No More Learning

But when the compromise had actually
been adopted, he dropped back into the party line behind Clay's
leadership, which he thenceforth never again forsook. There was an
element of indolence in his nature which it needed strong impulses
XXVII-984
>


## p. 15730 (#56) ###########################################

15730
DANIEL WEBSTER
to overcome, so as to set the vast machinery of his mind in full mo-
tion. Such an impulse was furnished again by Jackson's attack on
the United States Bank, and by other somewhat autocratic financial
measures. Webster opposed this policy in a series of speeches on
currency and banking, which deserve very high rank in the literature
of that branch of economics. They were not free from partisan bias
in the specific application of those fundamental principles of which
Webster had such a masterly grasp; but notwithstanding this, his
deep insight into the nature and conditions of credit, and his thorough
study and profound judgment of the functions of banking, made him
an invaluable teacher of the science of public finance. Nobody has
ever depicted the vices and dangers inherent in an unsound currency,
and the necessity of grounding the monetary system upon a firm
basis of value, with greater force and more convincing lucidity.
But in spite of the brilliancy and strength of his efforts in oppos-
ing Jackson's willful and erratic policies, Webster never became the
real leader of the Whig party. Although he was greatly the superior
of Clay in wealth of knowledge, in depth of thought, in statesmanlike
breadth of view, in solidity of reasoning power, and in argumentative
eloquence, he fell far behind him in those attributes which in con-
tests for general leadership are apt to turn the scale: the spirit of
initiative, force of will, that sincere self-confidence which extorts con-
fidence from others, bold self-assertion in doubtful situations, and
constant alertness in watching and directing the details of political
movements. Clay therefore remained the general leader of the Whig
party; while Webster, with New England at his back, stood now by
his side, now behind him, as in feudal times a great duke, rich in
treasure and lands and retainers, himself of royal blood, may have
stood now behind, now by the side of his king.
Unhappily for himself, Webster was not satisfied with the theatre
of action on which his abilities fitted him for the greatest service,
and on which he achieved his highest renown. At a comparatively
early period of his career he ardently wished to be sent as minister
to England; and he bore a grudge to John Quincy Adams for his
failure to gratify that desire. Ever since his Reply to Hayne” had
“
made his name a household word in the country, an ungovernable
longing possessed him to be President of the United States. The
morbid craving commonly called “the Presidential fever” developed
in him, as it became chronic, its most distressing form; disordering
his ambition, unsettling his judgment, and warping his statesmanship.
His imagination always saw the coveted prize within his grasp, which
in reality it never was. He lacked the sort of popularity which since
the administration of John Quincy Adams seemed to be required for
a Presidential candidacy. He traveled over the land south and north,


## p. 15731 (#57) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15731
and east and west, to manufacture it for himself; but in vain. The
people looked at him with awe, and listened to him with rapture and
wonder; but as to the Presidency, the fancy and favor of the poli-
ticians, as well as of the masses, obstinately ran to other men. So
it was again and again. Clay, too, was unfortunate as a Presidential
candidate; but he could have at least the nomination of his party
so long as there appeared to be any hope for his election. Webster
was denied even that. The vote for him in the party conventions
was always distressingly small; usually confined to New England, or
only a part of it. Yet he never ceased to hope against hope, and
thus to invite more and more galling disappointments. To Henry
Clay he could yield without humiliation; but when he saw his party
prefer to himself not once, but twice and three times, men of only
military fame, without any political significance whatever, his morti-
fication was so keen that in the bitterness of his soul he twice openly
protested against the result. Worse than all this, he had to meet the
fate a fate not uncommon with chronic Presidential candidates - to
see the most important and most questionable act of his last years
attributed to his inordinate craving for the elusive prize.
The cause of this steady succession of failures may have been,
partly, that the people found him too unlike themselves, too un-
familiar to the popular heart; and partly that the party managers
shrunk from nominating him because they saw in him not only a
giant, but a very vulnerable giant, who would not wear well »
a candidate. They had indeed reason to fear the discussions to
which in an excited canvass his private character would be sub-
jected. Of his moral failings, those relating to money were the most
notorious and the most offensive to the moral sense of the plain peo-
ple. In the course of his public life he became accustomed not only
to the adulation but also to the material generosity of his followers.
Great as his professional income was, his prodigality went far beyond
his means; and the recklessness with which he borrowed and forgot
to return, betrayed an utter insensibility to pecuniary obligation.
With the coolest nonchalance he spent the money of his friends, and
left to them his debts for payment. This habit increased as he grew
older, and severely tested the endurance of his admirers. So grave a
departure from the principles of common honesty could not fail to
cast a dark shadow upon his character, and it is not strange that the
cloud of distrust should have spread from his private to his public
morals. The charge was made that he stood in the Senate advocat-
ing high tariffs as the paid attorney of the manufacturers of New
England. It was met by the answer that so great a man would
not sell himself. This should have been enough. Nevertheless, his
defenders were grievously embarrassed when the fact was pointed
(
as


## p. 15732 (#58) ###########################################

15732
DANIEL WEBSTER
out that it was after all in great part the money of the rich manu-
facturers and bankers that stocked his farm, furnished his house,
supplied his table, and paid his bills. A man less great could
hardly have long sustained himself in public life under such a bur-
den of suspicion. That Daniel Webster did sustain himself, strik-
ingly proved the strength of his prestige. But his moral failings
cost him the noblest fruit of great service,- an unbounded public
confidence.
Although disappointed in his own expectations, he vigorously
supported General Harrison for the Presidency in the campaign of
1840, and in 1841 was made Secretary of State. He remained in that
office until he had concluded the famous Ashburton treaty, under
the administration of President Tyler, who turned against the Whig
policies. After his resignation he was again elected to the Senate.
Then a fateful crisis in his career approached.
The annexation of Texas, the Mexican War, and the acquisition of
territory on our southern and western border, brought the slavery
question sharply into the foreground. Webster had always, when
occasion called for a demonstration of sentiment, denounced slavery
as a great moral and political evil; and although affirming that under
the Constitution it could not be touched by the action of the general
government in the States in which it existed, declared himself against
its extension. He had opposed the annexation of Texas, the war
against Mexico, and the enlargement of the republic by conquest.
But while he did not abandon his position concerning slavery, his
tone in maintaining it grew gradually milder. The impression gained
ground that as a standing candidate for the Presidency, he became
more and more anxious to conciliate Southern opinion.
Then the day came that tried men's souls. The slave power had
favored war and conquest, hoping that the newly acquired territory
would furnish more slave States and more Senators in its interest.
That hope was cruelly dashed when California presented herself for
admission into the Union, with a State constitution excluding slavery
from her soil. To the slave power this was a stunning blow. It had
fought for more slave States and conquered for more free States.
The admission of California would hopelessly destroy the balance of
power between freedom and slavery in the Senate. The country soon
was ablaze with excitement. In the North the antislavery feeling
ran high. The fire-eaters” of the South, exasperated beyond meas-
ure by their disappointment, vociferously threatened to disrupt the
Union. Henry Clay, true to his record, hoped to avert the danger by
a compromise. He sought to reconcile the South to the inevitable
admission of California by certain concessions to slavery, among them
the ill-famed and ill-fated Fugitive Slave Law; a law offensive not


## p. 15733 (#59) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15733
-
only to antislavery sentiment, but also to the common impulses of
humanity and to the pride of manhood.
Webster had to choose. The antislavery men of New England,
and even many of his conservative friends, hoped and expected that
he would again, as he had done in Nullification times, proudly plant
the Union flag in the face of a disunion threat, with a defiant refusal
of concession to a rebellious spirit, and give voice to the moral
sense of the North. But Webster chose otherwise. On the 7th of
March, 1850, he spoke in the Senate. The whole country listened
with bated breath. While denouncing secession and pleading for
the Union in glowing periods, he spoke of slavery in regretful but
almost apologetic accents, upbraided the abolitionists as mischievous
marplots, earnestly advocated the compromise, and commended that
feature of it which was most odious to Northern sentiment, — the
Fugitive Slave Law.
From this “Seventh of March Speech » — by that name it has
passed into history – Webster never recovered. It stood in too strik-
ing a contrast to the “Reply to Hayne. ” There was indeed still the
same lucid comprehensiveness of statement. The heavy battalions
of argument marched with the same massive tread. But there was
lacking that which had been the great inspiration of the “Reply to
Hayne,” - the triumphant consciousness of being right. The effect
of the speech corresponded to its character. Southern men wel-
comed it as a sign of Northern submissiveness, but it did not go
far enough to satisfy them. The impression it made upon the anti-
slavery people of the North was painful in the extreme. They saw
in it “the fall of an archangel. ” Many of them denounced it as the
treacherous bid of a Presidential candidate for Southern favor. Their
reproaches varied from the indignant murmur to the shrillest note of
execration. Persons less interested or excited looked up at the colos-
sal figure of the old hero of “Liberty and Union with a sort of
bewildered dismay, as if something unnatural and portentous had
happened to him. Even many of his stanchest adherents among
the conservative Whigs stood at first stunned and perplexed, needing
some time to gather themselves up for his defense.
This was not surprising. Henry Clay could plan and advocate the
compromise of 1850 without loss of character. Although a man of
antislavery instincts, he was himself a slaveholder representing a
slaveholding community, a compromiser in his very being; and com-
promise had always been the vital feature of his statesmanship. But
Webster could not apologize for slavery, and in its behalf approve
compromise and concession in the face of disunion threats, without
turning his back upon the most illustrious feat of his public life.
Injustice may have been done to him by the assailants of his mo-
tives, but it can hardly be denied that the evidence of circumstances


## p. 15734 (#60) ###########################################

15734
DANIEL WEBSTER
stood glaringly against him. He himself was ill at ease. The viru-
lent epithets and sneers with which he thenceforth aspersed anti-
slavery principles and antislavery men - contrasting strangely with
the stately decorum he had always cultivated in his public utter-
ances — betrayed the bitterness of a troubled soul.
The 7th of March speech, and the series of addresses with which
he sought to set right and fortify the position he had taken, helped
greatly in inducing both political parties to accept the compromise of
1850; and also in checking, at least for the time being, the anti-
slavery movement in the Northern States. But they could not kill
that movement, nor could they prevent the coming of the final crisis.
They did, however, render him acceptable to the slave power, when,
after the death of General Taylor, President Fillmore made him
Secretary of State. Once more he stirred the people's heart by a
note addressed to the Chevalier Hülsemann, the Austrian chargé
d'affaires, in which, defending the mission of a special agent to
inquire into the state of the Hungarian insurrection, he proudly just-
ified the conduct of the government, pointed exultingly to the great-
ness of the republic, and vigorously vindicated the sympathies of the
American people with every advance of free institutions the world
over. The whole people applauded, and this was to him the last
flash of popularity.
In 1852 his hope to attain the Whig nomination for the Presidency
rose to the highest pitch, although his prospects were darker than
But he had reached the age of seventy; this was his last
chance, and he clung to it with desperate eagerness. He firmly
counted upon receiving in the convention a large number of South-
ern votes; he received not one. His defeat could hardly have been
more overwhelming. The nomination fell to General Scott. In the
agony of his disappointment, Webster advised his friends to vote for
the Democratic candidate, Franklin Pierce. In 1848 he had declared
General Taylor's nomination to be one «not fit to be made ); but
after all he had supported it. Then he still saw a possibility for
himself ahead. In 1852, the last hope having vanished, he punished
his party for having refused him what he thought his due, by openly
declaring for the opposition. The reasons he gave for this extreme
step were neither tenable, nor even plausible. It was a wail of utter
despair.
His health had for some time been failing, and the shock which
his defeat gave him aggravated his ailment. On the morning of
October 24th, 1852, he died. Henry Clay's death had preceded his by
four months. The month following saw the final discomfiture of the
Whig party. The very effort of its chiefs to hold it together, and
to preserve the Union by concessions to slavery, disrupted it so
thoroughly that it could never again rally. Its very name
|
1
ever.
!
1
soon


## p. 15735 (#61) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15735
>>
disappeared. Less than two years after Webster's death the whole
policy of compromise broke down in total collapse. Massachusetts
herself had risen against it, and in Webster's seat in the Senate sat
Charles Sumner, the very embodiment of the uncompromising anti-
slavery conscience. The “irrepressible conflict between freedom and
slavery rudely swept aside all other politics and filled the stage.
The thunder-clouds of the coming Civil War loomed darkly above
the horizon.
In the turmoils that followed, all of Webster's work sank into
temporary oblivion, except his greatest and best. The echoes of the
"Reply to Hayne” awoke again. "Liberty and Union, now and for-
ever, one and inseparable ! » became not merely the watchword of
a party, but the battle-cry of armed hosts. “I still live,) had been
his last words on his death-bed. Indeed, he still lived in his noblest
achievement, and thus he will long continue to live.
Over Webster's grave there was much heated dispute as to the
place he would occupy in the history of his country. Many of those
who had idolized him during his life extolled him still more after his
death, as the demigod whose greatness put all his motives and acts
above criticism, and whose genius excused all human frailties. Others,
still feeling the smart of the disappointment which that fatal 7th of
March had given them, would see in him nothing but rare gifts and
great opportunities prostituted by vulgar appetites and a selfish ambi-
tion. The present generation, remote from the struggles and pas-
sions of those days, will be more impartial in its judgment. Looking
back upon the time in which he lived, it beholds his statuesque form
towering with strange grandeur among his contemporaries,— huge in
his strength, and huge also in his weaknesses and faults; not indeed
an originator of policies or measures, but a marvelous expounder of
principles, laws, and facts, who illumined every topic of public con-
cern he touched, with the light of a sovereign intelligence and vast
knowledge; who, by overpowering argument, riveted around the
Union unbreakable bonds of constitutional doctrine; who awakened to
new life and animated with invincible vigor the national spirit; who
' left to his countrymen and to the world invaluable lessons of states-
manship, right, and patriotism, in language of grand simplicity and
prodigiously forceful clearness; and who might stand as its greatest
man in the political history of America, had he been a master char-
acter as he was a master mind.
-
C. Tulung


## p. 15736 (#62) ###########################################

15736
DANIEL WEBSTER
THE AMERICAN IDEA
From the Oration on Laying the Corner-Stone of the Bunker Hill Monument,'
June 17th, 1825
T feeling which
the occasion has
excited. These thousands of
1
human faces, glowing with sympathy and joy, and from the
impulses of a common gratitude turned reverently to heaven in
this spacious temple of the firmament, proclaim that the day, the
place, and the purpose, of our assembling, have made a deep im-
pression on our hearts.
If, indeed, there be anything in local association fit to affect
the mind of man, we need not strive to repress the emotions
which agitate us here. We are among the sepulchres of our
fathers. We are
We are on ground distinguished by their valor, their
constancy, and the shedding of their blood. We are here, not to
fix an uncertain date in our annals, nor to draw into notice an
obscure and unknown spot. If our humble purpose had never
been conceived, if we ourselves had never been born, the 17th of
June, 1775, would have been a day on which all subsequent
history would have poured its light, and the eminence where we
stand a point of attraction to the eyes of successive generations.
But we
are Americans.
We live in what may be called the
early age of this great continent; and we know that our poster-
ity, through all time, are here to suffer and enjoy the allotments
of humanity. We see before us a probable train of great events;
we know that our own fortunes have been happily cast; and it is
natural, therefore, that we should be moved by the contemplation
of occurrences which have guided our destiny before many of us
were born, and settled the condition in which we should pass
that portion of our existence which God allows to
earth.
But the great event in the history of the continent, which we
now met here to commemorate, — that prodigy of modern
times, at once the wonder and blessing of the world,- is the
American Revolution. In a day of extraordinary prosperity and
happiness, of high national honor, distinction, and power, we are
brought together in this place by our love of country, by our
admiration of exalted character, by our gratitude for signal serv-
ices and patriotic devotion.
men
on
.
are


## p. 15737 (#63) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15737
The society whose organ I am, was formed for the purpose
of rearing some honorable and durable monument to the memory
of the early friends of American independence.
They have
thought that for this object no time could be more propitious
than the present prosperous and peaceful period; that no place
could claim preference over this memorable spot; and that no
day could be more auspicious to the undertaking than the anni-
versary of the battle which was here fought. The foundation of
that monument we have now laid. With solemnities suited to the
occasion, with prayers to Almighty God for his blessing, and in
the midst of this cloud of witnesses, we have begun the work.
We trust it will be prosecuted; and that, springing from a broad
foundation, rising high in massive solidity and unadorned grand-
eur, it may remain as long as Heaven permits the works of man
to last, a fit emblem both of the events in memory of which it
is raised, and of the gratitude of those who have reared it.
We know, indeed, that the record of illustrious actions is
most safely deposited in the universal remembrance of mankind.
We know that if we could cause this structure to ascend, not
only till it reached the skies, but till it pierced them, its broad
surfaces could still contain but part of that which, in an age of
knowledge, hath already been spread over the earth, and which
history charges itself with making known to all future times.
We know that no inscription on entablatures less broad than the
earth itself can carry information of the events we commemorate
where it has not already gone; and that no structure which shall
not outlive the duration of letters and knowledge among men,
can prolong the memorial. But our object is, by this edifice to
show our own deep sense of the value and importance of the
achievements of our ancestors; and by presenting this work of
gratitude to the eye, to keep alive similar sentiments, and to fos-
ter a constant regard for the principles of the Revolution. Human
beings are composed, not of reason only, but of imagination also,
and sentiment; and that is neither wasted nor misapplied
which is appropriated to the purpose of giving right direc-
tion to sentiments, and opening proper springs of feeling in the
heart. Let it not be supposed that our object is to perpetuate
national hostility, or even to cherish a mere military spirit. It is
higher, purer, nobler. We consecrate our work to the spirit of
national independence, and we wish that the light of peace may


## p. 15738 (#64) ###########################################

15738
DANIEL WEBSTER
rest upon it forever. We rear a memorial of our conviction of
that unmeasured benefit which has been conferred on our own
land, and of the happy influences which have been produced by
the same évents, on the general interests of mankind. We come,
as Americans, to mark a spot which must forever be dear to us
and our posterity. We wish that whosoever, in all coming time,
shall turn his eye hither, may behold that the place is not un-
distinguished where the first great battle of the Revolution was
fought. We wish that this structure may proclaim the magni-
tude and importance of that event to every class and every age.
We wish that infancy may learn the purpose of its erection from
maternal lips, and that weary and withered age may behold it,
and be solaced by the recollections which it suggests. We wish
that labor may look up here, and be proud in the midst of its
toil. We wish that in those days of disaster which, as they
come upon all nations, must be expected to come upon us also,
desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be
assured that the foundations of our national power still stand
strong We wish that this column, rising toward heaven among
the pointed spires of so many temples dedicated to God, may con-
tribute also to produce, in all minds, a pious feeling of depend-
ence and gratitude. We wish, finally, that the last object on the
sight of him who leaves his native shore, and the first to glad-
den his who revisits it, may be something which shall remind
him of the liberty and glory of his country. Let it rise till it
meet the sun in his coming; let the earliest light of the morn-
ing gild it, and parting day linger and play on its summit.
We live in a' most extraordinary age. Events So various
and so important that they might crowd and distinguish centuries,
are in our times compressed within the compass of a single life.
When has it happened that history has had so much to record,
in the same term of years, as since the 17th of June, 1775 ? Our
own Revolution, which under other circumstances might itself
have been expected to occasion a war of half a century, has been
achieved; twenty-four sovereign and independent States erected;
and a general government established over them, so safe, so wise,
so free, so practical, that we might well wonder its establishment
should have been accomplished so soon, were it not far the
greater wonder that it should have been established at all. Two
or three millions of people have been augmented to twelve, the


## p. 15739 (#65) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15739
great forests of the West prostrated beneath the arm of success-
ful industry, and the dwellers on the banks of the Ohio and the
Mississippi become the fellow-citizens and neighbors of those who
cultivate the hills of New England. We have a commerce that
leaves no sea unexplored; navies which take no law from supe-
rior force; revenues adequate to all the exigencies of government,
almost without taxation; and peace with all nations, founded on
equal rights and mutual respect.
Europe, within the same period, has been agitated by a
mighty revolution; which, while it has been felt in the individual
condition and happiness of almost every man, has shaken to the
centre of her political fabric, and dashed against one another
thrones which had stood tranquil for ages. On this our conti-
nent, our own example has been followed, and colonies have
sprung to be nations.
Unaccustomed sounds of liberty and free
government have reached us from beyond the track of the sun;
and at this moment the dominion of European power in this
continent, from the place where we stand to the South Pole, is
annihilated forever,
In the mean time, both in Europe and America, such has
been the general progress of knowledge, such the improvements
in legislation, in commerce, in the arts, in letters, and above all,
in liberal ideas and the general spirit of the age, that the whole
world seems changed.
Yet notwithstanding that this is but a faint abstract of the
things which have happened since the day of the battle of Bun-
ker Hill, we are but fifty years removed from it; and we
stand here to enjoy all the blessings of our own condition, and
to look abroad to the brightened prospects of the world, while we
still hold among us some of those who were active agents in
the scenes of 1775, and who are now here, from every quarter
of New England, to visit once more, and under circumstances so
affecting,- I had almost said overwhelming,—this renowned the-
atre of their courage and patriotism.
Venerable men! you have come down to us from a former
generation. Heaven has bounteously lengthened out your lives,
that you might behold this joyous day. You are now where you
stood fifty years ago this very hour, with your brothers and your
neighbors, shoulder to shoulder, in the strife of your country.
Behold, how altered ! The same heavens are indeed over your
heads; the same ocean rolls at your feet: but all else, how
now
-


## p. 15740 (#66) ###########################################

15740
DANIEL WEBSTER
All is peace.
1
.
changed! You hear now no roar of hostile cannon, you see no
mixed volumes of smoke and flame rising from burning Charles-
town. The ground strewed with the dead and the dying; the im-
petuous charge; the steady and successful repulse; the loud call to
repeated assault; the summoning of all that is manly to repeated
resistance; a thousand bosoms freely and fearlessly bared in an
instant to whatever of terror there may be in war and death, -
all these you have witnessed, but you witness them no more.
The heights of yonder metropolis, its towers and
roofs, which you then saw filled with wives and children and
countrymen in distress and terror, and looking with unutterable
emotions for the issue of the combat, have presented you to-day
with the sight of its whole happy population, come out to wel-
come and greet you with a universal jubilee.
Yonder proud
ships, by a felicity of position appropriately lying at the foot of
this mount, and seeming fondly to cling to it, are not means of
annoyance to you, but your country's own means of distinction
and defense. All is peace; and God has granted you this sight
of your country's happiness, ere you slumber forever in the
grave. He has allowed you to behold and to partake the reward
of your patriotic toils; and he has allowed us, your sons and
countrymen, to meet you here, and in the name of the present
generation, in the name of your country, in the name of liberty,
to thank you!
A chief distinction of the present day is a community of opin-
ions and knowledge amongst men in different nations, existing
in a degree heretofore unknown. Knowledge has in our time
triumphed, and is triumphing, over distance, over difference of
languages, over diversity of habits, over prejudice, and
bigotry. The civilized and Christian world is fast learning the
great lesson that difference of nation does not imply necessary
hostility, and that all contact need not be war. The whole world
is becoming a common field for intellect to act in. Energy of
mind, genius, power, wheresoever it exists, may speak out in
any tongue, and the world will hear it.
A great chord of senti-
ment and feeling runs through two continents, and vibrates over
both.
Every breeze wafts intelligence from country to country;
every wave rolls it: all give it forth and all in turn receive it.
There is a vast commerce of ideas; there are marts and ex-
changes for intellectual discoveries, and a wonderful fellowship
of those individual intelligences which make up the mind and
over


## p. 15741 (#67) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15741
opinion of the age. Mind is the great lever of all things; human
thought is the process by which human ends are ultimately an-
swered: and the diffusion of knowledge, so astonishing in the last
half-century, has rendered innumerable minds, variously gifted
by nature, competent to be competitors or fellow-workers on the
theatre of intellectual operation.
Whatever benefit has been acquired is likely to be retained,
for it consists mainly in the acquisition of more enlightened
ideas. And although kingdoms and provinces may be wrested
from the hands that hold them, in the same manner that they
were obtained; although ordinary and vulgar power may, in
human affairs, be lost as it has been won: yet it is the glorious
prerogative of the empire of knowledge, that what it gains it
never loses. On the contrary, it increases by the multiple of its
own power: all its ends become means; all its attainments, helps
to new conquests. Its whole abundant harvest is but so much
seed wheat; and nothing has ascertained, and nothing can ascer-
tain, the amount of ultimate product.
And now let us indulge an honest exultation in the convic-
tion of the benefit which the example of our country has pro-
duced, and is likely to produce, on human freedom and human
happiness. Let us endeavor to comprehend in all its magnitude,
and to feel in all its importance, the part assigned to us in the
great drama of human affairs. We are placed at the head of
the system of representative and popular governments. Thus far
our example shows that such governments are compatible, not
only with respectability and power, but with repose, with peace,
with security of personal rights, with good laws, and a just ad-
ministration.
We are not propagandists. Wherever other systems are pre-
ferred, either as being thought better in themselves, or as bet.
ter suited to existing condition, we leave the preference to be
enjoyed. Our history hitherto proves, however, that the popular
form is practicable, and that with wisdom and knowledge men
may govern themselves; and the duty incumbent on us is, to
preserve the consistency of this cheering example, and take
care that nothing may weaken its authority with the world. If,
in our case, the representative system ultimately fail, popular
governments must be pronounced impossible. No combination
of circumstances more favorable to the experiment can ever be
expected to occur. The last hopes of mankind therefore rest


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15742
DANIEL WEBSTER
with us; and if it should be proclaimed that our example had
become an argument against the experiment, the knell of popu-
lar liberty would be sounded throughout the earth.
These are incitements to duty; but they are not suggestions
of doubt. Our history and our condition -- all that is gone
before us, and all that surrounds us authorize the belief that
popular governments, though subject to occasional variations,
perhaps not always for the better in form, may yet, in their
general character, be as durable and permanent as other systems.
We know, indeed, that in our country any other is impossible.
The principle of free governments adheres to the American soil.
It is bedded in it, immovable as its mountains.
And let the sacred obligations which have devolved on this
generation, and on us, sink deep into our hearts. Those are
daily dropping from among us who established our liberty and
our government. The great trust now descends to new hands.
Let us apply ourselves to that which is presented to us, as our
appropriate object. We can win no laurels in a war for inde-
pendence. Earlier and worthier hands have gathered them all.
Nor are there places for us by the side of Solon, and Alfred,
and other founders of States. Our fathers have filled them. But
there remains to us a great duty of defense and preservation;
and there is open to us, also, a noble pursuit, to which the
spirit of the times strongly invites us. Our proper business is
improvement. Let our age be the age of improvement. In a
day of peace, let us advance the arts of peace and the works of
peace.
Let us develop the resources of our land, call forth its
powers, build up its institutions, promote all its great interests,
and see whether we also, in our day and generation, may not
perform something worthy to be remembered. Let us cultivate
a true spirit of union and harmony. In pursuing the great
objects which our condition points out to us, let us act under a
settled conviction, and an habitual feeling, that these twenty-four
States are one country. Let our conceptions be enlarged to the
circles of our duties. Let us extend our ideas over the whole of
the vast field in which we are called to act. Let our object be,
OUR COUNTRY, OUR WHOLE COUNTRY, AND NOTHING BUT OUR COUN-
TRY. And by the blessing of God, may that country itself
become a vast and splendid monunent, not of oppression and
terror, but of wisdom, of peace, and of liberty, upon which the
world may gaze with admiration forever!


## p. 15743 (#69) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15743
MASSACHUSETTS AND SOUTH CAROLINA
From the Speech in the Senate, January 26th, 1830
S'*;
VIR, let me recur to pleasing recollections; let me indulge in
refreshing remembrance of the past; let me remind you
that in early times no States cherished greater harmony,
both of principle and feeling, than Massachusetts and South Caro-
lina. Would to God that harmony might again return! Shoul- .
der to shoulder they went through the Revolution; hand in hand
they stood round the administration of Washington, and felt his
own great arm lean on them for support. Unkind feeling, if
it exists, alienation and distrust, are the growth, unnatural to
such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, the
seeds of which that same great arm never scattered.
Mr. President, I shall enter on no encomium upon Massachu-
setts: she needs none. There she is. Behold her, and judge for
yourselves. There is her history; the world knows it by heart.
The past at least is secure. There is Boston, and Concord, and
Lexington, and Bunker Hill; and there they will remain forever.
The bones of her sons, falling in the great struggle for independ-
ence, now lie mingled with the soil of every State from New Eng.
land to Georgia; and there they will lie forever. And, sir, where
American liberty raised its first voice, and where its youth was
nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, in the strength of its
manhood and full of its original spirit. If discord and disunion
shall wound it, if party strife and blind ambition shall hawk at
and tear it, if folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary
and necessary restraint, shall succeed in separating it from that
Union by which alone its existence is made sure, it will stand
in the end by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was
rocked; it will stretch forth its arm with whatever of vigor it
may still retain over the friends who gather round it; and it will
fall at last, if fall it must, amidst the proudest monuments of its
own glory, and on the very spot of its origin.


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15744
DANIEL WEBSTER
LIBERTY AND UNION
From the Speech in the Senate, January 26th, 1830
F
I
ANYTHING be found in the national Constitution, either by
original provision or subsequent interpretation, which ought
not to be in it, the people know how to get rid of it. If
any construction be established unacceptable to them, so as to
become practically a part of the Constitution, they will amend it
at their own sovereign pleasure. But while the people choose to
maintain it as it is, while they are satisfied with it and refuse
to change it, who has given or who can give to the State legis-
latures a right to alter it, either by interference, construction, or
otherwise ? Gentlemen do not seem to recollect that the people
have any power to do anything for themselves. They imagine
there is no safety for them any longer than they are under the
close guardianship of the State legislatures. Sir, the people have
not trusted their safety, in regard to the general Constitution, to
these hands. They have required other security, and taken other
bonds. They have chosen to trust themselves, first, to the plain
words of the instrument, and to such construction as the govern-
ment itself, in doubtful cases, should put on its own powers, and
under their oaths of office, and subject to their responsibility to
them; just as the people of a State trust their own State govern-
ment with a similar power. Secondly, they have reposed their
trust in the efficacy of frequent elections; and in their own
power to remove their own servants and agents whenever they
Thirdly, they have reposed trust in the judicial
power; which, in order that it might be trustworthy, they have
made as respectable, as disinterested, and as independent, as was
practicable. Fourthly, they have seen fit to rely, in case of neces-
sity, or high expediency, on their known and admitted power to
alter or amend the Constitution, peaceably and quietly, whenever
experience shall point out defects or imperfections. And finally,
the people of the United States have at no time, in no way,
directly or indirectly, authorized any State legislature to con-
strue or interpret their high instrument of government; much
less to interfere by their own power, to arrest its course and oper-
ation.
If, sir, the people in these respects had done otherwise than
they have done, their Constitution could neither have been pre-
served, nor would it have been worth preserving. And if its
see
cause.


## p. 15745 (#71) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15745
plain provisions shall now be disregarded, and these new doc-
trines interpolated in it, it will become as feeble and helpless a
being as its enemies, whether early or more recent, could possi-
bly desire. It will exist in every State but as a poor dependent
on State permission. It must borrow leave to be; and will be,
no longer than State pleasure or State discretion sees fit to grant
the indulgence, and prolong its poor existence.
But, sir, although there are fears, there are hopes also. The
people have preserved this, their own chosen Constitution, for
forty years; and have seen their happiness, prosperity, and re.
nown grow with its growth, and strengthen with its strength.
They are now, generally, strongly attached to it. Overthrown by
direct assault, it cannot be; evaded, undermined, nullified, it will
not be, if we, and those who shall succeed us here as agents and
representatives of the people, shall conscientiously and vigilantly
discharge the two great branches of our public trust, faithfully to
preserve and wisely to administer it.
Mr. President, I have thus stated the reasons of my dissent
to the doctrines which have been advanced and maintained. I
am conscious of having detained you and the Senate much too
long. I was drawn into the debate with no previous delibera-
tion, such as is suited to the discussion of so grave and import-
ant a subject. But it is a subject of which my heart is full, and
I have not been willing to suppress the utterance of its spon-
taneous sentiments. I cannot, even now, persuade myself to
relinquish it, without expressing once more my deep conviction,
that since it respects nothing less than the union of the States,
it is of most vital and essential importance to the public happi-
ness. I profess, sir, in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily
in view the prosperity and honor of the whole country, and the
preservation of our federal Union. It is to that Union we owe
our safety at home, and our consideration and dignity abroad.
It is to that Union that we are chiefly indebted for whatever
makes us most proud of our country. That Union we reached
only by the discipline of our virtues in the severe school of
adversity. It had its origin in the necessities of disordered
finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its benign
influences, these great interests immediately awoke as from the
dead, and sprang forward with newness of life. Every year of
its duration has teemed with fresh proofs of its utility and its
blessings; and although our territory has stretched out wider and
XXVII-985


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15746
DANIEL WEBSTER
2
wider, and our population spread farther and farther, they have
not outrun its protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a
.
copious fountain of national, social, and personal happiness.
I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to
see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have
not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the
bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have
not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to
see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the
abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counselor in the
affairs of this government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent
on considering, not how the Union should be best preserved, but
how tolérable might be the condition of the people when it shall
be broken up and destroyed. While the Union lasts, we have
high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us,- for us
and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil.
God grant that in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise!
God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies
behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last
time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken
and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States
dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil
feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last
feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of
the republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still
full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their
original lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted, nor a single star
obscured, bearing for its motto no such miserable interrogatory
as «What is all this worth ? ” nor those other words of delusion
and folly, “Liberty first and Union afterwards ”; but everywhere,
spread over all in characters of living light, blazing on all its
ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in
every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear
to every true American heart — Liberty and Union, now and for-
ever, one and inseparable!


## p. 15747 (#73) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15747
THE DRUM-BEAT OF ENGLAND
From Speech in the Senate, May 7th, 1834
The
as
HE Senate regarded this interposition [the President's Protest]
an encroachment by the executive on other branches
of the government; as an interference with the legislative
disposition of the public treasure. It was strongly and forcibly
urged yesterday by the honorable member from South Carolina,
that the true and only mode of preserving any balance of power
in mixed governments is to keep an exact balance. This is very
true; and to this end encroachment must be resisted at the first
step. The question is therefore whether, upon the true principles
of the Constitution, this exercise of power by the President can
be justified. Whether the consequences be prejudicial or not, if
there be any illegal exercise of power it is to be resisted in the
proper manner. Even if no harm or inconvenience result from
transgressing the boundary, the intrusion is not to be suffered to
pass unnoticed. Every encroachment, great or small, is import-
ant enough to awaken the attention of those who are intrusted
with the preservation of a constitutional government. We are
not to wait till great public mischiefs come, till the government
is overthrown, or liberty itself put into extreme jeopardy. We
should not be worthy sons of our fathers were we so to regard
great questions affecting the general freedom. Those fathers
accomplished the Revolution on a strict question of principle.
The Parliament of Great Britain asserted a right to tax the
colonies in all cases whatsoever; and it was precisely on this
question that they made the Revolution turn. The amount of
taxation was trifling, but the claim itself was inconsistent with
liberty; and that was in their eyes enough. It was against the
recital of an act of Parliament, rather than against any suffering
under its enactments, that they took up arms. They went to
war against a preamble. They fought seven years against a dec-
laration. They poured out their treasures and their blood like
water, in a contest against an assertion which those less saga-
cious and not so well schooled in the principles of civil liberty
would have regarded as barren phraseology, or mere parade of
words. They saw in the claim of the British Parliament a sem-
inal principle of mischief, the germ of unjust power; they de-
tected it, dragged it forth from underneath its plausible disguises,


## p. 15748 (#74) ###########################################

15748
DANIEL WEBSTER
struck at it; nor did it elude either their steady eye or well-
directed blow till they had extirpated and destroyed it, to the
smallest fibre. On this question of principle, while actual suffer-
ing was yet afar off, they raised their flag against a power, to
which for purposes of foreign conquest and subjugation, Rome,
in the height of her glory, is not to be compared: a power which
has dotted over the surface of the whole globe with her posses-
sions and military posts; whose morning drum-beat, following
the sun and keeping company with the hours, circles the earth
with one continuous and unbroken strain of the martial airs of
England.
T
I
IMAGINARY SPEECH OF JOHN ADAMS
From the (Discourse on the Lives and Services of Adams and Jefferson,'
August 2d, 1826.
was for Mr. Adams to reply to arguments like these. We
know his opinions, and we know his character. He would
commence with his accustomed directness and earnestness.
«Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my
hand and my heart to this vote. It is true, indeed, that in the
beginning we aimed not at independence. But there's a divinity
which shapes our ends. The injustice of England has driven us
to arms; and blinded to her own interest for our good, she has
obstinately persisted, till independence is now within our grasp.
We have but to reach forth to it and it is ours. Why then
should we defer the declaration ? Is any man so weak as now to
hope for a reconciliation with England which shall leave either
safety to the country and its liberties, or safety to his own life
and his own honor ? Are not you, sir, who sit in that chair,-is
not he, our venerable colleague near you,- are you not both al-
ready the proscribed and predestined objects of punishment and
of vengeance? Cut off from all hope of royal clemency, what are
you, what can you be, while the power of England remains, but
outlaws? If we postpone independence, do we mean to carry on
or to give up the war? Do we mean to submit to the measures
of Parliament, Boston Port Bill and all? Do we mean to submit,
and consent that we ourselves shall be ground to powder, and
our country and its rights trodden down in the dust ? I know
we do not mean to submit. We never shall submit. Do we in-
tend to violate that most solemn obligation ever entered into by


## p. 15749 (#75) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15749
men,- that plighting, before God, of our sacred honor to Wash-
ington, when, putting him forth to incur the dangers of war as
well as the political hazards of the times, we promised to adhere
to him in every extremity, with our fortunes and our lives? I
know there is not a man here who would not rather see a general
conflagration sweep over the land, or an earthquake sink it, than
one jot or tittle of that plighted faith fall to the ground. For
myself, having twelve months ago in this place moved you that
George Washington be appointed commander of the forces raised,
or to be raised, for defense of American liberty,- may my right
hand forget her cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof of my
mouth, if I hesitate or waver in the support I give him.
« The war, then, must go on. We must fight it through. And
if the war must go on, why put off longer the declaration of
independence? That measure will strengthen us. It will give us
character abroad. The nations will then treat with us;
which
they never can do while we acknowledge ourselves subjects, in
arms against our sovereign. Nay, I maintain that England her-
.
.
self will sooner treat for peace with us on the footing of inde-
pendence, than consent, by repealing her acts, to acknowledge
that her whole conduct toward us has been a course of injustice
and oppression. Her pride will be less wounded by submitting
to that course of things which now predestinates our independence,
than by yielding the points in controversy to her rebellious sub-
jects. The former she would regard as the result of fortune; the
latter she would feel as her own deep disgrace. Why then, why
then, sir, do we not as soon as possible change this from a civil
to a national war? And since we must fight it through, why not
put ourselves in a state to enjoy all the benefits of victory, if we
gain the victory?
“If we fail, it can be no worse for us. But we shall not fail.
The cause will raise up armies; the cause will create navies. The
people, the people, if we are true to them, will carry us, and will
carry themselves, gloriously through this struggle. I care not
how fickle other people have been found. I know the people of
these colonies; and I know that resistance to British aggression
is deep and settled in their hearts, and cannot be eradicated.
Every colony indeed has expressed its willingness to follow, if
we but take the lead. Sir, the declaration will inspire the people
with increased courage. Instead of a long and bloody war for
(


## p. 15750 (#76) ###########################################

15750
DANIEL WEBSTER
the restoration of privileges, for redress of grievances, for char-
tered immunities held under a British king, set before them the
glorious object of entire independence, and it will breathe into
them anew the breath of life. Read this declaration at the head
of the army: every sword will be drawn from its scabbard, and
the solemn vow uttered to maintain it, or to perish on the bed
of honor. Publish it from the pulpit: religion will approve it,
and the love of religious liberty will cling round it, resolved to
stand with it or fall with it. Send it to the public halls; pro-
claim it there; let them hear it who heard the first roar of the
enemy's cannon; let them see it who saw their brothers and
their sons fall on the field of Bunker Hill and in the streets of
Lexington and Concord, and the very walls will cry out in its
support.
"Sir, I know the uncertainty of human affairs; but I see, I
see clearly, through this day's business. You and I, indeed, may
rue it. We may not live to the time when this declaration shall
be made good. We may die; die colonists; die slaves; die, it
may be, ignominiously and on the scaffold. Be it so.
.
Be it so.
If it be the pleasure of Heaven that my country shall require
the poor offering of my life, the victim shall be ready at the ap-
pointed hour to sacrifice, come when that hour may. But while
I do live, let me have a country, or at least the hope of a coun-
try, and that a free country.
“But whatever may be our fate, be assured, be assured, that
this declaration will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost
blood; but it will stand, and it will richly compensate for both.
Through the thick gloom of the present, I see the brightness of
the future, as the sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious,
an immortal day. When we are in our graves, our children will
honor it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity,
with bonfires and illuminations. On this annual return they will
shed tears,— copious, gushing tears,— not of subjection and
-
slavery, not of agony and distress, but of exultation, of gratitude,
and of joy. Sir, before God, I believe the hour is come. My
judgment approves this measure, and my whole heart is in it.
All that I have, and all that I am, and all that I hope, in this
life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off as I
begun, that live or die, survive or perish, I am for the declara-
tion. It is my living sentiment, and by the blessing of God it


## p. 15751 (#77) ###########################################

DANIEL WEBSTER
15751
shall be my dying sentiment, - Independence now, and indEPEND-
ENCE FOREVER.