E458 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS DODDblHESlS • • • '^oV^' 0^ * -^'^ *o ^-Jv A^ -^ - » - A- 0* • ' ' * < '?)^ °*^ * • • " ' A.° NATIONAL UNION, Test of American Loyalty, AN HISTORICAL DISCOURSE, N'OVEMBER 24tii, 18G4, By GEORGE DUFP^IELD, Jk., Pastor of the First Presbyterian Oliurcli, Adrian, Midi. ( PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. ) j Sit demqtie inscriplum infronte unius cujusque, quid de Republicn sentiat.— ViceroCaHl. 1, XIII DETROIT: PUBLISHED BY FRANCIS RAYMOND, 120 JEFFERSON AVENUE 1864. NATIONAL UNION, Test of American Loyalty. AN HISTORICAL DISCOURSE, NOVEMBER 24Tn, 1864, By GEORGE DUFFIELD, Jk. Pastor of the First Presbyterian Ctmrcli, Adrian, Mich. ( PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. ) Sit dentque inscriptum infronte uniuscujusque, quid de Republica senliat.— CieeroCatil. 1, XJJJ DETEOIT: PUBLISHED BY FRANCIS RAYMOND, 120 JEFFERSON AVENUE. 1864. iA:' •» ^i ^ "In his opening speech, Mr. Hamilton obferved, that it is of the utmost importance that the Convention lliould be ftrongly impressed witli the conviction of the necessity of the Union of the States. If they could be entirely satisfied of that great truth, dieir minds would then be prepared to admit the necessity of a govern- ment of similar organization and powers with the scheme of the one before them, to uphold and preferve that Union. It was like the case of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, and doubts on that subject were one great cause, he said, of modern infidelity; for if men could be thoroughly convinced that they had within them immaterial and immortal fpirits, their minds would be prepared for the ready reception of the Chrif- tian religion." — Chancellor Kent. ASTEBTISBB AND TRIB0KK PRINT, DBTBOIT. OUR NATIONAL UNION, * * * " And I will reftore thy judges as at the firft, and ^thy counsellors as at the beginning : afterward, thou fhalt be called THE City of Righteousness." — Isaiah, i, 26. We liave now at least three great National anni- versaries : the birth, day of Washington, the day that witnessed the Declaration of Independence, and the day of National Thanksgiving; one in the winter, one in the summer, and one in the autumn. To these, I believe, we will soon add a fourth, the great- est and most welcome of all, and that which will give new value and significance to all the rest: the day of Final Victoey over Eebellton ! The present anniversary is that of Thanksgiving. We are here this morning by the Proclamation of the President to acknowledge, as citizens of the United States, the various mercies which we have received during the past year from the "God of our Fathers." Your speaker himself is also here as a citizen as well, as a minister of the Gospel, and as such, is by com- mon consent, both allowed and expected to choose such a topic as may be most appropriate to the cir- 4 AilERICAN LOYALTY. cumstances of the case, and the best good of tlie^ Commonwealtli. Professing as a cliristian to know no politics but those that come from God, and as a citizen, to know only those that come from Union ; within these limits he dares to speak freely and boldly all that is in his heart. With all this idle talk that we sometimes hear about " driving men from the Church " by preaching the truth, either religious or political, he has no sympathy whatever. It is neither manly nor christian. As a hearer I would not be driven by the preacher ; and certainly, as a preacher, I will not be driven as to what I must or must not say, by the people. This pulpit in which I now stand is a Feee Pulpit. As such I received it from my predecessor, Mr. Curtis,* and as a free pulpit, I will, by the help of God, hand it down to him who comes after me,, if it be necessary so to do, to-morrow. "What this topic ougTit to be to-day admits but very little doubt. The great and all-absorbing idea of the American people during the last year, in the Army and in the Navy, in the pulpit and in the press, in the country and in the city, in the house and in the rail car, wherever men have written or spoken, or engaged in earnest conversation, or sung^ has been Loyalty ! And, as in England, the feelings of loyalty centre not in the Constitution, nor in the Prime Minister, but in the Queen; so in America, these feelings centre, not in the President, nor even in the Constitution, but in the Union. What the Rev. Geo. C. Curtis, D.D., Elmira, N. Y. AMERICAN LOYALTY. Queen is to tlie loyalty of an Englishman, the Union is to the loyalty of an American,* It is even more, THE Union is our Country. While it lives in our bosom the Country lives ! When it dies, like poor Kossuth, waiting the resurrection of Hungary, we are orphans and fatherless, and have no country, f Loyalty, then, our theme, our discussion of it will be mainly with reference to our National Union. To enter as thoroughly into this topic as I desire on this occasion, to investigate the origin and history of our Union, and reveal its inner life^ is no easy task. Others may have been more fortunate than myself in this respect, and have found elsewhere all that I shall now say, already done to their hand. If so, I shall be much obliged to any one who will tell me what that volume is. Though a thousand, times expecting to find such an historical sketch as the pres- ent, just as often have I been disappointed. One writer is a mere annalist, like Ramsay, and contents himself with the bare facts; while another, like Cal- houn, is a mere theorizer, and has as little to do with facts as possible ; one man, like Hildreth, writes a strictly documentary history, and another, like Judge Kent, or Story, looks at the subject in an entirely legal point of view ; and so it comes to pass that to the student of history, on this particular point, there is nothing but what is fragmentary ; he must get his knowledge from a great variety of different sources if he gets it at all. The only place where I ever ^expect to see it will be the ninth volume of Bancroft. * CiTil Liberty, by F. Lieber, LL. D., page 361. t Appendix A^ b AMERICAN LOYALTY. Meanwhile I throw myself on your mercy, if with the limited means at my disposal, I gain the credit awarded by Gen. Sherman to Mr. Lincoln, and " do the best I can." OuE National Union, then, a word in every mouth, what does it mean when we come to analyze it ? Will it bear such analysis ? What is it in its origin ? What in its history ? What in its relations ? What in the various changes through which it has passed ? What the secret of its strength during the progress of this unexampled war? What the value and significance of it at the present moment? In answer to these inquiries, my first position is that our National Union is something purely of its OWN kind. Not in the way of boasting do I affirm it, but as a matter of plain, historical fact, it is -altogether different from any previous National Union in the world, either in ancient times or modern; it is abso- lutely unique — no copy — but an original! no imita- tion, but an actual discovery or invention ! fl. It is not like the Aciiaian League in the latter days of Greece, for the simple reason, that anxious as the founders of our Union were to make a prac- tical use of ancient precedents, they had, confessedly, but little knowledge as to what those precedents really were. * 2. It is not like the Confederation of the Swiss * " Could the inner strueturo and regular operation of the Achaian League be ascertained, it is probable that more light would be thrown by it on the science of Federal Government than by any of the like experiments with which we are acquainted." — Federalist, xviii. AMERICAN LOYALTY. / Cantons, whicli, witli many changes in its extent and constitution, has lasted from the thirteenth century down to our own day, but which in no true sense whatever has "been a Kepublic. 3. It is not like the Seven United States of the Netheelands, that illustrious predecessor of ours, from whom with so much of its indomitable spirit we bor- rowed our very name; whose Union arose in the war of Independence against Spain, and lasted in a Republican form till the war of the French Revo- lution. When to these three Federal Commonwealths you add the United States as a Fourth, you have, then, the only four famous Federal Commonwealths of the world. To form a Federal Government, in which, on the one hand, each of the members of the Union must be "wholly independent in those matters which concern each member only ; and, on the other hand, all must be subject to a common power in matters which con- cern the whole body of members collectively" — so to combine the centrifugal and centripetal forces as to secure a steady and uniform orbit — is not so easy an achievement as modern dem- agogues would have us to suppose, " Rev. Prof. Johnson, of Missouri," at the Chicago Convention, for example. Hear him : " If it shall be necessary in the settlement of our difficulties to allow a few stars to hecome a constellation by themselves^ I think we can be just as safe, just as well protected, and just as happy under a Union of Itepiihlics as we have been under a Union of States. I want to see this whole AMERICAIN^ LOYALTY. ■Continent hound together hy a grand Union of Mepnhlics ! " Whatever other chair may be occupied by this Keverend Professor, it is sincerely to be hoped for the good of his pupils, that it is not the chair of the "Science of Law and Government." The very first proposition that meets him there, is, that a National Union such as ours, in its highest and most elaborate development, is the most finished and most artificial production of human ingenuity. As wisely and with as much reason might he carry out his figure literally, and say that the solar system would move on as safely and harmoniously after the seces- sion of half a dozen planets. This idea of Union, at least, in common with that of Vallandigham — first repudiated by his own State, and then by the entire country — is certainly open to revision and amendment. The personal defeat of these men, for a time, would -afibrd us but very little satisfaction indeed if we sup- posed that they would still continue to advocate, and endeavor to engraft into the platform of a party the same infamous principles. Now that the election is •over we can all of us afford to look this question fairly in the face — whether there is such a thing as loyalty, whether there is in reality such a crime as disloyalty, or whether it is only a " new crime " got up by an expiring Administration ! II. My second position is, that our Union came into existence gradually and unexpectedly. As a nation it must be confessed that we had a very humble origin, and that the few "colonies of outcasts in North America, scattered along the coast," began their existence under very unpropitious circum- AMERICAN LOYALTY. 9 stances. It is almost ludicrons, at this date, to open some of the old books of travels, that have come down to us, and see how times have altered. In 1*759, a clergyman of the name of Burnaby, landed at Yorktown, Virginia, and traveled as far North as Portsmouth, New Hampshire. " The inhabitants being of diflerent nations, different religions, different languages, it is almost impossible to give them any precise and determinate character." Closing his vol- ume with some speculations on the future of Amer- ica, his sagacious conclusion is, that " these several communities must always be helpless and dependent, formed for happiness, perhaps, but not formed for Mmpire or Union.'''' Thirty years before, we have an official communi- cation to the same effect made to the Home Govern- ment by the famous Hutchinson,* So said they all, and apparently with good reason. Swede and Dutchman, Cavalier and Puritan, Protestant Massa- chusetts and Catholic Maryland, ever in one common Union — the thing was impossible! But Hutchinson lived long enough to see that he was mistaken ! in. My third position is, that our Union was at first a Social Union. Bearing in mind that the settlements were for a * " From the universal loyalty of the people, it is absurd to imagine they have any thoughts of independence. Not more absurd would it be to place two of His Majesty's beef-eaters to watch a child in the cradle, that it do not rise and cut its father's throat, than to guard these infant colonies to prevent their shaking off the British yoke. Besides, they are so distinct from one another in their forms of government, in their religious rites, in their emulation of trade, and consequently their affections, that they ntver can unite in so dangerous an enterprise." — Yolvmc II, p. 118. 10 AMERICAN LOYALTY. long time merely on the coast, and did not extend back to the mountains, it is easy to see that there was nothing to prevent free intercourse in the way of traveling and business. In 1710, by act of Par- liament, a continuous mail route was oiganized on the sea-board, and from that moment the first great impulse was given to the Press. But even before the press, there was a still more potent influence at work to aid and develope the growth of this Social Union in the Pilgrim Pulpit. As early, too, as 1671 George Fox, the founder of the Society of Friends, landed in America, and left behind him "joyful hearts in the several Colonies," from New England to Georgia. So Wesley and Whitfield, and various others at a still later period, were engaged in setting up the telegraph poles and running the wire of chris- tian communion all over the wilderness — the sure precursor of National Union. Take away Protestant Christianity and you have no cementing principle whatever ! " IV. My fourth position is, that this j)reciou3 seed of Union thus beginning to germinate, was next a CIVIL Union. The Social Union had so matured that political Union became a natural suggestion. Its first development in this form was in 1643, when the Colonies of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Plymouth and New Haven solemnly agreed " that as in nation and relation, so in other respects, we be and continue one, by the name and title of the * For a full discussion of this point see an article by the author in the Presby- terian Quarterly, December, 1852. AMERICAN LOYALTY. 11 United Colonies of New England." The reasons assigned for this Union were the dispersed state of the Colonies, the dangers apprehended from the Dutch and Indians, the commencement of civil contests in the parent country, and above all, " the preserving and propagating the truths and liberties of the Gospel." The next development of this civil Union was in 1754, when the Convention of twenty -three commis- sioners, chosen by the Assemblies, and commissioned by the Crown, met at Albany to devise a concert of action against the French and Indians. One of the Commissioners was the sagacious Franklin. While the Lords of Trade were aiming at a Union that was merely temporary, in the mind of Franklin the desh'e for Union " assumed still more majestic proportions," and comprehended " the great country back of the Apalachian mountains." '' In less than a century," said he, " it must undoubtedly become a populous and powerful dominion." It was all important that it should be a united one. " William Penn in 1697 had proposed an annual Congress of all the Provinces on the Continent of America, with power to regu- late commerce. Franklin revived the great idea, and breathed into it enduring life. As he descended the Hudson the people of New York thronged about him to welcome him, and he who had first entered their city as a runaway apprentice, was revered as the mover of the American Union."* This honor, however, he can well afford to divide Bancroft) IV, 125. 12 AMERICAN LOYALTY. in no stinted measure with his personal friend and associate in the Albany Convention, James Bowdoin, the noble old Revolutionary Governor, who stood out among the Governors of his day as the Governors of Indiana and Massachusetts do in ours, and who was Chairman of the Committee of Seven, to consider and report " a general plan of Union of the several Colonies on this Continent." * True, the Albany plan of Union was only condi- tional, and the conditions failing, it was never carried into effect. But the friends of the measure were willmg to bide their time. " However necessary an Union may be for the mutual safety and preservation of these Colonies, it is certain it will never take place unless we are forced to it by the supreme authority of the nation." Ten years after this the ^Stamp Act Congress met in Philadelphia ; the Union was taking visible form. Ten years more and the Port-bill Congress was in session in New York; and the Union was still more embodied. Meanwhile the people had learned to say with Christopher Gadsden, of South Carohna, "There ought * In a speech of Bowdoin, delivered at that time, and still extant in his own handwriting, we find the following memorable words : " It seems to be generally allowed that a Union of some sort is necessary. If hat be granted the only question to be considered is, whether the Union shall be general or partial. It has been my opinion, and still is, that a general Union would he the most salutary. If the Colonies were united they could easily drive the French out of this part of America, but in a disunited State, the French, though not half so numerous, are an over-match for them. They are under one head and one direction, and all pull one way ; whereas, the Colonies have no head, some of them are under no direction in military matters, and all pull different ways» Join or die, must be their motto." — Winthrop's Oration, AMERICAN LOYALTY. IS to be no New England man, no New Yorker, known on the Continent, but all of us Americans." And with Patrick Henry, "The distinctions between Vir- ginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New Eng- landers are no more. I am not a Virginian, but an American." Their earnest, universal desire was that of Otis, for " a Union that should knit and work into the very blood and bones of the original system,, in every region as fast as settled." The language of Congress, in their address to the inhabitants of the Colonies, was as natural as it was appropriate: "We have been authorized and directed to meet and con- sult together about our Common Country." Assailed by common enemies, and occupying a com- mon soil, already a Nation in fact, it only remained to become one in form. Hence, the third great epoch in. the development of our Union, the ever memorable Dec- LARATioN, July 4th, 1776. The flower that has been maturing for more than a century, now bursts its petals and scatters its fragrance through an entire hemisphere. "Colonies are the foundations of GREAT Commonwealths," said the General Court of Massachusetts to Parliament in 1646, and so it proved. Independence is declared. Declared by whom? By the representatives of the Colonies, severally^ or as a Confederation? No! But "by the representatives of the United States in Congress assembled!" Declared in whose name? In the name of the people of the several Colonies or States? No! but in the name and by the authority of " the good jpeople of these United States." De- clared for what purpose? That they might define 14 AMERICAN LOYALTY. the relation of the States to one another? Nothing of the kind. For what, then? It was that they might be recognized as "One People." What else- "That they might dissolve the political bands that had connected them with another people." And still, what else? "That they might assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal sta- tion to which the laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitled them." Renouncing all claims to chartered rights as Eng- lishmen, henceforth the Declaration is their charter ! Their rights, the natural rights of mankind! * Their Union, that of those who " hold as self-evident truths, that ALL MEN" AEE CREATED EQUAL, that they are en- dowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ! " Their Government such as should be founded on these self-evident truths, and cor- respond with such a Union ! The Great Witness of the rectitude of their intentions, "the Supreme Judge of the world!" Their great Palladium, the protection of "Di\T.ne Providence!" Here, then, at length, you reach the true and * " All men have one common original : they participate in one common nature they have one common right." " Natural liberty is a gift of the benificent Creator to the whole human race ; civil liberty is founded on it; civil liberty is only natural ^liberty, modified and secured by civil society." " The sacred eights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among parchments or musty records ; they are written as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity himself, and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power." Such was the doctrine of Alexander Hamilton, to whom belongs the immortal honor of being " the first to perceive and develope the idea of a real Union of the people of the United States." — Curtis' History of the Constitution, I, p. 413. AMERICAN LOYALTY. 15 ■original idea of National Union, as it was found in the minds of our Fathers, who pledged to its support "their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor!" One People ! One Goveenment ! One Liberty ! One People ! Every man a citizen of the Repub- lic. One Government! Every man alike entitled to the protection and subject to the claims of its Flag! One Liberty! Every citizen a Freeman. Suck a definition of Union as [this, everywhere secured, and the Constitution strictly framed in accordance vnth. it, and God alone can tell what rivers of blood and tears the nation might have been saved. We have seen how the social Union became a civil Union, let us now see how the civil Union became a legal one. Really, and in point of fact, the Old Continental Congress was "a voluntary Congress, and no more." "No snchlL^nwii then existed as in the language of law to constitute a State." * The first treaty with France, February 6th, 1778, is between the King and the Thirteen States, all their names given in order, and this single exception that Arch Fiend of Rebellion^ Jefferson Davis^ seizes upon and affirms that it is the universal rule. The one, united people had as yet no Government! During six long years the war of Independence raged with unabated fury, and the Union was yet no more than a mutual pledge of faith, and a mutual participation of common sufferings and com- mon dangers. * Horace Binney, Esq., as quoted by Prof. Lieber. 16 AMERICAN LOYALTY. " In the enthusiasm of their first spontaneous^ unstipulated, unpremeditated Union, they had flattered themselves that no General Government would be required." * * '^ "They relaxed their Union into a le.ague of friendship between sovereign and inde- pendent States." * * * "There was thus, no con- geniality of principle between the Declaration of Independence and the Articles of Confederation." "The Fabric of the Declaration and of the Confede- ration, were each consistent with its own foundation, but they could not form one consistent, symmetrical edi- fice. The corner-stone of one was Right; the rights of man and a superintending Providence. That of the other was Powee ; the sovereignty of organized power, and the independence of the separate States. The Union languished to the point of death." * Everywhere the faces of the friends of freedom gathered blackness at the prospect. Even Washing- ton himself could scarcely hold fast to the great prin- ciple which had always been his guiding star, Never TO DESPAIR OF THE REPUBLIC ! In a letter to James Madison, November 6th, 1786, he says: "No morn ever dawned more favorably than ours did ; and no day was ever more clouded than the present. * * Without an alteration in our political creed the super- structure we have been seven years in raising, at the expense of so much treasure and blood, must fall. We are fast verging to anarchy and confusion." But in the midst of the darkness a ray of hght appears. Pelatiah Webster, in 1V81, published a pam- * J. Q. Adams' Jubilee of the ConBtitution. AMERICAN LOYALTY. 1 7 phlet proposing "a Greneral Convention to- remodel the Confederation." New York, Massachusetts and Vir- ginia take it np in their Legishitures, and at length a Convention of Delegates from eleven of the Thirteen States assembles, with George Washington at their head! Would you see what a Herculean task they had to perform? Look at the Federalist. Would you see the difficulties they had to encounter? Look especially at that number in which they are de- scribed by Madison. Would you know how they felt? Listen to the words of Hamilton: "A nation without a national government is an awful spectacle. The establishment of a Constitution in time of profound peace, by the voluntary consent of a whole people, is a Prodigy, to the completion of which I look forward with trembling anxiety!" Four plans were before them: 1. C o:N^soLrDATiO]sr ; the dissolution of thirteen Pro- vincial or State Governments, and a general amalga- mation under one republican character. — This was out of the question ; the Colonies would not consent to merge their individual existence in a single organiza- tion. — 2. Consolidation in the form of a Pure Democ- racy. — This would require the assembling of the whole body of citizens, and could exist only in a very limited territory. 3, The organizing of thirteen entirely Independent Governments. — This would be the sure precursor of wars interminable. 4. A sim- ple Confederation of Thii-teen Sovereignties. — Such a confederacy already existed, and its inadequacy was 2 18 AMERIOAN" LOYALTY. matter of bitter experience. * The Government of tlie Nation is at a dead lock. What now? Hear again tlie old man eloquent: "A work in wliich the people of the North American Union, act- ing under the deepest sense of resj)onsibility to the Supreme Pv^uler of the Universe, achieved the most transcendent act of power, that social man in his mortal condition can perform. Even that of dis- solving the ties of allegiance by which he is bound to his country; of renouncing the country itself; of demolishing its government; of instituting another government; and of making for himself another country in its stead." Hear De Tocqueville, in the highest compliment ever paid to our Nation : " If America ever approached, ( for however brief a time, ) that lofty pinnacle of glory to which the proud fancy of its inhalntants is wont to point, it was at the solemn moment at which the power of the nation abdicated, as it were, the empire of the land. '• * '' It is a novelty in the history of Society to see a great people turn a calm and scru- tinizing eye upon itself when apprized that the wheels of Government had stopped, to see it carefully examine the extent of the evil, and patiently wait for two whole years, until a remedy was discovered, which it voluntarily adopted Avithout ha™g wrung a tear or a drop of l)lood from mankind." Hear Mr. Madison : "We undertook to accomplish that which had always before ])een believed impossible." * Thanksgiving Sermon of H. A. Boirdman, D. D. — passim. AMERICAN LOYALTY. 19 And how did they accomplish it? As men who had lost tlieir waj, they retraced their steps to the Declaration! Like a Phoenix from its ashes, on the ruins of the Confederation arises the Constitution! With the help of God, what was before deemed impossible is now possible, and the prodigy appears. The new principle needed to meet the exigencies of the case is discovered. It is found in that of a Rep- EESENTATIVE REPUBLIC. "E PlURIBUS UnUM " haS now a double significance: From many races, one people! From many States, one Nation! To see the true spirit of the frainers of the Con- stitution, read the official letter of the President, Gen- eral Washington, in submitting it to Congress: "In all our deliberations on this subject, we kept steadily in our view that which appears to us the greatest interest of every true American, the Consolidation of Our IJjsrioisr, in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, perhaps our national existence." To see the true spirit of the Constitution itself, you need go no further than the short, but sublime Pkeaj[ble : "We, the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and to our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." The Constitution exists for the Union, not the Union for the Constitution! "We, The People of the United States, do ordain 20 AMERICAN" LOYALTY. and establish this Constitution!" To me, as well as to others, the most magnificent words in all history; like an entrance full of grandeur and simplicity into a wide temple. It is the -whole Nation that speaks in the full majesty of its power. "Why "we, the People?" was the indignant chal- lenge of the old Virginia Federalist? That means "that there must be one great Consolidated National Government of the People of all the States!" Of course it does. "Why not?" was the rejoinder of Gov. Randolph, "The Government is for the peo- ple, and the misfortune was that, previously, the 'peojple had no agency in the Government ! " V. Thus, then, when we come to the last analysis of the term Union, it is the Union of the People ; "an ideal nation," if you will, according to De Toc- queville, "which only exists in the mind," but which, on this account, is all the more potent and compre- hensive.* In short, the Union is the historic root OP the Nation ; it is its Organic Life. The Union IS Our Country. It would be interesting to pursue this subject at least two steps further: VI. To show] that it is a geographical Union, f VII. That it is a religious Union. * "In examing the Constitution of the United States, which is the most perfect Federal Constitution that ever existed, one is startled at the variety of its informa- tion and the excellence of discretion, which it presupposes in the people it is meant to govern. The Government of the Union depends entirely upon legal fictions j the Union is an ideal nation which only exists in the mind, and whose limits and extent can only be discerned by the understanding." — Democracy in America page 176. . t Harper's Magazine, February, 1863, p. 413. AMERICAN LOYALTY. 21 "Whether Britain would have had any colonies in America, if religion had not been the grand induce- ment, is doubtful," says the historian Hutchinson. "To the Bible do we mainly owe our national liber- ties," said Daniel Webster; and similar was the lan- guage of Andrew Jackson, on his death -bed: "That book, sir, is the rock on which our Republic rests; the bulwark of our free Institutions." Waiviuof, however, the further consideration of these points, in view of the outline sketch as thus presented; I remark, by way of application: 1. How grateful ought we this day to be to Almighty God, that he has given us such a Union, and that we have so much reason to believe that it is the woEK OF God, and not the work of man; repeating, as it were, the only form of Government he has ever condescended to bestow upon a nation. This is a subject on which I have always felt deeply and earnestly, but never so strongly, never so intensely, as since this wae foe the Union began ; and especially during the last year. Sometimes, when I have thought of this Union, as "reached only by the discipline of our virtues in the severe school of adversity," I have compared it to a diamond, originally in the rough, but in the skilful hands of the Divine Lapidary, cut and polished in all its parts and proportions, until it was at length revealed to the eyes of an astonished world as a brilliant of the first water and the first magnitude. At other times, when I have thous^ht of it as traversing our entire history from 1620, and Ply- mouth Rock, even down to the present moment, I have 22 AMERICAN LOYALTY, compared it to the great Father of Waters himself: the Mississippi, before the Ohio enters it; the Mis- sissippi after the Missouri pours into its channel its mighty flood ; still the Mississippi as it deepens and widens in its progress to the Gulf, and opens up the interior of the continent to the world! And yet again, when I have thought how noise- lessly and unperceived the various materials were being prepared, and fitted for their final place and use, no other comparison occurred so appropriate as the manner in which the First Temple was reared : "No workman steel, no pond'rous axes rung; Like some tall palm the noiseless fabric sprung." The Union is but another name for our National Life and National Government, and, as I understand it, this is, of all earthly blessings that God gives to man, the hio-hest and the best.* I have somewhere read that the Cretans called Patriotism by a name which indi- cated a mother's love for her children, and when we remark the depth and tenderness of this affection I do not wonder! To lose a country is to lose a mother; to have no one to love and care for us the rest of our lives, and no one on whom to bestow our love. 2. How carefully, therefore, should we estimate the value of this Union! *"The greatest engine of moral power known to human affairs, is an organized, prosperous State. All that man in his individual capacity can do — all that he can effect by his private fraternities, by his ingenious discoveries and wonders of art, or by his influence over others, is as nothing, compared with the collective, perpetu- ated influence on human affairs and human happiness, of a well constituted, power- ful Commonwealth ! " — Eyekett. AilERICAX LOYALTY. 23 Measure it by wliat stauclard you will, whether as a work of science and art, as the key-stone of the authority of the State, as the conservator of all lower law, as a simple National economic necessity, or as an example to the world ; and you can not, you dare not, tell me how much it is worth in blood and treasure, just how^ much, and not a drop or a dollar more. "While the Union endures, all else of trial and calamity which can befal a nation may be remedied and borne ; when that Union is dis- solved, the internal peace, the vigorous growth and the prosperity of the States, and the welfare of their inhabitants are blighted forever." * 3. We ought thoroughly to understand the nature of this Union. In what sense and to what extent the people of the United States are one, once the sub- ject of mere political speculation and j^arty declama- tion, is now a question of National life or death. From many things that I have heard and read during the last year, I very much fear that the real nature of our Government is not always as fully com23re- hended as it ought to be ;f and if- the old question of Federalism is to be fought over again. North as well as South, tlie sooner we know it, the better.;]; We * Everett. t Only, within the last week I see the New York World warning its Demo- cratic friends not to be led away by an over attachment to the Union ; and one of the editors of the New York Independent, reported as saying at Detroit, that we should talk less about the "Union" and more about the Republic. I Since the election the New York Neics announces that hereafter it will labor ■'for the recognition of the independence and sovereignty of the States," a conyen- ient synonym for Treason and Disunion. 24 AMERICANS" LOYALTY. Lave, for so long a time, taken it for granted that we know all about it, tliat it would almost seem as if we expected to have such knowledge by instinct ; so that of late, perhaps, we have begun to appreciate some- what that strange remark of Jefferson, on hearing of Shay's Rebellion : " God forbid that we should ever be twenty years without a rebellion. The tree of hberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure!" Only another form, we would charitably hope, of saying that in times of rel^ellion the people are more likely to take an interest in the affairs of Govern- ment, and if so, the remark is not without good rea- son. When the storm rages, then is the time to watch where the knees of the ship are the weakest, and the seams open the widest, that we may brace the one and stop the other. If, hitherto, our love of the Union has been instinctive, hereafter let it be INTELLIGENT ! We ought especially to understand the nature of this Union at the present time, when errors are so rife and so insidious, and are coming in upon us from so many dif- ferent quarters. In the introduction to this discourse I quoted a specimen or two by way of giving point and in- terest to a discussion, which to some might otherwise have seemed only time and labor thrown away. Per- haps at this point we might, with some propriety, con- sider a few specimens more. I open a newspaper, and find an article from Amos Kendall. "Let it never be forgotten," says he, "that we are one people, and one Nation, only so far as the Constitution makes us oner And where, pray, was the Union hefore the AMERICAN LOYALTY. 25 Constitution? I open a Southern Review, and find Dr. Palmer sneering at tlie doctrine that " The Union is more than a league of States," as " an exploded political heresy."* I am anxious to know whether Washington was a heretic, and who was the daring Gushing that applied the torpedo! I take up the Chicago Plat- form and there read, among such a tissue of falsehoods, as was never before presented to an intelligent peo- ple, of a "Union under the Constitution!" I read again of " four years failure to restore the Union ;" and remember Senator Seward's rebuke of the rebel Mason for using similar language in Congress: "Not restore^ Sir, but pkeseeve!" We, the people, made the Union ; only we, the people, in Convention assem- bled, can abrogate it and break it up. So said Washington ; so said Webster ; so in the days of Nul- lification said the MicJimond Enquirer^ and stigma- tized the contrary doctrine as treason. But again I read the Platform ! Alas ! there is no hope what- ever for the restoration of the Union ! Not by war; "hostilities" must cease. '■''Peaceahle'''' means * General Pinckney, of South Carolina, thought otherwise ; first quoting the words of Madison : " I hold it for a fundamental point, that an individual inde- pendence of the States is utterly irreconcilable with the idea of an aggregate sove- reignty." — (Mad. Papers, page 631.) He adds: "The separate independence and individual sovereignty of the several States were never thought of by the enlight- ened band of patriots who framed the Declaration. The several States are not even mentioned by name in any part of it, — as if it was intended to impress this maxim on Americans, that our freedom and independence arose from our Union, and that without it we could neither be free nor independent. Let us then consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each State is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses. — (Elliott's Debates, IV, page 301.) That State Rights should swallow up United States' Rights is simply ridiculous. 26 AMERICAN LOYALTY. must be employed, and these only; our only hope is for "peace!" But on what basis? On the basis of " tlie Union as the sole condition of peace % " No ! that is sound doctrine, come from where it will ; but " on the basis of the Federal Union of the States ! " The Union of the Declaration of Independence; the Union of the Constitution is to be considered as at an end^ and instead of the Union of the People, there is to be a Union of the States ! Instead of the Constitution we are to go back to the old clumsy contrivance repudiated by our fathers, the Confedera- tion, and become Confederate States ourselves. "It cannot be that the Chicago Platform meant that!" methinks I hear the exclamation from some of my hearers. Yes it did, if it meant anything ! " Cer- tainly, I did not so understand it, when I voted for it ! " Of course not, or you would be just as much a traitor to the true Union as any rebel at the South. Part of your thanksgiving as a good and true man, this day, should be, that if you did not see it, the great majority of the religious, intelligent, patriotic, native-born people of the country did. Otherwise, at the recent Presidential election, so far as your vote was concerned, it would have been " all over with the Republic." The great controversy now at issue between the rebel Confederates and the loyal Union men, narrows itself down . to this :' Is there a Union, or is there not? Is it a Union of States as in the old Confed- eration, or is it "a Union of all the People of all the States," as in the Constitution? If it is a Union of the States, then, for the time being, the Union is: AMERICAN LOYALTY. 21 apparently destroyed ;* but if it is a Union of tlie peo- ple, then the Union still lives ! Yes, and it will con- tinue to live ! As I read the signs of the times the history of Secession will be that predicted by Gene- ral Jackson of Nullification ! " As the authors of the first attack on the Constitution of your coun-- try, you will be stigmatized when dead, and dishonored and scorned while you live. Its destroyers you cannot be ! You may disturb its peace, you may inter- rupt the course of its prosperity, you may cloud its reputation for stability ; but its tranquillity will be restored, its prosperity will return, and the stain upon its National character will be transferred and remain as an eternal blot on the memory of those who caused the disorder ! " As the Old Continental Congress in its appeal to the States, September 23, 1779, declared that "the period had passed when honest men could doubt of the success of the Revolution," so in a similar manner are we called by the Proclamation of the President, to give thanks that God has begun to afford us "reasonable hopes of an ultimate and happy deliverance from all our dangers and afilictions ! " More than once in the history of the world have other nations undergone the same process through which we are now going, and it has been seen that the trials of a Nation are in proportion to its des- tinies, that "governments corrupted by vice have been restored by righteousness." Once before, when in the * Apparently, I say, not really. Uad the rebels taken one State more with them, and deprived us of the Constitutional two-thirds, there might have been a, technical question raised at this point. 28 AMERICAN LOYALTY. midst of tlie fog of treason and rebellion, we had lost our latitude and longitude, we went back to the Declaration of Independence to take a new reckon- ing, and now, since this recent triumphant and glo- rious election in favor of freedom, we are about to do so again. The articles of Confederation, as we have seen, did not rest on the old Declaration at all, and none knew that better than their author. They were swept away because they were built upon the sand. The Constitution, for the most part, vjcis placed upon the Declaration, and hence our unparalleled prosperity. The single exception, however, was Slavery — and hence all our trouble ! ''' Once more the people have a two- thirds majority in Congress, and they mean to lay the Constitution four-square upon the Declaration, the length, the breadth, and the height thereof EQUAL ! The old Independence Bell, in Philadelphia, which bears the signij&cant inscription — " Proclaim Liberty throughout all the Land, unto all the inhabitants thereof," if I have heard the story aright, " Cracked the very first time it rung." Significant omen, indeed ! As if God would not permit it to ring out a lie a second time ! But, "The thoughts of men are wulened with the process of the suns!" It would seem from the present indications of Provi- dence as if the old bell ought to be recast — yea! as * Yale students -will never forget Judge Daggett's sarcastic reading of that clause of the Constitution. — " Three -ffths of all other persons." AMERICAN LOYALTY. 29 if it had been recast already, and that we were this day having the fii'st pull at the rope ! The time of conflict, we trust, is well nigh over. With Mr. Lincoln to set us an example of magnanimity, and General Grant of equinamity — by the blessing of God we shall gain such a victory for free institutions as the world has never seen. We shall take a new lease of National life. We shall gain a new halo of National glory, whose light shall shine from the Atlantic to the Pacific shores and throughout the world ! * * Glory to God in the highest ! that He is thus "restoring our Judges as at the first, and our coun- sellors as at the beginning," and that now at length the foul blot is to be effaced from our escutcheon, and we are to be called "the Commonwealth of Kighteousness." I, too, believe in "The Unioi^ as it was!" I take it out of the mouth of those who have made it a false rallying cry, in favor of Slavery, in the recent campaign, and make it a rallying cry for all futui*e time for Liberty ! Liberty and Ukiois' ; one AND inseparable ! APPENDI X A. Vallandigliam, tlie man who in seeking the title 'of "Martyr," only achieved that of "Traitor," in his famous address last summer to a few foolish students of the Michigan University, who went over to hear him at Windsor, Canada West, just as dis- tinctly and formally repudiated the word Loyalty as his worthy friend, Fernando Wood. Lest the opinion of a " Union Man " should go for naught on this point, let me here quote the words of one, who, next to the impeachment of his ortho- doxy, would have resented that of his Democracy : ^''Loyalty is the very term to describe the senti- ment that coi'dially acknowledges the claims of our Nation upon our love and ser^dce. It has indeed signified, almost exclusively, the fidelity of a subject to his prince. * * Loyalty, with ns, is more agreeable to the etymology of the term. It is a reverent attachment to law, emanating from th'e people according to the Constitution. Our Magis- trates, it is true, are, during their term of office, representatives of the law, and, as such, should! AMERICAN LOYALTY. 31 receive our venerating obedience ; nay, very grave must be tlie provocation, before we " 'bate The place its honor for the holder's sake;" but our loyalty cannot be given to them, because they are the creatures of the popular will. Our only sovereign, under God, is the people acting legally, and, to them, while just in the exercise of their constitutional sovereignty, is due that fealty which political propriety, with the Word of God, commands from us to "the higher powers" of the land. Hence, the loyalty of an American citizen, is of a more intellectual character, and, therefore, more difficult to be maintained. The power of a king is a visible, tangible object, and men can regard him as a man ; but our people are such an immense multitude, it is not easy to regard them in their aggregate caj)acity, except as a theoretical idea. ^ * 'The law is the result of the general suffrage;' * * 'in the formation of which, each citizen, as the constituent part of the legislating people, has a share: so that as far as his vote has effect, he is his own sovereign, and a law unto himself.' * * Why should not such loyalty be cherished? Will not the issue of our ballot-box come nearer the right than the will of a crowned despot, or of an hereditary nobility, or of any privileged class? — Phi Beta Kappa Oration of Dr. JBeihune^ July^ 19, 1849, 'pages 12 and 13. " W 6 o . » • 4/V .^^^- -.^^Z >°'^^. V •n^.o^ ,.. -^^^^ ^^.^ oV^^B^'. %..-^^ ^*i5^.^ ^^..-j^'^ ^""-^t. .c^ ^0 'S^ •'-' ^ % "•'^ ^ ^ •'' *V^ <* TVS. 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