On the record
This assertion of the right of the Southern States to take part at once and peremptorily in the legislation of a country they had sought to ruin, was not conceded by the people of the loyal States.
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gutenberg.orgJames Blaine: “This assertion of the right of the Southern States to take part at once and peremptorily in the legislation of a country…”
Editor's note · Context
Blaine critiques the idea that Southern states should immediately participate in governance after attempting to destroy the Union.
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More from James Blaine
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.
The right of the General Government to preserve itself in its whole constitutional vigor by repelling a direct and positive aggression upon its property or its officers cannot be denied.
But what if the feeling in any State against the United States should become so universal that the Federal officers themselves (including judges, district attorneys, and marshals) would be reached by the same influences, and resign their…
All these provisions are made to protect the States, not to authorize an attack by one part of the country upon another; to preserve the peace, and not to plunge them into civil war.
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