True as this may be, it is a cheat, when used to cover dishonor.

The currency of all should be coin, and you should lift all the national creditors to this solid platform rather than drag a single citizen down.

A just Equality is sought by levelling up instead of levelling down.

Good people, especially all concerned in business, whether commerce, banking, or labor, our own compatriots or the people of other lands, will honor and uphold the nation which, against all temptation, keeps its word.

Permit me to say, at the outset, that the declared object of the present bill is all lost in certain special features, which are nothing less than monstrous, and utterly unworthy of a generous Republic hoping to give an example to mankind.

Surely, Sir, it is noble to reach out and protect the rights of the citizen at home and abroad; but no zeal in this behalf should betray us into conduct which cannot be regarded without a blush.

This bill proposes to confer upon the President prodigious powers, such as have never been lavished before in our history.

If it be shown that they are not only without precedent, but that they are inconsistent with the requirements of modern civilization, that they are of evil example, and that they tend directly to war,--then, on this account, we should…

Not lightly can a nation set itself against the requirements of civilization; not lightly can a nation do an act of evil example; not lightly can a nation take any step toward war.

I am not aware of any instance, in our own history or in the history of any other country, where there has been a suspension of commercial relations with any foreign power, unless as an act of war.

The moment war is declared, there is, from the fact of war, a suspension of commercial relations with the hostile power.

Not an instance of history, not a phrase in the Law of Nations, sanctions it.

The present object of good men is to make war difficult, if not impossible.

By the Constitution of our Republic it is Congress alone that can declare war.

And yet by this bill One Man, in his discretion, may do little short of declaring war.

He may hurl one of the bolts of war, and sever the commercial relations of two great powers.

It is nothing less than authority, in his discretion, to make reprisals, by seizing innocent foreigners happening to be in the United States.

The more this is considered, the more it must be regarded with distrust.

I do not say, that, according to the received rights of war, some terrible occasion may not arise even for this barbarous agency; but I insist that it is frowned upon by all the best authorities even in our own country, that it is contrary…

Admitting that such reprisals are not entirely discarded by writers on the Law of Nations, they are nevertheless condemned.

Who now would order the execution of prisoners of war?

The day has passed when any such outrage can be tolerated.

But it is hardly less barbarous to seize innocent persons whom business or pleasure has brought within your peaceful jurisdiction, under the guaranty of the Public Faith.

And yet the present effort will justify me in exposing the true character of reprisals, as seen in the light of history.

According to him, reprisals are nothing less than “wickedness” (improbitas), and unworthy of a magnanimous people.