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
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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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