It is because it is entirely the initiative, because it is only the employment of the Army of the United States as a mere police force, to preserve order until we can establish civil government based upon the loyal suffrages of the people, that I can support this measure at all.
Blaine explains his support for a measure that employs the army temporarily to maintain order until civil government is established.
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If this view of the subject be correct, as I think it is, then the Union must utterly perish at the moment when Congress shall arm one part of the people against another for any purpose beyond that of merely protecting the General…
Is any portion of the people bound to contribute their money or their blood to carry on a contest like that?
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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