American Eloquence, Volume 1: Studies In American Political History (1896)
History
American Eloquence, Volume 1: Studies In American Political History (1896)
Speeches, addresses, etc., American; United States -- History; United States -- Politics and government
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?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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