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Page 57
* * * * *
I say, then, that so far as I am concerned, I will yield to no
compromise. I do not come here begging, either. It would be an indignity
to the people that I represent if I were to stand here parleying as to
the rights of the party to which I belong. We have won our right to the
Chief Magistracy of this nation in the way that you have always won your
predominance; and if you are as willing to do justice to others as to
exact it from them, you would never raise an inquiry as to a committee
for compromises. Here I beg, barely for myself, to say one thing more.
Many of you stand in an attitude hostile to this Government; that is to
say, you occupy an attitude where you threaten that, unless we do so and
so, you will go out of this Union and destroy the Government. I say
to you for myself, that, in my private capacity, I never yielded to
anything by way of threat, and in my public capacity I have no right
to yield to any such thing; and therefore I would not entertain a
proposition for any compromise, for, in my judgment, this long, chronic
controversy that has existed between us must be met, and met upon the
principles of the Constitution and laws, and met now. I hope it may be
adjusted to the satisfaction of all; and I know no other way to adjust
it, except that way which is laid down by the Constitution of the United
States. Whenever we go astray from that, we are sure to plunge ourselves
into difficulties. The old Constitution of the United States, although
commonly and frequently in direct opposition to what I could wish,
nevertheless, in my judgment, is the wisest and best constitution
that ever yet organized a free Government; and by its provisions I
am willing, and intend, to stand or fall. Like the Senator from
Mississippi, I ask nothing more. I ask no ingrafting upon it. I ask
nothing to be taken away from it. Under its provisions a nation has
grown faster than any other in the history of the world ever did before
in prosperity, in power, and in all that makes a nation great and
glorious. It has ministered to the advantages of this people; and now
I am unwilling to add or take away anything till I can see much clearer
than I can now that it wants either any addition or lopping off.
* * * * *
The Senator from Texas says--it is not exactly his language--we will
force you to an ignominious treaty up in Faneuil Hall. Well, sir, you
may. We know you are brave; we understand your prowess; we want no fight
with you; but, nevertheless, if you drive us to that necessity, we
must use all the powers of this Government to maintain it intact in its
integrity. If we are overthrown, we but share the fate of a thousand
other Governments that have been subverted. If you are the weakest then
you must go to the wall; and that is all there is about it. That is
the condition in which we stand, provided a State sets herself up in
opposition to the General Government.
I say that is the way it seems to me, as a lawyer. I see no power in the
Constitution to release a Senator from this position. Sir, if there
was any other, if there was an absolute right of secession in the
Constitution of the United States when we stepped up there to take our
oath of office, why was there not an exception in that oath? Why did
it not run "that we would support the Constitution of the United States
unless our State shall secede before our term was out?" Sir, there is
no such immunity. There is no way by which this can be done that I can
conceive of, except it is standing upon the Constitution of the United
States, demanding equal justice for all, and vindicating the old flag
of the Union. We must maintain it, unless we are cloven down by superior
force.
Well, sir, it may happen that you can make your way out of the Union,
and that, by levying war upon the Government, you may vindicate your
right to independence. If you should do so, I have a policy in my mind.
No man would regret more than myself that any portion of the people of
these United States should think themselves impelled, by grievances or
anything else, to depart out of this Union, and raise a foreign flag and
a hand against the General Government. If there was any just cause
on God's earth that I could see that was within my reach of honorable
release from any such pretended grievance, they should have it; but
they set forth none; I can see none. It is all a matter of prejudice,
superinduced unfortunately, I believe, as I intimated before, more
because you have listened to the enemies of the Republican party and
what they said of us, while, from your intolerance, you have shut out
all light as to what our real principles are. We have been called and
branded in the North and in the South and everywhere else, as John Brown
men, as men hostile to your institutions, as meditating an attack upon
your institutions in your own States--a thing that no Republican ever
dreamed of or ever thought of, but has protested against as often as the
question has been up; but your people believe it. No doubt they believe
it because of the terrible excitement and reign of terror that prevails
there. No doubt they think so, but it arises from false information,
or the want of information--that is all. Their prejudices have been
appealed to until they have become uncontrolled and uncontrollable.
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