Seward], whom I do not now see in his
seat--well said in a speech wherein I found but little to commend--that
this Union could not be maintained by force, and that a Union of force
was a despotism. It was a great truth, come from what quarter it may.
That was not the Government instituted by our fathers; and against it,
so long as I live, with heart and hand, I will rebel.
This brings me to a passage in the message which says:
"I certainly had no right to make aggressive war upon any State; and I
am perfectly satisfied that the Constitution has wisely withheld that
power even from Congress"--very good--"but the right and the duty to use
military force defensively against those who resist the Federal officers
in the exercise of their legal functions, and against those who assail
the power of the Federal Government, are clear and undeniable."
Is it so? Where does he get it? Our fathers were so jealous of a
standing army, that they scarcely would permit the organization and
maintenance of any army! Where does he get the "clear and undeniable"
power to use the force of the United States in the manner he there
proposes? To execute a process, troops may be summoned in a posse
comitatus; and here, in the history of our Government, it is not to be
forgotten that in the earlier and, as it is frequently said, the better
days of the republic--and painfully we feel that they were better
indeed--a President of the United States did not recur to the army; he
went to the people of the United States.
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