Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1871-03-30

SENATOR HOWE S REMARKS.

bANAL OIb IOHL d ltL4uAAhD.
After Mr.. Morton's remarks nreply to Mr..
Summers San Domingo speech, Mr. Howe of
Wisconsin followed commencing his remarks
by quoting the proverb that trees have their
time to fall, SO have men, also. 'sWho," he
asked, "has witnessed forest oak river by
Heavens lightning, without feeling of sad
ness at its fate. Who can witness the specta-
Gle of great man wrecked by his own mis-
guided zeal, or his misguided passions, with
out feeling akin to pain" Mr.. Howe then
proceeded to quote from history instance of
this falling Oft from greatness, commencing
with scriptural times, and com down
through ancient Rome, when Cicero protested
that he belonged to the party of Pompey, but
did his utmost to blacken Pornpey with the
crimes Of Scylla, and double the crimes ofthe
Ku-Klux of to-day. Examples were quoted
| from English history, of Sir Edward Sey-
mour and the elder Pitt, who were wrecked
in their old age. Mr.. Howe then alluded to
Patrick Henry, who in his youth rallied the
scattered colonies to meet the whole power of
England, but became soured, and, after a
glorious independence had been won, retired
to private life, and was no longer known in
the politics of this country, either as proph-
ct or as a statesman. gar
MT. howe Lnen went on 10 say 5-Es.Ea
Still, Mr. President, we have had an illus
| tration of this truth, and Massachusetts far
nished it. You remember, sir, for how many
years great portion of the American people
hung upon Massachusetts statesman as if he
was-if not the prophet atleast the statesman,
who was to deliver us from the great evil which
then threatened the permanency of our institu-
tons. How long andhow steadfastly we follow
ed and we hung upon the counsels of Daniel
Webster. Mr.. President, it is twenty -one
years and twenty days ago this very day since
Daniel W ebster, eager tor what will not
undertake to say, arose in the Senate cham
Der and struck hands openly in the face of
the American people with the genius of mis-
rule. 1t was the last time he spoke with au-
thority to the people of the United States. Sir,
if in 1861 any intelligent American had been
asked to single out the three citizens of this
country who had most influence upon Ameri-
can opinion, is there a man amongst them
who would have hesitated to have named first
him who then held the office of Secretary of
State, and next him who held the office Of
Secretary of the Treasury, and next the dis
tinguished Senator from Massachusetts,, who
has addressed the Senate this afternoon, and
who then held the position of Chairman Of
the Committee on Foreign Relations? Sir, the
last we saw of the official career of the first
of the great triumvirate, he had turned his
back upon the hopes, the lessons and the
friends Of his better years, and he was acting
as master of ceremonies in a political page
ant, (which an itinerant President was the
principal figure, and whereat the public sense
OF duty was profoundly shocked. And but
recently we saw the second of the two en-
ploying the great authority of the Chief JUS
tice of the United States to annul the most
benefcent act of his civil administration, and
to-day, sir, think the Republican party at
least experience something of that anguish
which swelled the breast of Caesar, when he
had already been struck by Casco and by
Cassius, and when he saw the third dagger
uplifted in the hand of a dear friend, and
| there was wrenched from his agonized bosom
the exclamaton-'Et tu Brute For to-day
we have heard the remaining member of that
great triumvirate, now while the country still
resounds with that specious rhetoric with
which he induced reluctant Senate to ac-
quiesce in the purchase of those frigid and far
off regions about the pole, to-day turning a
deaf ear to those busy echoes which bring
back to us his own exutant prophecy that
-our city can be no less than the whole Amer
lean continent, with our gates upon all the
surrounding seas To-day that Senator aris-
es here in his place to employ that some rhet-
oric, not merely to oppose the annexation or
the acquisition of an island here at our very
doors, but to denounce as a criminal the great
magistrate who has ventured, in the exercise
of strictly constitutional prerogative, to ad-
wise the acquisition
Mr. Howe then commenced criticism of
Mr.. Summers resolution, but as it was grow
ing late he yielded to Mr. Stewart, who NOV
ed an adjournment.