590 



PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. 



speculations were true or false, it will be conceded 

 that they existed, and that the predilections of the 

 army were, for the time being, in the direction indi- 

 cated. Taking advantage ot this feeling, it would 

 have been easy, as the Commander-in-chief of the 

 army and navy ? and with all the power and patron- 

 age of the presidential office at my disposal, to turn 

 the concentrated military strength of the nation 

 against French interference in Mexico, and to in- 

 augurate a movement which would have been re- 

 ceived with favor by the military and a large portion 

 of the people. 



It is proper, in this connection, that I should refer 

 to the almost unlimited additional powers tendered 

 to the Executive by the measures relating to civil 

 rights and the Freedmen's Bureau. Contrary to 

 most precedents in tke experiences of public men, 

 the powers thus placed within my grasp were de- 

 clined, as in violation of the Constitution, dangerous 

 to the liberties of the people, and tending to aggra- 

 vate, rather than lessen, the discords naturally re- 

 sulting from our civil war. With a large army and 

 augmented authority, it would hay e_ been no difficult 

 tasK to direct at pleasure the destinies of the repub- 

 lic, and to make secure my continuance in the high- 

 est office known to our laws. 



Let the people whom I am addressing from the 

 presidential chair during the closing hours of a la- 

 borious term consider Tiow different would have 

 been their present condition had I yielded to the 

 dazzling temptation of foreign conquest, of personal 

 aggrandizement, and the desire to wield additional 

 power. Let them with justice consider that, if I 

 have not unduly " magnified mine office," the public 

 burdens have not been increased by my acts, and 

 other and perhaps thousands or tens of thousands of 

 lives sacrificed to visions of false glory. 



It cannot, therefore, be charged that my ambition 

 has been of that ordinary or criminal kind which ? to 

 the detriment of the people's rights and liberties, 

 ever seeks to grasp more and unwarranted powers, 

 and, to accomplish its purposes, panders too often 

 to popular prejudices and party aims. 



What, then, have been the aspirations which guided 

 me in my official acts ? Those acts need not, at this 

 time, an elaborate explanation. They have been 

 elsewhere comprehensively stated and fully dis- 

 cussed, and become a part of the nation's history. 

 By them I am willing to be judged, knowing that, 

 however imperfect, they at least show to the impar- 

 tial mind that my sole ambition has been to restore 

 the Union of the States, faithfully to execute the 

 office of President, and, to the best of my ability, to 

 preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution. I 

 cannot be censured if my efforts have been impeded 

 in the interests of party faction ; and if a policy 

 which was intended to reassure and conciliate the 

 people of both sections of the country was made the 

 occasion of inflaming and dividing still further those 

 who, only recently in arms against each other, yet, 

 as individuals and citizens, were sincerely desirous, 

 as I shall ever believe, of burying all hostile feelings 

 in the grave of the past. The bitter war was waged 

 on the part of the Government to vindicate the Con- 

 stitution and save the Union ; and if I have erred in 

 trying to bring about a more speedy and lasting 

 peace, to extinguish heart-burnings and enmities, 

 and to prevent troubles in the South which, retard- 



ing material prosperity in that region, injuriously 

 fected the whole county, I am quite content to rest 



affe< 



my case with the more deliberate judgment of the 

 people, and, as I have already intimated, with the 

 distant future. 



The war, all must remember, was a stupendous 

 and deplorable mistake. Neither side understood 

 the other ; and had this simple fact and its conclu- 

 sions been kept in view, all that was needed was ac- 

 complished by the acknowledgment of the terrible 

 wrong, and the expressed better feeling and earnest 

 endeavor at atonement shown and felt in the prompt 



ratification of constitutional amendments by the 

 Southern States at the close of the war. Not ac- 

 cepting the war as a confessed false step on the part 

 of those who inaugurated it ? was an error which now 

 only time can cure, and which even at this late date 

 we should endeavor to palliate. Experiencing, more- 

 over, as all have done, the frightful cost of the ar- 

 bitrament of the sword, let us, in the future, cling 

 closer than ever to the Constitution as our only safe- 

 guard. It is to be hoped that not until the burdens 

 now pressing upon us with such fearful weight are 

 removed will our people forget the lessons of the 

 war ; and that, remembering them from whatever 

 cause, peace between sections and States may be 

 perpetual. 



The history of late events in our country, as well 

 as of the greatest governments of ancient and mod- 

 ern times, teaches that we have every thing to fear 

 from a departure from the letter and spirit of the 

 Constitution, and the undue ascendency of men al- 

 lowed to assume power in what are considered des- 

 perate emergencies. Sylla, on becoming master of 

 Eome, at once adopted measures to crush his ene- 

 mies, and to consolidate the power of his party. He 

 established military colonies throughout Italy ; de- 

 prived of the full Boman franchise the inhabitants 

 of the Italian towns who had opposed his usurpa- 

 tions ; confiscated their lands, and gave them to his 

 soldiers ; and conferred citizenship upon a great 

 number of slaves belonging to those who had pro- 

 scribed him, thus creating at Eome a kind of body- 

 guard for his protection. After having given Eome 

 over to slaughter, and tyrannized beyond all exam- 

 ple over those opposed to him and the legions, his 

 terrible instruments of wrong, Sylla could yet feel 

 safe in laying down the ensigns of power so dread- 

 fully abused, and in mingling freely with the fami- 

 lies and friends of his myriad victims. The fear 

 which he had inspired continued after his voluntary 

 abdication, and even in retirement his will was law 

 to a people who had permitted themselves to be en- 

 slaved. What, but a subtle knowledge and convic- 

 tion that the Eoman people had become changed, 

 discouraged, and utterly broken in spirit, could have 

 induced this daring assumption ? What, but public 

 indifference to consequences so terrible as to leave 

 Eome open to every calamity which subsequently 

 befell her, could have justified the conclusions of the 

 dictator and tyrant in his startling experiment ? 



We find that, in the time which has since elapsed, 

 human nature and exigencies in the Government have 

 not greatly changed. Who, a few years past, in con- 

 templating our future, could have supposed that in a 

 brief period of bitter experience every thing de- 

 manded in the name of military emergency, or dic- 

 tated by caprice, would come to be considered as 

 mere matters of course ; that conscription, confisca- 

 tion, loss of personal liberty, the subjection of States 

 to military rule, and disfranchisement, with the ex- 

 tension of the right of suffrage merely to accomplish 

 party ends, would receive the passive submission, if 

 not acquiescence, of the people of the republic ? 



It has been clearly demonstrated, by recent occur- 

 rences, that encroachments upon the Constitution 

 cannot be prevented by the President alone, however 

 devoted or determined he may be, and that, unless 

 the people interpose, there is no power under the 

 Constitution to check a dominant majority of two- 

 thirds' in the Congress of the United States. -An ap- 

 peal to the nation, however, is attended with too 

 much delay to meet an emergency. While, if left 

 free to act, the people would correct, in time, such 

 evils as might follow legislative usurpation, there is 

 danger that the same power which disregards the 

 Constitution will deprive them of the right to change 

 their rulers, except by revolution. ^ Weliave already 

 seen the jurisdiction of the judiciary circumscribed 

 when it was apprehended that the courts would decide 

 against laws having for their sole object the suprem- 

 acy of party, while the veto-power, lodged in the 



