cruel as to refuse him that favor? My imagination
+shrinks from the miseries of such a connection. I call upon the House to
+reflect, whether they are not about to abandon all reclamation for the
+unparalleled outrages, "insults, and injuries" of the French government;
+to give up our claim for plundered millions; and I ask what reparation
+or atonement they can expect to obtain in hours of future dalliance,
+after they shall have made a tender of their person to this great
+deflowerer of the virginity of republics. We have, by our own wise (I
+will not say wiseacre) measures, so increased the trade and wealth of
+Montreal and Quebec, that at last we begin to cast a wistful eye at
+Canada. Having done so much toward its improvement, by the exercise of
+"our restrictive energies," we begin to think the laborer worthy of his
+hire, and to put in a claim for our portion. Suppose it ours, are we any
+nearer to our point? As his minister said to the king of Epirus, "May we
+not as well take our bottle of wine before as after this exploit?" Go
+march to Canada! leave the broad bosom of the Chesapeake and her hundred
+tributary rivers; the whole line of sea-coast from Machias to St.
+Mary's, unprotected! You have taken Quebec--have you conquered England?
+Will you seek for the deep foundations of her power in the frozen
+deserts of Labrador?
+
+"Her march is on the mountain wave, Her home is on the deep!"
+
+Will you call upon her to leave your ports and harbors untouched only
+just till you can return from Canada, to defend them? The coast is to be
+left defenceless, while men of the interior are revelling in conquest
+and spoil. * * *
+
+No sooner was the report laid on the table, than the vultures were
+flocking around their prey--the carcass of a great military
+establishment. Men of tainted reputation, of broken fortune (if they
+ever had any), and of battered constitutions, "choice spirits tired of
+the dull pursuits of civil life," were seeking after agencies and
+commissions, willing to doze in gross stupidity over the public fire; to
+light the public candle at both ends. Honorable men undoubtedly there
+are ready to serve their country; but what man of spirit, or of
+self-respect, will accept a commission in the present army? The
+gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Grundy) addressed himself yesterday
+exclusively to the "Republicans of the House." I know not whether I may
+consider myself as entitled to any part of the benefit of the honorable
+gentleman's discourse. It belongs not, however, to that gentleman to
+decide. If we must have an exposition of the doctrines of republicanism,
+I shall receive it from the fathers of the church, and not from the
+junior apprentices of the law. I shall appeal to my worthy friends from
+Carolina (Messrs. Macon and Stanford), "men with whom I have measured my
+strength," by whose side I have fought during the reign of terror; for
+it was indeed an hour of corruption, of oppression, of pollution. It was
+not at all to my taste--that sort of republicanism which was supported,
+on this side of the Atlantic, by the father of the sedition law, John
+Adams, and by Peter Porcupine on the other. Republicanism! of John Adams
+and William Cobbett! * * *
+
+Gallant crusaders in the holy cause of republicanism. Such republicanism
+does, indeed, mean any thing or nothing. Our people will not submit to
+be taxed for this war of conquest and dominion. The government of the
+United States was not calculated to wage offensive foreign war; it was
+instituted for the common defence and the general welfare; and whosoever
+should embark it in a war of offence, would put it to a test which it is
+by no means calculated to endure. Make it out that Great Britain has
+instigated the Indians on a late occasion, and I am ready for battle,
+but not for dominion. I am unwilling, however, under present
+circumstances, to take Canada, at the risk of the Constitution, to
+embark in a common cause with France, and be dragged at the wheels of
+the car of some Burr or Bonaparte. For a gentleman from Tennessee, or
+Genesee, or Lake Champlain, there may be some prospect of advantage.
+Their hemp would bear a great price by the exclusion of foreign supply.
+In that, too, the great importers are deeply interested. The upper
+country of the Hudson and the lakes would be enriched by the supplies
+for the troops, which they alone could furnish. They would have the
+exclusive market; to say nothing of the increased preponderance from the
+acquisition of Canada and that section of the Union, which the Southern
+and Western States have already felt so severely in the Apportionment
+bill. * * *
+
+Permit me now, sir, to call your attention to the subject of our black
+population. I will touch this subject as tenderly as possible. It is
+with reluctance that I touch it at all; but in cases of great emergency,
+the State physician must not be deterred by a sickly, hysterical
+humanity, from probing the wound of his patient; he must not be withheld
+by a fastidious and mistaken delicacy from representing his true
+situation to his friends, or even to the sick man himself, when the
+occasion calls for it. What is the situation of the slave-holding
+States? During the war of the Revolution, so fixed were their habits of
+subordination, that while the whole country was overrun by the enemy,
+who invited them to desert, no fear was ever entertained of an
+insurrection of the slaves. During a war of seven years, with our
+country in possession of the enemy, no such danger was ever apprehended.
+But should we, therefore, be unobservant spectators of the progress of
+society within the last twenty years; of the silent but powerful change
+wrought, by time and chance, upon its composition and temper? When the
+fountains of the great deep of abomination were broken up, even the poor
+slaves did not escape the general deluge. The French Revolution has
+polluted even them. * * *
+
+Men, dead to the operation of moral causes, have taken away from the
+poor slave his habit of loyalty and obedience to his master, which
+lightened his servitude by a double operation; beguiling his own cares
+and disarming his master's suspicions and severity; and now, like true
+empirics in politics, you are called upon to trust to the mere physical
+strength of the fetter which holds him in bondage. You have deprived him
+of all moral restraint; you have tempted him to eat of the fruit of the
+tree of knowledge, just enough to perfect him in wickedness; you have
+opened his eyes to his nakedness; you have armed his nature against the
+hand that has fed, that has clothed him, that has cherished him in
+sickness; that hand which before he became a pupil of your school, he
+had been accustomed to press with respectful affection. You have done
+all this--and then show him the gibbet and the wheel, as incentives to a
+sullen, repugnant obedience. God forbid, sir, that the Southern States
+should ever see an enemy on their shores, with these infernal principles
+of French fraternity in the van. While talking of taking Canada, some of
+us are shuddering for our own safety at home. I speak from facts, when I
+say, that the night-bell never tolls for fire in Richmond, that the
+mother does not hug her infant more closely to her bosom. I have been a
+witness of some of the alarms in the capital of Virginia. * * *
+
+Against whom are these charges brought? Against men, who in the war of
+the Revolution were in the councils of the nation, or fighting the
+battles of your country. And by whom are they made? By runaways chiefly
+from the British dominions, since the breaking out of the French
+troubles. It is insufferable. It cannot be borne. It must and ought,
+with severity, to be put down in this House; and out of it to meet the
+lie direct. We have no fellow-feeling for the suffering and oppressed
+Spaniards! Yet even them we do not reprobate. Strange! that we should
+have no objection to any other people or government, civilized or
+savage, in the whole world! The great autocrat of all the Russias
+receives the homage of our high consideration. The Dey of Algiers and
+his divan of pirates are very civil, good sort of people, with whom we
+find no difficulty in maintaining the relations of peace and amity.
+"Turks, Jews, and infidels"; Melimelli or the Little Turtle; barbarians
+and savages of every clime and color, are welcome to our arms. With
+chiefs of banditti, negro or mulatto, we can treat and trade. Name,
+however, but England, and all our antipathies are up in arms against
+her. Against whom? Against those whose blood runs in our veins; in
+common with whom, we claim Shakespeare, and Newton, and Chatham, for our
+countrymen; whose form of government is the freest on earth, our own
+only excepted; from whom every valuable principle of our own
+institutions has been borrowed: representation, jury trial, voting the
+supplies, writ of habeas corpus, our whole civil and criminal
+jurisprudence; against our fellow Protestants, identified in blood, in
+language, in religion, with ourselves. In what school did the worthies
+of our land, the Washingtons, Henrys, Hancocks, Franklins, Rutledges of
+America, learn those principles of civil liberty which were so nobly
+asserted by their wisdom and valor? American resistance to British
+usurpation has not been more warmly cherished by these great men and
+their compatriots; not more by Washington, Hancock, and Henry, than by
+Chatham and his illustrious associates in the British Parliament. It
+ought to be remembered, too, that the heart of the English people was
+with us. It was a selfish and corrupt ministry, and their servile tools,
+to whom we were not more opposed than they were. I trust that none such
+may ever exist among us; for tools will never be wanting to subserve the
+purposes, however ruinous or wicked, of kings and ministers of state. I
+acknowledge the influence of a Shakespeare and a Milton upon my
+imagination, of a Locke upon my understanding, of a Sidney upon my
+political principles, of a Chatham upon qualities which, would to God I
+possessed in common with that illustrious man! of a Tillotson, a
+Sherlock, and a Porteus upon my religion. This is a British influence
+which I can never shake off. I allow much to the just and honest
+prejudices growing out of the Revolution. But by whom have they been
+suppressed, when they ran counter to the interests of my country? By
+Washington. By whom, would you listen to them, are they most keenly
+felt? By felons escaped from the jails of Paris, Newgate, and
+Kilmainham, since the breaking out of the French Revolution; who, in
+this abused and insulted country, have set up for political teachers,
+and whose disciples give no other proof of their progress in
+republicanism, except a blind devotion to the most ruthless military
+despotism that the world ever saw. These are the patriots, who scruple
+not to brand with the epithet of Tory, the men (looking toward the seat
+of Col. Stewart) by whose blood your liberties have been cemented. These
+are they, who hold in such keen remembrance the outrages of the British
+armies, from which many of them are deserters. Ask these self-styled
+patriots where they were during the American war (for they are, for the
+most part, old enough to have borne arms), and you strike them dumb;
+their lips are closed in eternal silence. If it were allowable to
+entertain partialities, every consideration of blood, language,
+religion, and interest, would incline us toward England: and yet, shall
+they alone be extended to France and her ruler, whom we are bound to
+believe a chastening God suffers as the scourge of a guilty world! On
+all other nations he tramples; he holds them in contempt; England alone
+he hates; he would, but he cannot, despise her; fear cannot despise; and
+shall we disparage our ancestors?
+
+But the outrages and injuries of England--bred up in the principles of
+the Revolution--I can never palliate, much less defend them. I well
+remember flying, with my mother and her new-born child, from Arnold and
+Philips; and we were driven by Tarleton and other British Pandours from
+pillar to post, while her husband was fighting the battles of his
+country. The impression is indelible on my memory; and yet (like my
+worthy old neighbor, who added seven buckshot to every cartridge at the
+battle of Guilford, and drew fine sight at his man) I must be content to
+be called a Tory by a patriot of the last importation. Let us not get
+rid of one evil (supposing it possible) at the expense of a greater;
+_mutatis mutandis_, suppose France in possession of the British naval
+power--and to her the trident must pass should England be unable to
+wield it--what would be your condition? What would be the situation of
+your seaports, and their seafaring inhabitants? Ask Hamburg, Lubec! Ask
+Savannah! * * *
+
+Shall republicans become the instruments of him who has effaced the
+title of Attila to the "scourge of God!" Yet, even Attila, in the
+falling fortunes of civilization, had, no doubt, his advocates, his
+tools, his minions, his parasites, in the very countries that he
+overran; sons of that soil whereon his horse had trod; where grass could
+never after grow. If perfectly fresh, instead of being as I am, my
+memory clouded, my intellect stupefied, my strength and spirits
+exhausted, I could not give utterance to that strong detestation which I
+feel toward (above all other works of the creation) such characters as
+Gengis, Tamerlane, Kouli-Khan, or Bonaparte. My instincts involuntarily
+revolt at their bare idea. Malefactors of the human race, who have
+ground down man to a mere machine of their impious and bloody ambition!
+Yet under all the accumulated wrongs, and insults, and robberies of the
+last of these chieftains, are we not, in point of fact, about to become
+a party to his views, a partner in his wars? * * *
+
+I call upon those professing to be republicans to make good the
+promises, held out by their republican predecessors, when they came into
+power; promises which, for years afterward, they honestly, faithfully
+fulfilled. We have vaunted of paying off the national debt, of
+retrenching useless establishments; and yet have now become as
+infatuated with standing armies, loans, taxes, navies, and war as ever
+were the Essex Junto!
+
+
+
+
+ADMISSION OF LOUISIANA.
+
+
+JOSIAH QUINCY,
+
+--OF MASSACHUSETTS.' (BORN 1772, DIED 1864.)
+
+
+ON THE ADMISSION OF LOUISIANA--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JAN. 14, 1811.
+
+
+MR. SPEAKER:
+
+I address you, sir, with anxiety and distress of mind, with me, wholly
+unprecedented. The friends of this bill seem to consider it as the
+exercise of a common power; as an ordinary affair; a mere municipal
+regulation, which they expect to see pass without other questions than
+those concerning details. But, sir, the principle of this bill
+materially affects the liberties and rights of the whole people of the
+United States. To me it appears that it would justify a revolution in
+this country; and that, in no great length of time it may produce it.
+When I see the zeal and perseverance with which this bill has been urged
+along its parliamentary path, when I know the local interests and
+associated projects which combine to promote its success, all opposition
+to it seems manifestly unavailing. I am almost tempted to leave, without
+a struggle, my country to its fate. But, sir, while there is life, there
+is hope. So long as the fatal shaft has not yet sped, if Heaven so will,
+the bow may be broken and the vigor of the mischief-meditating arm
+withered. If there be a man in this House or nation, who cherishes the
+Constitution, under which we are assembled, as the chief stay of his
+hope, as the light which is destined to gladden his own day, and to
+soften even the gloom of the grave, by the prospects it sheds over his
+children, I fall not behind him in such sentiments. I will yield to no
+man in attachment to this Constitution, in veneration for the sages who
+laid its foundations, in devotion to those principles which form its
+cement and constitute its proportions. What then must be my feelings;
+what ought to be the feelings of a man, cherishing such sentiments, when
+he sees an act contemplated which lays ruin at the foot of all these
+hopes? When he sees a principle of action about to be usurped, before
+the operation of which the bands of this Constitution are no more than
+flax before the fire, or stubble before the whirlwind? When this bill
+passes, such an act is done; and such a principle is usurped.
+
+Mr. Speaker, there is a great rule of human conduct, which he who
+honestly observes, cannot err widely from the path of his sought duty.
+It is, to be very scrupulous concerning the principles you select as the
+test of your rights and obligations; to be very faithful in noticing the
+result of their application; and to be very fearless in tracing and
+exposing their immediate effects and distant consequences. Under the
+sanction of this rule of conduct, I am compelled to declare it as my
+deliberate opinion, that, if this bill passes, the bonds of this union
+are, virtually, dissolved; that the States which compose it are free
+from their moral obligations, and that as it will be the right of all,
+so it will be the duty of some, to prepare, definitely, for a
+separation: amicably, if they can; _violently, if they must_.
+
+(Mr. Quincy was here called to order by Mr. Poindexter, delegate from
+the Mississippi territory, for the words in italics. After it was
+decided, upon an appeal to the House, that Mr. Quincy was in order, he
+proceeded.)
+
+I rejoice, Mr. Speaker, at the result of this appeal. Not from any
+personal consideration, but from the respect paid to the essential
+rights of the people, in one of their representatives. When I spoke of
+the separation of the States, as resulting from the violation of the
+Constitution contemplated in this bill, I spoke of it as a necessity,
+deeply to be deprecated; but as resulting from causes so certain and
+obvious as to be absolutely inevitable, when the effect of the principle
+is practically experienced. It is to preserve, to guard the Constitution
+of my country, that I denounce this attempt. I would rouse the attention
+of gentlemen from the apathy with which they seem beset. These
+observations are not made in a corner; there is no low intrigue; no
+secret machination. I am on the people's own ground; to them I appeal
+concerning their own rights, their own liberties, their own intent, in
+adopting this Constitution. The voice I have uttered, at which gentlemen
+startle with such agitation, is no unfriendly voice. I intended it as a
+voice of warning. By this people, and by the event, if this bill passes,
+I am willing to be judged, whether it be not a voice of wisdom.
+
+The bill which is now proposed to be passed has this assumed principle
+for its basis; that the three branches of this national government,
+without recurrence to conventions of the people in the States, or to the
+Legislatures of the States, are authorized to admit new partners to a
+share of the political power, in countries out of the original limits of
+the United States. Now, this assumed principle, I maintain to be
+altogether without any sanction in the Constitution. I declare it to be
+a manifest and atrocious usurpation of power; of a nature, dissolving,
+according to undeniable principles of moral law, the obligations of our
+national compact; and leading to all the awful con-sequences which flow
+from such a state of things. Concerning this assumed principle, which is
+the basis of this bill, this is the general position, on which I rest my
+argument; that if the authority, now proposed to be exercised, be
+delegated to the three branches of the government by virtue of the
+Constitution, it results either from its general nature, or from its
+particular provisions. I shall consider distinctly both these sources,
+in relation to this pretended power.
+
+Touching the general nature of the instrument called the Constitution of
+the United States there is no obscurity; it has no fabled descent, like
+the palladium of ancient Troy, from the heavens. Its origin is not
+confused by the mists of time, or hidden by the darkness of passed,
+unexplored ages; it is the fabric of our day. Some now living, had a
+share in its construction; all of us stood by, and saw the rising of the
+edifice. There can be no doubt about its nature. It is a political
+compact. By whom? And about what? The preamble to the instrument will
+answer these questions.
+
+"We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect
+union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the
+common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of
+liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this
+Constitution, for the United States of America."
+
+It is, we the people of the United States, for ourselves and our
+posterity; not for the people of Louisiana; nor for the people of New
+Orleans or of Canada. None of these enter into the scope of the
+instrument; it embraces only "the United States of America." Who these
+are, it may seem strange in this place to inquire. But truly, sir, our
+imaginations have, of late, been so accustomed to wander after new
+settlements to the very ends of the earth, that it will not be time ill
+spent to inquire what this phrase means, and what it includes. These are
+not terms adopted at hazard; they have reference to a state of things
+existing anterior to the Constitution. When the people of the present
+United States began to contemplate a severance from their parent State,
+it was a long time before they fixed definitely the name by which they
+would be designated. In 1774, they called themselves "the Colonies and
+Provinces of North America." In 1775, "the Representatives of the United
+Colonies of North America." In the Declaration of Independence, "the
+Representatives of the United States of America." And finally, in the
+articles of confederation, the style of the confederacy is declared to
+be "the United States of America." It was with reference to the old
+articles of confederation, and to preserve the identity and established
+individuality of their character, that the preamble to this
+Constitution, not content, simply, with declaring that it is "we the
+people of the United States," who enter into this compact, adds that it
+is for "the United States of America." Concerning the territory
+contemplated by the people of the United States, in these general terms,
+there can be no dispute; it is settled by the treaty of peace, and
+included within the Atlantic Ocean, the St. Croix, the lakes, and more
+precisely, so far as relates to the frontier, having relation to the
+present argument, within "a line to be drawn through the middle of the
+river Mississippi, until it intersect the northernmost part of the
+thirty-first degree of north latitude, thence within a line drawn due
+east on this degree of latitude to the river Apalachicola, thence along
+the middle of this river to its junction with the Flint River, thence
+straight to the head of the St. Mary's River, and thence down the St.
+Mary's to the Atlantic Ocean."
+
+I have been thus particular to draw the minds of gentlemen, distinctly,
+to the meaning of the terms used in the preamble; to the extent which
+"the United States" then included; and to the fact, that neither New
+Orleans, nor Louisiana, was within the comprehension of the terms of
+this instrument. It is sufficient for the present branch of my argument
+to say, that there is nothing, in the general nature of this compact,
+from which the power, contemplated to be exercised in this bill,
+results. On the contrary, as the introduction of a new associate in
+political power implies, necessarily, a new division of power, and
+consequent diminution of the relative proportion of the former
+proprietors of it, there can, certainly, be nothing more obvious, than
+that from the general nature of the instrument no power can result to
+diminish and give away, to strangers, any proportion of the rights of
+the original partners. If such a power exist, it must be found, then, in
+the particular provisions in the Constitution. The question now arising
+is, in which of these provisions is given the power to admit new States,
+to be created in territories beyond the limits of the old United States.
+If it exist anywhere, it is either in the third section of the fourth
+article of the Constitution, or in the treaty-making power. If it result
+from neither of these, it is not pretended to be found anywhere else.
+
+That part of the third section of the fourth article, on which the
+advocates of this bill rely, is the following: "New States may be
+admitted by the Congress, into this Union; but no new State shall be
+formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other State, nor any
+State be formed by the junction of two or more States, or parts of
+States, without the consent of the Legislatures of the States concerned,
+as well as of the Congress."
+
+I know, Mr. Speaker, that the first clause of this paragraph has been
+read, with all the superciliousness of a grammarian's triumph--"New
+States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union,"--accompanied
+with this most consequential inquiry: "Is not this a new State to be
+admitted? And is there not here an express authority?" I have no doubt
+this is a full and satisfactory argument to every one who is content
+with the mere colors and superficies of things. And if we were now at
+the bar of some stall-fed justice, the inquiry would insure the victory
+to the maker of it, to the manifest delight of the constables and
+suitors of his court. But, sir, we are now before the tribunal of the
+whole American people; reasoning concerning their liberties, their
+rights, their Constitution. These are not to be made the victims of the
+inevitable obscurity of general terms; nor the sport of verbal
+criticism. The question is concerning the intent of the American people,
+the proprietors of the old United States, when they agreed to this
+article. Dictionaries and spelling-books are here of no authority.
+Neither Johnson, nor Walker, nor Webster, nor Dilworth, has any voice in
+this matter. Sir, the question concerns the proportion of power
+reserved, by this Constitution, to every State in this Union. Have the
+three branches of this government a right, at will, to weaken and
+out-weigh the influence, respectively secured to each State in this
+compact, by introducing, at pleasure, new partners, situate beyond the
+old limits of the United States? The question has not relation merely to
+New Orleans. The great objection is to the principle of the bill. If
+this principle be admitted, the whole space of Louisiana, greater, it is
+said, than the entire extent of the old United States, will be a mighty
+theatre, in which this government assumes the right of exercising this
+unparalleled power. And it will be; there is no concealment, it is
+intended to be exercised. Nor will it stop until the very name and
+nature of the old partners be overwhelmed by new-corners into the
+confederacy. Sir, the question goes to the very root of the power and
+influence of the present members of this Union. The real intent of this
+article, is, therefore, an injury of most serious import; and is to be
+settled only by a recurrence to the known history and known relations of
+this people and their Constitution. These, I maintain, support this
+position, that the terms "new States," in this article, do not intend
+new political sovereignties, with territorial annexations, to be created
+without the original limits of the United States. * * *
+
+But there is an argument stronger even than all those which have been
+produced, to be drawn from the nature of the power here proposed to be
+exercised. Is it possible that such a power, if it had been intended to
+be given by the people, should be left dependent upon the effect of
+general expressions, and such, too, as were obviously applicable to
+another subject, to a particular exigency contemplated at that time?
+Sir, what is this power we propose now to usurp? Nothing less than a
+power changing all the proportions of the weight and influence possessed
+by the potent sovereignties composing this Union. A stranger is to be
+introduced to an equal share without their consent. Upon a principle
+pretended to be deduced from the Constitution, this government, after
+this bill passes, may and will multiply foreign partners in power at its
+own mere motion; at its irresponsible pleasure; in other words, as local
+interests, party passions, or ambitious views may suggest. It is a power
+that from its nature never could be delegated; never was delegated; and
+as it breaks down all the proportions of power guaranteed by the
+Constitution to the States, upon which their essential security depends,
+utterly annihilates the moral force of this political conduct. Would
+this people, so wisely vigilant concerning their rights, have
+transferred to Congress a power to balance, at its will, the political
+weight of any one State, much more of all the States, by authorizing it
+to create new States, at its pleasure, in foreign countries, not
+pretended to be within the scope of the Constitution, or the conception
+of the people at the time of passing it? This is not so much a question
+concerning the exercise of sovereignty, as it is who shall be
+sovereign--whether the proprietors of the good old United States shall
+manage their own affairs in their own way; or whether they, and their
+Constitution, and their political rights, shall be trampled under foot
+by foreigners, introduced through a breach of the Constitution. The
+proportion of the political weight of each sovereign State constituting
+this Union depends upon the number of the States which have voice under
+the compact. This number the Constitution permits us to multiply at
+pleasure within the limits of the original United States, observing only
+the expressed limitations in the Constitution. But when, in order to
+increase your power of augmenting this number, you pass the old limits,
+you are guilty of a violation of the Constitution in a fundamental
+point; and in one, also, which is totally inconsistent with the intent
+of the contract and the safety of the States which established the
+association. What is the practical difference to the old partners
+whether they hold their liberties at the will of a master, or whether by
+admitting exterior States on an equal footing with the original States,
+arbiters are constituted, who, by availing themselves of the contrariety
+of interests and views, which in such a confederacy necessarily will
+arise, hold the balance among the parties which exist and govern us by
+throwing themselves into the scale most comformable to their purpose? In
+both cases there is an effective despotism. But the last is the more
+galling, as we carry the chain in the name and gait of freemen.
+
+I have thus shown, and whether fairly, I am willing to be judged by the
+sound discretion of the American people, that the power proposed to be
+usurped in this bill, results neither from the general nature nor the
+particular provisions of the Federal Constitution; and that it is a
+palpable violation of it in a fundamental point; whence flow all the
+consequences I have indicated.
+
+"But," says the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Rhea), "these people have
+been seven years citizens of the United States." I deny it, sir. As
+citizens of New Orleans, or of Louisiana, they never have been, and by
+the mode proposed they never will be, citizens of the United States.
+They may girt upon us for a moment, but no real cement can grow from
+such an association. What the real situation of the inhabitants of those
+foreign countries is, I shall have occasion to show presently. "But,"
+says the same gentleman: "if I have a farm, have not I a right to
+purchase another farm, in my neighborhood, and settle my sons upon it,
+and in time admit them to a share in the management of my household?"
+Doubtless, sir. But are these cases parallel? Are the three branches of
+this government owners of this farm, called the United States? I desire
+to thank heaven they are not. I hold my life, liberty, and property, and
+the people of the State from which I have the honor to be a
+representative hold theirs, by a better tenure than any this National
+Government can give. Sir, I know your virtue. And I thank the Great
+Giver of every good gift, that neither the gentleman from Tennessee, nor
+his comrades, nor any, nor all the members of this House, nor of the
+other branch of the Legislature, nor the good gentleman who lives in the
+palace yonder, nor all combined, can touch these my essential rights,
+and those of my friends and constituents, except in a limited and
+prescribed form. No, sir. We hold these by the laws, customs, and
+principles of the commonwealth of Massachusetts. Behind her ample
+shield, we find refuge, and feel safety. I beg gentlemen not to act upon
+the principle, that the commonwealth of Massachusetts is their farm.
+
+"But," the gentleman adds, "what shall we do, if we do not admit the
+people of Louisiana into our Union? Our children are settling that
+country." Sir, it is no concern of mine what he does. Because his
+children have run wild and uncovered into the woods, is that a reason
+for him to break into my house, or the houses of my friends, to filch
+our children's clothes, in order to cover his children's nakedness. This
+Constitution never was, and never can be, strained to lap over all the
+wilderness of the West, without essentially affecting both the rights
+and convenience of its real proprietors. It was never constructed to
+form a covering for the inhabitants of the Missouri and Red River
+country. And whenever it is attempted to be stretched over them, it will
+rend asunder. I have done with this part of my argument. It rests upon
+this fundamental principle, that the proportion of political power,
+subject only to internal modifications, permitted by the Constitution,
+is an unalienable, essential, intangible right. When it is touched, the
+fabric is annihilated; for, on the preservation of these proportions,
+depend our rights and liberties.
+
+If we recur to the known relations existing among the States at the time
+of the adoption of this Constitution, the same conclusions will result.
+The various interests, habits, manners, prejudices, education,
+situation, and views, which excited jealousies and anxieties in the
+breasts of some of our most distinguished citizens, touching the result
+of the proposed Constitution, were potent obstacles to its adoption. The
+immortal leader of our Revolution, in his letter to the President of the
+old Congress, written as president of the convention which formed this
+compact, thus speaks on this subject: "It is at all times difficult to
+draw, with precision, the line between those rights which must be
+surrendered, and those which may be reserved; and on the present
+occasion this difficulty was increased by a difference among the several
+States, as to their situation, extent, habits, and particular
+interests."
+
+The debates of that period will show that the effect of the slave votes
+upon the political influence of this part of the country, and the
+anticipated variation of the weight of power to the West, were subjects
+of great and just jealousy to some of the best patriots in the Northern
+and Eastern States. Suppose, then, that it had been distinctly foreseen
+that, in addition to the effect of this weight, the whole population of
+a world beyond the Mississippi was to be brought into this and the other
+branch of the Legislature, to form our laws, control our rights, and
+decide our destiny. Sir, can it be pretended that the patriots of that
+day would for one moment have listened to it? They were not madmen. They
+had not taken degrees at the hospital of idiocy. They knew the nature of
+man, and the effect of his combinations in political societies. They
+knew that when the weight of particular sections of a confederacy was
+greatly unequal, the resulting power would be abused; that it was not in
+the nature of man to exercise it with moderation. The very extravagance
+of the intended use is a conclusive evidence against the possibility of
+the grant of such a power as is here proposed. Why, sir, I have already
+heard of six States, and some say there will be, at no great distance of
+time, more. I have also heard that the mouth of the Ohio will be far to
+the east of the centre of the contemplated empire. If the bill is
+passed, the principle is recognized. All the rest are mere questions of
+expediency. It is impossible such a power could be granted. It was not
+for these men that our fathers fought. It was not for them this
+Constitution was adopted. You have no authority to throw the rights and
+liberties and property of this people into "hotch-pot" with the wild men
+on the Missouri, nor with the mixed, though more respectable, race of
+Anglo-Hispano-Gallo-Americans, who bask on the sands in the mouth of the
+Mississippi. I make no objection to these from their want of moral
+qualities or political light. The inhabitants of New Orleans are, I
+suppose, like those of all other countries, some good, some bad, some
+indifferent.* * *
+
+I will add only a few words, in relation to the moral and political
+consequences of usurping this power. I have said that it would be a
+virtual dissolution of the Union; and gentlemen express great
+sensibility at the expression. But the true source of terror is not the
+declaration I have made, but the deed you propose. Is there a moral
+principle of public law better settled, or more conformable to the
+plainest suggestions of reason, than that the violation of a contract by
+one of the parties may be considered as exempting the other from its
+obligations? Suppose, in private life, thirteen form a partnership, and
+ten of them undertake to admit a new partner without the concurrence of
+the other three, would it not be at their option to abandon the
+partnership, after so palpable an infringement of their rights? How much
+more, in the political partnership, where the admission of new
+associates, without previous authority, is so pregnant with obvious
+dangers and evils! Again, it is settled as a principle of morality,
+among writers on public law, that no person can be obliged, beyond his
+intent at the time of contract. Now who believes, who dare assert, that
+it was the intention of the people, when they adopted this Constitution,
+to assign, eventually, to New Orleans and Louisiana, a portion of their
+political power; and to invest all the people those extensive regions
+might hereafter contain, with an authority over themselves and their
+descendants? When you throw the weight of Louisiana into the scale, you
+destroy the political equipoise contemplated at the time of forming the
+contract. Can any man venture to affirm that the people did intend such
+a comprehension as you now, by construction, give it? Or can it be
+concealed that, beyond its fair and acknowledged intent, such a compact
+has no moral force? If gentlemen are so alarmed at the bare mention of
+the consequences, let them abandon a measure which, sooner or later,
+will produce them. How long before the seeds of discontent will ripen,
+no man can foretell. But it is the part of wisdom not to multiply or
+scatter them. Do you suppose the people of the Northern and Atlantic
+States will, or ought to, look on with patience and see Representatives
+and Senators, from the Red River and Missouri, pouring themselves upon
+this and the other floor, managing the concerns of a sea-board fifteen
+hundred miles, at least, from their residence; and having a
+preponderancy in councils, into which, constitutionally, they could
+never have been admitted? I have no hesitation upon this point. They
+neither will see it, nor ought to see it, with content. It is the part
+of a wise man to foresee danger and to hide himself. This great
+usurpation, which creeps into this House, under the plausible appearance
+of giving content to that important point, New Orleans, starts up a
+gigantic power to control the nation. Upon the actual condition of
+things, there is, there can be, no need of concealment. It is apparent
+to the blindest vision. By the course of nature, and conformable to the
+acknowledged principles of the Constitution, the sceptre of power, in
+this country, is passing toward the Northwest. Sir, there is to this no
+objection. The right belongs to that quarter of the country. Enjoy it;
+it is yours. Use the powers granted as you please. But take care, in
+your haste after effectual dominion, not to overload the scale by
+heaping it with these new acquisitions. Grasp not too eagerly at your
+purpose. In your speed after uncontrolled sway, trample not down this
+Constitution. * * *
+
+New States are intended to be formed beyond the Mississippi. There is no
+limit to men's imaginations, on this subject, short of California and
+Columbia River. When I said that the bill would justify a revolution and
+would produce it, I spoke of its principle and its practical
+consequences. To this principle and those consequences I would call the
+attention of this House and nation. If it be about to introduce a
+condition of things absolutely insupportable, it becomes wise and honest
+men to anticipate the evil, and to warn and prepare the people against
+the event. I have no hesitation on the subject. The extension of this
+principle to the States contemplated beyond the Mississippi, cannot,
+will not, and ought not to be borne. And the sooner the people
+contemplate the unavoidable result the better; the more hope that the
+evils may be palliated or removed.
+
+Mr. Speaker, what is this liberty of which so much is said? Is it to
+walk about this earth, to breathe this air, to partake the common
+blessings of God's providence? The beasts of the field and the birds of
+the air unite with us in such privileges as these. But man boasts a
+purer and more ethereal temperature. His mind grasps in its view the
+past and future, as well as the present. We live not for ourselves
+alone. That which we call liberty is that principle on which the
+essential security of our political condition depends. It results from
+the limitations of our political system, prescribed in the Constitution.
+These limitations, so long as they are faithfully observed, maintain
+order, peace, and safety. When they are violated, in essential
+particulars, all the concurrent spheres of authority rush against each
+other; and disorder, derangement, and convulsion are, sooner or later,
+the necessary consequences.
+
+With respect to this love of our Union, concerning which so much
+sensibility is expressed, I have no fears about analyzing its nature.
+There is in it nothing of mystery. It depends upon the qualities of that
+Union, and it results from its effects upon our and our country's
+happiness. It is valued for "that sober certainty of waking bliss" which
+it enables us to realize. It grows out of the affections, and has not,
+and cannot be made to have, any thing universal in its nature. Sir, I
+confess it: the first public love of my heart is the Commonwealth of
+Massachusetts. There is my fireside; there are the tombs of my ancestors.
+
+  "Low lies that land, yet blest with fruitful stores,
+   Strong are her sons, though rocky are her shores;
+   And none, ah! none, so lovely to my sight,
+   Of all the lands which heaven o'erspreads with light."
+
+The love of this Union grows out of this attachment to my native soil,
+and is rooted in it. I cherish it, because it affords the best external
+hope of her peace, her prosperity, her independence. I oppose this bill
+from no animosity to the people of New Orleans; but from the deep
+conviction that it contains a principle incompatible with the liberties
+and safety of my country. I have no concealment of my opinion. The bill,
+if it passes, is a death-blow to the Constitution. It may, afterward,
+linger; but, lingering, its fate will, at no very distant period, be
+consummated.
+
+
+
+
+HENRY CLAY
+
+
+--OF KENTUCKY. (BORN 1777, DIED 1852.)
+
+
+ON THE WAR OF 1812--HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, JAN. 8, 1813.
+
+SIR, gentlemen appear to me to forget that they stand on American soil;
+that they are not in the British House of Commons, but in the chamber of
+the House of Representatives of the United States; that we have nothing
+to do with the affairs of Europe, the partition of territory and
+sovereignty there, except so far as these things affect the interests of
+our own country. Gentlemen transform themselves into the Burkes,
+Chathams, and Pitts of another country, and, forgetting, from honest
+zeal, the interests of America, engage with European sensibility in the
+discussion of European interests. If gentlemen ask me whether I do not
+view with regret and horror the concentration of such vast power in the
+hands of Bonaparte, I reply that I do. I regret to see the Emperor of
+China holding such immense sway over the fortunes of millions of our
+species. I regret to see Great Britain possessing so uncontrolled a
+command over all the waters of the globe. If I had the ability to
+distribute among the nations of Europe their several portions of power
+and of sovereignty, I would say that Holland should be resuscitated and
+given the weight she enjoyed in the days of her De Witts. I would
+confine France within her natural boundaries, the Alps, Pyrenees, and
+the Rhine, and make her a secondary naval power only. I would abridge
+the British maritime power, raise Prussia and Austria to their original
+condition, and preserve the integrity of the Empire of Russia. But these
+are speculations. I look at the political transactions of Europe, with
+the single exception of their possible bearing upon us, as I do at the
+history of other countries and other times. I do not survey them with
+half the interest that I do the movements in South America. Our
+political relation with them is much less important than it is supposed
+to be. I have no fears of French or English subjugation. If we are
+united we are too powerful for the mightiest nation in Europe or all
+Europe combined. If we are separated and torn asunder, we shall become
+an easy prey to the weakest of them. In the latter dreadful contingency
+our country will not be worth preserving.
+
+Next to the notice which the opposition has found itself called upon to
+bestow upon the French Emperor, a distinguished citizen of Virginia,
+formerly President of the United States, has never for a moment failed
+to receive their kindest and most respectful attention. An honorable
+gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Quincy), of whom I am sorry to say it
+becomes necessary for me, in the course of my remarks, to take some
+notice, has alluded to him in a remarkable manner. Neither his
+retirement from public office, his eminent services, nor his advanced
+age, can exempt this patriot from the coarse assaults of party
+malevolence. No, sir. In 1801 he snatched from the rude hand of
+usurpation the violated Constitution of his country, and that is his
+crime. He preserved that instrument, in form, and substance, and spirit,
+a precious inheritance for generations to come, and for this he can
+never be forgiven. How vain and impotent is party rage, directed against
+such a man. He is not more elevated by his lofty residence, upon the
+summit of his own favorite mountain, than he is lifted, by the serenity
+of his mind, and the consciousness of a well-spent life, above the
+malignant passions and bitter feelings of the day. No! his own beloved
+Monticello is not less moved by the storms that beat against its sides
+than is this illustrious man by the howlings of the whole British pack,
+set loose from the Essex kennel. When the gentleman to whom I have been
+compelled to allude shall have mingled his dust with that of his abused
+ancestors, when he shall have been consigned to oblivion, or, if he
+lives at all, shall live only in the treasonable annals of a certain
+junto, the name of Jefferson will be hailed with gratitude, his memory
+honored and cherished as the second founder of the liberties of the
+people, and the period of his administration will be looked back to as
+one of the happiest and brightest epochs of American history; an oasis
+in the midst of a sandy desert. But I beg the gentleman's pardon; he has
+already secured to himself a more imperishable fame than I had supposed;
+I think it was about four years that he submitted to the House of
+Representatives an initiative proposition for the impeachment of Mr.
+Jefferson. The house condescended to consider it. The gentleman debated
+it with his usual temper, moderation, and urbanity. The house decided
+upon it in the most solemn manner, and, although the gentleman had
+somehow obtained a second, the final vote stood one for, and one hundred
+and seventeen against, the proposition. * * *
+
+But sir, I must speak of another subject, which I never think of but
+with feelings of the deepest awe. The gentleman from Massachusetts, in
+imitation of some of his predecessors of 1799, has entertained us with a
+picture of cabinet plots, presidential plots, and all sorts of plots,
+which have been engendered by the diseased state of the gentleman's
+imagination. I wish, sir, that another plot, of a much more serious and
+alarming character--a plot that aims at the dismemberment of our
+Union--had only the same imaginary existence. But no man, who has paid
+any attention to the tone of certain prints and to transactions in a
+particular quarter of the Union, for several years past, can doubt the
+existence of such a plot. It was far, very far from my intention to
+charge the opposition with such a design. No, I believe them generally
+incapable of it. But I cannot say as much for some who have been
+unworthily associated with them in the quarter of the Union to which I
+have referred. The gentleman cannot have forgotten his own sentiment,
+uttered even on the floor of this house, "peaceably if we can, forcibly
+if we must," nearly at the very time Henry's mission was undertaken. The
+flagitiousness of that embassy had been attempted to be concealed by
+directing the public attention to the price which, the gentleman says,
+was given for the disclosure. As if any price could change the
+atrociousness of the attempt on the part of Great Britain, or could
+extenuate, in the slightest degree, the offence of those citizens, who
+entertained and deliberated on a proposition so infamous and unnatural *
+* * But, sir, I will quit this unpleasant subject. * * *
+
+The war was declared because Great Britain arrogated to herself the
+pretension of regulating our foreign trade, under the delusive name of
+retaliatory orders in council--a pretension by which she undertook to
+proclaim to American enterprise, "thus far shalt thou go, and no
+further"--orders which she refused to revoke after the alleged cause of
+their enactment had ceased; because she persisted in the practice of
+impressing American seamen; because she had instigated the Indians to
+commit hostilities against us; and because she refused indemnity for her
+past injuries upon our commerce. I throw out of the question other
+wrongs. So undeniable were the causes of the war, so powerfully did they
+address themselves to the feelings of the whole American people, that
+when the bill was pending before this House, gentlemen in the
+opposition, although provoked to debate, would not, or could not, utter
+one syllable against it. It is true, they wrapped themselves up in
+sullen silence, pretending they did not choose to debate such a question
+in secret session. While speaking of the proceedings on that occasion I
+beg to be permitted to advert to another fact which transpired--an
+important fact, material for the nation to know, and which I have often
+regretted had not been spread upon our journals. My honorable colleague
+(Mr. McKee) moved, in committee of the whole, to comprehend France in
+the war; and when the question was taken upon the proposition, there
+appeared but ten votes in support of it, of whom seven belonged to this
+side of the house, and three only to the other. * * *
+
+It is not to the British principle (of allegiance), objectionable as it
+is, that we are alone to look; it is to her practice, no matter what
+guise she puts on. It is in vain to assert the inviolability of the
+obligation of allegiance. It is in vain to set up the plea of necessity,
+and to allege that she cannot exist without the impressment of HER
+seamen. The naked truth is, she comes, by her press-gangs, on board of
+our vessels, seizes OUR native as well as naturalized seamen, and drags
+them into her service. It is the case, then, of the assertion of an
+erroneous principle, and of a practice not conformable to the asserted
+principle--a principle which, if it were theoretically right, must be
+forever practically wrong--a practice which can obtain countenance from
+no principle whatever, and to submit to which, on our part, would betray
+the most abject degradation. We are told, by gentlemen in the
+opposition, that government has not done all that was incumbent on it to
+do, to avoid just cause of complaint on the part of Great Britain; that
+in particular the certificates of protection, authorized by the act of
+1796, are fraudulently used. Sir, government has done too much in
+granting those paper protections. I can never think of them without
+being shocked. They resemble the passes which the master grants to his
+negro slave: "Let the bearer, Mungo, pass and repass without
+molestation." What do they imply? That Great Britain has a right to
+seize all who are not provided with them. From their very nature, they
+must be liable to abuse on both sides. If Great Britain desires a mark,
+by which she can know her own subjects, let her give them an ear-mark.
+The colors that float from the mast-head should be the credentials of
+our seamen. There is no safety to us, and the gentlemen have shown it,
+but in the rule that all who sail under the flag (not being enemies),
+are protected by the flag. It is impossible that this country should
+ever abandon the gallant tars who have won for us such splendid
+trophies. Let me suppose that the genius of Columbia should visit one of
+them in his oppressor's prison, and attempt to reconcile him to his
+forlorn and wretched condition. She would say to him, in the language of
+gentlemen on the other side: "Great Britain intends you no harm; she did
+not mean to impress you, but one of her own subjects; having taken you
+by mistake, I will remonstrate, and try to prevail upon her, by
+peaceable means, to release you; but I cannot, my son, fight for you."
+If he did not consider this mere mockery, the poor tar would address her
+judgment and say: "You owe me, my country, protection; I owe you, in
+return, obedience. I am no British subject; I am a native of old
+Massachusetts, where lived my aged father, my wife, my children. I have
+faithfully discharged my duty. Will you refuse to do yours?" Appealing
+to her passions, he would continue: "I lost this eye in fighting under
+Truxton, with the Insurgence; I got this scar before Tripoli; I broke
+this leg on board the Constitution, when the Guerriere struck." * * * I
+will not imagine the dreadful catastrophe to which he would be driven by
+an abandonment of him to his oppressor. It will not be, it cannot be,
+that his country will refuse him protection. * * *
+
+An honorable peace is attainable only by an efficient war. My plan would
+be to call out the ample resources of the country, give them a judicious
+direction, prosecute the war with the utmost vigor, strike wherever we
+can reach the enemy, at sea or on land, and negotiate the terms of a
+peace at Quebec or at Halifax. We are told that England is a proud and
+lofty nation, which, disdaining to wait for danger, meets it half way.
+Haughty as she is we triumphed over her once, and, if we do not listen
+to the counsels of timidity and despair, we shall again prevail. In such
+a cause, with the aid of Providence, we must come out crowned with
+success; but, if we fail, let us fail like men, lash ourselves to our
+gallant tars, and expire together in one common struggle, fighting for
+FREE TRADE AND SEAMEN'S RIGHTS.
+
+
+
+
+IV. -- THE RISE OF NATIONALITY.
+
+
+In spite of execrable financial management, of the criminal blunders of
+political army officers, and of consequent defeats on land, and quite
+apart from brilliant sea-fights and the New Orleans victory, the war of
+1812 was of incalculable benefit to the United States. It marks more
+particularly the point at which the already established democracy began
+to shade off into a real nationality.
+
+The Democratic party began its career as a States-rights party.
+Possession of national power had so far modified the practical operation
+of its tenets that it had not hesitated to carry out a national policy,
+and even wage a desperate war, in flat opposition to the will of one
+section of the Union, comprising five of its most influential States;
+and, when the Hartford Convention was suspected of a design to put the
+New England opposition to the war into a forcible veto, there were many
+indications that the dominant party was fully prepared to answer by a
+forcible materialization of the national will. In the North and West, at
+least, the old States-rights formulas never carried a real vitality
+beyond the war of 1812. Men still spoke of "sovereign States," and
+prided themselves on the difference between the "voluntary union of
+States" and the effete despotisms of Europe; but the ghost of the
+Hartford Convention had laid very many more dangerous ghosts in the
+section in which it had appeared.
+
+The theatre of the war, now filled with comfortable farms and populous
+cities, was then less known than any of our Territories in 1896. There
+were no roads, and the transportation of provisions for the troops, of
+guns, ammunition, and stores for the lake navies, was one of the most
+difficult of the problems which the National Government was called upon
+to solve. It cannot be said that the solution was successfully reached,
+for the blunders in transportation were among the most costly,
+exasperating, and dangerous of the war. But the efforts to reach it
+provided the impulse which soon after resulted in the settlement of
+Western New York, the appearance of the germs of such flourishing cities
+as Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse, the opening up of the Southwest
+Territory, between Tennessee and New Orleans, and the rapid admission of
+the new States of Indiana, Illinois, Mississippi, and Missouri. But the
+impulse did not stop here. The inconveniences and dangers arising from
+the possession of a vast territory with utterly inadequate means of
+communication had been brought so plainly to public view by the war that
+the question of communication influenced politics in every direction. In
+New York it took shape in the construction of the Erie Canal (finished
+in 1825). In States farther west and south, the loaning of the public
+credit to enterprises of the nature of the Erie Canal increased until
+the panic of 1837 introduced "repudiation" into American politics. In
+national politics, the necessity of a general system of canals and
+roads, as a means of military defence, was at first admitted by all,
+even by Calhoun, was gradually rejected by the stricter constructionists
+of the Constitution, and finally became a tenet of the National
+Republican party, headed by John Quincy Adams and Clay (1825-29), and of
+its greater successor the Whig party, headed by Clay. This idea of
+Internal Improvements at national expense, though suggested by Gallatin
+and Clay in 1806-08, only became a political question when the war had
+forced it upon public attention; and it has not yet entirely
+disappeared.
+
+The maintenance of such a system required money, and a high tariff of
+duties on imports was a necessary concomitant to Internal Improvements.
+The germ of this system was also a product of the war of 1812. Hamilton
+had proposed it twenty years before; and the first American tariff act
+had declared that its object was the encouragement of American
+manufactures. But the system had never been effectively introduced until
+the war and the blockade had forced American manufactures into
+existence. Peace brought competition with British manufacturers, and the
+American manufacturers began to call for protection. The tariff of 1816
+contained the principle of Protection, but only carried it into practice
+far enough to induce the manufacturers to rely on the dominant party for
+more of it. This expectation, rather than the Federalist opposition to
+the war, is the explanation of the immediate and rapid decline of the
+Federal party in New England. Continued effort brought about the tariff
+of 1824, which was more protective; the tariff of 1828, which was still
+more protective; and the tariff of 1830, which reduced the protective
+element to a system.
+
+The two sections, North and South, had been very much alike until the
+war called the principle of growth into activity. The slave system of
+labor, which had fallen in the North and had survived and been made
+still more profitable in the South by Whitney's invention of the cotton
+gin in 1793, shut the South off from almost all share in the new life.
+That section had a monopoly of the cotton culture, and the present
+profit of slave labor blinded it to the ultimate consequences of it. The
+slave was fit for rude agriculture alone; he could not be employed in
+manufactures, or in any labor which required intelligence; and the
+slave-owner, while he desired manufactures, did not dare to cultivate
+the necessary intelligence in his own slaves. The South could therefore
+find no profit in protection, and yet it could not with dignity admit
+that its slave system precluded it from the advantages of protection, or
+base its opposition to protection wholly on economic grounds. Its only
+recourse was the constitutional ground of the lack of power of Congress
+to pass a protective tariff, and this brought up again the question
+which had evolved the Kentucky resolutions of 1798-9. Calhoun, with
+pitiless logic, developed them into a scheme of constitutional
+Nullification. Under his lead,
+
+South Carolina, in 1832, declared through her State Convention that the
+protective tariff acts were no law, nor binding on the State, its
+officers or citizens. President Jackson, while he was ready and willing
+to suppress any such rebellion by force, was not sorry to see his
+adherents in Congress make use of it to overthrow protection; and a
+"compromise tariff," to which the protectionists agreed, was passed in
+1833. It reduced the duties by an annual percentage for ten years. The
+nullifiers claimed this as a triumph, and formally repealed the
+ordinance of nullification, as if it had accomplished its object. But,
+in its real intent, it had failed wretchedly. It had asserted State
+sovereignty through the State's proper voice of a convention. When the
+time fixed for the execution of the ordinance arrived, Jackson's
+intention of taking the State's sovereignty by the throat had become so
+evident that an unofficial meeting of nullifiers suspended the ordinance
+until the passage of the compromise tariff had made it unnecessary. For
+the first time, the force of a State and the national force had
+approached threateningly near collision, and no State ever tried it
+again. When the tariff of 1842 reintroduced the principle of protection,
+no one thought of taking the broken weapon of nullification from its
+resting-place; and secession was finally attempted only as a sectional
+movement, not as the expression of the will of a State, but as a
+concerted revolution by a number of States. It seems certain that
+nationality had attained force enough, even in 1833, to have put State
+sovereignty forever under its feet; and that but for the cohesive
+sectional force of slavery and its interests, the development of
+nationality would have been undisputed for the future.
+
+New conditions were increasing the growth of the North and West, and
+their separation from the South in national life, even when
+nullification was in its death struggle. The acquisition of Louisiana in
+1803 had been followed in 1807 by Fulton's invention of the steamboat,
+the most important factor in carrying immigration into the new
+territories and opening them up to settlement. But the steamboat could
+not quite bridge over the gap between the Alleghanies and the
+Mississippi. Internal improvements, canals, and improved roads were not
+quite the instrument that was needed. It was found at last in the
+introduction of the railway into the United States in 1830-32. This
+proved to be an agent which could solve every difficulty except its own.
+It could bridge over every gap; it could make profit of its own, and
+make profitable that which had before been unprofitable. It placed
+immigrants where the steamboat, canal, and road could at last be of the
+highest utility to them; it developed the great West with startling
+rapidity; it increased the sale of government lands so rapidly that in a
+few years the debt of the United States was paid off, and the surplus
+became, for the first time, a source of political embarrassment. In a
+few years further, aided by revolutionary troubles in Europe,
+immigration became a great stream, which poured into and altered the
+conditions of every part of the North and West. The stream was
+altogether nationalizing in its nature. The immigrant came to the United
+States, not to a particular State. To him, the country was greater than
+any State; even that of his adoption. Labor conditions excluded the
+South from this element of progress also. Not only were the railroads of
+the South hampered in every point by the old difficulty of slave labor;
+immigration and free labor shunned slave soil as if the plague were
+there prevalent. Year after year the North and West became more national
+in their prejudices and modes of thought and action; while the South
+remained little changed, except by a natural reactionary drift toward a
+more extreme colonialism. The natural result, in the next period was the
+development of a quasi nationality in the South itself.
+
+The introduction of the railway had brought its own difficulties, though
+these were not felt severely until after years. In the continent of
+Europe, the governments carefully retained their powers of eminent
+domain when the new system was introduced. The necessary land was loaned
+to the railways for a term of years, at the expiration of which the
+railway was to revert to the State; and railway troubles were
+non-existent, or comparatively tractable. In the United States, as in
+Great Britain, free right of incorporation was supplemented by what was
+really a gift of the power of eminent domain. The necessary land became
+the property of the corporations in fee, and it has been found almost
+equally difficult to revoke the gift or to introduce a railway control.
+
+Democracy took a new and extreme line of development under its alliance
+with nationality. As the dominant party, about 1827-8, became divided
+into two parties, the new parties felt the democratic influence as
+neither of their predecessors had felt it. Nominations, which had been
+made by cliques of legislators or Congressmen, began to be made by
+popular delegate conventions about 1825. Before 1835, national, State,
+and local conventions had been united into parties of the modern type.
+With them came the pseudo-democratic idea of "rotation in office,"
+introduced into national politics by President Jackson, in 1829, and
+adopted by succeeding administrations. There were also some attempts to
+do away with the electoral system, and to make the federal judiciary
+elective, or to impose on it some other term of office than good
+behavior; but these had neither success nor encouragement.
+
+The financial errors of the war of 1812 had fairly compelled the
+re-establishment of the Bank of the United States in 1816, with a
+charter for twenty years, and the control of the deposits of national
+revenue. Soon after Jackson's inauguration, the managers of the new
+democratic party came into collision with the bank on the appointment of
+a subordinate agent. It very soon became evident that the bank could not
+exist in the new political atmosphere. It was driven into politics;
+a new charter was vetoed in 1832; and after one of the bitterest
+struggles of our history, the bank ceased to exist as a government
+institution in 1836. The reason for its fall, however disguised by
+attendant circumstances, was really its lack of harmony with the
+national-democratic environment which had overtaken it. Benton's
+speech presents a review of this bank struggle and of accompanying
+political controversies.
+
+The anti-slavery agitation, which began in 1830, was as evidently a
+product of the new phase of democracy, but will fall more naturally
+under the next period.
+
+Webster's reply to Hayne has been taken as the best illustration of that
+thoroughly national feeling which was impossible before the war of 1812,
+and increasingly more common after it. It has been necessary to preface
+it with Hayne's speech, in order to have a clear understanding of parts
+of Webster's; but it has not been possible to omit Calhoun's speech, as
+a defence of his scheme of nullification, and as an exemplification of
+the reaction toward colonialism with which the South met the national
+development. It has not seemed necessary to include other examples of
+the orations called forth by the temporary political issues of the time.
+
+
+
+
+ROBERT Y. HAYNE,
+
+---OF SOUTH CAROLINA. (BORN 1791, DIED 1840.)
+
+
+ON MR. FOOT'S RESOLUTION IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, JAN. 21, 1830
+
+
+MR. SPEAKER:
+
+Mr. Hayne said, when he took occasion, two days ago, to throw out some
+ideas with respect to the policy of the government in relation to the
+public lands, nothing certainly could have been further from his
+thoughts than that he should have been compelled again to throw himself
+upon the indulgence of the Senate. Little did I expect, said Mr. H., to
+be called upon to meet such an argument as was yesterday urged by the
+gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Webster). Sir, I question no man's
+opinions; I impeach no man's motives; I charged no party, or State, or
+section of country with hostility to any other, but ventured, as I
+thought, in a becoming spirit, to put forth my own sentiments in
+relation to a great national question of public policy. Such was my
+course. The gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Benton), it is true, had
+charged upon the Eastern States an early and continued hostility toward
+the West, and referred to a number of historical facts and documents in
+support of that charge. Now, sir, how have these different arguments
+been met? The honorable gentleman from Massachusetts, after deliberating
+a whole night upon his course, comes into this chamber to vindicate New
+England; and instead of making up his issue with the gentleman from
+Missouri, on the charges which he had preferred, chooses to consider me
+as the author of those charges, and losing sight entirely of that
+gentleman, selects me as his adversary, and pours out all the vials of
+his mighty wrath upon my devoted head. Nor is he willing to stop there.
+He goes on to assail the institutions and policy of the South, and calls
+in question the principles and conduct of the State which I have the
+honor to represent. When I find a gentleman of mature age and
+experience, of acknowledged talents and profound sagacity, pursuing a
+course like this, declining the contest offered from the West, and
+making war upon the unoffending South, I must believe, I am bound to
+believe, he has some object in view which he has not ventured to
+disclose. Mr. President, why is this? Has the gentleman discovered in
+former controversies with the gentleman from Missouri, that he is
+overmatched by that senator? And does he hope for an easy victory over a
+more feeble adversary? Has the gentleman's distempered fancy been
+disturbed by gloomy forebodings of "new alliances to be formed," at
+which he hinted? Has the ghost of the murdered coalition come back, like
+the ghost of Banquo, to "sear the eyeballs" of the gentleman, and will
+not down at his bidding? Are dark visions of broken hopes, and honors
+lost forever, still floating before his heated imagination? Sir, if it
+be his object to thrust me between the gentleman from Missouri and
+himself, in order to rescue the East from the contest it has provoked
+with the West, he shall not be gratified. Sir, I will not be dragged
+into the defence of my friend from Missouri. The South shall not be
+forced into a conflict not its own. The gentleman from Missouri is able
+to fight his own battles. The gallant West needs no aid from the South
+to repel any attack which may be made upon them from any quarter. Let
+the gentleman from Massachusetts controvert the facts and arguments of
+the gentleman from Missouri, if he can--and if he win the victory, let
+him wear the honors; I shall not deprive him of his laurels. * * *
+
+Sir, any one acquainted with the history of parties in this country will
+recognize in the points now in dispute between the Senator from
+Massachusetts and myself the very grounds which have, from the
+beginning, divided the two great parties in this country, and which
+(call these parties by what names you will, and amalgamate them as you
+may) will divide them forever. The true distinction between those
+parties is laid down in a celebrated manifesto issued by the convention
+of the Federalists of Massachusetts, assembled in Boston, in February,
+1824, on the occasion of organizing a party opposition to the reelection
+of Governor Eustis. The gentleman will recognize this as "the canonical
+book of political scripture"; and it instructs us that, when the
+American colonies redeemed themselves from British bondage, and became
+so many independent nations, they proposed to form a NATIONAL UNION (not
+a Federal Union, sir, but a NATIONAL UNION).
+
+Those who were in favor of a union of the States in this form became
+known by the name of Federalists; those who wanted no union of the
+States, or disliked the proposed form of union, became known by the name
+of Anti-Federalists. By means which need not be enumerated, the
+Anti-Federalists became (after the expiration of twelve years) our
+national rulers, and for a period of sixteen years, until the close of
+Mr. Madison's administration in 1817, continued to exercise the
+exclusive direction of our public affairs. Here, sir, is the true
+history of the origin, rise, and progress of the party of National
+Republicans, who date back to the very origin of the Government, and who
+then, as now, chose to consider the Constitution as having created not a
+Federal, but a National, Union; who regarded "consolidation" as no evil,
+and who doubtless consider it "a consummation to be wished" to build up
+a great "central government," "one and indivisible." Sir, there have
+existed, in every age and every country, two distinct orders of men--the
+lovers of freedom and the devoted advocates of power.
+
+The same great leading principles, modified only by the peculiarities of
+manners, habits, and institutions, divided parties in the ancient
+republics, animated the Whigs and Tories of Great Britain, distinguished
+in our own times the Liberals and Ultras of France, and may be traced
+even in the bloody struggles of unhappy Spain. Sir, when the gallant
+Riego, who devoted himself and all that he possessed to the liberties of
+his country, was dragged to the scaffold, followed by the tears and
+lamentations of every lover of freedom throughout the world, he perished
+amid the deafening cries of "Long live the absolute king!" The people
+whom I represent, Mr. President, are the descendants of those who
+brought with them to this country, as the most precious of their
+possessions, "an ardent love of liberty"; and while that shall be
+preserved, they will always be found manfully struggling against the
+consolidation of the Government AS THE WORST OF EVILS. * * *
+
+Who, then, Mr. President, are the true friends of the Union? Those who
+would confine the Federal Government strictly within the limits
+prescribed by the Constitution; who would preserve to the States and the
+people all powers not expressly delegated; who would make this a Federal
+and not a National Union, and who, administering the Government in a
+spirit of equal justice, would make it a blessing, and not a curse. And
+who are its enemies? Those who are in favor of consolidation; who are
+constantly stealing power from the States, and adding strength to the
+Federal Government; who, assuming an unwarrantable jurisdiction over the
+States and the people, undertake to regulate the whole industry and
+capital of the country. But, sir, of all descriptions of men, I consider
+those as the worst enemies of the Union, who sacrifice the equal rights
+which belong to every member of the confederacy to combinations of
+interested majorities for personal or political objects. But the
+gentleman apprehends no evil from the dependence of the States on the
+Federal Government; he can see no danger of corruption from the
+influence of money or patronage. Sir, I know that it is supposed to be a
+wise saying that "patronage is a source of weakness"; and in support of
+that maxim it has been said that "every ten appointments make a hundred
+enemies." But I am rather inclined to think, with the eloquent and
+sagacious orator now reposing on his laurels on the banks of the
+Roanoke, that "the power of conferring favors creates a crowd of
+dependents"; he gave a forcible illustration of the truth of the remark,
+when he told us of the effect of holding up the savory morsel to the
+eager eyes of the hungry hounds gathered around his door. It mattered
+not whether the gift was bestowed on "Towzer" or "Sweetlips," "Tray,"
+"Blanche," or "Sweetheart"; while held in suspense, they were all
+governed by a nod, and when the morsel was bestowed, the expectation of
+the favors of to-morrow kept up the subjection of to-day.
+
+The Senator from Massachusetts, in denouncing what he is pleased to call
+the Carolina doctrine, has attempted to throw ridicule upon the idea
+that a State has any constitutional remedy by the exercise of its
+sovereign authority, against "a gross, palpable, and deliberate
+violation of the Constitution." He calls it "an idle" or "a ridiculous
+notion," or something to that effect, and added, that it would make the
+Union a "mere rope of sand." Now, sir, as the gentleman has not
+condescended to enter into any examination of the question, and has been
+satisfied with throwing the weight of his authority into the scale, I do
+not deem it necessary to do more than to throw into the opposite scale
+the authority on which South Carolina relies; and there, for the
+present, I am perfectly willing to leave the controversy. The South
+Carolina doctrine, that is to say, the doctrine contained in an
+exposition reported by a committee of the Legislature in December, 1828,
+and published by their authority, is the good old Republican doctrine of
+'98--the doctrine of the celebrated "Virginia Resolutions" of that year,
+and of "Madison's Report" of '99. It will be recollected that the
+Legislature of Virginia, in December, '98, took into consideration the
+alien and sedition laws, then considered by all Republicans as a gross
+violation of the Constitution of the United States, and on that day
+passed, among others, the following resolution:
+
+"The General Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it
+views the powers of the Federal Government, as resulting from the
+compact to which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense
+and intention of the instrument constituting that compact, as no further
+valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact;
+and that in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of
+other powers not granted by the said compact, the States who are the
+parties there-to have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose for
+arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their
+respective limits the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to
+them."
+
+In addition to the above resolution, the General Assembly of Virginia
+"appealed to the other States, in the confidence that they would concur
+with that commonwealth, that the acts aforesaid (the alien and sedition
+laws) are unconstitutional, and that the necessary and proper measures
+would be taken by each for cooperating with Virginia in maintaining
+unimpaired the authorities, rights, and liberties reserved to the States
+respectively, or to the people." * * *
+
+But, sir, our authorities do not stop here. The State of Kentucky
+responded to Virginia, and on the 10th of November, 1798, adopted those
+celebrated resolutions, well known to have been penned by the author of
+the Declaration of American Independence. In those resolutions, the
+Legislature of Kentucky declare, "that the government created by this
+compact was not made the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the
+power delegated to itself, since that would have made its discretion,
+and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all
+other cases of compact among parties having no common judge, each party
+has an equal right to judge for itself as well of infractions as of the
+mode and measure of redress." * * *
+
+Sir, at that day the whole country was divided on this very question. It
+formed the line of demarcation between the federal and republican
+parties; and the great political revolution which then took place turned
+upon the very questions involved in these resolutions. That question was
+decided by the people, and by that decision the Constitution was, in the
+emphatic language of Mr. Jefferson, "saved at its last gasp." I should
+suppose, sir, it would require more self-respect than any gentleman here
+would be willing to assume, to treat lightly doctrines derived from such
+high sources. Resting on authority like this, I will ask, gentlemen,
+whether South Carolina has not manifested a high regard for the Union,
+when, under a tyranny ten times more grievous than the alien and
+sedition laws, she has hitherto gone no further than to petition,
+remonstrate, and to solemnly protest against a series of measures which
+she believes to be wholly unconstitutional and utterly destructive of
+her interests. Sir, South Carolina has not gone one step further than
+Mr. Jefferson himself was disposed to go, in relation to the present
+subject of our present complaints--not a step further than the statesmen
+from New England were disposed to go under similar circumstances; no
+further than the Senator from Massachusetts himself once considered as
+within "the limits of a constitutional opposition." The doctrine that it
+is the right of a State to judge of the violations of the Constitution
+on the part of the Federal Government, and to protect her citizens from
+the operations of unconstitutional laws, was held by the enlightened
+citizens of Boston, who assembled in Faneuil Hall, on the 25th of
+January, 1809. They state, in that celebrated memorial, that "they
+looked only to the State Legislature, which was competent to devise
+relief against the unconstitutional acts of the General Government. That
+your power (say they) is adequate to that object, is evident from the
+organization of the confederacy." * * *
+
+Thus it will be seen, Mr. President, that the South Carolina doctrine is
+the Republican doctrine of '98,--that it was promulgated by the fathers
+of the faith,--that it was maintained by Virginia and Kentucky in the
+worst of times,--that it constituted the very pivot on which the
+political revolution of that day turned,--that it embraces the very
+principles, the triumph of which, at that time, saved the Constitution
+at its last gasp, and which New England statesmen were not unwilling to
+adopt when they believed themselves to be the victims of
+unconstitutional legislation. Sir, as to the doctrine that the Federal
+Government is the exclusive judge of the extent as well as the
+limitations of its power, it seems to me to be utterly subversive of the
+sovereignty and independence of the States. It makes but little
+difference, in my estimation, whether Congress or the Supreme Court are
+invested with this power. If the Federal Government, in all, or any, of
+its departments, is to prescribe the limits of its own authority, and
+the States are bound to submit to the decision, and are not to be
+allowed to examine and decide for themselves when the barriers of the
+Constitution shall be overleaped, this is practically "a government
+without limitation of powers." The States are at once reduced to mere
+petty corporations, and the people are entirely at your mercy. I have
+but one word more to add. In all the efforts that have been made by
+South Carolina to resist the unconstitutional laws which Congress has
+extended over them, she has kept steadily in view the preservation of
+the Union, by the only means by which she believes it can be long
+preserved--a firm, manly, and steady resistance against usurpation. The
+measures of the Federal Government have, it is true, prostrated her
+interests, and will soon involve the whole South in irretrievable ruin.
+But even this evil, great as it is, is not the chief ground of our
+complaints. It is the principle involved in the contest--a principle
+which, substituting the discretion of Congress for the limitations of
+the Constitution, brings the States and the people to the feet of the
+Federal Government, and leaves them nothing they can call their own.
+Sir, if the measures of the Federal Government were less oppressive, we
+should still strive against this usurpation. The South is acting on a
+principle she has always held sacred--resistance to unauthorized
+taxation. These, sir, are the principles which induced the immortal
+Hampden to resist the payment of a tax of twenty shillings. Would twenty
+shillings have ruined his fortune? No! but the payment of half of twenty
+shillings, on the principle on which it was demanded, would have made
+him a slave. Sir, if acting on these high motives--if animated by that
+ardent love of liberty which has always been the most prominent trait in
+the Southern character, we would be hurried beyond the bounds of a cold
+and calculating prudence; who is there, with one noble and generous
+sentiment in his bosom, who would not be disposed, in the language of
+Burke, to exclaim, "You must pardon something to the spirit of liberty?"
+
+
+
+
+DANIEL WEBSTER,
+
+--OF MASSACHUSETTS. (BORN 1782, DIED 1852.)
+
+
+IN REPLY TO HAYNE, IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, JANUARY 26, 1830.
+
+
+MR. PRESIDENT:
+
+When the mariner has been tossed for many days in thick weather, and on
+an unknown sea, he naturally avails himself of the first pause in the
+storm, the earliest glance of the sun, to take his latitude, and
+ascertain how far the elements have driven him from his true course. Let
+us imitate this prudence, and before we float further on the waves of
+this debate, refer to the point from which we departed, that we may at
+least be able to conjecture where we now are. I ask for the reading of
+the resolution before the Senate.
+
+(The Secretary read the resolution, as follows:)
+
+"Resolved, That the Committee on Public Lands be instructed to inquire
+and report the quantity of public land remaining unsold within each
+State and Territory, and whether it be expedient to limit for a certain
+period the sales of the public lands to such lands only as have
+heretofore been offered for sale, and are now subject to entry at the
+minimum price. And, also, whether the office of Surveyor-General, and
+some of the land offices, may not be abolished without detriment to the
+public interest; or whether it be expedient to adopt measures to hasten
+the sales and extend more rapidly the surveys of the public lands."
+
+We have thus heard, sir, what the resolution is which is actually before
+us for consideration; and it will readily occur to everyone, that it is
+almost the only subject about which something has not been said in the
+speech, running through two days, by which the Senate has been
+entertained by the gentleman from South Carolina. Every topic in the
+wide range of our public affairs, whether past or present--every thing,
+general or local, whether belonging to national politics or party
+politics--seems to have attracted more or less of the honorable member's
+attention, save only the resolution before the Senate. He has spoken of
+every thing but the public lands; they have escaped his notice. To that
+subject, in all his excursions, he has not paid even the cold respect of
+a passing glance.
+
+When this debate, sir, was to be resumed, on Thursday morning, it so
+happened that it would have been convenient for me to be elsewhere. The
+honorable member, however, did not incline to put off the discussion to
+another day. He had a shot, he said, to return, and he wished to
+discharge it. That shot, sir, which he thus kindly informed us was
+coming, that we might stand out of the way, or prepare ourselves to fall
+by it and die with decency, has now been received. Under all advantages,
+and with expectation awakened by the tone which preceded it, it has been
+discharged, and has spent its force. It may become me to say no more of
+its effect, than that, if nobody is found, after all, either killed or
+wounded, it is not the first time in the history of human affairs, that
+the vigor and success of the war have not quite come up to the lofty and
+sounding phrase of the manifesto.
+
+The gentleman, sir, in declining to postpone the debate, told the
+Senate, with the emphasis of his hand upon his heart, that there was
+something rankling here, which he wished to relieve. (Mr. Hayne rose,
+and disclaimed having used the word rankling.) It would not, Mr.
+President, be safe for the honorable member to appeal to those around
+him, upon the question whether he did in fact make use of that word. But
+he may have been unconscious of it. At any rate, it is enough that he
+disclaims it. But still, with or without the use of that particular
+word, he had yet something here, he said, of which he wished to rid
+himself by an immediate reply. In this respect, sir, I have a great
+advantage over the honorable gentleman. There is nothing here, sir,
+which gives me the slightest uneasiness; neither fear, nor anger, nor
+that which is sometimes more troublesome than either, the consciousness
+of having been in the wrong. There is nothing, either originating here,
+or now received here by the gentleman's shot. Nothing originating here,
+for I had not the slightest feeling of unkindness toward the honorable
+member. Some passages, it is true, had occurred since our acquaintance
+in this body, which I could have wished might have been otherwise; but I
+had used philosophy and forgotten them. I paid the honorable member the
+attention of listening with respect to his first speech; and when he sat
+down, though surprised, and I must even say astonished, at some of his
+opinions, nothing was farther from my intention than to commence any
+personal warfare. Through the whole of the few remarks I made in answer,
+I avoided, studiously and carefully, every thing which I thought
+possible to be construed into disrespect. And, Sir, while there is thus
+nothing originating here which I have wished at any time, or now wish,
+to discharge, I must repeat, also, that nothing has been received here
+which rankles, or in any way gives me annoyance. I will not accuse the
+honorable member of violating the rules of civilized war; I will not say
+that he poisoned his arrows. But whether his shafts were, or were not,
+dipped in that which would have caused rankling if they had reached
+their destination, there was not, as it happened, quite strength enough
+in the bow to bring them to their mark. If he wishes now to gather up
+those shafts, he must look for them elsewhere; they will not be found
+fixed and quivering in the object at which they were aimed.
+
+The honorable member complained that I slept on his speech. I must have
+slept on it, or not slept at all. The moment the honorable member sat
+down, his friend from Missouri rose, and, with much honeyed commendation
+of the speech, suggested that the impressions which it had produced were
+too charming and delightful to be disturbed by other sentiments or other
+sounds, and proposed that the Senate should adjourn. Would it have been
+quite amiable in me, Sir, to interrupt this excellent good feeling? Must
+I not have been absolutely malicious, if I could have thrust myself
+forward, to destroy sensations thus pleasing? Was it not much better and
+kinder, both to sleep upon them myself, and to allow others also the
+pleasure of sleeping upon them? But if it be meant, by sleeping upon his
+speech, that I took time to prepare a reply to it, it is quite a
+mistake. Owing to other engagements, I could not employ even the
+interval between the adjournment of the Senate and its meeting the next
+morning, in attention to the subject of this debate. Nevertheless, Sir,
+the mere matter of fact is undoubtedly true. I did sleep on the
+gentleman's speech, and slept soundly. And I slept equally well on his
+speech of yesterday, to which I am now replying. It is quite possible
+that in this respect, also, I possess some advantage over the honorable
+member, attributable, doubtless, to a cooler temperament on my part;
+for, in truth, I slept upon his speeches remarkably well.
+
+But the gentleman inquires why HE was made the object of such a reply.
+Why was he singled out? If an attack has been made on the East, he, he
+assures us, did not begin it; it was made by the gentleman from
+Missouri. Sir, I answered the gentleman's speech because I happened to
+hear it; and because, also, I choose to give an answer to that speech,
+which, if unanswered, I thought most likely to produce injurious
+impressions. I did not stop to inquire who was the original drawer of
+the bill. I found a responsible indorser before me, and it was my
+purpose to hold him liable, and to bring him to his just responsibility
+without delay. But, sir, this interrogatory of the honorable member was
+only introductory to another. He proceeded to ask me whether I had
+turned upon him in this debate, from the consciousness that I should
+find an overmatch, if I ventured on a contest with his friend from
+Missouri. If, sir, the honorable member, _modestiae gratia_, had chosen
+thus to defer to his friend, and to pay him compliments, without
+intentional disparagement to others, it would have been quite according
+to the friendly courtesies of debate, and not at all ungrateful to my
+own feelings. I am not one of those, sir, who esteem any tribute of
+regard, whether light and occasional, or more serious and deliberate,
+which may be bestowed on others, as so much unjustly withholden from
+themselves. But the tone and the manner of the gentleman's question
+forbid me thus to interpret it. I am not at liberty to consider it as
+nothing more than a civility to his friend. It had an air of taunt and
+disparagement, something of the loftiness of asserted superiority, which
+does not allow me to pass it over without notice. It was put as a
+question for me to answer, and so put as if it were difficult for me to
+answer whether I deemed the member from Missouri an overmatch for myself
+in debate here. It seems to me, sir, that this is extraordinary
+language, and an extraordinary tone, for the discussions of this body.
+
+Matches and overmatches! Those terms are more applicable elsewhere than
+here, and fitter for other assemblies than this. Sir, the gentleman
+seems to forget where and what we are. This is a Senate, a Senate of
+equals, of men of individual honor and personal character, and of
+absolute independence. We know no masters, we acknowledge no dictators.
+This is a hall for mutual consultation and discussion; not an arena for
+the exhibition of champions. I offer myself, sir, as a match for no man;
+I throw the challenge of debate at no man's feet. But then, sir, since
+the honorable member has put the question in a manner that calls for an
+answer, I will give him an answer; and I tell him, that, holding myself
+to be the humblest of the members here, I yet know nothing in the arm of
+his friend from Missouri, either alone or when aided by the arm of his
+friend from South Carolina, that need deter even me from espousing
+whatever opinions I may choose to espouse, from debating whenever I may
+choose to debate, or from speaking whatever I may see fit to say, on the
+floor of the Senate. Sir, when uttered as matter of commendation or
+compliment, I should dissent from nothing which the honorable member
+might say of his friend. Still less do I put forth any pretensions of my
+own. But when put to me as a matter of taunt, I throw it back, and say
+to the gentleman, that he could possibly say nothing less likely than
+such a comparison to wound my pride of personal character. The anger of
+its tone rescued the remark from intentional irony, which otherwise,
+probably, would have been its general acceptation. But, sir, if it be
+imagined by this mutual quotation and commendation; if it be supposed
+that, by casting the characters of the drama, assigning to each his
+part, to one the attack, to another the cry of onset; or if it be
+thought that, by a loud and empty vaunt of anticipated victory, any
+laurels are to be won here; if it be imagined, especially, that any, or
+all of these things will shake any purpose of mine, I can tell the
+honorable member, once for all, that he is greatly mistaken, and that he
+is dealing with one of whose temper and character he has yet much to
+learn. Sir, I shall not allow myself, on this occasion, I hope on no
+occasion, to be betrayed into any loss of temper; but if provoked, as I
+trust I never shall be, into crimination and recrimination, the
+honorable member may, perhaps, find that in that contest, there will be
+blows to take as well as blows to give; that others can state
+comparisons as significant, at least, as his own, and that his impunity
+may possibly demand of him whatever powers of taunt and sarcasm he may
+possess. I commend him to a prudent husbandry of his resources.
+
+On yet another point, I was still more unaccountably misunderstood. The
+gentlemen had harangued against "consolidation." I told him, in reply,
+that there was one kind of consolidation to which I was attached, and
+that was the consolidation of our Union; that this was precisely that
+consolidation to which I feared others were not attached, and that such
+consolidation was the very end of the Constitution, the leading object,
+as they had informed us themselves, which its framers had kept in view.
+I turned to their communication, and read their very words, "the
+consolidation of the Union," and expressed my devotion to this sort of
+consolidation. I said, in terms, that I wished not in the slightest
+degree to augment the powers of this government; that my object was to
+preserve, not to enlarge; and that by consolidating the Union I
+understood no more than the strengthening of the Union, and perpetuating
+it. Having been thus explicit, having thus read from the printed book
+the precise words which I adopted, as expressing my own sentiments, it
+passes comprehension how any man could understand me as contending for
+an extension of the powers of the government, or for consolidation in
+that odious sense in which it means an accumulation, in the Federal
+Government, of the powers properly belonging to the States.
+
+I repeat, sir, that, in adopting the sentiments of the framers of the
+Constitution, I read their language audibly, and word for word; and I
+pointed out the distinction, just as fully as I have now done, between
+the consolidation of the Union and that other obnoxious consolidation
+which I disclaim. And yet the honorable member misunderstood me. The
+gentleman had said that he wished for no fixed revenue,--not a shilling.
+If by a word he could convert the Capitol into gold, he would not do it.
+Why all this fear of revenue? Why, sir, because, as the gentleman told
+us, it tends to consolidation. Now this can mean neither more nor less
+than that a common revenue is a common interest, and that all common
+interests tend to preserve the union of the States. I confess I like
+that tendency; if the gentleman dislikes it, he is right in deprecating
+a shilling of fixed revenue. So much, sir, for consolidation. * * *
+
+Professing to be provoked by what he chose to consider a charge made by
+me against South Carolina, the honorable member, Mr. President, has
+taken up a crusade against New England. Leaving altogether the subject
+of the public lands, in which his success, perhaps, had been neither
+distinguished nor satisfactory, and letting go, also, of the topic of
+the tariff, he sallied forth in a general assault on the opinions,
+politics, and parties of New England, as they have been exhibited in the
+last thirty years.
+
+New England has, at times, so argues the gentleman, held opinions as
+dangerous as those which he now holds. Suppose this were so; how should
+he therefore abuse New England? If he find himself countenanced by acts
+of hers, how is it that, while he relies on these acts, he covers, or
+seeks to cover, their authors with reproach? But, sir, if in the course
+of forty years, there have been undue effervescences of party in New
+England, has the same thing happened nowhere else? Party animosity and
+party outrage, not in New England, but elsewhere, denounced President
+Washington, not only as a Federalist, but as a Tory, a British agent, a
+man who in his high office sanctioned corruption. But does the honorable
+member suppose, if I had a tender here who should put such an effusion
+of wickedness and folly into my hand, that I would stand up and read it
+against the South? Parties ran into great heats again in 1799 and 1800.
+What was said, sir, or rather what was not said, in those years, against
+John Adams, one of the committee that drafted the Declaration of
+Independence, and its admitted ablest defender on the floor of Congress?
+If the gentleman wishes to increase his stores of party abuse and frothy
+violence, if he has a determined proclivity to such pursuits, there are
+treasures of that sort south of the Potomac, much to his taste, yet
+untouched. I shall not touch them. * * * The gentleman's purveyors have
+only catered for him among the productions of one side. I certainly
+shall not supply the deficiency by furnishing him samples of the other.
+I leave to him, and to them, the whole concern. It is enough for me to
+say, that if, in any part of their grateful occupation, if, in all their
+researches, they find any thing in the history of Massachusetts, or of
+New England, or in the proceedings of any legislative or other public
+body, disloyal to the Union, speaking slightingly of its value,
+proposing to break it up, or recommending non-intercourse with
+neighboring States, on account of difference in political opinion, then,
+sir, I give them all up to the honorable gentleman's unrestrained
+rebuke; expecting, however, that he will extend his buffetings in like
+manner, to all similar proceedings, wherever else found. * * *
+
+Mr. President, in carrying his warfare, such as it is, into New England,
+the honorable gentleman all along professes to be acting on the
+defensive. He chooses to consider me as having assailed South Carolina,
+and insists that he comes forth only as her champion, and in her
+defence. Sir, I do not admit that I made any attack whatever on South
+Carolina. Nothing like it. The honorable member, in his first speech,
+expressed opinions, in regard to revenue and some other topics, which I
+heard with both pain and surprise. I told the gentleman I was aware that
+such sentiments were entertained out of the Government, but had not
+expected to find them advanced in it; that I knew there were persons in
+the South who speak of our Union with indifference or doubt, taking
+pains to magnify its evils, and to say nothing of its benefits; that the
+honorable member himself, I was sure, could never be one of these; and I
+regretted the expression of such opinions as he had avowed, because I
+thought their obvious tendency was to encourage feelings of disrespect
+to the Union, and to impair its strength. This, sir, is the sum and
+substance of all I said on the abject. And this constitutes the attack
+which called on the chivalry of the gentleman, in his own opinion, to
+harry us with such a foray among the party pamphlets and party
+proceedings in Massachusetts! If he means that I spoke with
+dissatisfaction or disrespect of the ebullitions of individuals in South
+Carolina, it is true. But if he means that I assailed the character of
+the State, her honor, or patriotism, that I reflected on her history or
+her conduct, he has not the slightest grounds for any such assumption. *
+* * I shall not acknowledge that the honorable member goes before me in
+regard for whatever of distinguished talent or distinguished character
+South Carolina has produced. I claim part of the honor, I partake in the
+pride of her great names. I claim them for my countrymen, one and all,
+the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumpters, the
+Marions,--Americans all, whose fame is no more to be hemmed in by State
+lines than their talents and patriotism were capable of being
+circumscribed within the same narrow limits. In their day and generation
+they served and honored the country, and the whole country; and their
+renown is of the treasures of the whole country. Him whose honored name
+the gentleman himself bears--does he esteem me less capable of gratitude
+for his patriotism, or sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had
+first opened upon the light of Massachusetts, instead of South Carolina?
+Sir, does he suppose it in his power to exhibit a Carolina name so
+bright as to produce envy in my bosom? No, sir; increased gratification
+and delight, rather. I thank God that, if I am gifted with little of the
+spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet none, as
+I trust, of that other spirit which would drag angels down. When I shall
+be found, sir, in my place here in the Senate, or elsewhere, to sneer at
+public merit, because it happens to spring up beyond the little limits
+of my own State or neighborhood; when I refuse, for any such cause, or
+for any cause, the homage due to American talent, to elevated
+patriotism, to sincere devotion to liberty and the country; or, if I see
+an uncommon endowment of Heaven, if I see extraordinary capacity and
+virtue, in any son of the South; and if, moved by local prejudices or
+gangrened by State jealousy, I get up here to abate the tithe of a hair
+from his just character and just fame, may my tongue cleave to the roof
+of my mouth!
+
+Sir, let me recur to pleasing recollections; let me indulge in
+refreshing remembrances of the past; let me remind you that, in early
+times, no States cherished greater harmony, both of principle and
+feeling, than Massachusetts and South Carolina. Would to God that
+harmony might again return! Shoulder to shoulder they went through the
+Revolution, hand in hand they stood round the administration of
+Washington, and felt his own great arm lean on them for support. Unkind
+feeling, if it exist, alienation, and distrust, are the growth,
+unnatural to such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds,
+the seeds of which that same great arm never scattered.
+
+Mr. President, I shall enter upon no encomium of Massachusetts; she
+needs none. There she is. Behold her, and judge for yourselves. There is
+her history; the world knows it by heart. The past, at least, is secure.
+There is Boston, and Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill; and there
+they will remain for ever. The bones of her sons, falling in the great
+struggle for Independence, now lie mingled with the soil of every State
+from New England to Georgia, and there they will lie forever. And, sir,
+where American Liberty raised its first voice, and where its youth was
+nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, in the strength of its
+manhood, and full of its original spirit. If discord and disunion shall
+wound it, if party strife and blind ambition shall hawk and tear it, if
+folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary and necessary restraint
+shall succeed in separating it from that Union, by which alone its
+existence is made sure, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that
+cradle in which its infancy was rocked; it will stretch forth its arm
+with whatever of vigor it may still retain, over the friends who gather
+round it; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, amidst the
+profoundest monuments of its own glory, and on the very spot of its
+origin.
+
+There yet remains to be performed, Mr. President, by far the most grave
+and important duty which I feel to be devolved upon me by this occasion.
+It is to state, and to defend, what I conceive to be the true principles
+of the Constitution under which we are here assembled. I might well have
+desired that so weighty a task should have fallen into other and abler
+hands. I could have wished that it should have been executed by those
+whose character and experience give weight and influence to their
+opinions, such as cannot possibly belong to mine. But, sir, I have met
+the occasion, not sought it; and I shall proceed to state my own
+sentiments, without challenging for them any particular regard, with
+studied plainness, and as much precision as possible.
+
+I understand the honorable gentleman from South Carolina to maintain
+that it is a right of the State Legislatures to interfere whenever, in
+their judgment, this government transcends its constitutional limits,
+and to arrest the operation of its laws.
+
+I understand him to maintain this right, as a right existing under the
+Constitution, not as a right to overthrow it on the ground of extreme
+necessity, such as would justify violent revolution.
+
+I understand him to maintain an authority on the part of the States,
+thus to interfere, for the purpose of correcting the exercise of power
+by the General Government, of checking it and of compelling it to
+conform to their opinion of the extent of its powers.
+
+I understand him to maintain, that the ultimate power of judging of the
+constitutional extent of its own authority is not lodged exclusively in
+the General Government, or any branch of it; but that, on the contrary,
+the States may lawfully decide for themselves, and each State for
+itself, whether, in a given case, the act of the General Government
+transcends its power.
+
+I understand him to insist, that, if the exigencies of the case, in the
+opinion of any State government, require it, such State government may,
+by its own sovereign authority, annul an act of the General Government
+which it deems plainly and palpably unconstitutional.
+
+This is the sum of what I understand from him to be the South Carolina
+doctrine, and the doctrine which he maintains. I propose to consider it,
+and compare it with the Constitution. Allow me to say, as a preliminary
+remark, that I call this the South Carolina doctrine only because the
+gentleman himself has so denominated it. I do not feel at liberty to say
+that South Carolina, as a State, has ever advanced these sentiments. I
+hope she has not, and never may. That a great majority of her people are
+opposed to the tariff laws, is doubtless true. That a majority, somewhat
+less than that just mentioned, conscientiously believe these laws
+unconstitutional, may probably also be true. But that any majority holds
+to the right of direct State interference at State discretion, the right
+of nullifying acts of Congress by acts of State legislation, is more
+than I know, and what I shall be slow to believe.
+
+That there are individuals besides the honorable gentleman who do
+maintain these opinions, is quite certain. I recollect the recent
+expression of a sentiment, which circumstances attending its utterance
+and publication justify us in supposing was not unpremeditated. "The
+sovereignty of the State,--never to be controlled, construed, or decided
+on, but by her own feelings of honorable justice."
+
+[Mr. HAYNE here rose and said, that, for the purpose of being clearly
+understood, he would state that his proposition was in the words of the
+Virginia resolution as follows:
+
+"That this assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it
+views the powers of the Federal Government, as resulting from the
+compact to which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense
+and intention of the instrument constituting that compact, as no farther
+valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact;
+and that, in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of
+other powers not granted by the said compact. The States that are
+parties thereto have the right, and are in duty bound to interpose for
+arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their
+respective limits the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to
+them."
+
+Mr. WEBSTER resumed:]
+
+I am quite aware, Mr. President, of the existence of the resolution
+which the gentleman read, and has now repeated, and that he relies on it
+as his authority. I know the source, too, from which it is understood to
+have proceeded. I need not say that I have much respect for the
+constitutional opinions of Mr. Madison; they would weigh greatly with me
+always. But before the authority of his opinion be vouched for the
+gentleman's proposition, it will be proper to consider what is the fair
+interpretation of that resolution, to which Mr. Madison is understood to
+have given his sanction. As the gentleman construes it, it is an
+authority for him. Possibly, he may not have adopted the right
+construction. That resolution declares, that, in the case of the
+dangerous exercise of powers not granted by the General Government, the
+States may interpose to arrest the progress of the evil. But how
+interpose, and what does this declaration purport? Does it mean no more
+than that there may be extreme cases, in which the people, in any mode
+of assembling, may resist usurpation, and relieve themselves from a
+tyrannical government? No one will deny this. Such resistance is not
+only acknowledged to be just in America, but in England also. Blackstone
+admits as much, in the theory, and practice, too, of the English
+Constitution. We, sir, who oppose the Carolina doctrine, do not deny
+that the people may, if they choose, throw off any government when it
+becomes oppressive and intolerable, and erect a better in its stead. We
+all know that civil institutions are established for the public benefit,
+and that when they cease to answer the ends of their existence they may
+be changed. But I do not understand the doctrine now contended for to be
+that, which, for the sake of distinction, we may call the right of
+revolution. I understand the gentleman to maintain, that, without
+revolution, without civil commotion, without rebellion, a remedy for
+supposed abuse and transgression of the powers of the General Government
+lies in a direct appeal to the interference of the State governments.
+
+[Mr. HAYNE here arose and said: He did not contend for the mere right of
+revolution, but for the right of constitutional resistance. What he
+maintained was, that in a case of plain, palpable violation of the
+Constitution by the General Government, a State may interpose; and that
+this interposition is constitutional.
+
+Mr. WEBSTER resumed:]
+
+So, sir, I understood the gentleman, and am happy to find that I did not
+misunderstand him. What he contends for is, that it is constitutional to
+interrupt the administration of the Constitution itself, in the hands of
+those who are chosen and sworn to administer it, by the direct
+interference, in form of law, of the States, in virtue of their
+sovereign capacity. The inherent right in the people to reform their
+government I do not deny; and they have another right, and that is, to
+resist unconstitutional laws, without overturning the government. It is
+no doctrine of mine that unconstitutional laws bind the people. The
+great question is, Whose prerogative is it to decide on the
+constitutionality or unconstitutionality of the laws? On that, the main
+debate hinges. The proposition, that, in case of a supposed violation of
+the Constitution by Congress, the States have a constitutional right to
+interfere and annul the law of Congress is the proposition of the
+gentleman. I do not admit it. If the gentleman had intended no more than
+to assert the right of revolution for justifiable cause, he would have
+said only what all agree to. But I cannot conceive that there can be a
+middle course, between submission to the laws, when regularly pronounced
+constitutional, on the one hand, and open resistance, which is
+revolution or rebellion, on the other. I say, the right of a State to
+annul a law of Congress cannot be maintained, but on the ground of the
+inalienable right of man to resist oppression; that is to say, upon the
+ground of revolution. I admit that there is an ultimate violent remedy,
+above the Constitution and in defiance of the Constitution, which may be
+resorted to when a revolution is to be justified. But I do not admit,
+that, under the Constitution and in conformity with it, there is any
+mode in which a State government, as a member of the Union, can
+interfere and stop the progress of the General Government, by force of
+her own laws, under any circumstances whatever.
+
+This leads us to inquire into the origin of this government and the
+source of its power. Whose agent is it? Is it the creature of the State
+Legislatures, or the creature of the people? If the Government of the
+United States be the agent of the State governments, then they may
+control it, provided they can agree in the manner of controlling it; if
+it be the agent of the people, then the people alone can control it,
+restrain it, modify, or reform it. It is observable enough, that the
+doctrine for which the honorable gentleman contends leads him to the
+necessity of maintaining, not only that this General Government is the
+creature of the States, but that it is the creature of each of the
+States, severally, so that each may assert the power for itself of
+determining whether it acts within the limits of its authority. It is
+the servant of four-and-twenty masters, of different wills and different
+purposes, and yet bound to obey all. This absurdity (for it seems no
+less) arises from a misconception as to the origin of this government
+and its true character. It is, sir, the people's Constitution, the
+people's government, made for the people, made by the people, and
+answerable to the people. The people of the United States have declared
+that this Constitution shall be supreme law. We must either admit the
+proposition, or deny their authority. The States are, unquestionably,
+sovereign, so far as their sovereignty is not affected by this supreme
+law. But the State Legislatures, as political bodies, however sovereign,
+are yet not sovereign over the people. So far as the people have given
+power to the General Government, so far the grant is unquestionably
+good, and the Government holds of the people, and not of the State
+governments. We are all agents of the same supreme power, the people.
+The General Government and the State governments derive their authority
+from the same source. Neither can, in relation to the other, be called
+primary, though one is definite and restricted, and the other general
+and residuary. The National Government possesses those powers which it
+can be shown the people have conferred on it, and no more. All the rest
+belongs to the State governments, or to the people themselves. So far as
+the people have restrained State sovereignty by the expression of their
+will, in the Constitution of the United States, so far, it must be
+admitted, State sovereignty is effectually controlled. I do not contend
+that it is, or ought to be, controlled farther. The sentiment to which I
+have referred propounds that State sovereignty is only to be controlled
+by its own "feeling of justice"--that is to say, it is not to be
+controlled at all, for one who is to follow his own feelings is under no
+legal control. Now, however men may think this ought to be, the fact is
+that the people of the United States have chosen to impose control on
+State sovereignties. There are those, doubtless, who wish they had been
+left without restraint; but the Constitution has ordered the matter
+differently. To make war, for instance, is an exercise of sovereignty;
+but the Constitution declares that no State shall make war. To coin
+money is another exercise of sovereign power; but no State is at liberty
+to coin money. Again, the Constitution says that no sovereign State
+shall be so sovereign as to make a treaty. These prohibitions, it must
+be confessed, are a control on the State sovereignty of South Carolina,
+as well as of the other States, which does not arise "from her own
+feelings of honorable justice." The opinion referred to, therefore, is
+in defiance of the plainest provisions of the Constitution.
+
+There are other proceedings of public bodies which have already been
+alluded to, and to which I refer again, for the purpose of ascertaining
+more fully what is the length and breadth of that doctrine denominated
+the Carolina doctrine, which the honorable member has now stood up on
+this floor to maintain. In one of them I find it resolved, that "the
+tariff of 1828, and every other tariff designed to promote one branch of
+industry at the expense of others, is contrary to the meaning and
+intention of the federal compact, and such a dangerous, palpable, and
+deliberate usurpation of power, by a determined majority, wielding the
+General Government beyond the limits of its delegated powers, as calls
+upon the States which compose the suffering minority, in their sovereign
+capacity, to exercise the powers which, as sovereigns, necessarily
+devolve upon them when their contract is violated."
+
+Observe, sir, that this resolution holds the tariff of 1828, and every
+other tariff designed to promote one branch of industry at the expense
+of another, to be such a dangerous, palpable, and deliberate usurpation
+of power, as calls upon the States, in their sovereign capacity, to
+interfere by their own authority. This denunciation, Mr. President, you
+will please to observe, includes our old tariff of 1816, as well as all
+others; because that was established to promote the interest of the
+manufacturers of cotton, to the manifest and admitted injury of the
+Calcutta cotton trade. Observe, again, that all the qualifications are
+here rehearsed and charged upon the tariff, which are necessary to bring
+the case within the gentleman's proposition. The tariff is a usurpation;
+it is a dangerous usurpation; it is a palpable usurpation; it is a
+deliberate usurpation. It is such a usurpation, therefore, as calls upon
+the States to exercise their right of interference. Here is a case,
+then, within the gentleman's principles, and all his qualifications of
+his principles. It is a case for action. The Constitution is plainly,
+dangerously, palpably, and deliberately violated; and the States must
+interpose their own authority to arrest the law. Let us suppose the
+State of South Carolina to express the same opinion, by the voice of her
+Legislature. That would be very imposing; but what then? It so happens
+that, at the very moment, when South Carolina resolves that the tariff
+laws are unconstitutional, Pennsylvania and Kentucky resolve exactly the
+reverse. They hold those laws to be both highly proper and strictly
+constitutional. And now, sir, how does the honorable member propose to
+deal with this case? How does he relieve us from this difficulty upon
+any principle of his? His construction gets us into it; how does he
+propose to get us out?
+
+In Carolina the tariff is a palpable, deliberate usurpation; Carolina,
+therefore, may nullify it, and refuse to pay the duties. In Pennsylvania
+it is both clearly constitutional and highly expedient; and there the
+duties are to be paid. And yet we live under a government of uniform
+laws, and under a constitution, too, which contains an express
+provision, as it happens, that all duties shall be equal in all States.
+Does not this approach absurdity?
+
+If there be no power to settle such questions, independent of either of
+the States, is not the whole Union a rope of sand? Are we not thrown
+back again precisely upon the old Confederation?
+
+It is too plain to be argued. Four-and-twenty interpreters of
+constitutional law, each with a power to decide for itself, and none
+with authority to bind any body else, and this constitutional law the
+only bond of their union! What is such a state of things but a mere
+connection during pleasure, or to use the phraseology of the times,
+during feeling? And that feeling, too, not the feeling of the people,
+who established the Constitution, but the feeling of the State
+governments.
+
+In another of the South Carolina addresses, having premised that the
+crisis requires "all the concentrated energy of passion," an attitude of
+open resistance to the laws of the Union is advised. Open resistance to
+the laws, then, is the constitutional remedy, the conservative power of
+the State, which the South Carolina doctrines teach for the redress of
+political evils, real or imaginary. And its authors further say, that,
+appealing with confidence to the Constitution itself, to justify their
+opinions, they cannot consent to try their accuracy by the courts of
+justice. In one sense, indeed, sir, this is assuming an attitude of open
+resistance in favor of liberty. But what sort of liberty? The liberty of
+establishing their own opinions, in defiance of the opinions of all
+others; the liberty of judging and deciding exclusively themselves, in a
+matter in which others have as much right to judge and decide as they;
+the liberty of placing their own opinion above the judgment of all
+others, above the laws, and above the Constitution. This is their
+liberty, and this is the fair result of the proposition contended for by
+the honorable gentleman. Or, it may be more properly said, it is
+identical with it, rather than a result from it. * * *
+
+Sir, the human mind is so constituted, that the merits of both sides of
+a controversy appear very clear, and very palpable, to those who
+respectively espouse them; and both sides usually grow clearer as the
+controversy advances. South Carolina sees unconstitutionality in the
+tariff; she sees oppression there also, and she sees danger.
+Pennsylvania, with a vision not less sharp, looks at the same tariff,
+and sees no such thing in it; she sees it all constitutional, all
+useful, all safe. The faith of South Carolina is strengthened by
+opposition, and she now not only sees, but resolves, that the tariff is
+palpably unconstitutional, oppressive, and dangerous; but Pennsylvania,
+not to be behind her neighbors, and equally willing to strengthen her
+own faith by a confident asseveration resolves, also, and gives to every
+warm affirmative of South Carolina, a plain, downright, Pennsylvania
+negative. South Carolina, to show the strength and unity of her opinion,
+brings her assembly to a unanimity, within seven voices; Pennsylvania,
+not to be outdone in this respect any more than in others, reduces her
+dissentient fraction to a single vote. Now, sir, again, I ask the
+gentleman, What is to be done? Are these States both right? Is he bound
+to consider them both right? If not, which is in the wrong? or, rather,
+which has the best right to decide? And if he, and if I, are not to know
+what the Constitution means, and what it is, till those two State
+legislatures, and the twenty-two others, shall agree in its
+construction, what have we sworn to, when we have sworn to maintain it?
+I was forcibly struck, sir, with one reflection, as the gentleman went
+on in his speech. He quoted Mr. Madison's resolutions, to prove that a
+State may interfere, in a case of deliberate, palpable, and dangerous
+exercise of a power not granted. The honorable member supposes the
+tariff law to be such an exercise of power; and that consequently a case
+has arisen in which the State may, if it see fit, interfere by its own
+law. Now it so happens, nevertheless, that Mr. Madison deems this same
+tariff law quite constitutional. Instead of a clear and palpable
+violation, it is, in his judgment, no violation at all. So that, while
+they use his authority in a hypothetical case, they reject it in the
+very case before them. All this, sir, shows the inherent futility, I had
+almost used a stronger word, of conceding this power of interference to
+the State, and then attempting to secure it from abuse by imposing
+qualifications of which the States themselves are to judge. One of two
+things is true; either the laws of the Union are beyond the discretion
+and beyond the control of the States; or else we have no constitution of
+general government, and are thrust back again to the days of the
+Confederation. * * *
+
+I must now beg to ask, sir, whence is this supposed right of the States
+derived? Where do they find the power to interfere with the laws of the
+Union? Sir, the opinion which the honorable gentleman maintains, is a
+notion founded in a total misapprehension, in my judgment, of the origin
+of this government, and of the foundation on which it stands. I hold it
+to be a popular government, erected by the people; those who administer
+it, responsible to the people; and itself capable of being amended and
+modified, just as the people may choose it should be. It is as popular,
+just as truly emanating from the people, as the State governments. It is
+created for one purpose; the State governments for another. It has its
+own powers; they have theirs. There is no more authority with them to
+arrest the operation of a law of Congress, than with Congress to arrest
+the operation of their laws. We are here to administer a constitution
+emanating immediately from the people, and trusted by them to our
+administration. It is not the creature of the State governments.
+
+This government, sir, is the independent off-spring of the popular will.
+It is not the creature of State legislatures; nay, more, if the whole
+truth must be told, the people brought it into existence, established
+it, and have hitherto supported it, for the very purpose amongst others,
+of imposing certain salutary restraints on State sovereignties. The
+States cannot now make war; they cannot contract alliances; they cannot
+make, each for itself, separate regulations of commerce; they cannot lay
+imposts; they cannot coin money. If this Constitution, sir, be the
+creature of State legislatures, it must be admitted that it has obtained
+a strange control over the volitions of its creators.
+
+The people, then, sir, erected this government. They gave it a
+constitution, and in that constitution they have enumerated the powers
+which they bestow on it. They have made it a limited government. They
+have defined its authority. They have restrained it to the exercise of
+such powers as are granted; and all others, they declare, are reserved
+to the States, or the people. But, sir, they have not stopped here. If
+they had, they would have accomplished but half their work. No
+definition can be so clear as to avoid the possibility of doubt; no
+limitation so precise, as to exclude all uncertainty. Who, then, shall
+construe this grant of the people? Who shall interpret their will, where
+it may be supposed they have left it doubtful? With whom do they repose
+this ultimate right of deciding on the powers of the government? Sir,
+they have settled all this in the fullest manner. They have left it with
+the government itself, in its appropriate branches. Sir, the very chief
+end, the main design, for which the whole Constitution was framed and
+adopted, was to establish a government that should not be obliged to act
+through State agency, or depend on State opinion or State discretion.
+The people had had quite enough of that kind of government under the
+Confederation. Under that system, the legal action, the application of
+law to individuals, belonged exclusively to the States. Congress could
+only recommend; their acts were not of binding force, till the States
+had adopted and sanctioned them. Are we in that condition still? Are we
+yet at the mercy of State discretion and State construction? Sir, if we
+are, then vain will be our attempt to maintain the Constitution under
+which we sit.
+
+But, sir, the people have wisely provided, in the Constitution itself, a
+proper, suitable mode and tribunal for settling questions of
+constitutional law. There are in the Constitution grants of powers to
+Congress, and restrictions on these powers. There are also prohibitions
+on the States. Some authority must, therefore, necessarily exist, having
+the ultimate jurisdiction to fix and ascertain the interpretation of
+these grants, restrictions, and prohibitions. The Constitution has
+itself pointed out, ordained, and established that authority. How has it
+accomplished this great and essential end? By declaring, sir, that "the
+Constitution and the laws of the United States made in pursuance
+thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land, any thing in the
+Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding."
+
+This, sir, was the first great step. By this the supremacy of the
+Constitution and the laws of the United States is declared. The people
+so will it. No State law is to be valid which comes in conflict with the
+Constitution, or any law of the United States passed in pursuance of it.
+But who shall decide this question of interference? To whom lies the
+last appeal? This, sir, the Constitution itself decides also, by
+declaring, "that the judicial power shall extend to all cases arising
+under the Constitution and laws of the United States." These two
+provisions cover the whole ground. They are, in truth, the keystone of
+the arch! With these it is a government, without them a confederation.
+In pursuance of these clear and express provisions, Congress
+established, at its very first session, in the judicial act, a mode for
+carrying them into full effect, and for bringing all questions of
+constitutional power to the final decision of the Supreme Court. It
+then, sir, became a government. It then had the means of
+self-protection; and but for this, it would, in all probability, have
+been now among things which are past. Having constituted the Government,
+and declared its powers, the people have further said, that, since
+somebody must decide on the extent of these powers, the Government shall
+itself decide; subject, always, like other popular governments, to its
+responsibility to the people. And now, sir, I repeat, how is it that a
+State legislature acquires any power to interfere? Who, or what gives
+them the right to say to the people: "We, who are your agents and
+servants for one purpose, will undertake to decide, that your other
+agents and servants, appointed by you for another purpose, have
+transcended the authority you gave them!" The reply would be, I think,
+not impertinent: "Who made you a judge over another's servants? To their
+own masters they stand or fall."
+
+Sir, I deny this power of State legislatures altogether. It cannot stand
+the test of examination. Gentlemen may say, that, in an extreme case, a
+State government may protect the people from intolerable oppression.
+Sir, in such a case the people might protect themselves without the aid
+of the State governments. Such a case warrants revolution. It must make,
+when it comes, a law for itself. A nullifying act of a State legislature
+cannot alter the case, nor make resistance any more lawful. In
+maintaining these sentiments, sir, I am but asserting the rights of the
+people. I state what they have declared, and insist on their right to
+declare it.
+
+They have chosen to repose this power in the General Government, and I
+think it my duty to support it like other constitutional powers.
+
+For myself, sir, I do not admit the competency of South Carolina or any
+other State to prescribe my constitutional duty; or to settle, between
+me and the people the validity of laws of Congress for which I have
+voted. I decline her umpirage. I have not sworn to support the
+Constitution according to her construction of the clauses. I have not
+stipulated by my oath of office or otherwise, to come under any
+responsibility, except to the people, and those whom they have appointed
+to pass upon the question, whether laws, supported by my votes, conform
+to the Constitution of the country. And, sir, if we look to the general
+nature of the case, could any thing have been more preposterous than to
+make a government for the whole Union, and yet leave its powers subject,
+not to one interpretation, but to thirteen or twenty-four
+interpretations? Instead of one tribunal, established by all,
+responsible to all, with power to decide for all, shall constitutional
+questions be left to four-and-twenty popular bodies, each at liberty to
+decide for itself, and none bound to respect the decisions of others;
+and each at liberty, too, to give a new constitution on every new
+election of its own members? Would any thing, with such a principle in
+it, or rather with such a destitution of all principle be fit to be
+called a government? No, sir. It should not be denominated a
+constitution. It should be called, rather, a collection of topics for
+everlasting controversy; heads of debate for a disputatious people. It
+would not be a government. It would not be adequate to any practical
+good, or fit for any country to live under.
+
+To avoid all possibility of being misunderstood, allow me to repeat
+again in the fullest manner, that I claim no powers for the government
+by forced or unfair construction. I admit that it is a government of
+strictly limited powers; of enumerated, specified, and particularized
+powers; and that whatsoever is not granted is withheld. But
+notwithstanding all this, and however the grant of powers may be
+expressed, its limit and extent may yet, in some cases, admit of doubt;
+and the General Government would be good for nothing, it would be
+incapable of long existing, if some mode had not been provided in which
+those doubts as they should arise, might be peaceably but
+authoritatively solved.
+
+And now, Mr. President, let me run the honorable gentleman's doctrine a
+little into its practical application. Let us look at his probable
+_modus operandi_. If a thing can be done, an ingenious man can tell how
+it is to be done, and I wish to be informed how this State interference
+is to be put in practice, without violence, bloodshed, and rebellion. We
+will take the existing case of the tariff law. South Carolina is said to
+have made up her opinion upon it. If we do not repeal it (as we probably
+shall not), she will then apply to the case the remedy of her doctrine.
+She will, we must suppose, pass a law of her legislature, declaring the
+several acts of Congress, usually called the tariff laws, null and void,
+so far as they respect South Carolina, or the citizens thereof. So far,
+all is a paper transaction, and easy enough. But the collector at
+Charleston is collecting the duties imposed by these tariff laws. He,
+therefore, must be stopped. The collector will seize the goods if the
+tariff duties are not paid. The State authorities will undertake their
+rescue, the marshal, with his posse, will come to the collector's aid,
+and here the contest begins. The militia of the State will be called out
+to sustain the nullifying act. They will march, sir, under a very
+gallant leader; for I believe the honorable member himself commands the
+militia of that part of the State. He will raise the NULLIFYING ACT on
+his standard, and spread it out as his banner! It will have a preamble,
+setting forth, that the tariff laws are palpable, deliberate, and
+dangerous violations of the Constitution! He will proceed, with this
+banner flying, to the custom-house in Charleston,
+
+         "All the while,
+   Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds."
+
+Arrived at the custom-house, he will tell the collector that he must
+collect no more duties under any of the tariff laws. This he will be
+somewhat puzzled to say, by the way, with a grave countenance,
+considering what hand South Carolina herself had in that of 1816. But,
+sir, the collector would not, probably, desist at his bidding. He would
+show him the law of Congress, the treasury instruction, and his own oath
+of office. He would say, he should perform his duty, come what come
+might.
+
+Here would ensue a pause; for they say that a certain stillness precedes
+the tempest. The trumpeter would hold his breath awhile, and before all
+this military array should fall on the custom-house, collector, clerks,
+and all, it is very probable some of those composing it would request of
+their gallant commander-in-chief to be informed upon a little point of
+law; for they have doubtless, a just respect for his opinions as a
+lawyer, as well as for his bravery as a soldier. They know he has read
+Blackstone and the Constitution, as well as Turenne and Vauban. They
+would ask him, therefore, somewhat concerning their rights in this
+matter. They would inquire whether it was not somewhat dangerous to
+resist a law of the United States. What would be the nature of their
+offence, they would wish to learn, if they, by military force and array,
+resisted the execution in Carolina of a law of the United States, and it
+should turn out, after all, that the law was constitutional? He would
+answer, of course, treason. No lawyer could give any other answer. John
+Fries, he would tell them, had learned that some years ago. "How, then,"
+they would ask, "do you propose to defend us? We are not afraid of
+bullets, but treason has a way of taking people off that we do not much
+relish. How do you propose to defend us?" "Look at my floating banner,"
+he would reply; "see there the nullifying law!"
+
+"Is it your opinion, gallant commander," they would then say, "that, if
+we should be indicted for treason, that same floating banner of yours
+would make a good plea in bar?" "South Carolina is a sovereign State,"
+he would reply. "That is true; but would the judge admit our plea?"
+"These tariff laws," he would repeat, "are unconstitutional, palpably,
+deliberately, dangerously." "That may all be so; but if the tribunal
+should not happen to be of that opinion, shall we swing for it? We are
+ready to die for our country, but it is rather an awkward business, this
+dying without touching the ground! After all, that is a sort of hemp tax
+worse than any part of the tariff."
+
+Mr. President, the honorable gentleman would be in a dilemma, like that
+of another great general. He would have a knot before him which he could
+not untie. He must cut it with his sword. He must say to his followers,
+"Defend yourselves with your bayonets"; and this is war--civil war.
+
+Direct collision, therefore, between force and force, is the unavoidable
+result of that remedy for the revision of unconstitutional laws which
+the gentleman contends for. It must happen in the very first case to
+which it is applied. Is not this the plain result? To resist by force
+the execution of a law, generally, is treason. Can the courts of the
+United States take notice of the indulgence of a State to commit
+treason? The common saying, that a State cannot commit treason herself,
+is nothing to the purpose. Can she authorize others to do it? If John
+Fries had produced an act of Pennsylvania, annulling the law of
+Congress, would it have helped his case? Talk about it as we will, these
+doctrines go the length of revolution. They are incompatible with any
+peaceable administration of the government. They lead directly to
+disunion and civil commotion; and therefore it is, that at their
+commencement, when they are first found to be maintained by respectable
+men, and in a tangible form, I enter my public protest against them all.
+
+The honorable gentleman argues that, if this Government be the sole
+judge of the extent of its own powers, whether that right of judging be
+in Congress or the Supreme Court, it equally subverts State sovereignty.
+This the gentleman sees, or thinks he sees, although he cannot perceive
+how the right of judging, in this matter, if left to the exercise of
+State legislatures, has any tendency to subvert the government of the
+Union. The gentleman's opinion may be, that the right ought not to have
+been lodged with the General Government; he may like better such a
+Constitution as we should have had under the right of State
+interference; but I ask him to meet me on the plain matter of fact. I
+ask him to meet me on the Constitution itself. I ask him if the power is
+not found there, clearly and visibly found there?
+
+But, sir, what is this danger, and what are the grounds of it? Let it be
+remembered that the Constitution of the United States is not
+unalterable. It is to continue in its present form no longer than the
+people who established it shall choose to continue it. If they shall
+become convinced that they have made an injudicious or inexpedient
+partition and distribution of power between the State governments and
+the General Government, they can alter that distribution at will.
+
+If any thing be found in the national Constitution, either by original
+provision or subsequent interpretation, which ought not to be in it, the
+people know how to get rid of it. If any construction, unacceptable to
+them, be established so as to become practically a part of the
+Constitution, they will amend it, at their own sovereign pleasure. But
+while the people choose to maintain it as it is, while they are
+satisfied with it, and refuse to change it, who has given, or who can
+give, to the legislatures a right to alter it, either by interference,
+construction, or otherwise? Gentlemen do not seem to recollect that the
+people have any power to do any thing for themselves. They imagine there
+is no safety for them, any longer than they are under the close
+guardianship of the State legislatures. Sir, the people have not trusted
+their safety, in regard to the General Constitution, to these hands.
+They have required other security, and taken other bonds. They have
+chosen to trust themselves, first, to the plain words of the instrument,
+and to such construction as the Government themselves, in doubtful
+cases, should put on their powers, under their oaths of office, and
+subject to their responsibility to them, just as the people of a State
+trust to their own governments with a similar power. Secondly, they have
+reposed their trust in the efficacy of frequent elections, and in their
+own power to remove their own servants and agents whenever they see
+cause.
+
+Thirdly, they have reposed trust in the judicial power, which, in order
+that it might be trustworthy, they have made as respectable, as
+disinterested, and as independent as was practicable. Fourthly, they
+have seen fit to rely, in case of necessity, or high expediency, on
+their known and admitted power to alter or amend the Constitution,
+peaceably and quietly, whenever experience shall point out defects or
+imperfections. And, finally, the people of the United States have at no
+time, in no way, directly or indirectly, authorized any State
+legislature to construe or interpret their high instrument of
+government; much less to interfere, by their own power, to arrest its
+course and operation.
+
+If, sir, the people in these respects had done otherwise than they have
+done, their Constitution could neither have been preserved, nor would it
+have been worth preserving. And if its plain provisions shall now be
+disregarded, and these new doctrines interpolated in it, it will become
+as feeble and helpless a being as its enemies, whether early or more
+recent, could possibly desire. It will exist in every State but as a
+poor dependent on State permission. It must borrow leave to be; and will
+be, no longer than State pleasure, or State discretion, sees fit to
+grant the indulgence, and to prolong its poor existence.
+
+But, sir, although there are fears, there are hopes also. The people
+have preserved this, their own chosen Constitution, for forty years, and
+have seen their happiness, prosperity, and renown grow with its growth,
+and strengthen with its strength. They are now, generally, strongly
+attached to it. Overthrown by direct assault, it cannot be; evaded,
+undermined, NULLIFIED, it will not be, if we, and those who shall
+succeed us here, as agents and representatives of the people, shall
+conscientiously and vigilantly discharge the two great branches of our
+public trust, faithfully to preserve and wisely to administer it.
+
+Mr. President, I have thus stated the reasons of my dissent to the
+doctrines which have been advanced and maintained. I am conscious of
+having detained you and the Senate much too long. I was drawn into the
+debate with no previous deliberation, such as is suited to the
+discussion of so grave and important a subject. But it is a subject of
+which my heart is full, and I have not been willing to suppress the
+utterance of its spontaneous sentiments. I cannot, even now, persuade
+myself to relinquish it, without expressing, once more my deep
+conviction, that, since it respects nothing less than the union of the
+States, it is of most vital and essential importance to the public
+happiness. I profess, sir, in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily
+in view the prosperity and honor of the whole country, and the
+preservation of our Federal Union. It is to that Union we owe our safety
+at home, and our consideration and dignity abroad. It is to that Union
+that we are chiefly indebted for whatever makes us most proud of our
+country. That Union we reached only by the discipline of our virtues in
+the severe school of adversity. It had its origin in the necessities of
+disordered finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its
+benign influences, these great interests immediately awoke, as from the
+dead, and sprang forth with newness of life. Every year of its duration
+has teemed with fresh proofs of its utility and its blessings; and
+although our territory has stretched out wider and wider, and our
+population spread farther and farther, they have not outrun its
+protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a copious fountain of
+national, social, and personal happiness.
+
+I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what
+might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed
+the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together
+shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the
+precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom
+the depth of the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe
+counsellor in the affairs of this Government, whose thoughts should be
+mainly bent on considering, not how the Union may be best preserved, but
+how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it should be
+broken up and destroyed. While the Union lasts we have high, exciting,
+gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us and our children.
+Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that in my day
+at least that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never
+may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold
+for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the
+broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union, on States
+dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or
+drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and
+lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now
+known and honored through-out the earth, still full high advanced, its
+arms and trophies streaming in their original lustre, not a stripe
+erased or polluted, not a single star obscured, bearing for its motto,
+no such miserable interrogotary as "What is all this worth?" nor those
+other words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterward";
+but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing
+on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land,
+and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to
+every true American heart,--Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and
+inseparable!
+
+
+
+
+JOHN C. CALHOUN
+
+--OF SOUTH CAROLINA. (BORN 1782, DIED 1850.)
+
+
+ON NULLIFICATION AND THE FORCE BILL,
+
+IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, FEB. 15, 1833.
+
+
+MR. PRESIDENT:
+
+At the last session of Congress, it was avowed on all sides that the
+public debt, as to all practical purposes, was in fact paid, the small
+surplus remaining being nearly covered by the money in the Treasury and
+the bonds for duties which had already accrued; but with the arrival of
+this event our last hope was doomed to be disappointed. After a long
+session of many months, and the most earnest effort on the part of South
+Carolina and the other Southern States to obtain relief, all that could
+be effected was a small reduction in the amount of the duties, but a
+reduction of such a character that, while it diminished the amount of
+burden, it distributed that burden more unequally than even the
+obnoxious act of 1828; reversing the principle adopted by the bill of
+1816, of laying higher duties on the unprotected than the protected
+articles, by repealing almost entirely the duties laid upon the former,
+and imposing the burden almost entirely on the latter. It was thus that,
+instead of relief--instead of an equal distribution of burdens and
+benefits of the government, on the payment of the debt, as had been
+fondly anticipated,--the duties were so arranged as to be, in fact,
+bounties on one side and taxation on the other; thus placing the two
+great sections of the country in direct conflict in reference to its
+fiscal action, and thereby letting in that flood of political corruption
+which threatens to sweep away our Constitution and our liberty.
+
+This unequal and unjust arrangement was pronounced, both by the
+administration, through its proper organ, the Secretary of the Treasury,
+and by the opposition, to be a permanent adjustment; and it was thus
+that all hope of relief through the action of the General Government
+terminated; and the crisis so long apprehended at length arrived, at
+which the State was compelled to choose between absolute acquiescence in
+a ruinous system of oppression, or a resort to her reserved
+powers--powers of which she alone was the rightful judge, and which
+only, in this momentous juncture, could save her. She determined on the
+latter.
+
+The consent of two thirds of her Legislature was necessary for the call
+of a convention, which was considered the only legitimate organ through
+which the people, in their sovereignty, could speak. After an arduous
+struggle the States-right party succeeded; more than two thirds of both
+branches of the Legislature favorable to a convention were elected; a
+convention was called--the ordinance adopted. The convention was
+succeeded by a meeting of the Legislature, when the laws to carry the
+ordinance into execution were enacted--all of which have been
+communicated by the President, have been referred to the Committee on
+the Judiciary, and this bill is the result of their labor.
+
+Having now corrected some of the prominent misrepresentations as to the
+nature of this controversy, and given a rapid sketch of the movement of
+the State in reference to it, I will next proceed to notice some
+objections connected with the ordinance and the proceedings under it.
+
+The first and most prominent of these is directed against what is called
+the test oath, which an effort has been made to render odious. So far
+from deserving the denunciation that has been levelled against it, I
+view this provision of the ordinance as but the natural result of the
+doctrines entertained by the State, and the position which she occupies.
+The people of Carolina believe that the Union is a union of States, and
+not of individuals; that it was formed by the States, and that the
+citizens of the several States were bound to it through the acts of
+their several States; that each State ratified the Constitution for
+itself, and that it was only by such ratification of a State that any
+obligation was imposed upon its citizens. Thus believing, it is the
+opinion of the people of Carolina that it belongs to the State which has
+imposed the obligation to declare, in the last resort, the extent of
+this obligation, as far as her citizens are concerned; and this upon the
+plain principles which exist in all analogous cases of compact between
+sovereign bodies. On this principle the people of the State, acting in
+their sovereign capacity in convention, precisely as they did in the
+adoption of their own and the Federal Constitution, have declared, by
+the ordinance, that the acts of Congress which imposed duties under the
+authority to lay imposts, were acts not for revenue, as intended by the
+Constitution, but for protection, and therefore null and void. The
+ordinance thus enacted by the people of the State themselves, acting as
+a sovereign community, is as obligatory on the citizens of the State as
+any portion of the Constitution. In prescribing, then, the oath to obey
+the ordinance, no more was done than to prescribe an oath to obey the
+Constitution. It is, in fact, but a particular oath of allegiance, and
+in every respect similar to that which is prescribed, under the
+Constitution of the United States, to be administered to all the
+officers of the State and Federal Governments; and is no more deserving
+the harsh and bitter epithets which have been heaped upon it than that
+or any similar oath. It ought to be borne in mind that, according to the
+opinion which prevails in Carolina, the right of resistance to the
+unconstitutional acts of Congress belongs to the State, and not to her
+individual citizens; and that, though the latter may, in a mere question
+of _meum_ and _tuum_, resist through the courts an unconstitutional
+encroachment upon their rights, yet the final stand against usurpation
+rests not with them, but with the State of which they are members; and
+such act of resistance by a State binds the conscience and allegiance of
+the citizen. But there appears to be a general misapprehension as to the
+extent to which the State has acted under this part of the ordinance.
+Instead of sweeping every officer by a general proscription of the
+minority, as has been represented in debate, as far as my knowledge
+extends, not a single individual has been removed. The State has, in
+fact, acted with the greatest tenderness, all circumstances considered,
+toward citizens who differed from the majority; and, in that spirit, has
+directed the oath to be administered only in the case of some official
+act directed to be performed in which obedience to the ordinance is
+involved. * * *'
+
+It is next objected that the enforcing acts, have legislated the United
+States out of South Carolina. I have already replied to this objection
+on another occasion, and will now but repeat what I then said: that they
+have been legislated out only to the extent that they had no right to
+enter. The Constitution has admitted the jurisdiction of the United
+States within the limits of the several States only so far as the
+delegated powers authorize; beyond that they are intruders, and may
+rightfully be expelled; and that they have been efficiently expelled by
+the legislation of the State through her civil process, as has been
+acknowledged on all sides in the debate, is only a confirmation of the
+truth of the doctrine for which the majority in Carolina have contended.
+
+The very point at issue between the two parties there is, whether
+nullification is a peaceful and an efficient remedy against an
+unconstitutional act of the General Government, and may be asserted, as
+such, through the State tribunals. Both parties agree that the acts
+against which it is directed are unconstitutional and oppressive. The
+controversy is only as to the means by which our citizens may be
+protected against the acknowledged encroachments on their rights. This
+being the point at issue between the parties, and the very object of the
+majority being an efficient protection of the citizens through the State
+tribunals, the measures adopted to enforce the ordinance, of course
+received the most decisive character. We were not children, to act by
+halves. Yet for acting thus efficiently the State is denounced, and this
+bill reported, to overrule, by military force, the civil tribunal and
+civil process of the State! Sir, I consider this bill, and the arguments
+which have been urged on this floor in its support, as the most
+triumphant acknowledgment that nullification is peaceful and efficient,
+and so deeply intrenched in the principles of our system, that it cannot
+be assailed but by prostrating the Constitution, and substituting the
+supremacy of military force in lieu of the supremacy of the laws. In
+fact, the advocates of this bill refute their own argument. They tell us
+that the ordinance is unconstitutional; that it infracts the
+constitution of South Carolina, although, to me, the objection appears
+absurd, as it was adopted by the very authority which adopted the
+constitution itself. They also tell us that the Supreme Court is the
+appointed arbiter of all controversies between a State and the General
+Government. Why, then, do they not leave this controversy to that
+tribunal? Why do they not confide to them the abrogation of the
+ordinance, and the laws made in pursuance of it, and the assertion of
+that supremacy which they claim for the laws of Congress? The State
+stands pledged to resist no process of the court. Why, then, confer on
+the President the extensive and unlimited powers provided in this bill?
+Why authorize him to use military force to arrest the civil process of
+the State? But one answer can be given: That, in a contest between the
+State and the General Government, if the resistance be limited on both
+sides to the civil process, the State, by its inherent sovereignty,
+standing upon its reserved powers, will prove too powerful in such a
+controversy, and must triumph over the Federal Government, sustained by
+its delegated and limited authority; and in this answer we have an
+acknowledgment of the truth of those great principles for which the
+State has so firmly and nobly contended. * * *
+
+Notwithstanding all that has been said, I may say that neither the
+Senator from Delaware (Mr. Clayton), nor any other who has spoken on the
+same side, has directly and fairly met the great question at issue: Is
+this a Federal Union? a union of States, as distinct from that of
+individuals? Is the sovereignty in the several States, or in the
+American people in the aggregate? The very language which we are
+compelled to use when speaking of our political institutions, affords
+proof conclusive as to its real character. The terms union, federal,
+united, all imply a combination of sovereignties, a confederation of
+States. They never apply to an association of individuals. Who ever
+heard of the United State of New York, of Massachusetts, or of Virginia?
+Who ever heard the term federal or union applied to the aggregation of
+individuals into one community? Nor is the other point less clear--that
+the sovereignty is in the several States, and that our system is a union
+of twenty-four sovereign powers, under a constitutional compact, and not
+of a divided sovereignty between the States severally and the United
+States? In spite of all that has been said, I maintain that sovereignty
+is in its nature indivisible. It is the supreme power in a State, and we
+might just as well speak of half a square, or half of a triangle, as of
+half a sovereignty. It is a gross error to confound the exercise of
+sovereign powers with sovereignty itself, or the delegation of such
+powers with the surrender of them. A sovereign may delegate his powers
+to be exercised by as many agents as he may think proper, under such
+conditions and with such limitations as he may impose; but to surrender
+any portion of his sovereignty to another is to annihilate the whole.
+The Senator from Delaware (Mr. Clayton) calls this metaphysical
+reasoning, which he says he cannot comprehend. If by metaphysics he
+means that scholastic refinement which makes distinctions without
+difference, no one can hold it in more utter contempt than I do; but if,
+on the contrary, he means the power of analysis and combination--that
+power which reduces the most complex idea into its elements, which
+traces causes to their first principle, and, by the power of
+generalization and combination, unites the whole in one harmonious
+system--then, so far from deserving contempt, it is the highest
+attribute of the human mind. It is the power which raises man above the
+brute--which distinguishes his faculties from mere sagacity, which he
+holds in common with inferior animals. It is this power which has raised
+the astronomer from being a mere gazer at the stars to the high
+intellectual eminence of a Newton or a Laplace, and astronomy itself
+from a mere observation of insulated facts into that noble science which
+displays to our admiration the system of the universe. And shall this
+high power of the mind, which has effected such wonders when directed to
+the laws which control the material world, be forever prohibited, under
+a senseless cry of metaphysics, from being applied to the high purposes
+of political science and legislation? I hold them to be subject to laws
+as fixed as matter itself, and to be as fit a subject for the
+application of the highest intellectual power. Denunciation may, indeed
+fall upon the philosophical inquirer into these first principles, as it
+did upon Galileo and Bacon, when they first unfolded the great
+discoveries which have immortalized their names; but the time will come
+when truth will prevail in spite of prejudice and denunciation, and when
+politics and legislation will be considered as much a science as
+astronomy and chemistry.
+
+In connection with this part of the subject, I understood the Senator
+from Virginia (Mr. Rives) to say that sovereignty was divided, and that
+a portion remained with the States severally, and that the residue was
+vested in the Union. By Union, I suppose the Senator meant the United
+States. If such be his meaning--if he intended to affirm that the
+sovereignty was in the twenty-four States, in whatever light he may view
+them, our opinions will not disagree; but according to my conception,
+the whole sovereignty is in the several States, while the exercise of
+sovereign power is divided--a part being exercised under compact,
+through this General Government, and the residue through the separate
+State Governments. But if the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Rives) means to
+assert that the twenty-four States form but one community, with a single
+sovereign power as to the objects of the Union, it will be but the
+revival of the old question, of whether the Union is a union between
+States, as distinct communities, or a mere aggregate of the American
+people, as a mass of individuals; and in this light his opinions would
+lead directly to consolidation. * * *
+
+Disguise it as you may, the controversy is one between power and
+liberty; and I tell the gentlemen who are opposed to me, that, as strong
+as may be the love of power on their side, the love of liberty is still
+stronger on ours. History furnishes many instances of similar struggles,
+where the love of liberty has prevailed against power under every
+disadvantage, and among them few more striking than that of our own
+Revolution; where, as strong as was the parent country, and feeble as
+were the colonies, yet, under the impulse of liberty, and the blessing
+of God, they gloriously triumphed in the contest. There are, indeed,
+many striking analogies between that and the present controversy. They
+both originated substantially in the same cause--with this
+difference--in the present case, the power of taxation is converted into
+that of regulating industry; in the other, the power of regulating
+industry, by the regulation of commerce, was attempted to be converted
+into the power of taxation. Were I to trace the analogy further, we
+should find that the perversion of the taxing power, in the one case,
+has given precisely the same control to the Northern section over the
+industry of the Southern section of the Union, which the power to
+regulate commerce gave to Great Britain over the industry of the
+colonies in the other; and that the very articles in which the colonies
+were permitted to have a free trade, and those in which the
+mother-country had a monopoly, are almost identically the same as those
+in which the Southern States are permitted to have a free trade by the
+act of 1832, and in which the Northern States have, by the same act,
+secured a monopoly. The only difference is in the means. In the former,
+the colonies were permitted to have a free trade with all countries
+south of Cape Finisterre, a cape in the northern part of Spain; while
+north of that, the trade of the colonies was prohibited, except through
+the mother-country, by means of her commercial regulations. If we
+compare the products of the country north and south of Cape Finisterre,
+we shall find them almost identical with the list of the protected and
+unprotected articles contained in the list of last year. Nor does the
+analogy terminate here. The very arguments resorted to at the
+commencement of the American Revolution, and the measures adopted, and
+the motives assigned to bring on that contest (to enforce the law), are
+almost identically the same.
+
+But to return from this digression to the consideration of the bill.
+Whatever difference of opinion may exist upon other points, there is one
+on which I should suppose there can be none; that this bill rests upon
+principles which, if carried out, will ride over State sovereignties,
+and that it will be idle for any advocates hereafter to talk of State
+rights. The Senator from Virginia (Mr. Rives) says that he is the
+advocate of State rights; but he must permit me to tell him that,
+although he may differ in premises from the other gentlemen with whom he
+acts on this occasion, yet, in supporting this bill, he obliterates
+every vestige of distinction between him and them, saving only that,
+professing the principles of '98, his example will be more pernicious
+than that of the most open and bitter opponent of the rights of the
+States. I will also add, what I am compelled to say, that I must
+consider him (Mr. Rives) as less consistent than our old opponents,
+whose conclusions were fairly drawn from their premises, while his
+premises ought to have led him to opposite conclusions. The gentleman
+has told us that the new-fangled doctrines, as he chooses to call them,
+have brought State rights into disrepute. I must tell him, in reply,
+that what he calls new-fangled are but the doctrines of '98; and that it
+is he (Mr. Rives), and others with him, who, professing these doctrines,
+have degraded them by explaining away their meaning and efficacy. He
+(Mr. R.) has disclaimed, in behalf of Virginia, the authorship of
+nullification. I will not dispute that point. If Virginia chooses to
+throw away one of her brightest ornaments, she must not hereafter
+complain that it has become the property of another. But while I have,
+as a representative of Carolina, no right to complain of the disavowal
+of the Senator from Virginia, I must believe that he (Mr. R.) has done
+his native State great injustice by declaring on this floor, that when
+she gravely resolved, in '98, that "in cases of deliberate and dangerous
+infractions of the Constitution, the States, as parties to the compact,
+have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose to arrest the
+progress of the evil, and to maintain within their respective limits the
+authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them," she meant no
+more than to proclaim the right to protest and to remonstrate. To
+suppose that, in putting forth so solemn a declaration, which she
+afterward sustained by so able and elaborate an argument, she meant no
+more than to assert what no one had ever denied, would be to suppose
+that the State had been guilty of the most egregious trifling that ever
+was exhibited on so solemn an occasion.
+
+
+
+
+THOMAS H. BENTON, OF MISSOURI. (BORN 1782, DIED 1858.)
+
+
+ON THE EXPUNGING RESOLUTION
+
+--UNITED STATES SENATE, JANUARY 12, 1837
+
+
+MR. PRESIDENT:
+
+It is now near three years since the resolve was adopted by the Senate,
+which it is my present motion to expunge from the journal. At the moment
+that this resolve was adopted, I gave notice of my intention to move to
+expunge it; and then expressed my confident belief that the motion would
+eventually prevail. That expression of confidence was not an ebullition
+of vanity, or a presumptuous calculation, intended to accelerate the
+event it affected to foretell. It was not a vain boast, or an idle
+assumption, but was the result of a deep conviction of the injustice
+done President Jackson, and a thorough reliance upon the justice of the
+American people. I felt that the President had been wronged; and my
+heart told me that this wrong would be redressed! The event proves that
+I was not mistaken. The question of expunging this resolution has been
+carried to the people, and their decision has been had upon it. They
+decide in favor of the expurgation; and their decision has been both
+made and manifested, and communicated to us in a great variety of ways.
+A great number of States have expressly instructed their senators to
+vote for this expurgation. A very great majority of the States have
+elected senators and representatives to Congress, upon the express
+ground of favoring this expurgation. The Bank of the United States,
+which took the initiative in the accusation against the President, and
+furnished the material, and worked the machinery which was used against
+him, and which was then so powerful on this floor, has become more and
+more odious to the public mind, and musters now but a slender phalanx of
+friends in the two Houses of Congress. The late Presidential election
+furnishes additional evidence of public sentiment. The candidate who was
+the friend of President Jackson, the supporter of his administration,
+and the avowed advocate for the expurgation, has received a large
+majority of the suffrages of the whole Union, and that after an express
+declaration of his sentiments on this precise point. The evidence of the
+public will, exhibited in all these forms, is too manifest to be
+mistaken, too explicit to require illustration, and too imperative to be
+disregarded. Omitting details and specific enumeration of proofs, I
+refer to our own files for the instructions to expunge,--to the
+complexion of the two Houses for the temper of the people,--to the
+denationalized condition of the Bank of the United States for the fate
+of the imperious accuser,--and to the issue of the Presidential election
+for the answer of the Union.
+
+All these are pregnant proofs of the public will, and the last
+preeminently so: because, both the question of the expurgation, and the
+form of the process, were directly put in issue upon it. * * *
+
+Assuming, then, that we have ascertained the will of the people on this
+great question, the inquiry presents itself, how far the expression of
+that will ought to be conclusive of our action here. I hold that it
+ought to be binding and obligatory upon us; and that, not only upon the
+principles of representative government, which requires obedience to the
+known will of the people, but also in conformity to the principles upon
+which the proceeding against President Jackson was conducted when the
+sentence against him was adopted. Then everything was done with especial
+reference to the will of the people. Their impulsion was assumed to be
+the sole motive to action; and to them the ultimate verdict was
+expressly referred. The whole machinery of alarm and pressure--every
+engine of political and moneyed power--was put in motion, and worked for
+many months, to excite the people against the President; and to stir up
+meetings, memorials, petitions, travelling committees, and distress
+deputations against him; and each symptom of popular discontent was
+hailed as an evidence of public will, and quoted here as proof that the
+people demanded the condemnation of the President. Not only legislative
+assemblies, and memorials from large assemblies, were then produced here
+as evidence of public opinion, but the petitions of boys under age, the
+remonstrances of a few signers, and the results of the most
+inconsiderable elections were ostentatiously paraded and magnified, as
+the evidence of the sovereign will of our constituents. Thus, sir, the
+public voice was everything, while that voice, partially obtained
+through political and pecuniary machinations, was adverse to the
+President. Then the popular will was the shrine at which all worshipped.
+Now, when that will is regularly, soberly, repeatedly, and almost
+universally expressed through the ballot-boxes, at the various
+elections, and turns out to be in favor of the President, certainly no
+one can disregard it, nor otherwise look at it than as the solemn
+verdict of the competent and ultimate tribunal upon an issue fairly made
+up, fully argued, and duly submitted for decision. As such verdict, I
+receive it. As the deliberate verdict of the sovereign people, I bow to
+it. I am content. I do not mean to reopen the case nor to re-commence
+the argument. I leave that work to others, if any others choose to
+perform it. For myself, I am content; and, dispensing with further
+argument, I shall call for judgment, and ask to have execution done,
+upon that unhappy journal, which the verdict of millions of freemen
+finds guilty of bearing on its face an untrue, illegal, and
+unconstitutional sentence of condemnation against the approved President
+of the Republic.
+
+But, while declining to reopen the argument of this question, and
+refusing to tread over again the ground already traversed, there is
+another and a different task to perform; one which the approaching
+termination of President Jackson's administration makes peculiarly
+proper at this time, and which it is my privilege, and perhaps my duty,
+to execute, as being the suitable conclusion to the arduous contest in
+which we have been so long engaged. I allude to the general tenor of his
+administration, and to its effect, for good or for evil, upon the
+condition of his country. This is the proper time for such a view to be
+taken. The political existence of this great man now draws to a close.
+In little more than forty days he ceases to be an object of political
+hope to any, and should cease to be an object of political hate, or
+envy, to all. Whatever of motive the servile and time-serving might have
+found in his exalted station for raising the altar of adulation, and
+burning the incense of praise before him, that motive can no longer
+exist. The dispenser of the patronage of an empire, the chief of this
+great confederacy of States, is soon to be a private individual,
+stripped of all power to reward, or to punish. His own thoughts, as he
+has shown us in the concluding paragraph of that message which is to be
+the last of its kind that we shall ever receive from him, are directed
+to that beloved retirement from which he was drawn by the voice of
+millions of freemen, and to which he now looks for that interval of
+repose which age and infirmities require. Under these circumstances, he
+ceases to be a subject for the ebullition of the passions, and passes
+into a character for the contemplation of history. Historically, then,
+shall I view him; and limiting this view to his civil administration, I
+demand, where is there a chief magistrate of whom so much evil has been
+predicted, and from whom so much good has come? Never has any man
+entered upon the chief magistracy of a country under such appalling
+predictions of ruin and woe! never has any one been so pursued with
+direful prognostications! never has any one been so beset and impeded by
+a powerful combination of political and moneyed confederates! never has
+any one in any country where the administration of justice has risen
+above the knife or the bowstring, been so lawlessly and shamelessly
+tried and condemned by rivals and enemies, without hearing, without
+defence, without the forms of law and justice! History has been
+ransacked to find examples of tyrants sufficiently odious to illustrate
+him by comparison. Language has been tortured to find epithets
+sufficiently strong to paint him in description. Imagination has been
+exhausted in her efforts to deck him with revolting and inhuman
+attributes. Tyrant, despot, usurper; destroyer of the liberties of his
+country; rash, ignorant, imbecile; endangering the public peace with all
+foreign nations; destroying domestic prosperity at home; ruining all
+industry, all commerce, all manufactures; annihilating confidence
+between man and man; delivering up the streets of populous cities to
+grass and weeds, and the wharves of commercial towns to the encumbrance
+of decaying vessels; depriving labor of all reward; depriving industry
+of all employment; destroying the currency; plunging an innocent and
+happy people from the summit of felicity to the depths of misery, want,
+and despair. Such is the faint outline, followed up by actual
+condemnation, of the appalling denunciations daily uttered against this
+one MAN, from the moment he became an object of political competition,
+down to the concluding moment of his political existence.
+
+The sacred voice of inspiration has told us that there is a time for all
+things. There certainly has been a time for every evil that human nature
+admits of to be vaticinated of President Jackson's administration;
+equally certain the time has now come for all rational and well-disposed
+people to compare the predictions with the facts, and to ask themselves
+if these calamitous prognostications have been verified by events? Have
+we peace, or war, with foreign nations? Certainly, we have peace with
+all the world! peace with all its benign, and felicitous, and
+beneficent influences! Are we respected, or despised abroad? Certainly
+the American name never was more honored throughout the four quarters of
+the globe than in this very moment. Do we hear of indignity or outrage
+in any quarter? of merchants robbed in foreign ports? of vessels
+searched on the high seas? of American citizens impressed into foreign
+service? of the national flag insulted anywhere? On the contrary, we see
+former wrongs repaired; no new ones inflicted. France pays twenty-five
+millions of francs for spoliations committed thirty years ago; Naples
+pays two millions one hundred thousand ducats for wrongs of the same
+date; Denmark pays six hundred and fifty thousand rix-dollars for wrongs
+done a quarter of a century ago; Spain engages to pay twelve millions of
+reals vellon for injuries of fifteen years' date; and Portugal, the last
+in the list of former aggressors, admits her liability and only waits
+the adjustment of details to close her account by adequate indemnity. So
+far from war, insult, contempt, and spoliation from abroad, this
+denounced administration has been the season of peace and good will and
+the auspicious era of universal reparation. So far from suffering injury
+at the hands of foreign powers, our merchants have received indemnities
+for all former injuries. It has been the day of accounting, of
+settlement, and of retribution. The total list of arrearages, extending
+through four successive previous administrations, has been closed and
+settled up. The wrongs done to commerce for thirty years back, and under
+so many different Presidents, and indemnities withheld from all, have
+been repaired and paid over under the beneficent and glorious
+administration of President Jackson. But one single instance of outrage
+has occurred, and that at the extremities of the world, and by a
+piratical horde, amenable to no law but the law of force. The Malays of
+Sumatra committed a robbery and massacre upon an American vessel.
+Wretches! they did not then know that JACKSON was President of the
+United States! and that no distance, no time, no idle ceremonial of
+treating with robbers and assassins, was to hold back the arm of
+justice. Commodore Downes went out. His cannon and his bayonets struck
+the outlaws in their den. They paid in terror and in blood for the
+outrage which was committed; and the great lesson was taught to these
+distant pirates--to our antipodes themselves,--that not even the entire
+diameter of this globe could protect them, and that the name of American
+citizen, like that of Roman citizen in the great days of the Republic
+and of the empire, was to be the inviolable passport of all that wore it
+throughout the whole extent of the habitable world. * * *
+
+From President Jackson, the country has first learned the true theory
+and practical intent of the Constitution, in giving to the Executive a
+qualified negative on the legislative power of Congress. Far from being
+an odious, dangerous, or kingly prerogative, this power, as vested in
+the President, is nothing but a qualified copy of the famous veto power
+vested in the tribunes of the people among the Romans, and intended to
+suspend the passage of a law until the people themselves should have
+time to consider it? The qualified veto of the President destroys
+nothing; it only delays the passage of a law, and refers it to the
+people for their consideration and decision. It is the reference of a
+law, not to a committee of the House, or of the whole House, but to the
+committee of the whole Union. It is a recommitment of the bill to the
+people, for them to examine and consider; and if, upon this examination,
+they are content to pass it, it will pass at the next session. The delay
+of a few months is the only effect of a veto, in a case where the people
+shall ultimately approve a law; where they do not approve it, the
+interposition of the veto is the barrier which saves them the adoption
+of a law, the repeal of which might afterwards be almost impossible. The
+qualified negative is, therefore, a beneficent power, intended as
+General Hamilton expressly declares in the Federalist, to protect,
+first, the executive department from the encroachments of the
+legislative department; and, secondly, to preserve the people from
+hasty, dangerous, or criminal legislation on the part of their
+representatives. This is the design and intention of the veto power; and
+the fear expressed by General Hamilton was, that Presidents, so far from
+exercising it too often, would not exercise it as often as the safety of
+the people required; that they might lack the moral courage to stake
+themselves in opposition to a favorite measure of the majority of the
+two Houses of Congress; and thus deprive the people, in many instances,
+of their right to pass upon a bill before it becomes a final law. The
+cases in which President Jackson has exercised the veto power have shown
+the soundness of these observations. No ordinary President would have
+staked himself against the Bank of the United States and the two Houses
+of Congress in 1832. It required President Jackson to confront that
+power--to stem that torrent--to stay the progress of that charter, and
+to refer it to the people for their decision. His moral courage was
+equal to the crisis. He arrested the charter until it could be got to
+the people, and they have arrested it forever. Had he not done so, the
+charter would have become law, and its repeal almost impossible. The
+people of the whole Union would now have been in the condition of the
+people of Pennsylvania, bestrode by the monster, in daily conflict with
+him, and maintaining a doubtful contest for supremacy between the
+government of a State and the directory of a moneyed corporation.
+
+Sir, I think it right, in approaching the termination of this great
+question, to present this faint and rapid sketch of the brilliant,
+beneficent, and glorious administration of President Jackson. It is not
+for me to attempt to do it justice; it is not for ordinary men to
+attempt its history. His military life, resplendent with dazzling
+events, will demand the pen of a nervous writer; his civil
+administration, replete with scenes which have called into action so
+many and such various passions of the human heart, and which has given
+to native sagacity so many victories over practised politicians, will
+require the profound, luminous, and philosophical conceptions of a Livy,
+a Plutarch, or a Sallust. This history is not to be written in our day.
+The contemporaries of such events are not the hands to describe them.
+Time must first do its office--must silence the passions, remove the
+actors, develop consequences, and canonize all that is sacred to honor,
+patriotism, and glory. In after ages the historic genius of our America
+shall produce the writers which the subject demands--men far removed
+from the contests of this day, who will know how to estimate this great
+epoch, and how to acquire an immortality for their own names by
+painting, with a master's hand, the immortal events of the patriot
+President's life.
+
+And now, sir, I finish the task which, three years ago, I imposed on
+myself. Solitary and alone, and amidst the jeers and taunts of my
+opponents, I put this ball in motion. The people have taken it up, and
+rolled it forward, and I am no longer anything but a unit in the vast
+mass which now propels it. In the name of that mass I speak. I demand
+the execution of the edict of the people; I demand the expurgation of
+that sentence which the voice of a few senators, and the power of their
+confederate, the Bank of the United States, has caused to be placed on
+the journal of the Senate; and which the voice of millions of freemen
+has ordered to be expunged from it.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's American Eloquence, Volume I. (of 4), by Various
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