George F. Hoar

Democrat and Republican, men of the South and men of the North, now agree in exercising without a scruple the power of Congress to protect American interests by the tariff, to endow and to subsidize railroads across the continent, and to…

Seldom any doubt is raised now as to the Constitutional power of the National Government to accomplish and secure any of the great results which we could not secure before the war, by reason of what is called the doctrine of State Rights.

There were other very strong arguments on the same side, and I had the gratification of being assured by several Senators that my presentation of the case had convinced them.

But I came to the conclusion, both from the history of the proceedings at Geneva, and from the nature of the submission, that the claim that had been established against Great Britain was a National claim, made by National authority for a…

If there be anything likely to induce a man with legal or judicial instincts to set his teeth against a proposition, it is that style of argument.

These attacks appealed to the lowest passions and prejudices.

There was no doubt anywhere, that the owners of vessels or cargoes that had been captured or destroyed by the cruisers for whose departure from British ports Great Britain was in fault, were entitled to be paid.

The terror of these Confederate vessels had driven our commerce from the sea, or had compelled our merchant vessels to sail under foreign flags, and had enormously increased the rate of insurance to those who kept the sea under our flag.

A war with England would have been a grievous thing to her workingmen who stood by us in our hour of peril, and to all that class of Englishmen whom we loved, and who loved us.

I would rather the United States should occupy the position of paying that award, after calling the attention of England to its injustice and wrong, than to occupy the position of England when she pocketed the money.

The Treaty of Washington, creditable to all who engaged in it, not to be judged by its details, but by its great effect in securing peace to the world, saved Great Britain from a war with us, in which it is not unlikely that the nations of…

But every man's conscience is given to him as the lamp for his path.

I know very well that the American people mean to do right, and I believe with all my heart that the men and the party with whom I have acted for fifty years mean to do right.

I hold that every human soul has its rights, dependent upon its individual personal worth and not dependent upon color or race, and that all races, all colors, all nationalities contain persons entitled to be recognized everywhere they go…

But I cannot agree with the principle on which this legislation or any legislation on the subject which we have had in the country since 1870 rests.

The sentiment of the country has passed, certainly so far as it is represented by a majority of the Senate, the stage, if it ever was in it, of a reckless seeking to accomplish the result of Chinese exclusion without regard to…

As surely as the path on which our fathers entered a hundred years ago led to safety, to strength, to glory, so surely will the path on which we now propose to enter bring us to shame, to weakness, and to peril.

The power that causes the compass to point to the north, that dismisses the star on its pathway through the skies, promising that in a thousand years it shall return again true to its hour and keeps His word, will vindicate His own moral…

I believe that the immortal truths of the Declaration of Independence came from the same source with the Golden Rule and the Sermon on the Mount.

It is not by injustice, exclusion, caste, but by reverence for the individual soul that we can aid in this consummation.

To rescue humanity from this degradation is, we are taught to believe, the great object of God's moral government on earth.

The Chinese, like all other races, has given us its examples of both.

Humanity, capable of infinite depths of degradation, is also capable of infinite heights of excellence.

I pointed out that this declaration was extorted from unwilling China by the demand of America; and that laborers were henceforth to be classed, in the enumeration of American public law, with paupers, lazzaroni, harlots, and persons…

I showed also that the Chinese race had shown examples of the highest qualities of manhood, of intelligence, probity and industry.