In conflicts of opinion the superior mind, the subtle address, the fixed purpose, the gentle yet strong will, must in the end prevail.
James Blaine: “In conflicts of opinion the superior mind, the subtle address, the fixed purpose, the gentle yet strong will, must in…”
Editor's note · Context
Blaine reflects on the nature of strong leadership and the eventual triumph of reasoned discourse in debates.
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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.
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.
If it be true that war cannot be declared, nor a system of general hostilities carried on by the Central Government against a State, then it seems to follow that an attempt to do so would be ipso facto an expulsion of such State from the…
But this is a totally different thing from an offensive war to punish the people for the political misdeeds of their State Government, or to enforce an acknowledgment that the Government of the United States is supreme.





