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THE LEAGUE 
 
 FOR 
 
 THE UNION. 
 
 SPEECHES OF THE 
 Hon. GEORGE BANCROFT and JAMES MILLIKEN, Esq. 
 
THE 
 
 LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 SPEECHES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Hon. GEORGE BANCEOFT, 
 
 AND 
 
 JAMES MILLIKEN, Esq. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA: 
 WILLIAM S. & ALFRED MARTIEN, 
 
 No. 606 CHESTNUT STREET. 
 1863. 
 

 i. 'as 
 
SPEECH BY JAMES MILLIKEN, Esq., 
 
 OF PHILADELPHIA, 
 
 BEFORE THE UNION LEAGUE OF CENTRE COUNTY, DELIVERED 
 AT BELLEFONTE, PENNSYLVANIA, APRIL 25, 1863. 
 
 Mr. Chairman: 
 
 Some five months ago, when it was apparent that 
 our armies must go into winter quarters ; when there 
 were serious apprehensions as to the measures that 
 might be adopted by the Congress then about to 
 convene, with regard to the conduct and future 
 prosecution of the war ; when the financial condition 
 of the country gave cause for much alarm; when 
 traitors in our midst — taking courage from the dark- 
 ness of the night in our country's history — became 
 more and more defiant, more open in their whisper- 
 ings of treason and treasonable designs; a small 
 party of gentlemen in Philadelphia, of which I had 
 the honor to be one, met at the residence of that 
 justly distinguished patriot and poet, Mr. George H. 
 Boker, to devise, adopt, and carry into practice, 
 some plan for better securing the influence and 
 
4 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 the hearty cooperation of every loyal citizen of the 
 country in sustaining and defending the govern- 
 ment, in order that, throughout a fratricidal war, it 
 might assert — as it had through many years of peace 
 asserted — the principles of civil liberty. 
 
 It was evident to all present that there was a 
 necessity for unity of purpose and of action on the 
 part of the whole people. All felt that we could 
 no longer stand idly by, and permit the growth of 
 unfruitful counsel and divided sentiment. We must 
 act together, and act promptly. The want of encour- 
 agement from the people, the masses at home, if you 
 will permit the expression, had so disheartened the 
 Administration, as to leave it somewhat paralyzed. 
 The plan adopted was that of a League, an organi- 
 zation having for its sole object the bringing together 
 of those citizens who would pledge themselves to 
 U7iqualified loyalty to the government of the United 
 States, and unwavering support of its efforts for the 
 suppression of the rebellion. The association could 
 have no higher political aim; and anything other than 
 this, such as bringing into life a new political party, 
 or of advocating or endorsing, inconsiderately or 
 blindly, the theories of the old political parties, was 
 entirely ignored. Those present at that meeting 
 gave expression to the belief, that any effort to take 
 advantage of the association, through which to use 
 it for the aggrandizement of political parties, would 
 result in its demoralization and final ruin; and it 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 5 
 
 was resolved that ''The League" should have but one 
 object — that of the perpetuity of our government. 
 Such was the formation of the parent League of the 
 United States, and our action was but the sounding 
 of a key-note. It was but the electric touch that 
 made the great heart of the nation beat with hope 
 and confidence. The purity of the principles then 
 and there enunciated found a hearty response in the 
 bosom of every patriot; and most happy am I to- 
 night, to find that the reverberation of that voice 
 finds a responding echo here in your beautiful 
 mountain home. (Great applause.) As the brittle 
 threads of the spinners' flax, when twisted and 
 securely held together, serve to make a cable which 
 will hold in safety the mighty ships of the ocean, so 
 also will the power and influence of each individual, 
 when bound together in a league, serve to hold fast 
 to its moorings the ship of State. (Applause.) 
 
 Gentlemen of the League, you should not be 
 unmindful of the fact, that those whose responsible 
 duty it is to administer the affairs of the govern- 
 ment in the present crisis, look to you to sustain 
 them. They take courage and hope from what you 
 have already said and done; and when you hesitate, 
 or fail to discharge your full duty, may they, too, 
 not have reason to hesitate, to become discouraged 
 in their efforts for the preservation of our political 
 system] The might and power of this govern- 
 ment rest with the people, and they have but to 
 
6 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 will to Avhat extent it shall be exercised. Keep ever 
 before you the great truth, that what the people 
 would have this government be, that, with the aid 
 of Providence, they can make it; but if they with- 
 hold the expression of their opinions and their aid, 
 it must, of necessity, drift into anarchy or des- 
 potism. 
 
 The soldiers that have gone forth to do battle in 
 our most righteous cause, have a right to expect 
 an encouraging word from those at home. They ask 
 that they may be supported, and that the moral 
 power of the whole people may be exerted on the 
 side of the government; and nothing so cheers them 
 on to duty, or so rewards them for their toils and 
 privations, as the knowledge that the people are 
 alive to the dangers that threaten that government, 
 and in earnest in their eiforts for its preservation. 
 Imagine, if you can, the feelings of the soldier who 
 has staked his life and his honor on the issue, when 
 he turns his eyes homewards, and discovers a divided 
 sentiment among the people, or an apathy as to the 
 cause in which he has so largely embarked. Will 
 that condition of affairs be likely to make him more 
 brave, or to excite feelings of pride for his country 
 and his countrymen^ Will such ingratitude not 
 sting more keenly than the serpent's tooth 1 Is 
 there any one within the sound of my voice who, 
 when that brave band of soldiers which so recently 
 left your village and neighborhood, return again, 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 1 
 
 with all their honors heaped upon them, would dare 
 meet them face to face, and say to them, "AVhile 
 you were absent, I did nothing'"? or, that "I con- 
 sorted and acted with the opposers of the war and 
 of the government'"? No I there is not one that 
 would dare do so; for in that hour of our country's 
 greatness, in that hour of exultant pride at the 
 heroic achievements of your sons, your brothers, and 
 your neighbors, will come the full shame and dis- 
 grace of those who now hesitate, and who now 
 withhold the influence they so well could exercise. 
 Then, too, will come the disgrace and shame of those 
 in your midst who are now plotting treason under 
 the cowardly disguise of perpetuating a political 
 party. (Applause.) 
 
 With those who oppose the government, and those 
 who render reluctant aid to its measures, it has 
 become a settled policy to argue upon certain specu- 
 lative theories in reference to the causes of the 
 rebellion. This is but a ruse to divert attention, to 
 distract, and to divide. Our duty in this hour is 
 to deal with the war, and not with the causes of 
 the war. What would you think of the crew of 
 a ship who should refuse aid to the captain when 
 she was about to founder in a storm, because they 
 had not agreed in their reckoning during their voy- 
 age "? Or what would you have thought a few nights 
 ago, when an alarming fire was raging in your 
 village, of the individual who had refused to aid in 
 
8 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 subduing the flames, because, forsooth, he had not 
 been fully informed of, or did not quite understand, 
 the causes of the fire; or because he had believed 
 it to be the result of gross carelessness ] Why, such 
 a man would have been driven out from among you 
 as a disgrace to your society; and yet you have 
 among you, as I am informed, those who act in 
 that manner towards our government. You cannot 
 certainly hold fellowship with such men, and I can, 
 therefore, readily understand the additional aims and 
 objects of this association. 
 
 The duty of the citizen to his government grows 
 and increases with the perils that environ it. "The 
 pride of personal opinion is one of our stumbling 
 blocks" — I quote from memory some recent writer — 
 "but we should not be unmindful of the fact that 
 each forms but one of the great family, and that the 
 public safety and quiet demand of us that we should , 
 cheerfully concur in all measures looking to a res- 
 toration of law and order, even where our private 
 judgment may not approve. There cannot be good 
 government without self-denial on the part of the 
 citizen. It is through this that he has a right to 
 claim protection of his government against encroach- 
 ments upon his liberty ; but discontent will, in time, 
 midermine the stability of the State, and lose to 
 him all liberty and government." 
 
 No good citizen will ever lose faith in our 
 national institutions. As the dangers increase 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. \) 
 
 he will renew his courage. "As the storm grows 
 (lark his confidence in the light of the morning will 
 revive. He will hope and labor on, through all dif- 
 ficulties and trials, for the sake of his country. He 
 will ever feel himself a sentinel on the watchtower 
 of hberty, with a high and holy duty to perform. 
 He will make of patriotism more than a sentiment; 
 it w411 become with him a principle of action, of 
 noble effort, and of constant hope and confidence." 
 It will be to him his guiding star, his creed at his 
 lying down, and at his rising up. 
 
 Turning our attention for a moment from our 
 individual duties, and desirous that we may more 
 firmly feel the security of our position, we may 
 now inquire what those who are decrying the efforts 
 of our League organizations propose as a remedy for 
 the dangers and perils that now beset our govern- 
 ment. We hear from them a cry of peace, with their 
 reasons therefor based only upon the calamities of 
 w^ar, which they picture so vividly in the abstract. 
 But what have been to the people of the north the 
 distresses from which they are said so much to 
 suffer? Beyond that melancholy one of loss of life, 
 and of friends dear to us as life — the responsibilities 
 for which God knows, and we know, do not rest 
 with our government or ourselves — I answer, none. 
 Never was there a people in the enjoyment of such 
 prosperity. It would seem, indeed, that a kind Pro- 
 vidence held us in his special keeping. The land 
 
10 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 produces most abundantly, and the laborer meets 
 with a full reward for his labor; the manufacturer 
 and the merchant are content with their profits and 
 their gains. But we are told that this prosperity is 
 not real — that it is fictitious. So, I grant you it will 
 be, if our government fail to maintain itself, or fail 
 to assert its authority everywhere throughout the 
 republic. 
 
 The prosperity of the people is inseparably bound 
 up with the present issue, and our commercial and 
 financial condition must of necessity rise or fall with 
 the success or failure of our cause. Fortunately 
 for us, however, the people have decreed that the 
 cause shall not fail. The assurance that goes up 
 from this and from kindred associations has been 
 accepted at home and abroad, as an earnest of what 
 our future must be. The cry of peace, therefore, is 
 prompted by no feelings of real concern for the wel- 
 fare of the government or of the people. It has 
 neither reason for its utterance nor argument for its 
 basis. What plan have we submitted to us for a 
 permanent peace, but a further prosecution of the 
 war"? Are we to ask that our armies shall lay down 
 their arms, and that our soldiers shall return to 
 their homes'? And if so, what then] How will 
 that bring us peace? Will the failure of our govern- 
 ment, and the failure of the principle, that a repub- 
 lican government can possess sufiicient inherent 
 power to preserve itself when assailed by foes from 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 11 
 
 Avithin, bring with it peace 1 That principle having 
 failed at our hands, does any sane man believe 
 that we of the north could frame a government that 
 would be permitted to work out its destiny in peace ] 
 No ! no ! ! no ! ! ! The failure of our arms, and, there- 
 by, the failure of our government, would be a failure 
 of civil liberty throughout the world ; and we, as a 
 people, permitting such an event to happen, would 
 be lending our aid to turn civilization into barbarism. 
 There is, therefore, a necessity that the war shall 
 go on, for the sake of peace, for the sake of our in- 
 stitutions, for the sake of humanity. It was not ours 
 to begin, neither can it yet be ours to stop. We 
 have a name and a fame to preserve, and principles 
 to perpetuate. Who is there that could be induced 
 to take down from its high position, where it now 
 floats so proudly aloft, the American flag, and muti- 
 late it, by erasing ten or more stars from its beautiful 
 azure fiekU (Cries of "No one!") When an Ame- 
 rican citizen can be found capable of that act it will 
 be time enough to whisper peace, without presenting 
 to us a plan of peace. (Applause.) 
 
 From the earliest history of our government up 
 to the present hour, the politicians of the southern 
 States have at all times resisted and opposed those 
 principles of government which have looked to the 
 material prosperity of the whole people, as the main 
 bulwark of the nation. Their plans for the dis- 
 solution of the Union were laid long since, and 
 
12 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 their jealousy of the growth of free labour has never 
 been concealed. This last it was that gave them 
 most concern. As their schemes were, from time 
 to time, necessarily deferred, the statistics of eacli 
 new census furnished them new cause for alarm and 
 complaint. They watched the growth of the free 
 North with serious apprehensions, until finally a 
 great political contest decided that the executive 
 power of the government should for a time be 
 wielded by a direct representative of free labor. 
 This was all that was done, and it was met by 
 an open rebellion; and because of the assertion of 
 this principle by a majority of the whole people, 
 would you have the war to cease, and the principle 
 to be abandoned? 
 
 Gentlemen of the League, there can be no doubt 
 of the ultimate success of our cause. I never had 
 a doubt of it ; and viewing it, as we all must, in its 
 moral aspect, I see much that is hopeful and encour- 
 aging. It would be vain and unbecoming in me to 
 attempt to penetrate or predict the designs of Pro- 
 vidence; but who can now fail to perceive that this 
 great calamity has been permitted for our good I 
 Are we not daily realizing the conviction that the 
 institution which has ever been a hinderance to our 
 civilization and our progress, and which has been 
 made "the chief corner-stone" of the rebel govern- 
 ment, must be brought to ruin by the success of our 
 cause"? The statesman, the philanthropist, and the 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 13 
 
 economist, both of the Old World and of the New, 
 foreseeing the evil tendency of that institution, and 
 alive to the fearful responsibility for its growth and 
 for its continuance, sought in vain for some plan 
 through which to remedy its present, and to avert its 
 future, evil. They abandoned, without hope, every 
 scheme proposed, and gave themselves over to feel- 
 ings of deep concern for the hour when this conti- 
 nent should witness a war of races — a war of an 
 enslaved race against a free one. Books had already 
 been written pointing out the calamities that must 
 befal our posterity. Who shall longer doubt that 
 the wisdom of an All-wise Providence is nearest to 
 us when our scope of vision fails'? This war was 
 not, as we have seen, instituted for the suppres- 
 sion of slavery, nor is it now prosecuted for that 
 purpose ; but I can readily believe that those who 
 did inaugurate it for the purpose of perpetuating 
 slavery, begin to see the handwriting upon the wall, 
 which tells them that they and their institution have 
 been weighed in the balance — that they and their 
 institutions are politically doomed. 
 
 It must be so. History teaches that the onward 
 path of all great nations has been through seas of 
 blood, and ours, it proves, will not be permitted to 
 escape that terrible ordeal. As the blood of the 
 martyrs has been the seed of the Church, so will 
 the bones of our heroes be the foundation stones of 
 a monument of freedom, everlasting as the hills. 
 
14 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 It is but a question of time as to when we shall 
 have peace. But when we do have it, it must 
 be a permanent one — a peace that all the world 
 shall know is based upon the principle, that while 
 in the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty — of 
 freedom — man is capable of self-government. (Ap- 
 plause.) 
 
 But I cannot take my seat without a word more 
 personal. You of this county have done much for 
 the cause of your government. You have sent your 
 full share of brave soldiers to the field, and have 
 contributed most liberally from your means. You 
 have given to the State our present patriotic and 
 most praiseworthy Governor, (cheers), who has re- 
 warded you by the honour he has won for himself, 
 and the fame that he will leave behind him for this 
 his birthplace and his home. As an humble citizen, 
 I must thank you for all this good in the past, and 
 for the cheering promise that this crowded room 
 gives for the future. (Tremendous applause.) 
 
SPEECH BY MR. BANCROFT, 
 
 At the New York Union Meetincx, April 20, 1863. 
 
 Hon. George Bancroft was first introduced, and 
 spoke as follows: 
 
 Two years ago the purposes and acts of the rebel- 
 lion forced the faithful citizens of the United States 
 to rise in arms, and prove that we are a people — that 
 we possess a country. Every hour of the long and 
 terrible conflict has raised it in importance ; the eyes 
 of the whole civilized world rest upon us ; the indus- 
 trial classes of Europe bend toward us in sympathy 
 and hope as to their champions; and the question is 
 found to be, not merely whether the United States 
 shall be stricken from the family of nations, but 
 whether the vital principles of freedom shall be 
 preserved. (Applause.) The imperative call of 
 duty cheers us on to the struggle more than ever; 
 for unless we succeed, the power of the people 
 which pervades all history as a prophecy, is beaten 
 down, and there is no other Western hemisphere 
 where the struggle can be renewed. We have no 
 choice; we must persevere. If we would build up 
 
16 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 the home of humanity — if we would safely transmit 
 the regenerating principles that give life its value — 
 we must persevere. The result cannot be doubtful. 
 The resources of the rebellion are nearly exhausted, 
 while our own prosperity has hardly been impaired; 
 we must press onward with united zeal, and "win 
 the victory of endurance born." (Cheers.) 
 
 We meet to-day without reference to party, to 
 pledge ourselves to one another for the vigorous 
 prosecution of the war, until right shall triumph. 
 But while we reserve to ourselves the utmost liberty 
 of judgment, both of men and measures, it is but an 
 act of simple justice and historic truth, to say that 
 the rebellion found not even a plausible excuse in 
 the administration which last came into power. 
 No sooner had the elections passed over, than those 
 who succeeded made every effort to allay excite- 
 ment. A party had been formed that seemed 
 pledged to prohibit the introduction of slavery into 
 the Territories, and yet the men of that party, after 
 deliberations, not in an unauthorized and insignifi- 
 cant peace congress, so-called, but in the constitu- 
 tional halls of legislation, joined in organizing the 
 Territories of the United States, without the restric- 
 tion in the fundamental law of any one of them, 
 leaving the event to the action of natural causes. 
 A motion was even made and countenanced, by inti- 
 mate friends of the incoming President, to bring a 
 vast territory, under the name of New Mexico, into 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 17 
 
 the Union as an independent State, without any 
 such restriction, and at a time when the municipal 
 law of that Territory sustained slavery with an 
 extravagant hyperbole of intolerance. Nor were the 
 friends of the present President wanting in giving 
 assurances that his administration would be as little 
 .marked by hostility to slavery as if the chair had 
 been occupied by Madison or Henry Clay. More- 
 over, the Generals of the President's appointment 
 were loud in professing their readiness in the midst 
 of war, to pause in their career and assist in sup- 
 pressing any possible rising of slaves. 
 
 But yet, under all these circumstances, so in- 
 fatuated was slavery, that it still passionately pur- 
 sued its purpose, and for the sake of founding a 
 Confederacy on a basis on which no enduring 
 government can rest, aimed a blow that was in- 
 tended to be fatal to the country and to the liberty 
 of man. The war was, under every aspect, forced 
 upon the northern States; it was a war from which 
 they could not escape. Had they proved cravens, 
 they would have stood before the Powers of the 
 earth of their own day, and before all succeeding 
 generations, as men who betrayed their country, and 
 were recreant to freedom itself (Applause.) 
 
 Our coming together on this occasion means, that 
 no exertion shall be wanting to annihilate the rebel- 
 lion by the united and untiring exertion of the 
 wealth and strength of the nation. It means that 
 
18 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 those who are in arms against our flag, shall not at 
 the same time receive at our hands the belligerent 
 rio-hts of alien enemies and the constitutional rights 
 of citizens. It means that whoever may be at the 
 head of our armies, the undivided sympathy of the 
 country is to command unity in council and add 
 vigour to every blow. (Applause.) It means that 
 with one heart we entreat the President to disregard 
 all considerations of so-called party necessities; to 
 adopt the measures but for the public good; to turn 
 a deaf ear to all selfish importunities of politicians 
 of every party, and ever to remember that it would 
 be a sin against the country, against his own happi- 
 ness now, against his name with posterity, to lift an 
 unfit man to ofiice, in civil life or in the field. (Ap- 
 plause.) It means that all the generous feeling of 
 the country goes forth to cheer on the noble states- 
 men of Missouri, who are now struggling to shake ofi" 
 the terrible evil which alone holds that State back 
 from one of the first places — perhaps from the very 
 first place in the Union — for agriculture, mining, 
 mechanical industry, for wealth and population. 
 It means that our earnest sympathies embrace the 
 freemen of the South, who, trained in the school of 
 poverty, are now compelled by tyrannical power to 
 fiffht for results that are in direct conflict with their 
 own chances of happiness and advancement. It 
 means that we are eager to go to the assistance of 
 our friends in our mountain regions, and to give 
 
THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION". 19 
 
 them security in the natural fastnesses of American 
 freedom. 
 
 Nor are we deterred from rendering a loyal sup- 
 port to the government, by the thought that the war 
 in its results will weaken slavery, or even work its 
 overthrow. Civil war has always, in God's provi- 
 dence, been a means for rescuing men from bondage. 
 Who is there to deplore the probable result that 
 States, where, in times past, labor has been despised, 
 should come to own the true nobility of the working 
 man, and restore the fields and the workshops to the 
 free^ Take Virginia, for an example. Her soil is 
 fertile, her air salubrious; her springs renovate 
 health; her mountains glisten with precious ores. 
 There, in her many chambers, where nature has 
 heaped up stores of gold and silver, of gypsum and 
 iron, of salt and copper, an evil spirit has cast over 
 her its spell, and she sleeps in almost hopeless 
 lethargy. Who will mourn if the time has come 
 when her long and deep slumber shall be broken^ 
 Who will grieve if the procession of the Star Span- 
 gled Banner, borne onward to the songs of liberty, 
 shall wake her from her trance of centuries'? Then 
 let her clothe her beautiful limbs in the robes of 
 freedom, and open her hundred hills to the hands of 
 self-directed enterprise and skill. (Applause.) The 
 present bitterness will pass away, and the next 
 generation of her sons will meet ours in affection, 
 and they will own that from this desperate strife 
 
20 THE LEAGUE FOR THE UNION. 
 
 has sprung the blessed regeneration of their lovely 
 land. 
 
 Nor is union required by our domestic affairs 
 alone. There is reason to believe that here in New 
 York, men, falsely usurping the name of democracy, 
 have been willing to invite the interposition of the 
 aristocracies of Europe. These men must be made 
 to know that they stand alone. (Cheers and cries 
 of "Good!") A nation which has always professed 
 zeal for free trade, aims at a monopoly of the inter- 
 national carrying trade for themselves, by sending 
 out ships built in their own shipyards to prey upon 
 our commerce. It is here in New York, more than 
 in any place in our land, that the government should 
 be able to count with certainty upon a unanimous 
 support in its efforts to maintain, against any foreign 
 power, the rights and the dignity and interests of 
 the country. (Applause.) So then the love of the 
 Constitution, the love of liberty, the love of country, 
 a proper sense of overhanging dangers, a just appre- 
 ciation of our resources, conspire to demand the 
 patriotic union of the people as our security at 
 home, and our only protection against wrongs from 
 abroad. (Applause.) 
 
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