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Page 49
In selecting the representative opinions for this period, all the
marked shades of opinion have been respected, both the Union and the
anti-coercion sentiment of the Border States, the extreme secession
spirit of the Gulf States, and, from the North, the moderate and the
extreme Republican, and the orthodox Democratic, views. The feeling of
the so-called "peace Democrats" of the North differed so little from
those of Toombs or Iverson that it has not seemed advisable to do more
than refer to Vallandigham's speech in opposition to the war, under the
next period.
JOHN PARKER HALE,
OF NEW HAMPSHIRE (BORN 1806, DIED 1873.)
ON SECESSION; MODERATE REPUBLICAN OPINION;
IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, DECEMBER 5, 1860.
MR. PRESIDENT:
I was very much in hopes when the message was presented that it would be
a document which would commend itself cordially to somebody. I was not
so sanguine about its pleasing myself, but I was in hopes that it would
be one thing or another. I was in hopes that the President would have
looked in the face the crisis in which he says the country is, and that
his message would be either one thing or another. But, sir, I have read
it somewhat carefully. I listened to it as it was read at the desk; and,
if I understand it--and I think I do--it is this: South Carolina has
just cause for seceding from the Union; that is the first proposition.
The second is, that she has no right to secede. The third is, that we
have no right to prevent her from seceding. That is the President's
message, substantially. He goes on to represent this as a great and
powerful country, and that no State has a right to secede from it; but
the power of the country, if I understand the President, consists in
what Dickens makes the English constitution to be--a power to do nothing
at all.
Now, sir, I think it was incumbent upon the President of the United
States to point out definitely and recommend to Congress some rule
of action, and to tell us what he recommended us to do. But, in my
judgment, he has entirely avoided it. He has failed to look the thing
in the face. He has acted like the ostrich, which hides her head and
thereby thinks to escape danger. Sir, the only way to escape danger
is to look it in the face. I think the country did expect from the
President some exposition of a decided policy; and I confess that,
for one, I was rather indifferent as to what that policy was that he
recommended; but I hoped that it would be something; that it would be
decisive. He has utterly failed in that respect.
I think we may as well look this matter right clearly in the face; and
I am not going to be long about doing it. I think that this state of
affairs looks to one of two things: it looks to absolute submission, not
on the part of our Southern friends and the Southern States, but of the
North, to the abandonment of their position,--it looks to a surrender
of that popular sentiment which has been uttered through the constituted
forms of the ballot-box, or it looks to open war. We need not shut our
eyes to the fact. It means war, and it means nothing else; and the State
which has put herself in the attitude of secession, so looks upon it.
She has asked no council, she has considered it as a settled question,
and she has armed herself. As I understand the aspect of affairs,
it looks to that, and it looks to nothing else except unconditional
submission on the part of the majority. I did not read the paper--I do
not read many papers--but I understand that there was a remedy suggested
in a paper printed, I think, in this city, and it was that the President
and the Vice-President should be inaugurated (that would be a great
concession!) and then, being inaugurated, they should quietly resign!
Well, sir, I am not entirely certain that that would settle the
question. I think that after the President and Vice-President-elect had
resigned, there would be as much difficulty in settling who was to take
their places as there was in settling it before.
I do not wish, sir, to say a word that shall increase any irritation;
that shall add any feeling of bitterness to the state of things which
really exists in the country, and I would bear and forbear before I
would say any thing which would add to this bitterness. But I tell you,
sir, the plain, true way is to look this thing in the face--see where we
are. And I avow here--I do not know whether or not I shall be sustained
by those who usually act with me--if the issue which is presented is
that the constitutional will of the public opinion of this country,
expressed through the forms of the Constitution, will not be submitted
to, and war is the alternative, let it come in any form or in any shape.
The Union is dissolved and it cannot be held together as a Union, if
that is the alternative upon which we go into an election. If it is
pre-announced and determined that the voice of the majority, expressed
through the regular and constituted forms of the Constitution, will not
be submitted to, then, sir, this is not a Union of equals; it is a Union
of a dictatorial oligarchy on one side, and a herd of slaves and cowards
on the other. That is it, sir; nothing more, nothing less. * * *
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