On the record
They had been too long accustomed to power to surrender it to an adverse majority, however lawful or constitutional that majority might be.
Source
gutenberg.orgJames Blaine: “They had been too long accustomed to power to surrender it to an adverse majority, however lawful or constitutional that…”
Editor's note · Context
Blaine explains the Southern leaders' reluctance to relinquish power to a majority they opposed.
Share
More from James Blaine
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.
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.
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.
Other voices in this conversation
