HKB
years open to Southern colonization, only twenty-four slaves had been introduced into it. No, the real question is, whether pride of opinion shall succumb to the necessities of the crisis.
The Premier of the incoming administration has declared that parties and platforms are subordinate to, and must disappear in the presence of the great question of the Union. This gives me hope. Let him and his friends act upon that, and this Conference can in six hours, in conjunction with a committee of his political friends, adjust such terms of settlement as will save the Union.
The Roman Curtius offered himself as a sacrifice to save Rome, when informed by the oracle that the loss of his life would save his country. We are now in greater danger than Rome was then; but is there no Curtius for our salvation? We are not called upon to give up life, property, or honor, but to concede justice and equal rights to our Southern brethren. We only want the courage to yield extreme opinions. What power, after victory, refuses to lower the lofty terms which were asserted on the eve of the battle for the sake of peace? But the Republicans say, shall we surrender the fruits of victory to the vanquished? I answer, how are you to enjoy your fruits without pacification? You expected to govern the whole country. You aspired to the control of the whole empire. Without peace you will not succeed in establishing possession of that magnificent country which your predecessors governed, but you will govern a little more than half of it, and with that you have to provide for war.
It is easy to dispose of the threatening attitude of the South by denouncing it as a rebellion--as treason. It is idle to disguise the danger. The revolt of a whole people, covering a territory equal to half of Europe, is a revolution. You cannot dwarf the movement by stigmatizing it as treason. Its magnitude and proportions make the sword, and not the law, its arbiter. Is it possible that people can be so infatuated as to contemplate the use of the sword to conquer secession? Will you hasten the time when we shall begin to shed each other's blood? Coerce! force fifteen States! Why, you cannot force New Jersey alone! Force the South? They won't stop to count forces--neither side can be frightened. Don't think of it. You cannot frighten either, no more than the hero could be frightened whom the Roman poet has immortalized. Suppose after the expenditure of a thousand millions you shall have stopped dismemberment and subjugated the South, what is to become of the country then? what is to become of the army and its chiefs who have conquered? When the Long Parliament had murdered Charles, subdued Ireland and Scotland, and compelled the deference of all Europe, they supposed they would enjoy the fruits of their victories. They began to discuss the expenses of the army, and the expediency of its reduction. They had hardly commenced when Cromwell entered Westminster Hall and turned out the Republican party of that day. The whole country, tired of war, crouched under the iron heel of the Puritan soldier. The Republican party of England succumbed; Cromwell died; his son resigned the Protectorate, and the Republican party of England rose to the surface and made its last struggle for its power. General Monk and his army approached London, and Parliament with servility waited the pleasure of the army. The army declared for the King, and the King was restored.
When men meet to save the country, they must be prepared to give up every thing--to give their lives if necessary. How can men stop for party platforms when their country is in danger? But will the country consent to be dragged into civil war to maintain the Chicago Platform? It will not. That Platform was erected upon a perishable foundation. In the language of the New York Senator, it must "disappear."