Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16)United States. Congress
History
Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16)
United States. Congress
Law -- United States; United States -- Politics and government
Mr. President, our fate is in our own hands; let us have union and
we have nothing to fear. So highly do I prize union, at this awful
moment, that I would prefer any one measure of resistance with union,
to any other measure of resistance with division; let us then, sir,
banish all personal feelings; let us present to our enemies the
formidable front of an indissoluble band of brothers, nothing else is
necessary to our success. Mr. President, unequal as this contest may
seem; favored as we are by our situation, and under the blessing of a
beneficent Providence, who has never lost sight of the United States
in times of difficulty and trial, I have the most perfect confidence,
that if we prove true to ourselves, we shall triumph over our enemies.
Deeply impressed with these considerations, I am prepared to give the
resolution a flat and decided negative.
FRIDAY, November 25.
JOHN MILLEDGE, from the State of Georgia, attended.
WEDNESDAY, November 30.
_The Embargo._
Mr. PICKERING.--Mr. President: I am aware, sir, of the consequences
of advancing any thing from which conclusions may be drawn adverse to
the opinions of our own Administration, which, by many, are conceived
to be indisputably just. Merely to state these questions, and to
mention such arguments as the British Government may, perhaps, have
urged in their support on her side, is sufficient to subject a man to
the popular charge of being under British influence, or to the vulgar
slander of being a "British tory." He will be fortunate to escape the
accusation of touching British gold. But, sir, none of these things
move me. The patrons of the miscreants who utter these slanders know
better, but are, nevertheless, willing to benefit by the impression
they may make on the minds of the people. From an early period of my
life I was zealously engaged in every measure opposed to the attempts
of Great Britain to encroach upon our rights, until the commencement
of our Revolutionary war; and during its whole continuance, I was
uninterruptedly employed in important civil or military departments,
contributing all my efforts to bring that war to a successful
termination.
I, sir, am not the advocate of wrong-doers, to whatever country
they belong, whether Emperors, or Kings, or the Administrators of a
Republic. Justice is my object, and Truth my guide; and wherever she
points the way I shall not fear to go.
Great Britain has done us many wrongs. When we were Colonies, she
attempted to deprive us of some of our dearest birth-rights--rights
derived from our English ancestors, rights which we defended, and
finally established, by the successful conclusion of the Revolutionary
war. But these wrongs, and all the wounds of war, were intended to be
obliterated and healed by the treaty of peace, when all enmities should
have ceased.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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