American Eloquence Volume IV Part 2

This, our new government, is the first in the history of the world based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us.

Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind, from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises. So with the antislavery fanatics; their conclusions are right, if their premises were. They a.s.sume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is ent.i.tled to equal rights and privileges with the white man. If their premises were correct, their conclusions would be logical and just; but, their premise being wrong, their whole argument fails. I recollect once hearing a gentleman from one of the Northern States, of great power and ability, announce in the House of Representatives, with imposing effect, that we of the South would be compelled ultimately to yield upon this subject of slavery, that it was as impossible to war successfully against a principle in politics as it was in physics or mechanics; that the principle would ultimately prevail; that we, in maintaining slavery as it exists with us, were warring against a principle, founded in nature, the principle of the equality of men. The reply I made to him was that upon his own grounds we should ultimately succeed, and that he and his a.s.sociates in this crusade against our inst.i.tutions would ultimately fail. The truth announced, that it was as impossible to war successfully against a principle in politics as it was in physics and mechanics, I admitted; but told him that it was he, and those acting with him, who were warring against a principle. They were attempting to make things equal which the Creator had made unequal.

In the conflict, thus far, success has been on our side, complete throughout the length and breadth of the Confederate States. It is upon this, as I have stated, our social fabric is firmly planted; and I cannot permit myself to doubt the ultimate success of a full recognition of this principle throughout the civilized and enlightened world.

As I have stated, the truth of this principle may be slow in development, as all truths are and ever have been, in the various branches of science. It was so with the principles announced by Galileo.

It was so with Adam Smith and his principles of political economy. It was so with Harvey and his theory of the circulation of the blood; it is stated that not a single one of the medical profession, living at the time of the announcement of the truths made by him, admitted them. Now they are universally acknowledged. May we not, therefore, look with confidence to the ultimate universal acknowledgment of the truths upon which our system rests? It is the first government ever inst.i.tuted upon the principles in strict conformity to nature and the ordination of Providence in furnishing the materials of human society. Many governments have been founded upon the principle of the subordination and serfdom of certain cla.s.ses of the same race; such were and are in violation of the laws of nature. Our system commits no such violation of nature's laws. With us, all the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro; subordination is his place. He, by nature or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system.

The architect, in the construction of buildings, lays the foundation with the proper material--the granite; then comes the brick or the marble. The substratum of our society is made of the material fitted by nature for it; and by experience we know that it is best not only for the superior race, but for the inferior race, that it should be so. It is, indeed, in conformity with the ordinance of the Creator. It is not for us to inquire into the wisdom of His ordinances, or to question them. For His own purposes He has made one race to differ from another, as He has made "one star to differ from another star in glory." The great objects of humanity are best attained when there is conformity to His laws and decrees, in the formation of governments as well as in all things else. Our Confederacy is founded upon principles in strict conformity with these views. This stone, which was rejected by the first builders, "is become the chief of the corner," the real "corner-stone"

in our new edifice. * * *

Mr. Jefferson said in his inaugural, in 1801, after the heated contest preceding his election, that there might be differences of opinion without differences of principle, and that all, to some extent, had been Federalists, and all Republicans. So it may now be said of us that, whatever differences of opinion as to the best policy in having a cooperation with our border sister slave States, if the worst came to the worst, as we were all cooperationists, we are all now for independence, whether they come or not. * * *

We are a young republic, just entering upon the arena of nations; we will be the architects of our own fortunes. Our destiny, under Providence, is in our own hands. With wisdom, prudence, and statesmanship on the part of our public men, and intelligence, virtue, and patriotism on the part of the people, success to the full measure of our most sanguine hopes may be looked for. But, if unwise counsels prevail, if we become divided, if schisms arise, if dissensions spring up, if factions are engendered, if party spirit, nourished by unholy personal ambition, shall rear its hydra head, I have no good to prophesy for you. Without intelligence, virtue, integrity, and patriotism on the part of the people, no republic or representative government can be durable or stable.

JOHN C. BRECKENRIDGE, and EDWARD D. BAKER

JOHN C. BRECKENRIDGE, OF KENTUCKY, (BORN 1825, DIED 1875),

EDWARD D. BAKER, OF OREGON, (BORN 1811, DIED 1861)

ON SUPPRESSION OF INSURRECTION,

UNITED STATES SENATE, AUGUST I, 1861.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. I do not know how the Senate may vote upon this question; and I have heard some remarks which have dropped from certain Senators which have struck me with so much surprise, that I desire to say a few words in reply to them now.

This drama, sir, is beginning to open before us, and we begin to catch some idea of its magnitude. Appalled by the extent of it, and embarra.s.sed by what they see before them and around them, the Senators who are themselves the most vehement in urging on this course of events, are beginning to quarrel among themselves as to the precise way in which to regulate it.

The Senator from Vermont objects to this bill because it puts a limitation on what he considers already existing powers on the part of the President. I wish to say a few words presently in regard to some provisions of this bill, and then the Senate and the country may judge of the extent of those powers of which this bill is a limitation.

I endeavored, Mr. President, to demonstrate a short time ago, that the whole tendency of our proceedings was to trample the Const.i.tution under our feet, and to conduct this contest without the slightest regard to its provisions. Everything that has occurred since, demonstrates that the view I took of the conduct and tendency of public affairs was correct. Already both Houses of Congress have pa.s.sed a bill virtually to confiscate all the property in the States that have withdrawn, declaring in the bill to which I refer that all property of every description employed in any way to promote or aid in the insurrection, as it is denominated, shall be forfeited and confiscated. I need not say to you, sir, that all property of every kind is employed in those States, directly or indirectly, in aid of the contest they are waging, and consequently that bill is a general confiscation of all property there.

As if afraid, however, that this general term might not apply to slave property, it adds an additional section. Although they were covered by the first section of the bill, to make sure of that, however, it adds another section, declaring that all persons held to service or labor; who shall be employed in any way to aid or promote the contest now waging, shall be discharged from such service and become free: Nothing can be more apparent than that that is a general act of emanc.i.p.ation; because all the slaves in that country are employed in furnishing the means of subsistence and life to those who are prosecuting the contest; and it is an indirect, but perfectly certain mode of carrying out the purposes contained in the bill introduced by the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Pomeroy). It is doing under cover and by indirection, but certainly, what he proposes shall be done by direct proclamation of the President.

Again, sir: to show that all these proceedings are characterized by an utter disregard of the Federal Const.i.tution, what is happening around us every day? In the State of New York, some young man has been imprisoned by executive authority upon no distinct charge, and the military officer having him in charge refused to obey the writ of _habeas corpus_ issued by a judge. What is the color of excuse for that action in the State of New York? As a Senator said, is New York in resistance to the Government? Is there any danger to the stability of the Government there? Then, sir, what reason will any Senator rise and give on this floor for the refusal to give to the civil authorities the body of a man taken by a military commander in the State of New York?

Again: the police commissioners of Baltimore were arrested by military authority without any charges whatever. In vain they have asked for a specification. In vain they have sent a respectful protest to the Congress of the United States. In vain the House of Representatives, by resolution, requested the President to furnish the representatives of the people with the grounds of their arrest. He answers the House of Representatives that, in his judgment, the public interest does not permit him to say why they were arrested, on what charges, or what he has done with them--and you call this liberty and law and proceedings for the preservation of the Const.i.tution! They have been spirited off from one fortress to another, their locality unknown, and the President of the United States refuses, upon the application of the most numerous branch of the national Legislature, to furnish them with the grounds of their arrest, or to inform them what he has done with them.

Sir, it was said the other day by the Senator from Illinois (Mr.

Browning) that I had a.s.sailed the conduct of the Executive with vehemence, if not with malignity. I am not aware that I have done so.

I criticised, with the freedom that belongs to the representative of a sovereign State and the people, the conduct of the Executive. I shall continue to do so as long as I hold a seat upon this floor, when, in my opinion, that conduct deserves criticism. Sir, I need not say that, in the midst of such events as surround us, I could not cherish personal animosity towards any human being. Towards that distinguished officer, I never did cherish it. Upon the contrary, I think more highly of him, as a man and an officer, than I do of many who are around him and who, perhaps guide his counsels. I deem him to be personally an honest man, and I believe that he is trampling upon the Const.i.tution of his country every day, with probably good motives, under the counsels of those who influence him. But, sir, I have nothing now to say about the President.

The proceedings of Congress have eclipsed the actions of the Executive; and if this bill shall become a law, the proceedings of the President will sink into absolute nothingness in the presence of the outrages upon personal and public liberty which have been perpetrated by the Congress of the United States.

Mr. President, gentlemen talk about the Union as if it was an end instead of a means. They talk about it as if it was the Union of these States which alone had brought into life the principles of public and of personal liberty. Sir, they existed before, and they may survive it.

Take care that in pursuing one idea you you do not destroy not only the Const.i.tution of your country, but sever what remains of the Federal Union. These eternal and sacred principles of public men and of personal liberty, which lived before the Union and will live forever and ever somewhere, must be respected; they cannot with impunity be overthrown; and if you force the people to the issue between any form of government and these priceless principles, that form of government will perish; they will tear it asunder as the irrepressible forces of nature rend whatever opposes them.

Mr. President, I shall not long detain the Senate. I shall not enter now upon an elaborate discussion of all the principles involved in this bill, and all the consequences which, in my opinion, flow from it. A word in regard to what fell from the Senator from Vermont, the substance of which has been uttered by a great many Senators on this floor. What I tried to show some time ago has been substantially admitted. One Senator says that the Const.i.tution is put aside in a struggle like this. Another Senator says that the condition of affairs is altogether abnormal, and that you cannot deal with them on const.i.tutional principles, any more than you can deal, by any of the regular operations of the laws of nature, with an earthquake. The Senator from Vermont says that all these proceedings are to be conducted according to the laws of war; and he adds that the laws of war require many things to be done which are absolutely forbidden in the Const.i.tution; which Congress is prohibited from doing, and all other departments of the Government are forbidden from doing by the Const.i.tution; but that they are proper under the laws of war, which must alone be the measure of our action now. I desire the country, then, to know this fact; that it is openly avowed upon this floor that const.i.tutional limitations are no longer to be regarded; but that you are acting just as if there were two nations upon this continent, one arrayed against the other; some eighteen or twenty million on one side, and some ten or twelve million on the other, as to whom the Const.i.tution is nought, and the laws of war alone apply.

Sir, let the people, already beginning to pause and reflect upon the origin and nature and the probable consequences of this unhappy strife, get this idea fairly lodged in their minds--and it is a true one--and I will venture to say that the brave words which we now hear every day about crushing, subjugating, treason, and traitors, will not be so uttered the next time the Representatives of the people and States a.s.semble beneath the dome of this Capitol.

Mr. President, we are on the wrong tack; we have been from the beginning. The people begin to see it. Here we have been hurling gallant fellows on to death, and the blood of Americans has been shed--for what?

They have shown their prowess, respectively--that which belongs to the race--and shown it like men. But for what have the United States soldiers, according to the exposition we have heard here to-day, been shedding their blood, and displaying their dauntless courage? It has been to carry out principles that three fourths of them abhor; for the principles contained in this bill, and continually avowed on the floor of the Senate, are not shared, I venture to say, by one fourth of the army.

I have said, sir, that we are on the wrong tack. Nothing but ruin, utter ruin, to the North, to the South, to the East, to the West, will follow the prosecution of this contest. You may look forward to countless treasures all spent for the purpose of desolating and ravaging this continent; at the end leaving us just where we are now; or if the forces of the United States are successful in ravaging the whole South, what on earth will be done with it after that is accomplished? Are not gentlemen now perfectly satisfied that they have mistaken a people for a faction?

Are they not perfectly satisfied that, to accomplish their object, it is necessary to subjugate, to conquer--aye, to exterminate--nearly ten millions of people? Do you not know it? Does not everybody know it? Does not the world know it? Let us pause, and let the Congress of the United States respond to the rising feeling all over this land in favor of peace. War is separation; in the language of an eminent gentleman now no more, it is disunion, eternal and final disunion. We have separation now; it is only made worse by war, and an utter extinction of all those sentiments of common interest and feeling which might lead to a political reunion founded upon consent and upon a conviction of its advantages. Let the war go on, however, and soon, in addition to the moans of widows and orphans all over this land, you will hear the cry of distress from those who want food and the comforts of life. The people will be unable to pay the grinding taxes which a fanatical spirit will attempt to impose upon them. Nay, more, sir; you will see further separation. I hope it is not "the sunset of life gives me mystical lore," but in my mind's eye I plainly see "coming events cast their shadows before." The Pacific slope now, doubtless, is devoted to the union of States. Let this war go on till they find the burdens of taxation greater than the burdens of a separate condition, and they will a.s.sert it. Let the war go on until they see the beautiful features of the old Confederacy beaten out of shape and comeliness by the brutalizing hand of war, and they will turn aside in disgust from the sickening spectacle, and become a separate nation. Fight twelve months longer, and the already opening differences that you see between New England and the great Northwest will develop themselves. You have two confederacies now. Fight twelve months, and you will have three; twelve months longer, and you will have four.

I will not enlarge upon it, sir. I am quite aware that all I say is received with a sneer of incredulity by the gentlemen who represent the far Northeast; but let the future determine who was right and who was wrong. We are making our record here; I, my humble one, amid the sneers and aversion of nearly all who surround me, giving my votes, and uttering my utterances according to my convictions, with but few approving voices, and surrounded by scowls. The time will soon come, Senators, when history will put her final seal upon these proceedings, and if my name shall be recorded there, going along with yours as an actor in these scenes, I am willing to abide, fearlessly, her final judgment.

MR. BAKER.

Mr. President, it has not been my fortune to partic.i.p.ate in at any length, indeed, not to hear very much of, the discussion which has been going on--more, I think, in the hands of the Senator from Kentucky than anybody else--upon all the propositions connected with this war; and, as I really feel as sincerely as he can an earnest desire to preserve the Const.i.tution of the United States for everybody, South as well as North, I have listened for some little time past to what he has said with an earnest desire to apprehend the point of his objection to this particular bill. And now--waiving what I think is the elegant but loose declamation in which he chooses to indulge--I would propose, with my habitual respect for him, (for n.o.body is more courteous and more gentlemanly,) to ask him if he will be kind enough to tell me what single particular provision there is in this bill which is in violation of the Const.i.tution of the United States, which I have sworn to support--one distinct, single proposition in the bill.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. I will state, in general terms, that every one of them is, in my opinion, flagrantly so, unless it may be the last. I will send the Senator the bill, and he may comment on the sections.

MR. BAKER. Pick out that one which is in your judgment most clearly so.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. They are all, in my opinion, so equally atrocious that I dislike to discriminate. I will send the Senator the bill, and I tell him that every section, except the last, in my opinion, violates the Const.i.tution of the United States; and of that last section, I express no opinion.

MR. BAKER. I had hoped that that respectful suggestion to the Senator would enable him to point out to me one, in his judgment, most clearly so, for they are not all alike--they are not equally atrocious.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. Very nearly. There are ten of them. The Senator can select which he pleases.

MR. BAKER. Let me try then, if I must generalize as the Senator does, to see if I can get the scope and meaning of this bill. It is a bill providing that the President of the United States may declare, by proclamation, in a certain given state of fact, certain territory within the United States to be in a condition of insurrection and war; which proclamation shall be extensively published within the district to which it relates. That is the first proposition. I ask him if that is unconst.i.tutional? That is a plain question. Is it unconst.i.tutional to give power to the President to declare a portion of the territory of the United States in a state of insurrection or rebellion? He will not dare to say it is.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. Mr. President, the Senator from Oregon is a very adroit debater, and he discovers, of course, the great advantage he would have if I were to allow him, occupying the floor, to ask me a series of questions, and then have his own criticisms made on them.

When he has closed his speech, if I deem it necessary, I will make some reply. At present, however, I will answer that question. The State of Illinois, I believe, is a military district; the State of Kentucky is a military district. In my judgment, the President has no authority, and, in my judgment, Congress has no right to confer upon the President authority, to declare a State in a condition of insurrection or rebellion.

MR. BAKER. In the first place, the bill does not say a word about States. That is the first answer.

MR. BRECKENRIDGE. Does not the Senator know, in fact, that those States compose military districts? It might as well have said "States" as to describe what is a State.