I Hate Military
Belongings, And Am Disgusted At Seeing The Great Affairs Of A Nation
Put Out Of Their Regular Course.
Congress to me is respectable.
Parliamentary debates - be they ever so prosy, as with us, or even so
rowdy, as sometimes they have been with our cousins across the
water - engage my sympathies.
I bow inwardly before a Speaker's
chair, and look upon the elected representatives of any nation as
the choice men of the age. Those muddy, clattering dragoons,
sitting at the corners of the streets with dirty woolen comforters
around their ears, were to me hideous in the extreme. But there at
Washington, at the period of which I am writing, I was forced to
acknowledge that Congress was at a discount, and that the rough-shod
generals were the men of the day. "Pack them up and send them in
boxes to their several States." It would come to that, I thought,
or to something like that, unless Congress would consent to be
submissive. "I have yet to learn - !" said indignant members,
stamping with their feet on the floor of the House. One would have
said that by that time the lesson might almost have been understood.
Up to the period of this civil war Congress has certainly worked
well for the United States. It might be easy to pick holes in it;
to show that some members have been corrupt, others quarrelsome, and
others again impracticable. But when we look at the circumstances
under which it has been from year to year elected; when we remember
the position of the newly populated States from which the members
have been sent, and the absence throughout the country of that old
traditionary class of Parliament men on whom we depend in England;
when we think how recent has been the elevation in life of the
majority of those who are and must be elected, it is impossible to
deny them praise for intellect, patriotism, good sense, and
diligence. They began but sixty years ago, and for sixty years
Congress has fully answered the purpose for which it was
established. With no antecedents of grandeur, the nation, with its
Congress, has made itself one of the five great nations of the
world. And what living English politician will say even now, with
all its troubles thick upon it, that it is the smallest of the five?
When I think of this, and remember the position in Europe which an
American has been able to claim for himself, I cannot but
acknowledge that Congress on the whole has been conducted with
prudence, wisdom, and patriotism.
The question now to be asked is this - Have the powers of Congress
been sufficient, or are they sufficient, for the continued
maintenance of free government in the States under the Constitution?
I think that the powers given by the existing Constitution to
Congress can no longer be held to be sufficient; and that if the
Union be maintained at all, it must be done by a closer assimilation
of its congressional system to that of our Parliament. But to that
matter I must allude again, when speaking of the existing
Constitution of the States.
CHAPTER III.
THE CAUSES OF THE WAR.
I have seen various essays purporting to describe the causes of this
civil war between the North and South; but they have generally been
written with the view of vindicating either one side or the other,
and have spoken rather of causes which should, according to the
ideas of their writers, have produced peace, than of those which
did, in the course of events, actually produce war. This has been
essentially the case with Mr. Everett, who in his lecture at New
York, on the 4th of July, 1860, recapitulated all the good things
which the North has done for the South, and who proved - if he has
proved anything - that the South should have cherished the North
instead of hating it. And this was very much the case also with Mr.
Motley in his letter to the London Times. That letter is good in
its way, as is everything that comes from Mr. Motley, but it does
not tell us why the war has existed. Why is it that eight millions
of people have desired to separate themselves from a rich and mighty
empire - from an empire which was apparently on its road to
unprecedented success, and which had already achieved wealth,
consideration, power, and internal well-being?
One would be glad to imagine, from the essays of Mr. Everett and of
Mr. Motley, that slavery has had little or nothing to do with it. I
must acknowledge it to be my opinion that slavery in its various
bearings has been the single and necessary cause of the war; that
slavery being there in the South, this war was only to be avoided by
a voluntary division - secession voluntary both on the part of North
and South; that in the event of such voluntary secession being not
asked for, or if asked for not conceded, revolution and civil war
became necessary - were not to be avoided by any wisdom or care on
the part of the North.
The arguments used by both the gentlemen I have named prove very
clearly that South Carolina and her sister States had no right to
secede under the Constitution; that is to say, that it was not open
to them peaceably to take their departure, and to refuse further
allegiance to the President and Congress without a breach of the
laws by which they were bound. For a certain term of years, namely,
from 1781 to 1787, the different States endeavored to make their way
in the world simply leagued together by certain articles of
confederation. It was declared that each State retained its
sovereignty, freedom, and independence; and that the said States
then entered severally into a firm league of friendship with each
other for their common defense. There was no President, no Congress
taking the place of our Parliament, but simply a congress of
delegates or ambassadors, two or three from each State, who were to
act in accordance with the policy of their own individual States.
It is well that this should be thoroughly understood, not as bearing
on the question of the present war, but as showing that a loose
confederation, not subversive of the separate independence of the
States, and capable of being partially dissolved at the will of each
separate State, was tried, and was found to fail.
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