The South had always contended for the right of States to instruct their senators, but now the Southern senators proceeded to instruct their States.
James Blaine: “The South had always contended for the right of States to instruct their senators, but now the Southern senators…”
Editor's note · Context
Blaine discusses the Southern senators' shift from advocating for state instruction to instructing their states during the secession process.
Share
More from James Blaine
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…
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.
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.
Is any portion of the people bound to contribute their money or their blood to carry on a contest like that?





