He resisted the passage of the tariff of 1846, stood firmly and consistently for the industrial interests of his State, cultivated an alliance with the Whigs in the Senate, and by their aid thwarted all the attempts of the Polk administration to interfere with his plans and purposes in Pennsylvania.
Blaine highlights the efforts of a politician to protect industrial interests and navigate political alliances.
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Is any portion of the people bound to contribute their money or their blood to carry on a contest like that?
The States are colleagues of one another, and if some of them shall conquer the rest, and hold them as subjugated provinces, it would totally destroy the whole theory upon which they are now connected.
Without the exercise of those functions which belong exclusively to the civil service, the laws cannot be executed in any event, no matter what may be the physical strength which the Government has at its command.
Under such circumstances, to send a military force into any State, with orders to act against the people, would be simply making war upon them.
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