Speech of Hon. Jefferson Davis, Senator from Mississippi,
I rise, Mr. President, for the purpose of announcing to the Senate that I have satisfactory evidence that the State of Mississippi, by a solemn ordinance of her people in convention assembled, has declared her separation from the United States. Under these circumstances, of course my functions are terminated here. It has seemed to me proper, however, that I should appear in the Senate to announce that fact to my associates, and I will say but very little more. The occasion does not invite me to go into argument; and my physical condition would not permit me to do so if it were otherwise, and yet it seems to become me to say something on the part of the State I here represent, on an occasion so solemn as this. It is known to Senators who have served with me here, that I have for many years advocated as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right of a State to secede from the Union. Therefore, if I had not believed there was justifiable cause; if I had thought that Mississippi was acting without sufficient provocation, or without an existing necessity, I should still, under my theory of the government, because of my allegiance to the State of which I am a citizen, have been bound by her action. I, however, may be permitted to say that I do think she has justifiable cause and I approve of her act. I conferred with her people before that act was taken, counseled them then that if the state of things which they apprehended should exist when the convention met, they should take the action which they have now adopted.
I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union and to disregard its constitutional obligations by the nullification of the law. Such is not my theory. Nullification and secession so often confounded are indeed antagonistic principles. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply within the Union and against the agents of the States. It is only to be justified when the agent has violated his constitutional obligation, and a State, assuming to judge for itself denies the right of the agent thus to act and appeals to the other States of the Union for a decision; but when the States themselves and when the people of the States have so acted as to convince us that they will not regard our constitutional rights, then, and then for the first time, arises the doctrine of secession in its practical application.
A great man who now reposes with his fathers and who has been often arraigned for a want of fealty to the Union advocated the doctrine of Nullification because it preserved the Union. It was because of his deep-seated attachment to the Union, his determination to find some remedy for existing ills short of the severance of the ties which bound South Carolina to the other States, that Mr. Calhoun advocated the doctrine of nullification, which he proclaimed to be peaceful, to be within the limits of State power, not to disturb the Union, but only to be a means of bringing the agent before the tribunal of the States for their judgment.
Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon the basis that the States are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it. I hope the time may come again when a better comprehension of the theory of our government and the inalienable rights of the people of the States will prevent any one from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may reclaim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever.
I therefore say I concur in the action of the people of Mississippi, believing it to be necessary and proper, and should have been bound by their action if my belief had been otherwise; and this brings me at the important point which I wish, on this last occasion, to present to the Senate. It is by this confounding of nullification and secession that the name of a great man whose ashes now mingle with his mother earth, has been invoked to justify coercion against a seceding state. The phrase “to execute the laws” was an expression which General Jackson applied to the case of a State refusing to obey the laws while yet a member of the Union. That is not the case which is now presented. The laws are to be executed over the United States, and upon the people of the United States. They have no relation with any foreign country. It is a perversion of terms, at least it is a great misapprehension of the case, which cites that expression for application to a State which has withdrawn from the Union. You may make war on a foreign State. If it be the purpose of gentlemen they may make war against a State which has withdrawn from the Union; but there are no laws of the United States to be executed within the limits of a Seceded State. A State finding herself in the condition in which Mississippi has judged she is; in which her safety requires that she should provide for the maintenance of her rights out of the Union, surrenders all the benefits, (and they are known to be many) deprives herself of the advantages, (they are known to be great) severs all the ties of affection (and they are close and enduring) which have bound her to the Union; and thus divesting herself of every benefit, taking upon herself every burden, she claims to be exempt from any power to execute the laws of the United States within her limits.
I well remember an occasion when Massachusetts was arraigned before the Bar of the Senate, and when then the doctrine of coercion was rife, and to be applied against her because of the rescue of a fugitive slave in Boston. My opinion then was the same as it is now. Not in the spirit of egotism, but to show that I am not influenced in my opinion because the case is my own, I refer to that time and that occasion as containing the opinion which I then entertained and on which my present conduct is based. I then said, if Massachusetts, following her through a stated line of conduct, chooses to take the last step which separates her from the Union, it is her right to go, and I will neither vote one dollar nor one man to coerce her back; but will say to her, “God speed,” in memory of the kind associations which once existed between her and the other States. It has been a conviction of pressing necessity, it has been a belief that we are to be deprived in the Union, of the rights which our fathers bequeathed to us, which has brought Mississippi into her present decision. She has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack on her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races. That Declaration of Independence is to be construed by the circumstances and purposes for which it was made. The communities were declaring their independence; the people of those communities were asserting that no man was born—to use the language of Mr. Jefferson—booted and spurred to ride over the rest of mankind; that men were created equal—meaning the men of the political community; that there was no divine right to rule; that no man inherited the right to govern; that there were no classes by which power and place descended to families, but that all stations were equally within the grasp of each member of the body politic. These were the great principles they announced; these were the purposes for which they made their declaration; these were the ends to which their enunciation was directed. They have no reference to the slave; else, how happened it that among the items of arraignment made against George III. was that he endeavored to do just what the North has been endeavoring of late to do—to stir up insurrection among our slaves? Had the Declaration announced that the negroes were free and equal how was it the Prince was to be arraigned for stirring up insurrection among them? And how was this to be enumerated among the high crimes which caused the colonies to sever their connection with the mother country? When our constitution was formed, the same idea was rendered more palpable, for there we find provision made for that very class of persons as property; they were not put upon the footing of equality with white men—not even upon that of paupers and convicts, but so far as representation was concerned, were discriminated against as a lower caste only to be represented in a numerical proportion of three-fifths.
Then, Senators, we recur to the compact which binds us together; we recur to the principles upon which our government was founded; and when you deny them, and when you deny to us, the right to withdraw from a government which thus prevented, threatens to be destructive of our rights, we but tread in the path of our fathers when we proclaim our independence, and take the hazard. This is done not in hostility to others, not to injure any section of the country, not even for our own pecuniary benefit, but from the high and solemn motive of defending and protecting the rights we inherited, and which it is our sacred duty to transmit unshorn to our children.
I find in myself, perhaps, a type of the general feeling of my constituents towards yours. I am sure I feel no hostility to you, Senators from the North. I am sure there is not one of you, whatever sharp discussion there may have been between us, to whom I cannot now say, in the presence of my God, “I wish you well,” and such, I am sure, is the feeling of the people whom I represent towards those whom you represent. I therefore feel that I but express their desire when I say I hope, and they hope for peaceful relations with you, though we must part. They may be mutually beneficial to us in the future as they have been in the past, if you so will it. The reverse may bring disaster on every portion of the country; and if you will have it thus, we will invoke the God of our fathers, who delivered them from the power of the lion, to protect us from the ravages of the bear, and thus, putting our trust in God, and to our firm hearts and strong arms we will vindicate the right as best we may.
In the course of my service here, associated at different times with a great variety of Senators, I see now around me some with whom I have served long; there have been points of collision, but whatever of offense there has been to me I leave here; I carry with me no hostile remembrance. Whatever offense I have given which has not been redressed, or for which satisfaction has not been demanded, I have, Senators, in this hour of our parting, to offer you an apology for any harm which, in the heat of discussion, I have inflicted. I go hence unencumbered of any injury received, and having discharged the duty of making the only reparation in my power for any injury offered.
Mr. President and Senators, having made the announcement which the occasion seemed to me to require, it only remains for me to bid you a final adieu.
Speech of the Hon. Henry Wilson of Massachusetts
AN ABSTRACT.
Gentlemen, standing here to-day, in this presence, among these liberty-loving, patriotic men and women of Wayne county, I want to call your attention for a few moments to what we have struggled for in the past.
Nearly forty years ago, when the slave power dominated the country—when the dark shadow of human slavery fell upon us all here in the North—there arose a body of conscientious men and women who proclaimed the doctrine that emancipation was the duty of the master and the right of the slave; they proclaimed it to be a duty to let the oppressed go free. Rewards were offered—they were denounced, mobbed—violence pervaded the land. Yet these faithful ones maintained with fidelity, against all odds, the sublime creed of human liberty. The struggle, commencing forty years ago against the assumptions and dominations of the slave power, went on from one step to another—the slave power went right on to the conquest of the country—promises were broken, without regard to constitutions or laws of the human race. The work went on till the people, in their majesty, in 1860, went to the ballot-box and made Abraham Lincoln President of the United States. [Cheers.] Then came a great trial; that trial was whether we should do battle for the principles of eternal right, and maintain the cause of liberty, or surrender; whether we would be true to our principles or false. We stood firm—stood by the sacred cause—and then the slave power plunged the country into a godless rebellion.
Then came another trial, testing the manhood, the courage, the sublime fidelity of the lovers of liberty in the country. We met that test as we had met every other test—trusting in God, trusting in the people—willing to stand or fall by our principles. Through four years of blood we maintained those principles; we broke down the rebellion, restored a broken Union, and vindicated the authority and power of the nation. In that struggle Indiana played a glorious part in the field, and her voice in the councils of the nation had great and deserved influence. [Cheers.]
Now, gentlemen, measured by the high standard of fidelity to country, of patriotism, the great political party to which we belong to-day was as true to the country in war as it had been in peace—true to the country every time, and on all occasions.
Not only true to the country, but the Republican party was true to liberty. It struck the fetters from the bondman, and elevated four and a half millions of men from chattel-hood to manhood; gave them civil rights, gave them political rights, and gave them part and parcel of the power of the country. [Applause.]
Now, gentlemen, here to-day, I point to this record—this great record—and say to you, that, measured by the standard of patriotism—one of the greatest and grandest standards by which to measure public men, political organizations or nations—measured by that standard which the whole world recognizes, the Republican party of the United States stands before the world with none, to accuse it of want of fidelity to country. [Cheers.] Measured by the standard of liberty, equal, universal, impartial liberty—liberty to all races, all colors and all nationalities—the Republican party stands to-day before the country pre-eminently the party of universal liberty. [Loud cheers.] Measured by the standard of humanity—that humanity that stoops down and lifts up the poor and lowly, the oppressed and the castaways, the poor, struggling sons and daughters of toil and misfortune—measured by that standard, the Republican party stands before this country to-day without a peer in our history, or in the history of any other people. [Renewed and general applause.] We have gone further, embraced more, lifted up lowlier men, carried them to a higher elevation, labored amid obloquy and reproach to lift up the despised and lowly nations of the earth than any political organization that the sun ever shone upon.
And then, gentlemen, tested by the support of all the great ideas that tend to lift up humanity, to pull none down, to lift all up, to carry the country upward and forward, ever toward God, the Republican party of the country has been, and now is, to-day, in advance of any political organization the world knows.
Gentlemen, I am not here to maintain that this great party, with its three and a half millions of voters, tested and tried as it has been during twelve years—I am not here to say that it has made no mistakes. We have committed errors; we could not always see what the right was; we failed sometimes; but, gentlemen, take our record—take it as it stands—it is a bright and glorious record, that any man, or set of men, may be proud of. We have stood, and we stand to-day, on the side of man, and on the side of the ideas God has given us in His Holy Word. [Applause.] There has not been a day since by the labors, the prayers and the sacrifices of the old anti-slavery men and women of the country, from 1830 to 1855—during twenty-five years—I say to you, gentlemen, here, to-day, that this party, the product of these prayers, and these sacrifices, and these efforts—with all its faults—has been true to patriotism, true to liberty, true to justice, true to humanity, true to Christian civilization. [Cheers.]
I say to you here to-day, that all along during this time, the Democratic party carried the banners of slavery. Whenever the slave power desired anything they got it. They wielded the entire power of the nation, until, in their arrogance, when we elected Abraham Lincoln, they plunged the country into the fire and blood of the greatest civil war recorded in history. After the war all the measures inaugurated for emancipation—to make the country free—to lift an emancipated race up—to give them instruction and make them citizens—to give them civil rights and make them voters—to put them on an equality with the rest of the people—to every one of that series of thirty or forty measures the Democratic party gave their President unqualified and united opposition. Well, now, we have been accustomed to say that they were mistaken, misinformed, that they were honest—that they believed what they did; but, gentlemen, if they have believed what they have said, that they have acted according to their convictions from 1832 to 1872—a period of forty years—can they be honest, to-day, in indorsing the Cincinnati platform—in supporting Horace Greeley? [“No, no!”]
Why, we have read of sudden and miraculous conversions. We read of St. Paul’s conversion, of the light that shone around him, but I ask you, in the history of the human family have you ever known three millions of men—three millions of great sinners for forty years—[laughter]—three millions of men, all convicted, all converted, and all changed in the twinkling of an eye. [Renewed laughter.] Why, gentlemen, if it is so, for one I will lift up my eyes and my heart to God, that those sinners, that this great political party that has been for forty years, every time and all the time, on every question and on all questions pertaining to the human race and the rights of the colored race, on the wrong side—on the side of injustice, oppression and inhumanity—on the side that has been against man, and against God’s holy word; I say, gentlemen, that I will lift up my heart in gratitude to God that these men have suddenly repented.
Why, I have been accustomed to think that the greatest victory the Republican party would ever be called upon to win—and I knew it would win it, because the Republican party, as Napoleon said of his armies, are accustomed to sleep on the field of victory. The Republican party—that always won—always ought to win, because it is on the right side; and when it is defeated, it only falls back to gather strength to advance again. [Applause.] I did suppose that the greatest task it would ever have, greater than putting down the rebellion, greater than emancipating four millions of men, greater than lifting them up to civil rights—greater than all its grand deeds—would be the conviction and conversion of the Democratic party of the United States. [Laughter and cheers.] Just as we are going into a Presidential election—when it was certain that if the Republican party said and affirmed, said by its members, said altogether, that its ideas, its principles, its policy, its measures, were stronger than were the political organization of the Democrats. I say, just as we are going into the contest, when it was certain that we would break down and crush out its ideas, and take its flags and disband it, and out of the wreck we would gather hundreds of thousands of changed and converted men, the best part of the body—just at that time some of our men are so anxious to embrace somebody that has always been wrong that they start out at once in a wild hunt to clasp hands with our enemies and to save the Democratic party from absolute annihilation. [Laughter.] To do what they want us is to disband. Well, gentlemen, I suppose there are some here to-day that belonged to the grand old Army of the Potomac. If when Lee had retreated on Richmond, and Phil. Sheridan sent back to Grant that if he pushed things he would capture the army—if, instead of sending back to Sheridan, as Grant did, “Push things,” he had said to him, “Let us disband the Army of the Potomac; don’t hurt the feelings of these retreating men; let us clasp hands with them,” what would have been the result? I suppose there are some of you here to-day that followed Sherman—that were with him in his terrible march from Chattanooga to Atlanta—with him in that great march from Atlanta to the sea—what would you have thought of him if, when you came in sight of the Atlantic ocean, you had had orders to disband before the banners of the rebellion had disappeared from the Southern heavens?
I tell you, to-day, this movement of a portion of our forces is this and nothing more. I would as soon have disbanded that Army of the Potomac after Sheridan’s ride through the valley of the Shenandoah, or when Sherman had reached the sea, as to disband the Republican party to-day. The time has not come. [Loud and continued applause.]
I am not making a mere partisan appeal to you. I believe in this Republican party, and, if I know myself, rather than see it defeated to-day—rather than see the government pass out of its hands—I would sacrifice anything on earth in my possession, even life itself. [Loud applause] I have seen brave and good men—patriotic, liberty-loving, God-fearing men—I have seen them die for the cause of the country—for the ideas we profess, and I tell you to-day, with all the faults of the Republican party—and it has had faults and has made some mistakes—I say to you that I believe upon my conscience its defeat would be a disaster to the country, and would be a stain upon our record. It would bring upon us—we might say what we pleased, our enemies would claim it, and the world would record it—that this great, patriotic, liberty-loving Republican party of the United States, after all its great labors and great history, had been weighed in the balances and found wanting, and condemned by the American people.
Well, gentlemen, I choose, if it is to fall, to fall with it. I became an anti-slavery man in 1835. In 1836 I tied myself, pledged myself, to do all I could to overthrow the slave power of my country. During all these years I have never given a vote, uttered a word, or written a line that I did not suppose tended to this result. I invoke you old anti-slavery men here to-day—and I know I am speaking to men who have been engaged in the cause—I implore you men who have been true in the past, no matter what the men or their natures are, to stand with the grand organization of the Republican party—be true to its cause and fight its battles—if we are defeated, let us accept the defeat as best we may; if we are victorious, let us make our future more glorious than the past. If we fail, let us have the proud consciousness that we have been faithful to our principles, true to our convictions; that we go down with our flag flying—that we go down trusting in God that our country may become, what we have striven to make it, the foremost nation on the globe. [Immense applause.]
Speech of Senator Oliver P. Morton, of Indiana,
The distinguished orator was introduced by Senator Anthony, and made an extended speech, from which we take the more pertinent paragraphs:
From this proposition two corollaries have been adduced from time to time, and I must say with great force of logic. The first is that this Union is composed of sovereign and independent States who have simply entered into a compact for particular purposes, and the government is merely their agent; that any State has the right to withdraw from the Union at pleasure, or whenever in its judgment the terms of the compact have been violated, or the interests of the State require its withdrawal. The second is that each State has the right to nullify any law of Congress which, in the judgment of the State, is in violation of the compact by which the government was formed. This doctrine has been the evil genius of the country from the foundation of our government. It may be said to be the devil in our political system. It has been our danger from the first. It is the rock in the straits, and we fear that the end is not yet. Now what can we oppose to this doctrine? We oppose what we call “the national idea.” We assume that this government was formed by the governments of the United States in their aggregate and in their primary capacity. We assume that, instead of there being thirty-seven nations, there is but one; instead of there being thirty-seven sovereignties, there is but one sovereignty. We assume that the States are not sovereign, but that they are integral and subordinate parts of one great country. I may be asked the question here, “Are there no State rights? Would you override the States? Would you obliterate State lines?” I answer, “No.” I answer that this doctrine is the only doctrine that can preserve the peace of this nation and preserve the rights of the States. I answer that there is a vast body of State rights guaranteed and secured by the Constitution of the United States, by the same Constitution that created and upholds the government of the United States; that these State rights have the same guarantee that the rights of the National Government have, equally entitled to the protection of the Supreme Court, springing out of the same instrument, and that one set of rights are just as sacred as the other. Some confound the idea of State sovereignty and State rights as being one and the same thing. Others seem to suppose that State rights are only consistent with State sovereignty, and cannot exist except upon the theory of State sovereignty; while I assume that State rights are consistent with National sovereignty, and are safest under the protection of the nation. The Constitution gives one class of rights to the government of the United States. They are specified, and they carry with them all the rights that are indispensable and necessary to their full execution and enjoyment. The rest are to be held and enjoyed by the States, or reserved to the people. The States have their rights by the agreement of the nation. That seems to be the important truth that is so often overlooked, that the rights of the States, sacred and unapproachable, are sacred by the agreement of the nation, as much so as are the powers that are conferred upon the government of the United States, that the States derive their powers from the same source, viz: The Constitution of the United States. That Constitution says that the government shall have one class of powers, and that other powers shall be gained by the States, to be enjoyed by them or reserved to the people. In the consideration of this question, we must reflect that the nation had assembled in convention in 1787, and there formed a government, there declared what rights should be given to the National Government, and what rights should be reserved to the States, and that, in either case, the grant and guarantee is an act of national sovereignty by the people in convention assembled. When we shall embrace this idea fully, all the danger of centralization will pass away, though we discard the idea of State sovereignty.
I do not differ so much with many gentlemen in regard to what the rights of the States are. I differ with them in regard to the titles by which they hold them. I say that so far as State rights are concerned, and the rights of the government, that we are not to go back beyond the period of 1787, when the Constitution was formed. The rights of the elder States, and of Rhode Island as she has them now, are to be dated from the formation of the Constitution. Then they came into convention. They had the right to make any sort of government they pleased, and they did. And in that government they guarantied and secured to the States the great body of rights in regard to local and domestic government, but it was the agreement of the nation at that time. So far as the new States are concerned, they are to come in on an equality. They are to have the same rights with the old; and this theory would be impossible of execution except upon the idea that the rights of the States and of the National Government are to be determined from the action that was taken at that time. The difficulty had been in regard to this theory of State sovereignty, and the assumed right of secession and of nullification was the result. They assumed that these States existed as nations separate and distinct before that time, and that they only loaned a portion of their rights for a particular purpose. This is the base of that theory; while we assume that the people were acting together at that time in their aggregate capacity, raising a system of government, giving the United States certain powers, and providing that the States should hold and enjoy the rest, excepting those that were reserved to the people. The preservation of local self-government is essential to the liberties of this nation. Nobody endorses that sentiment more strongly than I do. Nobody will stand by the rights of the States more firmly than I will. I hold that their rights are consistent with national sovereignty, and that national sovereignty is consistent with the rights of the States, and I deny that these rights are the result of inherent original State sovereignty. In other words, we differ in regard to the title. What the States should have, and what the government should have, was settled by the act of the nation in convention in 1787, changed to some extent by the adoption of amendments since that time. It is not enough for a party to deny the right of secession. It is not enough for a party to deny the right of nullification. They must go further. They must deny the doctrine of State sovereignty; for as long as that doctrine is admitted, these other things will spring up spontaneously from it, and whenever the occasion allows it. If we were to admit that the States were sovereign, then we would be bound to say that Webster did not answer Hayne, and that Webster and Hayne never answered Calhoun. If once it is admitted that the States are sovereign, it is hard to resist the corollaries to which I have referred, that they have the right to secede, and that they have the right to nullify.
The doctrine of nationality planted deep in the hearts of the American people is our only sheet-anchor of safety for the future. Our country is greatly extended, from the tropical to the arctic regions, with every variety of climate, soil, and productions, with different commercial and manufacturing interests. The States on the Pacific slopes are separated from those on this side of the Rocky Mountains by fifteen hundred miles of mountain and desert. They have a different commerce from what you have, almost an independent commerce. Their commerce will be with China, Japan, Australia, the western countries of South America, and the islands of the Southern Pacific. It is now but in its infancy, but it bids fair to develop into colossal proportions, and may change the commercial aspect of the world. We know not what feelings of independence may arise in those States in time to come. It is difficult to deny the effect that may be produced by the separation of vast States with a different commerce acting in conjunction with forced theories of the origin and laws of our government. In saying this I will cast no imputation upon the loyalty of those States. They are now as loyal as any, and were during the war. But we can imagine that what has been may be again. And we can understand what may be the danger of this doctrine, if it should still maintain its hold in the minds of the American people, when conflicting interests arise, and conflicting notions arise as to what may be the interests of the people; as in 1812 a war was brought about which was regarded as being fatal to the interests of the New England States, they took their position upon it. We have had a law which was regarded in South Carolina as being fatal to her interests, and she took her position upon it. This doctrine was again seized by slavery in 1861, and the rebellion was brought on. And what may happen in the far future upon the eastern and western coasts, upon the northern and southern extremities of our nation, we cannot tell.
The idea that we are a nation, that we are one people, undivided and indivisible, should be a plank in the platform of every party. It should be printed on the banner of every party. It should be taught in every school, academy, and college. It should be the political North Star by which every political manager should steer his bark. It should be the central idea of American politics, and every child, so to speak, should be vaccinated with this idea, so that he may be protected against this political distemper that has brought such calamity upon our country. Were the mind of the nation, so to speak, fully saturated with this sentiment of nationality, that we are but one people, undivided and indivisible, there would be no danger though our boundaries came to embrace the entire continent. It is therefore of the utmost importance that it should be taught and inculcated upon all occasions. What the sun is in the heavens, diffusing light, and life, and warmth, and by its subtle influence holding the planets in their orbits and preserving the harmony of the universe—such is the sentiment of nationality in a nation, diffusing light and protection in every part, holding the faces of Americans always toward their home, protecting the States in the exercise of their just powers, and preserving the harmony and prosperity of all.
We must have a nation. It is a necessity of our political existence, and we find the countries of the Old World now aspiring for nationality. Italy, after a long absence, has returned. Rome has again become the centre and the capital of a great nation. The bleeding fragments of the beautiful land have been bound up together, and Italy again resumes her place among the nations. And we find the great Germanic family has been sighing for a nationality. That race, whose overmastering civilization is acknowledged by all the world, has hitherto been divided into petty Principalities and States, such as Virginia and South Carolina aspire to be, but now are coming together and asserting their unity, their national existence, and are now able to dominate all the nations of Europe. We should then cherish this idea, that while the States have their rights sacred and unapproachable, which we should guard with untiring vigilance, never permitting an encroachment, and remembering that such encroachment is as much a violation of the Constitution of the United States as to encroach upon the rights of the general Government, still bearing in mind that the States are but subordinate parts of one great nation, and that the nation is over, all even as God is over the universe. Without entering into any of the consequences that flow from this doctrine, allow me for to-night to refer to that great national attribute, that great national duty—the duty and the power to protect the citizen in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and property. If the Government of the United States has not the power to protect the citizens of the United States in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and property in cases where the States fail, or refuse, or are unable to grant protection, then that Government should be amended, or should give place to a better. Great Britain sent forth a costly and powerful expedition to Abyssinia to rescue four British subjects who had been captured and imprisoned by the government of that country. She has recently threatened Greece with war, if she did not use all her power to bring to justice two brigands who had lately murdered two British subjects. These things are greatly to the honor of Great Britain. And our Government threatened Austria with war if she did not release Martin Kosta, who had declared his intention to become a citizen of the United States, and was therefore protected by the Government of the United States. More recently we have made war upon Corea, a province in Asia, and slaughtered her people, and battered down her forts, because Americans shipwrecked upon her coast were murdered and the government had refused to give satisfaction for it. And if a mob in London should murder half a dozen American citizens, we would call upon that government to use all its power to bring the murderers to punishment, and if Great Britain did not do so, it would be regarded as a cause of war. And yet some people entertain the idea that our Government has the power to protect its citizens everywhere except upon its own soil. The idea that I would advocate, the doctrine that I would urge as being the only true and national one, flowing inevitably from national sovereignty, is that our Government has the right to protect her citizens in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and property wherever the flag floats, whether at home or abroad.
Speech of Hon. J. Proctor Knott, of Kentucky,
The house having under consideration the joint resolution (S. R. No. 11) extending the time to construct a railroad from St. Croix river or lake to the west end of Lake Superior and to Bayfield—
Mr. Knott said: Mr. Speaker—If I could be actuated by any conceivable inducement to betray the sacred trust in me by those to whose generous confidence I am indebted for the honor of a seat on this floor; if I could be influenced by any possible consideration to become instrumental in giving away, in violation of their known wishes any portion of their interest in the public domain for the mere promotion of any railroad enterprise whatever, I should certainly feel a strong inclination to give this measure my most earnest and hearty support; for I am assured that its success would materially enhance the pecuniary prosperity of some of the most valued friends I have on earth; friends for whose accommodation I would be willing to make almost any sacrifice not involving my personal honor or my fidelity as the trustee of an express trust. And that act of itself would be sufficient to countervail almost any objection I might entertain to the passage of this bill not inspired by any imperative and inexorable sense of public duty.
But, independent of the seductive influences of private friendship, to which I admit I am, perhaps, as susceptible as any of the gentlemen I see around me, the intrinsic merits of the measure itself are of such an extraordinary character as to commend it most strongly to the favorable consideration of every member of this house, myself not excepted, notwithstanding my constituents, in whose behalf alone I am acting here, would not be benefited by its passage one particle more than they would be by a project to cultivate an orange grove on the bleakest summit of Greenland’s icy mountains.
Now, sir, as to those great trunk lines of railways, spanning the continent from ocean to ocean, I confess my mind has never been fully made up. It is true they may afford some trifling advantages to local traffic, and they may even in time become the channels of a more extended commerce. Yet I have never been thoroughly satisfied either of the necessity or expediency of projects promising such meagre results to the great body of our people. But with regard to the transcendent merits of the gigantic enterprise contemplated in this bill, I have never entertained the shadow of a doubt.
Years ago, when I first heard that there was somewhere in the vast terra incognita, somewhere in the bleak regions of the great northwest, a stream of water known to the nomadic inhabitants of the neighborhood as the river St. Croix, I became satisfied that the construction of a railroad from that raging torrent to some point in the civilized world was essential to the happiness and prosperity of the American people if not absolutely indispensable to the perpetuity of republican institutions on this continent. I felt instinctively that the boundless resources of that prolific region of sand and pine shrubbery would never be fully developed without a railroad constructed and equipped at the expense of the government, and perhaps not then. I had an abiding presentiment that, some day or other, the people of this whole country, irrespective of party affiliations, regardless of sectional prejudices, and “without distinction of race, color, or previous condition of servitude,” would rise in their majesty and demand an outlet for the enormous agricultural productions of those vast and fertile pine barrens, drained in the rainy season by the surging waters of the turbid St. Croix.
These impressions, derived simply and solely from the “eternal fitness of things,” were not only strengthened by the interesting and eloquent debate on this bill, to which I listened with so much pleasure the other day, but intensified, if possible, as I read over this morning, the lively colloquy which took place on that occasion, as I find it reported in last Friday’s Globe. I will ask the indulgence of the house while I read a few short passages, which are sufficient, in my judgment, to place the merits of the great enterprise, contemplated in the measure now under discussion, beyond all possible controversy.
The honorable gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Wilson), who, I believe, is managing this bill, in speaking of the character of the country through which this railroad is to pass, says this:
“We want to have the timber brought to us as cheaply as possible. Now, if you tie up the lands, in this way, so that no title can be obtained to them—for no settler will go on these lands, for he cannot make a living—you deprive us of the benefit of that timber.”
Now, sir, I would not have it by any means inferred from this that the gentleman from Minnesota would insinuate that the people out in this section desire this timber merely for the purpose of fencing up their farms so that their stock may not wander off and die of starvation among the bleak hills of St. Croix. I read it for no such purpose, sir, and make no comment on it myself. In corroboration of this statement of the gentleman from Minnesota, I find this testimony given by the honorable gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Washburn). Speaking of these same lands, he says:
“Under the bill, as amended by my friend from Minnesota, nine-tenths of the land is open to actual settlers at $2.50 per acre; the remaining one tenth is pine-timbered land, that is not fit for settlement, and never will be settled upon; but the timber will be cut off. I admit that it is the most valuable portion of the grant, for most of the grant is not valuable. It is quite valueless; and if you put in this amendment of the gentleman from Indiana you may as well just kill the bill, for no man and no company will take the grant and build the road.”
I simply pause here to ask some gentleman better versed in the science of mathematics than I am, to tell me if the timbered lands are in fact the most valuable portion of that section of country, and they would be entirely valueless without the timber that is in them, what the remainder of the land is worth which has no timber on it at all?
But, further on, I find a most entertaining and instructive interchange of views between the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Rogers), the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Washburn), and the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Peters), upon the subject of pine lands generally, which I will tax the patience of the house to read:
“Mr. Rogers—Will the gentleman allow me to ask him a question?
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—Certainly.
“Mr. Rogers—Are these pine lands entirely worthless except for timber?
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—They are generally worthless for any other purpose. I am personally familiar with that subject. These lands are not valuable for purposes of settlement.
“Mr. Farnsworth—They will be after the timber is taken off.
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—No, sir.
“Mr. Rogers—I want to know the character of these pine lands.
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—They are generally sandy, barren lands. My friend from the Green Bay district (Mr. Sawyer) is himself perfectly familiar with this question, and he will bear me out in what I say, that these timber lands are not adapted to settlement.
“Mr. Rogers—The pine lands to which I am accustomed are generally very good. What I want to know is, what is the difference between our pine lands and your pine lands?
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—The pine timber of Wisconsin generally grows upon barren, sandy land. The gentleman from Maine (Mr. Peters) who is familiar with pine lands, will, I have no doubt, say that pine timber grows generally upon the most barren lands.”
“Mr. Peters—As a general thing pine lands are not worth much for cultivation.”
And further on I find this pregnant question the joint production of the two gentlemen from Wisconsin.
“Mr. Paine—Does my friend from Indiana suppose that in any event settlers will occupy and cultivate these pine lands?
“Mr. Washburn, of Wisconsin—Particularly without a railroad.”
Yes, sir, “particularly without a railroad.” It will be asked after awhile, I am afraid, if settlers will go anywhere unless the government builds a railroad for them to go on.
I desire to call attention to only one more statement, which I think sufficient to settle the question. It is one made by the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Paine), who says:
“These lands will be abandoned for the present. It may be that at some remote period there will spring up in that region a new kind of agriculture, which will cause a demand for these particular lands; and they may then come into use and be valuable for agricultural purposes. But I know, and I cannot help thinking that my friend from Indiana understands that, for the present, and for many years to come, these pine lands can have no possible value other than that arising from the pine timber which stands on them.”
Now, sir, who, after listening to this emphatic and unequivocal testimony of these intelligent, competent and able-bodied witnesses, who that is not as incredulous as St. Thomas himself, will doubt for a moment that the Goshen of America is to be found in the sandy valleys and upon the pine-clad hills of the St. Croix? Who will have the hardihood to rise in his seat on this floor and assert that, excepting the pine bushes, the entire region would not produce vegetation enough in ten years to fatten a grasshopper? Where is the patriot who is willing that his country shall incur the peril of remaining another day without the amplest railroad connection with such an inexhaustible mine of agricultural wealth? Who will answer for the consequences of abandoning a great and warlike people, in the possession of a country like that, to brood over the indifference and neglect of their government? How long would it be before they would take to studying the Declaration of Independence and hatching out the damnable heresy of secession? How long before the grim demon of civil discord would rear again his horrid head in our midst, “gnash loud his iron fangs and shake his crest of bristling bayonets?”
Then, sir, think of the long and painful process of reconstruction that must follow with its concomitant amendments to the constitution, the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth articles. The sixteenth, it is of course understood, is to be appropriated to those blushing damsels who are, day after day, beseeching us to let them vote, hold office, drink cocktails, ride a-straddle, and do everything else the men do. But above all, sir, let me implore you to reflect for a single moment on the deplorable condition of our country in case of a foreign war, with all our ports blockaded, all our cities in a state or siege, the gaunt specter of famine brooding like a hungry vulture over our starving land; our commissary stores all exhausted, and our famishing armies withering away in the field, a helpless prey to the insatiate demon of hunger; our navy rotting in the docks for want of provisions for our gallant seamen, and we without any railroad communication whatever with the prolific pine thickets of the St. Croix.
Ah, sir, I could very well understand why my amiable friends from Pennsylvania (Mr. Myers, Mr. Kelley and Mr. O’Neill) should be so earnest in their support of this bill the other day; and if their honorable colleague, my friend, Mr. Randall, will pardon the remark, I will say I consider his criticism of their action on that occasion as not only unjust, but ungenerous. I knew they were looking forward with a far-reaching ken of enlightened statesmanship to the pitiable condition in which Philadelphia will be left unless speedily supplied with railroad connection in some way or other with this garden spot of the universe. And beside, sir, this discussion has relieved my mind of a mystery that has weighed upon it like an incubus for years. I could never understand before why there was so much excitement during the last Congress over the acquisition of Alta Vela. I could never understand why it was that some of our ablest statesmen and most disinterested patriots should entertain such dark forebodings of the untold calamities that were to befall our beloved country unless we should take immediate possession of that desirable island. But I see now that they were laboring under the mistaken impression that the government would need the guano to manure the public lands on the St. Croix.
Now, sir, I repeat, I have been satisfied for years that if there was any portion of the inhabited globe absolutely in a suffering condition for want of a railroad it was these teeming pine barrens of the St. Croix. At what particular point on that noble stream such a road should be commenced I knew was immaterial, and it seems so to have been considered by the draughtsman of this bill. It might be up at the spring or down at the foot-log, or the water-gate, or the fish-dam, or anywhere along the bank, no matter where. But in what direction should it run, or where it should terminate, were always to my mind questions of the most painful perplexity. I could conceive of no place on “God’s green earth” in such straitened circumstances for railroad facilities as to be likely to desire or willing to accept such a connection. I knew that neither Bayfield nor Superior city would have it, for they both indignantly spurned the munificence of the government when coupled with such ignominious conditions, and let this very same land grant die on their hands years and years ago rather than submit to the degradation of a direct communication by railroad with the piny woods of the St. Croix; and I knew that what the enterprising inhabitants of those giant young cities would refuse to take would have few charms for others, whatever their necessities or cupidity might be.
Hence as I have said, sir, I was utterly at a loss to determine where the terminus of this great and indispensable road should be, until I accidentally overheard some gentleman the other day mention the name of “Duluth.”
Duluth! The word fell upon my ear with a peculiar and indescribable charm, like the gentle murmur of a low fountain stealing forth in the midst of roses; or the soft, sweet accents of an angel’s whisper in the bright, joyous dream of sleeping innocence.
“Duluth!” ’Twas the name for which my soul had panted for years, as the hart panteth for the water-brooks. But where was Duluth? Never in all my limited reading, had my vision been gladdened by seeing the celestial word in print. And I felt a profound humiliation in my ignorance that its dulcet syllables had never before ravished my delighted ear. I was certain the draughtsman in this bill had never heard of it or it would have been designated as one of the termini of this road. I asked my friends about it, but they knew nothing of it. I rushed to the library, and examined all the maps I could find. I discovered in one of them a delicate hairlike line, diverging from the Mississippi near a place marked Prescott, which, I supposed, was intended to represent the river St. Croix, but, could nowhere find Duluth. Nevertheless, I was confident it existed somewhere, and that its discovery would constitute the crowning glory of the present century, if not of all modern times. I knew it was bound to exist in the very nature of things; that the symmetry and perfection of our planetary system would be incomplete without it. That the elements of maternal nature would since have resolved themselves back into original chaos if there had been such a hiatus in creation as would have resulted from leaving out Duluth! In fact, sir, I was overwhelmed with the conviction that Duluth not only existed somewhere, but that wherever it was, it was a great and glorious place. I was convinced that the greatest calamity that ever befell the benighted nations of the ancient world was in their having passed away without a knowledge of the actual existence of Duluth; that their fabled Atlantis, never seen save by the hallowed vision of the inspired poesy, was, in fact, but another name for Duluth; that the golden orchard of the Hesperides, was but a poetical synonym for the beer-gardens in the vicinity of Duluth. I was certain that Herodotus had died a miserable death, because in all his travels and with all his geographical research he had never heard of Duluth. I knew that if the immortal spirit of Homer could look down from another heaven than that created by his own celestial genius upon the long lines of pilgrims from every nation of the earth to the gushing fountain of poesy opened by the touch of his magic wand, if he could be permitted to behold the vast assemblage of grand and glorious productions of the lyric art called into being by his own inspired strains, he would weep tears of bitter anguish that, instead of lavishing all the stores of his mighty genius upon the fall of Illion, it had not been his more blessed lot to crystalize in deathless song the rising glories of Duluth. Yes, sir, had it not been for this map, kindly furnished me by the legislature of Minnesota, I might have gone down to my obscure and humble grave in an agony of despair, because I could nowhere find Duluth. Had such been my melancholy fate, I have no doubt that with the last feeble pulsation of my breaking heart, with the last faint exhalation of my fleeting breath, I should have whispered, “Where is Duluth?”
But, thanks to the beneficence of that band of ministering angels who have their bright abodes in the far-off capital of Minnesota, just as the agony of my anxiety was about to culminate in the frenzy of despair, this blessed map was placed in my hands; and as I unfolded it a resplendent scene of ineffable glory opened before me, such as I imagined burst upon the enraptured vision of the wandering peri through the opening gates of Paradise. There, there, for the first time, my enchanted eye rested upon the ravishing word, “Duluth!” This map, sir, is intended, as it appears from its title, to illustrate the position of Duluth in the United States; but if gentlemen will examine it, I think they will concur with me in the opinion, that it is far too modest in its pretensions. It not only illustrates the position of Duluth in the United States, but exhibits its relations with all created things. It even goes further than this. It hits the shadowy vale of futurity, and affords us a view of the golden prospects of Duluth far along the dim vista of ages yet to come.
If gentlemen will examine it, they will find Duluth not only in the center of the map, but represented in the center of a series of concentric circles one hundred miles apart, and some of them as much as four thousand miles in diameter, embracing alike, in their tremendous sweep the fragrant savannas of the sunlit South and the eternal solitudes of snow that mantle the ice-bound North. How these circles were produced is perhaps one of those primordial mysteries that the most skilled paleologist will never be able to explain. But the fact is, sir, Duluth is pre-eminently a central point, for I am told by gentlemen who have been so reckless of their own personal safety as to venture away into those awful regions where Duluth is supposed to be, that it is so exactly in the center of the visible universe that the sky comes down at precisely the same distance all around it.
I find, by reference to this map, that Duluth is situated somewhere near the western end of Lake Superior, but as there is no dot or other mark indicating its exact location, I am unable to say whether it is actually confined to any particular spot, or whether “it is just lying around there loose.” I really cannot tell whether it is one of those ethereal creations of intellectual frostwork, more intangible than the rose-tinted clouds of a summer sunset; one of those airy exhalations of the speculator’s brain which, I am told, are very flitting in the form of towns and cities along those lines of railroad, built with government subsidies, luring the unwary settler as the mirage of the desert lures the famishing traveler on, and ever on, until it fades away in the darkening horizon; or whether it is a real, bona fide, substantial city, all “staked off,” with the lots marked with their owners’ names, like that proud commercial metropolis recently discovered on the desirable shores of San Domingo. But, however that may be, I am satisfied Duluth is there, or thereabouts, for I see it stated here on the map that it is exactly thirty-nine hundred and ninety miles from Liverpool, though I have no doubt, for the sake of convenience, it will be moved back ten miles, so as to make the distance an even four thousand.
Then, sir, there is the climate of Duluth, unquestionably the most salubrious and delightful to be found anywhere on the Lord’s earth. Now, I have always been under the impression, as I presume other gentlemen have, that in the region around Lake Superior it was cold enough for at least nine months in the year to freeze the smoke-stack off a locomotive. But I see it represented on this map that Duluth is situated exactly half way between the latitudes of Paris and Venice, so that gentlemen who have inhaled the exhilarating air of the one, or basked in the golden sunlight of the other, may see at a glance that Duluth must be the place of untold delight, a terrestrial paradise, fanned by the balmy zephyrs of an eternal spring, clothed in the gorgeous sheen of ever blooming flowers, and vocal with the silvery melody of nature’s choicest songsters. In fact sir, since I have seen this map, I have no doubt that Byron was vainly endeavoring to convey some faint conception of the delicious charms of Duluth when his poetic soul gushed forth, in the rippling strains of that beautiful rhapsody—