Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 1.djvu/470

436 own existence against aggression organized upon a large scale. If you run this doctrine to its logical consequences, then a State can, as such, not be held to account for an act of rebellion, for a rebellion is the act of individuals, while individuals ought not to be held to account for an act of rebellion if, in committing it, they merely followed their allegiance to the State. Who, then, is to be held to account for the rebellion? Nobody; for the State is covered by the responsibility of the individual, while the responsibility of the individual is covered by the State. Accept this position, and rebellion will be a mere pastime, which can result only in the acquisition of new rights by success, and the preservation of old rights by failure. The National power will be a mere football, to be tossed about at pleasure by daring sectional minorities. Disputed questions of general concern will not be decided by the largest number of votes, but by the greatest fighting capacity of this or that political faction. And the Republic must insensibly drift into disgrace, ruin and the chaos of universal anarchy, Yes, the principle the Democrats now maintain is identical with the doctrine of the unconstitutionally of coercion, which, logically, means nothing but the right of secession. And well may the Southern leaders say—as they boastfully tell us every day—if the Democratic construction of the Constitution prevails, they have, even after their defeat, at last won what they fought for. What then, is the great Democratic Constitutional doctrine? It is an attempt to twist the Constitution into a rope with which to strangle the Republic. There I will leave it, to the contemplation of a patriotic people.

The next great objection raised by our opponents against the Republican policy consists in the assertion that Congress has subjected the South to the most odious and oppressive military despotism the world ever saw. Upon this subject that mournful statesman from