Excerpt from The Republican Party Its Present Duties and Past Achievements, and Democratic Repudiation, Vol. 5

Think of the pleading wail of the Continental Congress and of the ina bility of the Confederation to touch individuals; and then think of the vigor of a nation that is one consolidated power, as witnessed in its ability to cope successfully with a rei olt of a third of her people occupy ing more than the half of her territory. Our centralization is one of rea son, and commands my admiiation. Were it a centralization of brute force it would merit condemnation. Were the remote parts of our country dif ficult of access to each other and to the center this concentration of power could scarcely take place, and would be more dangerous if it did. The steamboat strengthened the unity of the nation; and when the loco motive reduced a fatiguing day's journey to a pleasant trip of a few min utes, political power concent1 ated still more rapidly and surely; but it was reserved f01 the telegraph'to put it in the power of the central Government to reach in a few seconds the most remote parts of her borders and govern a continent as readily as a single city.

Recent utteiances in Congress and elsewhere show that the old. Strife between the States and the nation is not yet ended. In such a struggle I do not hesitate here and now to take my stand on the side of the nation. On this question of the power of States the Democratic party is still living in the year 1798. The Republican party has gone la1 cre beyond that; but the events of the last ten years, even the events of the last two months, have shown us that we must go a step further, and maintain the power of Congress, under the 0 ua1 antee clause of the Constitution and the re cent amendments, to check by appiopiiate legislation any failure of any State to secure for all her citizens complete civil and political equality.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.