The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1852-10-30
The Defenders of the Union.
From the Ne,p York Express.

from Ne NeD york cypress.
The great fact, the leading idea, the governing
impulse, in the lives Of the illustrious statesmen
and patriots whom the nation has just been called
upon to mourn, was, unquestionably, the preserva-
ton of our Federal Union. The career of Clay
and ebster, from first to last, seemed to have this
the end and object of it's final contamination.
While they lived, they were the strongest and
proudest pillars of the State, the Union, and the
Constitution. To tear down the beautiful fabric Of
a united Republic stretching from the chores of the
Atlantic to the coasts of the Pacific the hand,
and from the great Lakes to the Gull Of Mexico on
the other, was an impossibility while such men
in the councils of the country to fight in its
defence-an impossibility, no matter how earnest
how malignant the onset Of the abolitionism of
the North, or the stll fercer sectionalsm Of the
South. Clay fought on the very battle. field of the
Union, the battle OF the Compromise bills, literally
with his armor Webster was in the same ter
rible fight, performed the same feats of patriotic
valor, and shrunk not to meet the heavy personal
and political responsibilities it imposed. Clay left
his quiet home beyond the Alleganies to save his
couutry-and to die. Many years ago. on a well,
remembered occasion, when the Union just
undergoing one Of those trying tests which threat
ened to rend it in twain, Daniel Webster ex-
claimed:
"Vhen my eyes for the last time shGH be rnised 10
behold the in heauea, may they not gaze upon
the broken fragments OF a dishonored bat once
glorious Union; upon States discovered, discord-
ant, belgerent; upon land rent with civil tcuds,
and drenohed, it may be, in fraternal blood Let
their last feeble and lingering gaze rather behold
the glorious ensign of the Republic, now known
and honorcd throughout the earth, still full high
advanced, not one stripe erased or polluted, not
star obscured, but streaming in all their origi
nal lustre, and bearing for its motto such mise
rable interrogatory as What s all this worth !?
nor of those other words Of deusion and folly, Lib
erty first and Union aiterwards;' but everywhere,
spread all over in characters OF living light, blaz
ing all it's ample folds, they float over the sea
and over the land, and in every wind under the
whole heavens, that other sentiment dear to every
true American heart, Liberty aud Union, now
and forever, one and ineeparable.'"
That was the prayer of a patriot in the United
States Senate, on a memorable occasion some
| twenty years since And through his mighty ex
ertons behalf of the Union, then and since,
joined to those of the lustrious Sage Of Ashland,
the eyes OF Daniel Webster, hs death bed, ,pere
enabled to the rise and set upon the land he
had labored long and 30 nobiy to save, united and
| happy, as he had wished-prospcrous at hotne, re
spected abroad, greater, grander, and more gori
Gus than ever.
| Clay and Webster are no more The defenders
of the Constitution the defenders of the Union, are
gone; but the legacy they have left thanks to
the Giver of all Good, is still here To preserve
that legacy unbroken in all it's parts, to strengthen
| and consolidate the Union which it the pur-
pose of their lifetime save, nov the moet sacred
| of all duties devolving upon the public men OF
America, and especially 50 at a time like this,
| when a rampant demagoguism at home boldly
Joins hands with a lawleas spirit Of foreign aggres
sion, to involve Us in new wars new conquests, new
aRitations, new excitcmeEts, the end whereof we
have now no Websters or Clays to foresee, and the
bad consequences of which to show us how to avoid
Let the people remember these truths, aud lay
them to heart, else the death bed scenes at ash'
ington and Marshfield are without their moral.