Daily national Democrat., 1861-06-19
nailp slatlOnal Dmotrat.
I,o.qrdv JohnsOn's Great Union Speech,
TeIivered at Frederick, Maryland,
Nov Tth. 1861.

MAY 7th, 1861.
The California papers published some time
,;ocea synopsis of the following speech, re-
osyed by Pony Express. We find the speech
attire in a late Eastern exchange received by
mail. and publish it, believing that it will be
.ood with interest by all classes of our read
If is the voice of one of the first legal
minds, as well as If one of the purest patriots
in the land:
SPEECH OF HON. REvEREY JOHNSON.
Iam before you by the request of the "a
,,iotc ladies of your city to present in their
tabalf n standard, the work of their hands,
which they desire to trust to your custody
and protection.
with this request comply with the truest
In this existing crisis of our countrys fate
ivory Indication ola national, patriotic spirit
;shaiiled with joy by every 10y heart
And when, as in this instance, it is exhih-
;tod by those whose thoughts are nstinctively
rnre. having no partisan motives to influence
tthem no patriotic prejudices to crafty, no
neAr ambition to subserve, no interest other
than in their countrys prosperity and good
name, we rejoice at it even the more from
conviction that it must tend to strengthen the
resolves of the loyal, encourage the hopes of
the depending, and bring to pause the
plottings of the rebelious
Before doing the mere act | am delegated
foperfcrni hope you will consider the occa-
sion as Justfying few thoughts as to the
duty and interest of our State in the present
emergency. In the original causes which
have produced it, she, tthank G cd, has had no
share Amongst the foremost and bravest in
winning our independence, amongst the
truest and wisest in forming our Government,
and amongst the first in adopting it, her sons
have uniformly given it n faithful and zeal
Gus support. No reasonable thought, as far
as We know, ever entered the mind of one of
them; certainly no threat of treason was
ever whispered by them. They ever felt the
immense advantage of the Union; they saw
evidenced by everything around them the
blessings it conferred upon Maryland and
upon all. Prosperity uneXamped, a national
oower increasing every year with a rapdity,
and to degree never before witnessed in
nations history, and winning for us a name
challenging theTespect and admiration of the
world They saw in the extent OF the coun.
1ry, and the differences of climate and hab-
its, clement of strength rather than of weak
ness, and apprehended therefore no parrcidal
efforts in any quarter to destroy the Govern
ment
If occasionally murniurs Of dissatisfaction
were heard elsewhere, they were attributed
10 the whining disposition Of some and the
Disappointed ambition of others. They were
rilicucd, subjected to no other punishment
lWlelt TO stand as monuments of safety
with which error of opinion may he tolerated
where reason is left free to combat it."
No "whisky instruction ever occurred
within our borders. No ordinance Of nulli-
iication was ever threatened by us; and, if
We continue true to patriotic duty no ordi-
nance Of secession, direct or Indirect open or
covert, will ever be adopted by those in au
thorly, or if madly adopted, be tolerated by
the people.
To this steadfast attachment to the Union
We are not only bound 10y gratitude to the
noble ancestry by whose patriotic wisdom it
was bequeathed to us, and by the unappreci-
at,e blessings the bequest has conferred upon
Us, but by the assurance, which the most
stoid intellect can hardly fail to feel, that
its destruction would not only, and at once,
depriye us of all these but precipitate us into
irrerorable ruin. In this ruin all would more
or less participate, but our geographical posi-
ton would make it to us immediate and total
=
men who have heretofore guided our public
councils ever predicted to be impossible.
The proclamations now trumpeted through
the land, the marshalling of hosts 10y thou
sands and tens of thousands the Whitening
Of Our waters with an immense naval marine,
theblockade of ports, the prostralion of com
incrce, the destruction of almost all civil en-
ployment, the heated tone Of the public press
OF all sections, belching forth the most bitter
eamiiy, ALL all testify to the truth of the pre-
dc,ion.
How this is to result Heaven alone knows
but to my mind one thing is certan The
Government, by no single net of its own, has
given cause for resistance to its rightful au-
thority. The powers which it was exercis-
ing at the moment when rebellion began to
muster its "armies of pestilence" were clearly
conferred upon it by the Constitution. And
il the Executive, then just legally chosen,
had meditated any illegal policy, the friends
Unconstitutional rights were numerous enough
in Congress, had they all remained at their
posts, as they were bound to do hy their
oaths and their duty TO the holy cause Of Con
sulutional Government, successfully and
peaeefully to have thwartcd it.
The professed especial friends of Southern
Rights, instead of this, rulely shot from their
of constitutional right advised State seces-
sion. Madmen-if not worse-they desecrate,
too in support of this dogma, the name of
Calhoun. lie may have committed political
errors-who has not? His doctrine of nulli-
hcation was certainly one, in the judgment of
all his great eompeers, sanctioned hy almost
the entire country, but he never maintained
the nonsensical heresy of rightful secession
On the contrary. long after that of the short
lived nullidcation, in February, 1874, writ
ing to his political friends and supporters" +"
refusing to permit his name to be presented
before the then approaching Baltimore Coh-
vention, he said
"That each State has the right to act as it
pleases in whatever relates to itsefexclusive
iy, no one will deny; but it is a perfectly
novel doctrine thatany State has such right
when she comes to act in concert with others,
In reference to what concerns the whole. In
such cases it is the plainest dictate of common
sense that whatever affects the whole should
te regulated by the mutual consent of all
ana not by the discretion of each
That great philosophical statesman under
stood, as in another letter of the Sd of July,
1913, he invites his countrymen to under
stand Gin all its great and beautiful proper
tons the noble political structure reared by
lhc wisdom and patriotism of our ancest ors,
and to have the virtue and the sense to pre-
serve and protect it," and declared it IT, c
duty of the Federal Government under the
guarantees Of the Constitution promptly to
suppress physical force as an element of
change, aud to keep wide open the door for
the free and full action of all the moral ele-
mcnts in its power"
ihe truth is, and | regret sincerely to be-