He spoke earnestly against the use of the National power to hold these States to their duty as members of a common government, and expressed the belief that it would be better to have two republics, than to have one strong enough to command respect for its laws and to enforce obedience at the cannon's mouth.
Blaine argues against using national power to enforce obedience from Southern states, preferring peaceful separation.
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He had placed himself in a position from which he could not with grace retreat, and to go forward in which was still further to blight his hopes of promotion in his party.
It is to the eminent credit of the Republican members of Congress that they stood in a crisis of this magnitude true to principle, firm against all the power and all the patronage of the Administration.
The wonder excited by the raising of the vast army which saved the Union from destruction was even surpassed by the wonder excited by its prompt and peaceful dissolution.
The two schools in short marked the dividing line between the radical and the conservative.
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