History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United StatesBarnes, William Horatio
History
History of the Thirty-Ninth Congress of the United States
Barnes, William Horatio
United States -- Politics and government -- 1865-1869; United States. Congress (39th : 1865-1867)
"If, sir, it should ever be your good fortune to visit romantic old
Spain, and to enter the fortress and palace of Alhambra, the fairest
monument of Moorish grandeur and skill, as this Capitol is the pride
of American architecture, you may see cut in stone a hand holding a
key, surmounting the horse-shoe arch of the main gateway. They are the
three types of strength, speed, and secresy, the boast of a now fallen
Saracen race, sons of that sea of sand, the desert, who carried the
glory of Islam to furthest Gades. In an evil hour of civil strife and
bitter hatred of faction, the Alhambra was betrayed to Spain, 'to feed
fat an ancient grudge' between political chiefs. The stronghold of the
race, with the palace, the sacred courts of justice, and all the rare
works of art--the gardens of unrivaled splendor--all that was their
own of majesty, strength, and beauty, became the trophies of another.
"The legend of the Saracen exile tells the story of penitence and
shame; and to the last moment of his sad life he sighs in the sultry
desert for the fair home of his ancestors, the gorgeous Alhambra. We,
too, are descended from a race of conquerors, who crossed the ocean to
establish the glory of civil and religious liberty, and secure freedom
to themselves and their posterity. To-day we are assembled in the
Alhambra of America; here is our citadel; here our courts of highest
resort; around these halls cluster the proudest associations of the
American people; they seem almost sacred in their eyes. No hostile
foot of foreign foe or domestic traitor has trodden them in triumph.
Above it floats the flag, the emblem of our Union. That Union is the
emblem of the triumphs of the white race. That race rules by the
ballot. Shall we surrender the ballot, the emblem of our sovereignty;
the flag, the emblem of our Union; the Union, the emblem of our
national glory, that they may become the badges of our weakness and
the trophies of another race? Never, sir! never, never!
"Shall the white laborer bow his free, independent, and honored brow
to the level of the negro just set free from slavery, and, by yielding
the entrance to this great citadel of our nation, surrender the
mastery of his race over the Representatives of the people, the
Senate, and Supreme Court of this Union? Then, sir, the white
workingman's sovereignty would begin to cease to be.
"Then the most democratic majesty of American liberty would be humbled
in the little dust which was lately raised by a brief campaign of two
hundred thousand negro troops, and even they led by white officers,
while millions of white soldiers held the field in victory by their
own strength and valor. Deny it if ye dare! Sir, I know that this is a
white man's Government, and I believe the white workingman has the
manhood which shall preserve it to his latest posterity, pure and
strong, in 'justice tempered with mercy.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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