New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1876-07-09

Britain-thy enmity was but q rugged
| verted thy aggressive musket, and found
thou hadst Drought us > stout colonial
club after all.
| A hearty hand to thee, strong, grand old
Germany, that didst stride over the Rhine
lustrum ago, and tossing the blood from
| thy dripping beard, didst pocket thy old
provinces, and laugh and below back old
Gallo hatreds and disdains.
A hearty hand to thee. Oh, France-the
same hand that entreated help from thee,
and is helped now with benson for sister
republic.
A solemn, earnest hand to thee, Oh, Po-
land, whose invincible Pulaski, cleft down
bv British might upon our soil, swept aside
his rent flesh 80 If cumbr0us robe and
lespt unvanquished, hot and naked soul,
to God for ne!
A frank, lingering hand in thine, Oh,
Swede, whose great war weary Gustavus
dreamed and half century before Penn
planted an asylum for freemen OF chaste
aims and brave caree rs near where to day
uprear the vast centennial piles at Phila-
delphia.
But to return. Said John Quincy Adams
forty-ive years ago: "The declaration OF
independence was social compact ~
which the whole people cOvenanted with
each citizen of the united colonies
and each citizen with the whole people.
To this compact union was as vital as free
dom or independence. From the hour OF
that declaration no one of the States, whose
people were parties. could, without viola
ton of that primitive compact, recede or
separate from the rest. Each was pledged
to all and all were pledged to each, without
limitation Of time, in the presence Of Al
mighty God, and proclaimed to all man
kind. The colonies were not declared SOW
ereign States-the term ia not even to be
found in the declaration" The articles of
confederation that ensued two years later
were self.declared articles Of perpetual
union" but by the close of the revolution
had abundantly proved to lack the legal
vigor to compass that intent and to rescue the
Union from angry State jealousies. Wrote
the father of his country to Jay N785):
Experience has taught Us that men will \
not adopt and carry into execution meas-
ures the best calculated for their own good
without the Intervention of c0erciue power.
do not conceive we can subsist long as q
nation without lodging somewhere power
energetic manner as the authority OF the
State governments extend over the several
States"
And to Lee l7s6) concerning the rebel
lions in three New England States: "Let
us have q government Know precisely
what the iasurEents aim ct. If they have
not real grievances, employ the whole force
And by circular letter tl783) to the Gov
ernors of the States: "Whatever measures
have tendency to dissolve the Union or
contribute to violate or lessen the sovereign
authority ought to be considered as hostile
to the liberty and independence of Ameri-
ca, and the authors Of them treated accord
ingly."
Surely this was Union all bolts and riv.
cts, yet the federal convention in 1887 met
to improve upon the perpetual Union
and ''to form q more perfect Union" in the
especial assertion Of sovereign authority
to digest the common sympathy to common
aud supreme law.
The subject is q tempting one, but have
not the time to follow it out as l would
like. It may suffice to add that such cham
pions Of State jealousy as Yates and Lam
sing abandoned in despair the convention
that formed the constitution, and reported
to Governor Clinton that 'before we left
the convention it's principles we're so well
as to convince rs that no a1tera-
ton was to be expected to conform to our
IDEAS" Patrick Henry, too, warned Viz
ginia: at must be one great consolidated
national government of the people of all
the States" and as such Virginia uncon-
ratified it in convention, and
later even he challenged the claims of the
States.
As Fisher Ames declared, "the Union ;s
he vital sap that nOurishes the tree"
State jealousies finally found expression,
however, from under the covert hand Of
Jefferson. in the Kentucky resolutions of
Thnxv thn
Calhoun dropped in dismay in 1888, when
grim old jackson reached forth his stout
hand and snarled 'disunion by armed force
8 treason" and which were then husbauded
ill used in 1861. Then q whole nation of
Dackson's stepped forth and made good the
eminal purpose of our fathers in ''per-
,etual and more perfect Union" The
adapted the colonies as stavee; the COM
)scr Of confederation and the later consti-
.ution were the hoops bent around them;
'ur late war was the hammer that drove
he hoops down and down and down, till
o-day the States stand tight and solid
barrel. IA government" says Draper,
which has neither the resolution nor the
10 Tcr to prevent itself from being assassin
tied has no right to hve."
The tempered steel Of 1876 is only the old
moral iron of l776.
There" said noble son of America, dis
he declaration of independence and there is
he cOnstitutiOn-let them speak for them
elves. The grossly immoral and dishonest
doctrine of despotic State sovereignty, the
Exclusive judge of its own obligations, and
to no power on earth or in
leaven for the violation, is not there. The
says, 1t is not in me. The
says, 1t is not in me-" I en-
reat you, my countrymen, to remember
ne value OF your great charter and to
tand increasingly by it, to exhibit an
hiding belief in it and courage for it.
'ome men, often without selfish or dishon-
st motive, are afraid of the opinion OF
heir ne;ghbors-their patriotism is cow
rdice, ana skulks behind the skirt of ma
Drities. Sir, know nothing under heaven
0 noble as an unawed personal independ-
nee that puts the foot upon base preiu-
ice, nay, mounts the dunghill of that
rejudice to survey horizon smaller men
I'LL not see. Gibe, murmur, menace dis
nay him not, he will not abicate his i'm
erlal right to think for his people, though
hey mock and pelt him.
He shouts as did Achilles.
Hateful to me a. are the gates of hell.
l. he who hiding one thing in his heart
Utters another"
He feels, in the language of the declara-
on, that "silence would be disloyalty.'
history teens with luminous examples of
UGH men Of candOr and courage, and too
item people have been left to make tardv
p0lOgy at their gravestones. Stark, Greene,
chuyler and Washington were no worse
len because they were visited with tauns
nd reprOach by their cOuntrymen, but bet
,r men in that they could contemn and live
own taunt and repr0ach. Too few of
lose who arrogate leadership are indie
min Ac.t