Page:The World's Famous Orations Volume 9.djvu/92

 THE WORLD'S FAMOUS ORATIONS obligation. The monarchy was dissolved, and each integral part had a right to seek its own happiness by the institution of any new govern- ment adapted to its wants. Joseph Bonaparte, the successor de facto of Ferdinand, recognized this right on the part of the Colonies, and recom- mended them to establish their independence. Thus upon the ground of strict right, upon the footing of a mere legal question, governed by forensic rules, the Colonies, being absolved by the acts of the parent country from the duty of subjection to it, had an indisputable right to set up for themselves. But I take a broader and a bolder position. I maintain that an op- pressed people are authorized, whenever they can, to rise and break their fetters. This was the great principle of the English Revolution. It was the great principle of our own. Vattel, if authority were wanting, expressly supports this right. We must pass sentence of condemna- tion upon the founders of our liberty, say that you were rebels, traitors, and that we are at this moment legislating without competent powers, before we can condemn the cause of Spanish America. Our Revolution was mainly directed against the mere theory of tyranny. We had suffered but comparatively little; we had, in some respects, been kindly treated; but our in- trepid and intelligent fathers saw, in the usurpa- tion of the power to levy an inconsiderable tax, the long train of oppressive acts that were to follow. They rose; they breasted the storm;