Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 9.djvu/231

 TOOMBS for it? Does ''dispose of" mean to rob the rightful owners? You must show a better title than that, or a better sword than we have. What, then, will you take? You will take nothing but your own judgment; that is, you will not only judge for yourselves, not only dis- card the court, discard our construction, discard the practise of the government, but you will drive us out, simply because you will it. Come and do it ! You have sapped the foundations of society; you have destroyed almost all hope of peace. In a compact where there is no common arbiter, where the parties finally decide for them- selves, the sword alone at last becomes the real, if not the constitutional, arbiter. Your party says that you will not take the decision of the Supreme Court. You said so at Chicago; you said so in committee ; every man of you in both Houses says so. What are you going to do? You say we shall submit to your construction. We shall do it, if you can make us ; but not other- wise, or in any other manner. That is settled. You may call it secession, or you may call it revolution; but there is a big fact standing be- fore you, ready to oppose you — that fact is, freemen with arms in their hands. 221