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prediction; the war came, and while it lasted its horrors were as lurid as he had painted them. Fortunately its duration and its consequences were widely different from his depressing prediction. As for himself, his wish was granted.. He did not survive to witness the "heart-rending spectacle." We give this prediction from his speech in the Senate on February 6, 1850.]

Mr. President, I am directly opposed to any purpose of secession, of separation. I am for staying within the Union, and defying any portion of this Union to expel or drive me out of the Union. I am for staying and fighting for my rights-if necessary, with the sword-within the bounds and under the safeguard of the Union. I am for vindicating these rights, but not by being driven out of the Union rashly and unceremoniously by any portion of this confederacy. Here I am within it, and here I mean to stand and die-as far as my individual purposes or wishes can go; within it to protect myself, and to defy all power upon earth to expel me or drive me from the situation in which I am placed. Will there not be more safety in fighting within the Union than without it?

Suppose your rights to be violated; suppose wrongs to be done you, aggressions to be perpetrated upon you; cannot you better fight and vindicate them, if you have occasion to result to that last necessity of the sword, within the Union, and with the sympathies of a large portion of the population of the Union of these States differently constituted from you, than you can fight and vindicate your rights expelled from the Union, and driven from it without ceremony and without authority?

I said that I thought that there was no right on the part of one or more of the States to secede from this Union. I think that the Constitution of the thirteen States was made not merely for the generation which then existed, but for posterity, undefined, unlimited, permanent and perpetual-for their posterity and for every subsequent State which might come into the Union, binding themselves by that indissoluble bond. It is to remain for that posterity now and forever. Like another of the great relations of private life, it was a marriage that no human authority can dissolve or divorce the parties from; and if I may be allowed to refer to this same example in private life, let us say what man and wife say to each other: "We have mutual faults; nothing in the form of human beings can be perfect. Let us then be kind to each other, forbearing, conceding; let us live in happiness and peace."

Mr. President, I have said what I solemnly believe, that the dissolution of the Union and war are identical and inseparable; that they are convertible terms.

Such a war, too, as that would be, following the dissolution of the Union! Sir, we may search the pages of history, and none so furious, so

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bloody, so implacable, so exterminating, from the wars of Greece down, including those of the Commonwealth of England and the revolution of France-none of them raged with such violence, or was ever conducted with such bloodshed and enormities, as will that war which shall follow that disastrous event-if that event ever happens-of dissolution.

And what would be its termination? Standing armies and navies, to an extent draining the revenues of each portion of the dissevered empire, would be created; exterminating wars would follow-not a war of two nor three years, but of interminable duration-an exterminating war would follow, until some Philip or Alexander, some Cæsar or Napoleon, would rise to cut the Gordian knot and solve the problem of the capacity of man for self-government, and crush the liberties of both the dissevered portions of this Union. Can you doubt it? Look at history-consult the pages of all history, ancient or modern; look at human nature; look at the character of the contest in which you would be engaged in the supposition of a war following the dissolution of the Union, such as I have suggested; and I ask you if it is possible for you to doubt that the final but perhaps distant termination of the whole will be some despot treading down the liberties of the people? that the final result will be the extinction of this last and glorious light, which is leading all mankind who are gazing upon it to cherish hope and anxious expectatation that the liberty which prevails here will sooner or later be advanced throughout the civilized world? Can you, Mr. President, lightly contemplate the consequences? Can you yield yourself to a torrent of passion, amidst dangers which I have depicted in colors far short of what would be the reality, if the event should ever happen? I conjure gentlemen-whether from the South or North-by all they hold dear in this world, by all their love of liberty, by all their veneration for their ancestors, by all their regard for posterity, by all their gratitude to Him who has bestowed upon them such unnumbered blessings, by all the duties which they owe to mankind and all the duties which they owe to themselves, by all these considerations I implore them to pause-solemnly to pause—at the edge of the precipice, before the fearful and disastrous leap is taken into the yawning abyss below, which will inevitably lead to certain and irretrievable destruction.

And, finally, Mr. President, I implore, as the best blessing which Heaven can bestow upon me on earth, that if the direful and sad event of the dissolution of the Union shall happen, I may not survive to behold the sad and heart-rending spectacle.

ROBERT Y. HAYNE (1792-1839)

THE CHAMPION OF SOUTH CAROLINA

I

N 1830 a resolution, innocent in appearance but momentous in consequences, was introduced into the United States Senate by Mr. Foot, a member of that body. It related to the sale of the public lands, and had no visible bearing on other questions; yet it gave rise to a controversy in which the doctrine of the right of a State to withdraw from the Union was brought prominently forward, and which drew forth from Daniel Webster his noblest and most famous speech. His opponent was Robert Y. Hayne, of South Carolina, the leading advocate of the principle of nullification and the right of secession.

Hayne was descended from a patriotic South Carolina family of revolutionary fame. He himself served with gallantry at Fort Moultrie in 1812, and there first became known as an able orator, in an address on the anniversary of independence, in which he evinced earnestness of patriotism, purity of style and depth of pathos. He was elected to the United States Senate in 1822 and remained a member for ten years, resigning in 1832 to accept the governorship of South Corolina.

Hayne was a vigorous opponent of the policy of protection, and, in his celebrated speeches on Mr. Foot's resolution, advanced a thinlyveiled doctrine of disunion. He became an open supporter of this doctrine in 1832, in the convention called in South Carolina to nullify the tariff laws of the United States. The Ordinance of Nullification was adopted on November 24, 1832. On December 10th, President Jackson issued a proclamation vigorously denouncing it. Governor Hayne issued a counter-proclamation, in which he showed his intention to resist the General Government, even at the bayonet's point.

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Twelve thousand volunteers were called out, and preparations made for the defence of the State, but Jackson's energetic measures quickly brought them to an end. In the following March the passage of Clay's Compromise Tariff Act removed the subject of dispute; and in a subsequent convention, over which Governor Hayne presided, the Nullification measure was repealed. Hayne was a man of excellent mental powers and was ready, fluent and able as an orator.

SOUTH CAROLINA AND THE UNION

[Mr. Foot's resolution, which called forth the brilliant passage of arms between the oratorical champions of South Carolina and Massachusetts, was for an inquiry and report on the quantity of the public lands remaining within each State and Territory, and to consider the expediency of continuing or ceasing their sale. This resolution was debated by Hayne in two able speeches, both of which were answered by Webster. In these speeches the subject broadened far beyond the original topic, bringing in the question of the stability of the Union. In his second speech Hayne was very caustic in his allusions to the Massachusetts Senator, provoking the latter to his famous rejoinder. We must confine ourselves to suggestive extracts from this speech.]

MR. PRESIDENT: When I took occasion, two days ago, to throw out some ideas with respect to the policy of the Government, in relation to the public lands, nothing certainly could have been further from my thoughts than that I should have been compelled again to throw myself upon the indulgence of the Senate. Little did I expect to be called upon to meet such an argument as was yesterday urged by the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Webster). Sir, I questioned no man's opinions; I impeached no man's motives; I charged no party, or State, or section of country with hostility to any other, but ventured, as I thought in a becoming spirit, to put forth my own sentiments in relation to a great national question of public policy. Such was my course. The gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Benton), it is true, had charged upon the Eastern States an early and continued hostility towards the West, and referred to a number of historical facts and documents in support of that charge. Now, sir, how have these different arguments been met? The honorable gentleman from Massachusetts, after deliberating a whole night upon his course, comes into this chamber to vindicate New England; and, instead of making up his issue with the gentleman from Missouri, on the charges which he had preferred, chooses to consider me as the author of those charges; and, losing sight entirely of that gentleman, selects me as his adversary, and pours all the vials of his mighty wrath upon my devoted head. Nor is he willing to stop there. He goes on to assail the institutions and policy of the South, and calls in question the principles and

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