nature
America.

ORATION OF THE HON. GEORGE BANCROFT.

HIS PROGRESS IN LIFE.

he honoured from boyhood. For the rest, volved upon any other man since Washingfrom day to day, he lived the life of the ton. He never would have succeeded, exAmerican people; walked in its light; rea- cept for the aid of Divine Providence, upon soned with its reason, thought with its pow- which he at all times relied. On the same er of thought; felt the beatings of its mighty Almighty Being I place my reliance. Pray heart; and so was in every way a child of that I may receive that Divine assistance, a child of the West a child of without which I cannot succeed, but with which success is certain." To the men of Indiana he said: "I am but an accidental, to rise up and preserve the Union and libtemporary instrument; it is your business erty." At the capital of Ohio he said: "Without a name, without a reason why I should have a name, there has fallen upon me a task such as did not rest even upon the Father of his country." At various places in New York, especially at Albany before the Legislature, which tendered him the united support of the great Empire humblest of all the individuals who have State, he said: "While I hold myself the ever been elevated to the Presidency, I have a more difficult task to perform than any of them. I bring a true heart to the work. I must rely upon the people of the whole country for support; and with their sustaining aid even I, humble as I am, cannot fail to carry the ship of State safely through the storm." To the Assembly of New Jersey, at Trenton, he explained: "I shall take the ground I deem most just to the North, the East, the West, the South, and the whole country, in good temper, certainly with no malice to any section. I am devoted to peace, but it may be neces‐ sary to put the foot down firmly." In the old Independence Hall of Philadelphia he said: "I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Into the people of this country, but to the dependence, which gave liberty, not alone world in all future time. If the country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, I would rather be assassinated on the spot than surrender it. I have said nothing but what I am willing to live and die by.

At nineteen, feeling impulses of ambition to get on in the world, he engaged himself to go down the Mississippi in a flat boat, receiving ten dollars a month for his wages, and afterwards he made the trip once more. At twenty-one he drove his father's cattle as the family migrated to Illinois, and split rails to fence in the new homestead in the wild. At twenty-three he was a captain of volunteers in the Black Hawk war. kept a shop; he learned something of surHe veying; but of English literature he added to Bunyan nothing but Shakespeare's plays. At twenty-five he was elected to the Legislature of Illinois, where he served eight years. At twenty-seven he was admitted to the bar. In 1837 he chose his home at Springfield, the beautiful centre of the richest land in the State. In 1847 he was a member of the national Congress, where he voted about forty times in favour of the principle of the Jefferson proviso. In 1854 he gave his influence to elect from Illinois to the American Senate a democrat who would certainly do justice to Kansas. In 1858, as the rival of Douglas, he went before the people of the mighty Prairie State, saying: "This Union cannot permanently endure, half slave and half free; the Union will not be dissolved, but the house will cease to be divided." And with no experience whatever as an execnow, in 1861, utive officer, while States were madly flying from their orbit, and wise men knew not where to find counsel, this descendant of Quakers, this pupil of Bunyan, this child of the great West was elected President of America.

He measured the difficulty of the duty that devolved on him, and was resolved to fulfil it.

HE GOES TO WASHINGTON.

IN WHAT STATE HE FOUND THE

COUNTRY.

Travelling in the dead of night to escape As on the eleventh of February, 1861, he ton nine days before his inauguration. The assassination, Lincoln arrived at Washingleft Springfield, which for a quarter of a outgoing President, at the opening of the century had been his happy home, to the session of Congress had still kept as the crowd of his friends and neighbours whom majority of his advisers men engaged in he was never more to meet, he spoke a treason: had declared that in case of even solemn farewell: "I know not how soon I an shall see you again. A duty has devolved from notions of freedom among the slaves, imaginary" apprehension of danger upon me, greater than that which has de- " disunion would become inevitable." Lin

66

HIS INAUGURATION.

coln and others had questioned the opinion of of the South, or any decision of the SuTaney; such impugning he ascribed to the preme Court; and, nevertheless, the seced"factious temper of the times." The fa- ing States formed at Montgomery a provivorite doctrine of the majority of the sional government, and pursued their redemocratic party on the power of a terri- lentless purpose with such success that the torial legislature over slavery he condemned Lieutenant-General feared the city of as an attack on "the sacred rights of pro- Washington might find itself "included in perty." The State Legislatures, he insist- a foreign country," and proposed, among ed, must repeal what he called "their un- the options for the consideration of Lincoln, constitutional and obnoxious enactments," to bid the seceded States "depart in peace." and which, if such, were "null and void," The great republic seemed to have its emor "it would be impossible for any human blem in the vast unfinished capitol, at that power to save the Union!" Nay! if these moment surrounded by masses of stone and unimportant acts were not repealed, "the prostrate columns never yet lifted into injured States would be justified in revolu- their places: seemingly the monument of tionary resistance to the government of the high but delusive aspirations, the confused Union." He maintained that no State wreck of inchoate magnificence, sadder might secede at its sovereign will and than any ruin of Egyptian Thebes or pleasure; that the Union was meant for Athens. perpetuity; and that Congress might attempt to preserve, but only by conciliation; that "the sword was not placed in their The fourth of March came. With inhands to preserve it by force;" that "the stinctive wisdom the new President, speaklast desperate remedy of a despairing peo- ing to the people on taking the oath of ple" would be "an explanatory amend- office, put aside every question that divided ment recognizing the decision of the Su- the country, and gained a right to univerpreme Court of the United States." The sal support, by planting himself on the American Union he called "a confederacy" single idea of Union. That Union he deof States, and he thought it a duty to make clared to be unbroken and perpetual; and the appeal for amendment "before any of he announced his determination to fulfil these States should separate themselves "the simple duty of taking care that the from the Union." The views of the Lieu- laws be faithfully executed in all the tenant-General, containing some patriotic States." Seven days later, the convention advice," conceded the right of secession," of confederate States unanimously adopted pronounced a quadruple rupture of the a constitution of their own; and the new Union "a smaller evil than the reuniting of government was authoritatively announthe fragments by the sword," and "eschew-ced to be founded on the idea that slaveed the idea of invading a seceded State. ry is the natural and normal condition After changes in the Cabinet, the Presi- of the negro race. The issue was made up dent informed Congress that "matters were whether the great republic was to mainstill worse;" that "the South suffered se- tain its providential place in the history of rious grievances," which should be redress- mankind, or a rebellion founded on negro ed "in peace." The day after this message slavery gain a recognition of its principle the flag of the Union was fired upon from throughout the civilized world. To the Fort Moultrie, and the insult was not disaffected Lincoln had said: "You have revenged or noticed. Senators in Congress no conflict without being yourselves the agtelegraphed to their constituents to seize gressors." To fire the passions of the Souththe national forts, and they were not ar- ern portion of the people the confederate rested. The finances of the country were government chose to become aggressors; grievously embarrassed. Its little army and on the morning of the 12th of April was not within reach the part of it in began the bombardment of Fort Sumter, Texas, with all its stores, were made over and compelled its evacuation. by its commander to the seceding insurgents. One State after another voted in convention to go out of the Union. A It is the glory of the late President th peace Congress, so-called, met at the re- he had perfect faith in the perpetuity quest of Virginia, to concert the terms of the Union. Supported in advance capitulation for the continuance of the Union. Congress in both branches sought to devise conciliatory expedients; the territories of the country were organized in a manner not to conflict with any pretensions

UPRISING OF THE PEOPLE

Douglas, who spoke as with the voice million, he instantly called a meeting Congress, and summoned the peopl come up and repossess the forts, placi property which had been seized fro

Union. The men of the North were trained in an eminent degree attained to freedom in schools; industrious and frugal; many of industry and the security of person and of them delicately bred, their minds teem- property. Its middle class rose to greatness. ing with ideas and fertile in plans of enter- Out of that class sprung the noblest poets prise; given to the culture of the arts; and philosophers, whose words built up the eager in the pursuit of wealth, yet employ- intellect of its people; skilful navigators, ing wealth less for ostentation than for de- to find out the many paths of the ocean; veloping the resources of their country; discoverers in natural science, whose invenseeking happiness in the calm of domestic tions guided its industry to wealth, till it life; and such lovers of peace that for gen- equalled any nation of the world in letters, erations they have been reputed unwarlike. and excelled all in trade and commerce. Now, at the cry of their country in its dis- But its government was become a governtress, they rose up with unappeasable patri- ment of land, and not of men; every blade otism not hirelings- the purest and of the of grass was represented, but only a small best blood in the land; sons of a pious minority of the people. In the transition ancestry, with a clear perception of duty, from the feudal forms, the heads of the sounclouded faith and fixed resolve to succeed, cial organization freed themselves from the they thronged round the President to sup- military services which were the conditions port the wronged, the beautiful flag of the of their tenure, and throwing the burden on nation. The halls of theological semi- the industrial classes, kept all the soil to naries sent forth their young men, whose themselves. Vast estates that had been hips were touched with eloquence, whose managed by monasteries as endowments for hearts kindled with devotion to serve in the religion and charity were impropriated to ranks, and make their way to command swell the wealth of courtiers and favorites; only as they learned the art of war. Strip- and the commons, where the poor man once lings in the colleges, as well as the most had his right of pasture, were taken away, gentle and the most studious; those of and, under forms of law, enclosed distribsweetest temper and loveliest character and utively within their own domains. Although brightest genius passed from their classes to no law forbade any inhabitant from purthe camp. The lumbermen sprang forward chasing land, the costliness of the transfer from the forest, the mechanics from their constituted a prohibition; so that it was the benches, where they had been trained by rule of that country that the plough should the exercise of political rights to share not be in the hands of its owner. the life and hope of the Republic, to feel church was rested on a contradiction, their responsibility to their forefathers, claiming to be an embodiment of absolute their posterity and mankind, went forth re- truth, and yet was a creature of the statute solved that their dignity as a constituent book. part of this republic should not be impaired. Farmers and sons of farmers left the land but half ploughed, the grain but half planted, and, taking up the musket, learned to face without fear the presence of peril and the coming of death in the shocks of war, while their hearts were still attracted to the charms of their rural life, and all the tender affections of home. Whatever there was of truth and faith and public love in the common heart broke out with one expression. The mighty winds blew from every quarter to fan the flame of the sacred and unquenchable fire.

THE WAR A WORLD-WIDE WAR.

For a time the war was thought to be confined to our own domestic affairs; but it was soon seen that it involved the destinies of mankind, and its principles and causes shook the politics of Europe to the centre, and from Lisbon to Pekin, divided the governments of the world.

HER SENTIMENTS.

The

The progress of time increased the terrible contrast between wealth and poverty; in their years of strength, the laboring people, cut off from all share in governing the State, derived a scanty support from the severest toil, and had no hope for old age but in public charity or death. A grasping ambition had dotted the world with military posts, kept watch over our borders on the northeast, at the Bermudas, in the West Indies, held the gates of the Pacific, of the Southern and of the Indian Ocean, hovered on our northwest at Vancouver, held the whole of the newest continent, and the entrances to the old Mediterranean and Red

Sea; and garrisoned forts all the way from Madras to China. That aristocracy had gazed with terror on the growth of a commonwealth where freeholds existed by the million, and religion was not in bondage to the state; and now they could not repress their joy at its perils. They had not one There was a kingdom whose people had word of sympathy for the kind-hearted

GREAT BRITAIN.

poor man's son whom America had chosen for her chief; they jeered at his large hands, and long feet, and ungainly stature; and the British secretary of state for foreign affairs made haste to send word through the palaces of Europe that the great republic was in its agony, that the republic was no more, that a head stone was all that remained due by the law of nations to "the late Union." But it is written: "Let the dead bury their dead;" they may not bury the living. Let the dead bury their dead; let a bill of reform remove the worn-out government of a class, and infuse new life into the British constitution by confiding rightful power to the people.

HER POLICY.

land. Thrice only in all its history has that yearning been fairly met; in the days of Hampden and Cromwell, again in the first ministry of the elder Pitt, and once again in the ministry of Shelburne. Not that there have not at all times been just men among the peers of Britain-like Halifax in the days of James the Second, or a Granville, an Argyll, or a Houghton in ours; and we cannot be indifferent to a country that produces statesmen like Cobden and Bright; but the best bower anchor of peace was the working class of England, who suffered most from our civil war, but who, while they broke their diminished bread in sorrow, always encouraged us to persevere.

FRANCE AND THE MONROE DOCTRINE.

The act of recognizing the rebel belligerents was concerted with France; France, so beloved in America, on which she had conferred the greatest benefits that one people ever conferred on another; France, which stands foremost on the continent of Europe for the solidity of her culture, as well as for the bravery and generous impulses of her sons; France, which for centuries had been moving steadily in its own way towards intellectual and political freedom. The policy regarding further colonization of America by European powers, known commonly as the doctrine of Monroe, had its origin in France; and if it takes any man's name, should bear the name of Turgot. It was adopted by Louis the Sixteenth, in the cabinet of which Vergennes was the most important member. It is emphatically the policy of France; to which, with transient deviations, the Bourbons, the First Napoleon, the House of Orleans have ever adhered.

But while the vitality of America is indestructible, the British government hurried to do what never before had been done by Christian powers, what was in direct conflict with its own exposition of public law in the time of our struggle for independence. Though the insurgent States had not a ship in an open harbor, it invested them with all the rights of a belligerent, even on the ocean; and this, too, when the rebellion was not only directed against the gentlest and most beneficent government on earth, without a shadow of justifiable cause, but when the rebellion was directed against human nature itself for the perpetual enslavement of a race. And the effect of this recognition was that acts in themselves piratical found shelter in British courts of law. The resources of British capitalists, their workshops, their armories, their private arsenals, their shipyards, were in league with the insurgents, and every British harbor in the wide world became a safe port for British ships, manned by British sailors, and armed with British guns, to prey on our peaceful commerce; even on our ships coming from British ports, freighted with British products, or that had carried gifts of grain to the English poor. The prime minister in the House of Commons, sustained by cheers, scoffed at the thought that their laws could be amended at our request, so as to pre-judgment and clear perception of events. serve real neutrality; and to remonstrances now owned to have been just, their secretary answered that they could not change their laws ad infinitum.

RELATIONS WITH ENGLAND.

The people of America then wished, as they always have wished, as they still wish, friendly relations with England; and no man in Europe or America can desire it more strongly than I. This country has always yearned for good relations with Eng

THE EMPEROR NAPOLEON AND MEXICO.

The late President was perpetually harassed by rumors that the Emperor Napoleon the Third desired formally to recognize the States in rebellion as an independent power, and that England held him back by her reluctance, or France by her traditions of freedom, or he himself by his own better

But the republic of Mexico, on our borders, was, like ourselves, distracted by a rebellion, and from a similar cause. The monarchy of England had fastened upon us slavery which did not disappear with independence; in like manner, the ecclesiastical policy established by the Spanish council of the Indies, in the days of Charles the Fifth and Philip the Second, retained its vigor in the Mexican Republic. The fifty years of civil war under which she had languished was due to the bigoted system which was the

legacy of monarchy, just as here the inheritance of slavery kept alive political strife, and culminated in civil war. As with us there could be no quiet but through the end of slavery, so in Mexico there could be no prosperity until the crushing tyranny of intolerance should cease. The party of slavery in the United States sent their emissaries to Europe to solicit aid; and so did the party of the church in Mexico, as organized by the old Spanish council of the Indies, but with a different result. Just as the republican party had made an end of the rebellion, and was establishing the best government ever known in that region, and giving promise to the nation of order, peace, and prosperity, word was brought us, in the moment of our deepest affliction, that the French emperor, moved by a desire to erect in North America a buttress for Imperialism, would transform the republic of Mexico into a secundo-geniture for the house of Hapsburgh. America might complain; she could not then interpose, and delay seemed justifiable. It was seen that Mexico could not, with all its wealth of land, compete in cereal products with our northwest, nor, in tropical products, with Cuba; nor could it, under a disputed dynasty, attract capital, or create public works, or develop mines, or borrow money; so that the imperial system of Mexico, which was forced at once to recognize the wisdom of the policy of the republic by adopting it, could prove only an unremunerating drain on the French treasury for the support of an Austrian adventurer.

THE PERPETUITY OF REPUBLICAN INSTI

TUTIONS.

for its overthrow? These momentous questions are by the invasion of Mexico thrown up for solution. A free State once truly constituted should be as undying as its people; the republic of Mexico must rise again.

THE POPE OF ROME AND THE REBELLION. It was the condition of affairs in Mexico that involved the Pope of Rome in our difficulties so far that he alone among temporal sovereigns recognized the chief of the Confederate States as a president, and his supporters as a people; and in letters to two great prelates of the Catholic Church in the United States gave counsels for peace at a time when peace meant the victory of secession. Yet events move as they are ordered. The blessing of the Pope at Rome on the head of Duke Maximilian could not revive in the nineteenth century the ecclesiastical policy of the sixteenth; and the result is only a new proof that there can be no prosperity in the State without religious freedom.

THE PEOPLE OF AMERICA.

When it came home to the consciousness of the Americans that the war which they were waging was a war for the liberty of all the nations of the world, for freedom itself, they thanked God for the severity of the trial to which he put their sincerity, and nerved themselves for their duty with an inexorable will. The President was led along by the greatness of their self-sacrificing example; and as a child, in a dark night on a rugged way, catches hold of the hand of its father for guidance and support, he clung fast to the hand of the people, and moved calmly through the gloom. While the statesmanship of Europe was scoffing at the hopeless vanity of their efforts, they put forth such miracles of energy as the history of the world had never known. The navy of the United States drawing into the public service the willing militia of the seas, doubled its tonnage in eight months, and established an actual blockade from Cape Hatteras to the Rio Grande. In the course of the war it was increased five fold in men and in tonnage, while the inventive genius of the country devised more effective kinds of ordnance, and new forms of naval architecture in wood and iron. There went into the field, for various terms of service, about two million men; and in Shall a republic have less power of March last the men in service exceeded a continuance when invading armies prevent million; that is to say, one of every two a peaceful resort to the ballot box? What able-bodied men took some part in the war; force shall it attach to intervening legisla- and at one time every fourth able-bodied tion? What validity to debts contracted I man was in the field. In one single month,

Meantime, a new series of momentous questions grows up, and forces themselves on the consideration of the thoughtful. Republicanism has learned how to introduce into its constitution every element of order, as well as every element of freedom; but thus far the continuity of its government has seemed to depend on the continuity of elections. It is now to be considered how perpetuity is to be secured against foreign occupation. The successor of Charles the First of England dated his reign from the death of his father; the Bourbons, coming back after a long series of revolutions, claimed that the Louis who became king was the eighteenth of that name. The present emperor of the French, disdaining a title from election alone, is called the third of his

name.