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NECESSITY OF PREPARING FOR A WAR WITH FRANCE. 179

which results from party strife, gentlemen will believe me on my word. I will not pretend, like my honorable colleague, to describe to you the waste, the ravages, and the horrors of war. I have not the same harmonious periods, nor the same musical tones; neither shall I boast of Christian charity, nor attempt to display that ingenuous glow of benevolence, so decorous to the cheek of youth, which gave a vivid tint to every sentence he uttered, and was, if possible, as impressive even as his eloquence. But though we possess not the same pomp of words, our hearts are not insensible to the woes of humanity. We can feel for the misery of plundered towns, the conflagration of defenceless villages, and the devastation of cultured fields.

Yes, Sir, we wish for peace; but how is that blessing to .be preserved? In my opinion, there is nothing worth fighting for but national honor; for in the national honor is involved the national independence. I know that prudence may force a wise government to conceal the sense of indignity; but the insult should be engraven on tablets of brass with a pencil of steel. And when that time and change, which happen to all, shall bring forward the favorable moment, then let the avenging arm strike home. It is by avowing and maintaining this stern principle of honor, that peace can be preserved.

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I have no hesitation in saying that you ought to have taken possession of New Orleans and the Floridas the instant your treaty was violated. You ought to do it now. Your rights are invaded, confidence in negotiation is in vain there is therefore no alternative but force. You are exposed to imminent present danger; you have the prospect of great future advantage; you are justified by the clearest principles of right; you are urged by the strongest motives of policy; you are commanded by every sentiment of national dignity.

Look, Mr. President, at the conduct of America in her infant years. When there was no actual invasion of right, but only a claim to invade, she resisted the claim; she spurned the insult. Did we then hesitate? Did we then wait for foreign alliance? No; animated with the spirit, warmed by the soul of Freedom, we threw our oaths of allegiance in the face of our sovereign, and committed our fortunes and our fate to the God of battles. We were then subjects. We had not then attained to the dignity of an independent republic. We then had no rank among the nations of the earth. But we had the spirit which deserved that elevated

And now that we have gained it, shall we fall from

station.
our honor?

Sir, I repeat to you that I wish for peace-real, lasting, honorable peace. To obtain and secure this blessing, let us, by a bold and decisive conduct, convince the powers of Europe that we are determined to defend our rights; that we will not submit to insult; that we will not bear degradation. This is the conduct which becomes a generous people. This conduct will command the respect of the world. I can not believe, with my honorable colleague, that three-fourths of America are opposed to vigorous measures. I can not believe that they will meanly refuse to pay the sums needful to vindicate their honor and support their independence. Sir, this is a libel on the people of America. They will disdain submission to the proudest sovereign of earth. They have not lost the spirit of '76. But, Sir, if they are so base as to barter their rights for gold, if they are so vile that they will not defend their honor, they are unworthy of the rank they enjoy, and it is no matter how soon they are parcelled out among better masters.

Ex. CXII.-SONG.

REMEMBER the glories of patriots brave,
Though the days of the heroes are o'er;
Long lost to their country, and cold in their grave,
They return to their kindred no more.
The stars of the field, which in victory poured
Their beams on the battle, are set;

But enough of their glory remains on each sword
To light us to victory yet!

Wollansac! when nature embellished the tint
Of thy fields and thy mountains so fair,

Did she ever intend that a tyrant should print
The footsteps of slavery there?

No! Freedom, whose smiles we shall never resign,
Told those who invaded our plains,

That 'tis sweeter to bleed for an age at thy shrine,

Than to sleep for a moment in chains.

JEFFERSON'S PURCHASE OF LOUISIANA.

Forget not the chieftains of Hampshire, who stood
In the day of distress by our side;

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Nor the heroes who nourished the fields with their blood,

Nor the rights they secured as they died.

The sun that now blesses our eyes with his light,

Saw the martyrs of liberty slain;

Oh, let him not blush, when he leaves us to-night,
To find that they fell there in vain!

Ex. CXIII.-JEFFERSON'S PURCHASE OF THE LOUISIANA TERRITORY, MADE IN 1803.

HENRY S. RANDALL.

No conqueror who has trod the earth to fill it with desolation and mourning, ever conquered and permanently amalgamated with his native kingdom a remote approach to the same extent of territory secured by this peaceful purchase. But one kingdom in Europe equals the extent of one of its present states. Germany supports a population of thirty-seven millions of people. All Germany has a little more than the area of two-thirds of Nebraska; and, acre for acre, less tillable land. The Louisiana territory, as densely populated in proportion to its natural materials of sustentation as parts of Europe, would be capable of supporting from four to five hundred millions of people. The whole United States became capable, by this acquisition, of sustaining a larger population than ever occupied Europe.

This purchase secured, independently of territory, several prime national objects. It gave us that homogeneousness, unity and independence which is derived from the absolute control and disposition of our commerce, trade and industry, in every department, without the hindrance or meddling of any intervening nation between us and any natural element of industry, between us and the sea, or between us and the open market of the world. It gave us ocean boundaries on all exposed sides; it made us indisputably and forever (if our own Union is preserved), the controllers of the Western Hemisphere. It placed our national course, character, civilization and destiny solely in our own hands.

It gave us the certain sources of a not distant numerical strength to which that of the mightiest empires of the past or present is insignificant.

A Gallic Cæsar was leading his armies over shattered kingdoms. His armed foot shook the world. He decimated Europe. Millions on millions of mankind perished, and there was scarcely a human habitation from the Polar seas to the Mediterranean, where the voice of lamentation was not heard over kindred slaughtered to swell the conqueror's strength and "glory!" And the carnage and rapine of war are trifling evils compared with its demoralizations. The rolling tide of conquest subsided. France shrank back to her ancient limits. Napoleon died a repining captive on a rock of the ocean. The stupendous tragedy was played out, and no physical results were left behind but decrease, depopulation and universal loss.

A Republican President, on a distant continent, was also: seeking to aggrandize his country. He led no armies. He shed not a solitary drop of human blood. He caused not a tear of human woe. He bent not one toiling back lower by governmental burdens. Strangest of political anomalies, (and ludicrous as strange to the representatives of the ideas of the tyrannical and bloody past,) he lightened the taxes while he was lightening the debts of a nation. And without interrupting either of these meliorations for an instantwithout imposing a single new exaction on his people, he acquired, peaceably and permanently for his country, more extensive and fertile domains than ever for a moment owned the sway of Napoleon-more extensive ones than his gory plume ever floated over.

Which of these yictors deserves to be termed "glorious?"

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Ex. CXIV.-WAR DISCOUNTENANCED.

Speech in Congress, March, 1806.

JOHN RANDOLPH.

WHAT, Sir, is the question in dispute? The carrying trade. What part of it? The fair, the honest, and the useful trade, that is engaged in carrying our own productions

WAR DISCOUNTENANCED.

183

to foreign markets, and bringing back their productions in exchange? No, Sir; it is that carrying trade which covers enemies' property, and carries the coffee, the sugar, and other West India products to the mother country. No, Sir; if this great agricultural nation is to be governed by Salem and Boston, New York and Philadelphia, Baltimore, Norfolk and Charleston, let gentlemen come out and say so; and let a committee of public safety be appointed from these towns to carry on the government. I, for one, will not mortgage my property and my liberty to carry on this trade. The nation said so seven years ago; I said so then, I say so now; it is not for the honest carrying trade of America, but for this mushroom, this fungus of war,-for a trade which, as soon as the nations of Europe are at peace, will cease to exist-it is for this that the spirit of avaricious traffic would plunge us into war.

But yet, Sir, I have a more cogent reason against going to war for the honor of the flag in the narrow seas, or any other maritime punctilio. It springs from my attachment to the principles of the government under which I live. I declare, in the face of day, that this government was not instituted for the purposes of offensive war. No; it was framed, to use its own language, for the common defence and general welfare, which are inconsistent with offensive war. As, in 1798, I was opposed to this species of warfare, because I believed it would raze the Constitution to its very foundation; so, in 1806, I am opposed to it on the very same grounds. No sooner do you put the Constitution to this use-to a test which it is by no means calculated to endure,— than its incompetency to such purposes becomes manifest and apparent to all. I fear that if you go into a foreign war, for a circuitous, unfair foreign trade, you will come out without your Constitution. We shall be told that our government is too free, or in other words, too weak and inefficient-much virtue, Sir, in terms;-that we must give the President power to call forth the resources of the nation-that is, to filch the last shilling from our pockets, or to drain the last drop of blood from our veins. I am against giving this power to any man, be he who he may. The American people must either withhold this power, or resign their liberties. There is no other alternative. Nothing but the most imperious necessity will justify such a grant; and is there a powerful enemy at our door? You may begin with a First Consul. From that chrysalis state he soon becomes an emperor. You have

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