He felt, as the responsible author of the Compromise, that he was himself on trial, and it would be a peculiar mortification if the party which he had led so long should fail to sustain him in this final crisis of his public life.
Blaine emphasizes the personal stakes and pressures faced by a political leader during a pivotal moment in their career.
Share
More from James Blaine
You can use force only to repel an assault on the public property and aid the Courts in the performance of their duty.
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 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…
And if Congress shall break up the present Union by unconstitutionally putting strife and enmity and armed hostility between different sections of the country, instead of the domestic tranquility which the Constitution was meant to insure…
Other voices in this conversation
