William Carey Crane

“ Let us all, then, be friends. Let us meet and shake hands in the prairies, at the council, and at the trading-houses. Chiefs should love peace, for war brings death and distress upon the people. The warrior is no more seen around the council-fire, and the women and children weep in sorrow. Peace will make all happy; and plenty will fill the tent of every family. The buffalo can be hunted without fear, and the hunter return to his home laden with the fruits of the chase. Peace will enable our traders to sell you whatever you want and buy whatever you have to sell. ”

“ I believe, sir, I do no injustice to the distinguished living or dead of this State when I say Sam Houston was the most remarkable man known to its history. May I not safely assert that his life is more fruitful of remarkable and thrilling events and incidents than that of any other man of his generation? Profound, far-seeing, and comprehensive in statesmanship; bold, daring, glorious in war; a dear lover of peace, with wonderful capacity to enjoy private life and the family circle, he combined all the elements necessary to constitute him truly a great man. ”

“ Sir, much as I admire the patriots who strike for liberty —much as I admire the noble people whom Kossuth purported to represent—much as I admire all men who have struggled, even unfortunately or misguidedly, for liberty, no matter where—much as I admire the promptings which actuated them, and love the cause in which they have been engaged, yet when a man proves recreant to a noble cause, forgets his people, lives in comfort, splendor, and display, when they have to bite the dust or gnaw the file in agony, I have no sympathy for that man. ”

“ When I look around me, my fellow-citizens, and see and know that the prospects of the Republic are brightening, its resources developing, its commerce extending, and its moral influence in the community of nations increasing, my heart is filled with sensations of joy and pride. A poor and despised people a few years ago, borne down by depressing influences at home and abroad, we have risen, in defiance of all obstacles, to a respectable place in the eye of the world. One great nation is inviting us to a full participancy in all its privileges, and to a full community of laws and interests. ”

“ I appeal to the nation. I ask not the defeat of sectionalism by sectionalism, but by nationality. These men who talk of a united South, know well that it begets a united North. Talk of frightening the North into measures by threats of dissolving the Union! It is child's play and folly. It is all the Black Republican leaders want. American blood, North nor South, has not yet become so ignoble as to be chilled by threats. Strife begets strife, threat begets threat, and taunt begets taunt, and these disunionists know it. American blood brooks no such restraints as these men would put upon it. ”

“ Is it for this that the Southern States are called Upon to dissolve the fraternal ties of the Union, and to abandon all the benefits they enjoy under its aegis, and to enter upon expedients in violation of the Constitution and of all the safeguards of liberty under which we have existed as a nation nearly a century? In the history of nations, no people ever enjoyed so much national character and glory, or individual happiness, as do today the people of the United States. ”

“ The Indians, oppressed and outraged, had the sympathy of Houston. He knew their wrongs, and his untiring and magnanimous efforts in their behalf form some of the finest pictures of the lights and shadows of forest life. Domiciled among them, he determined to care for their interests and protect them in their rights. He had studied the mysteries of nature among their wigwams, around their council fires, and in the silent virgin forests. By an Indian he had never been betrayed or deceived, and the Indians on this continent never had a better friend than Houston. ”

“ We believe no man can say that he ever saw Houston rendered incompetent, by any indulgence, to perform any offices of private or public life a single hour. But the days of his indulgences passed away. When the sunlight of domestic happiness again shone through his dwelling, and he was sustained once more by that great conservative principle of a man's life, a happy home, illumined by the smile of an affectionate and devoted wife, his good angel came back, and for years no man was more exemplary in all the duties and all the virtues of the citizen, the father, and the husband. ”

“ Fear never blanched the cheek of Sam Houston. Dread of danger never dismayed his courageous soul nor withheld him from a peril for a right or liberty. His courage was the courage of a predetermined thought; resolved to make a sacrifice only with the highest possibility of a grand advantage. Had Gen. Houston risked an engagement with Santa Anna near Goliad, or at a period earlier than he did at San Jacinto, numbers would have won the victory, and Texas would have been enslaved. ”

“ Such, sir, is the man whom Texas has the honor of claiming as her own, and whose death we now lament. And though he leaves an enduring monument of his greatness and worth in the history of his country and the affections of his countrymen, yet I would it were in our power at this time to erect a material monument, towering and colossal, like the majestic form of him in whose honor it is reared, as a token of that high esteem in which he was held by the people of the State. ”

“ The scroll of the history of Texas was unrolled, her future policy was portrayed; her future destiny, if a sound policy was pursued, was set forth in prophetic speech. Good faith with all nations was solemnly enjoined, individual and national economy was inculcated, the cultivation of peace with the Indians was earnestly urged, and the people were warned against faction and the rancor of party spirit. Instead of vesting hopes in annexation or treaties, he implored the people to rely on their own public and private virtue, and be magnanimous and just with all men and all nations. ”

“ I have declared myself in favor of peace, of harmony, of compromise, in order to obtain a fair expression of the will of the people. Dangerous as may be the precedent inaugurated by the convention before the majesty of the law which recognizes the power to submit the question of disunion to the people, I yield, in the same spirit that actuated Andrew Jackson in paying the fine arbitrarily imposed on him at New Orleans. I am determined that those who would overthrow shall learn no lesson from me. I still believe that secession will bring ruin and civil war ”

“ His words are not heard in council. The chief is no more. His life has fled to the Great Spirit. His eyes are closed. His heart no longer leaps at the sight of the buffalo. The voices of your camp are no longer heard to cry; " Flaco has returned from the chase!" Your chiefs look down on the earth and groan in trouble. Your warriors weep. The loud voices of grief are heard from your women and children. The song of birds is silent. The ears of your people hear no pleasant sound. Sorrow whispers in the winds. ”

“ In our Republic's life that period is not a great way off. And in that hour Texas will need men—I am speaking now to the young men—to the bright-eyed boys of Texas. In that hour your State will need men, not, oh! not the paid politicians of the present, who seek office for its gold, and not its glory; who trade in honor and traffic in eminence! But she will need statesmen in her councils and warriors on her battle-fields. She will want the mighty in intellect, the grand in soul; more than that—the pure in heart. Do you want an example? Look at the Texas veterans! ”

“ Imprisonment is eternal infamy to an Indian. A prairie Indian would rather die a thousand deaths than submit to the disgrace of imprisonment. You may wound and mutilate him as you please, you may crush every limb in the body of a prairie Indian, and if he can make no other resistance, he will spit defiance at you when you come within his reach. This chief, meditating upon his deep disgrace, knowing that he was irreparably dishonored, unless he could wash out his stains with blood, resolved that night that he would either die a freeman or rescue himself from dishonor. ”

“ It is palpable scandal to the nineteenth century, that statesmen should be prating about the emancipation of persons born and their race held in slavery, by the custom and consent of nations for centuries, while they permit Santa Anna to forge and rivet chains upon eight millions of people who were born free. Thus will the horrors of slavery be increased, with design to render his success subservient to the subversion of the liberties of Texas, and form a new era in the history by degrading to slavery a portion of the Anglo-Saxon race. ”

“ Were Government formed in an hour, and human liberty the natural result of revolution, less responsibility would attach to us as we consider the momentous question before us. A long struggle amid bloodshed and privation secured the liberty which has been our boast for three-quarters of a century. Wisdom, patriotism, and the noble concessions of great minds framed our Constitution. Long centuries of heroic strife attest the progress of freedom to their culminating point. ”

“ War can not make them happy. It has lasted too long. Let it now be ended and cease forever. Tell all my red brothers to listen to my commissioners, and to walk by the words of my counsel. If they hear me and keep my words, their homes shall be happy—their fires shall burn brightly, and the pipe of peace shall be handed round the hearth of their wigwams. The tomahawk shall no more be raised in war. Nor shall the dog howl for his master who has been slain in battle. Joy shall take the place of sorrow; and the laughing of your children shall be heard in place of the cries of women. ”

“ Whenever one section of this country presumes upon its strength for the oppression of the other, then will our Constitution be a mockery, and it would matter not how soon it was severed into a thousand atoms and scattered to the four winds. If the principles are disregarded upon which the annexation of Texas was consummated, there will be for her neither honor nor interest in the Union; if the mighty, in the face of written law, can place with impunity an iron yoke upon the neck of the weak, Texas will be at no loss how to act, or where to go, before the blow aimed at her vitals is inflicted. ”

“ If we remain an independent nation, our territory will be extensive—unlimited.
The Pacific alone will bound the mighty march of our race and our empire. From Europe and America her soil is to be peopled. In regions where the savage and the buffalo now roam uncontrolled, the enterprise and industry of the Anglo-American are yet to find an extensive field of development.
With union, industry, and virtue, we have nothing to apprehend. If left alone, we have our destiny in our own hands, and may become a nation distinguished for its wealth and power. ”

“ The moment for victory and independence had come. The war-cry, Remember the Alamo! was sounded out with the charge ordered by Houston. Every soldier was aroused by the inspiring battle charge. The shout of an united army rent the air with the wild words, The Alamo! the Alamo! Terror thrilled the Mexican host. As he had been instructed to do, at that supreme moment Deaf Smith rode up on a horse covered with mire and foam, swinging an axe over his head, dashing along the Texan lines, and exclaiming, "I have cut down Vince's Bridge—now fight for your lives, and remember the Alamo." ”

“ Whatever may be the course of Texas, the ambition of her people should be that she should take no step except after calm deliberation. A past history, in which courage, wisdom, and patriotism united to found a Republic and a State, is in our keeping. Let the record of no rash action blur its pages. If after passing through two revolutions another is upon us, let the same prudence mark our course as when we merged from an independent nation into one of the States of the Union. ”

“ To leave men with whom I have mingled in troublous times, and whom I have learned to love as brothers—to leave the children of those whom I have seen pass away, after lives of devotion to the Union—to leave the people who have borne me up and sustained me—to leave my country, and not feel that the liberty and happiness I have enjoyed would still be theirs, would be the worst pang of death. ”

“ For Fame's clarion has sounded their praises, and earth is the only limit of their renown. But as in the sheer magnitude of its results, the battle of San Jacinto has but few, if any, parallels, allusion to those results may not seem improper. Never before has the surface of a land changed with such marvellous rapidity as has Texas in the last four or five decades. Only a few years back and the plumed and crested Algonquin roamed over magnificent Texas, sole lord of its vast wastes, save where a few isolated missions sought vainly to weave religion's silken fetters over the savage mind. ”

“ It seems that we have arrived at a crisis, in our national progress, which is neither cheering for the present nor flattering for the future. I heartily regret that truth will not allow me to approach the Congress with the usual felicitations of present and prospective happiness. The time has arrived when facts must be submitted in their simplest dress. Unawed by sectional or party influences, I shall occupy the position my constituents have assigned me with unslumbering vigilance, and a sacred determination to act with decision and to speak with candor. ”

“ When the path between us is smooth and white, and all trouble removed from our footsteps, we shall then know that you are our friends and not our enemies. When the Great Spirit smiles, clouds and darkness are taken away from our path. When He frowns, war and death and trouble come upon us. Let us listen to the counsels of the old men. Let us live like brothers and be happy.
When the pipe of peace is smoked, you may come to see me, and none will do you harm. The white and the red men will meet as brothers. The Comanches once made peace with me at Houston. ”

“ The Texan pursuers as they came up, poured a deadly fire upon the Mexicans struggling with the flood. Escape was impossible. By hundreds, men and horses rolled together. Blood discolored the stream; dying gurgles mingled with the plashing of waters.
Never before has history recorded an event in such words: "The deep, turbid stream was literally choked with the dead." In the rear of the battle-ground near the Mexican encampment, on the southern verge of the Island of Trees, a spectacle of equal strangeness and horror was witnessed. ”

“ No bright genius ever elicited it; no brilliant conception ever discovered it until this session had progressed for some time, when the great principle of non-intervention at once sprang up to illumine the world, to be regarded as one which, at some future day, would be a universally-recognized principle. Sir, I recognize the principles of self-government, but I do it in sovereignty. A people in tutelage can not exercise sovereignty, but States can. A people who are in a territorial existence which is fitting them to become States, exercise what may be called a quasi sovereignty. ”

“ Those who march with martial display upon the Indians, find them to-night at one point at dark; they may see the smoke of their fires; and at dawn tomorrow they will be fifty or seventy miles away, with their caravans, and every child and woman, not even a dog being left behind. What army that you could send of three thousand men, or any other number, could effect anything by making war upon the Indians? Why, sir, it would be like the redoubtable exploit of the celebrated King of France, who, "with forty thousand men marched up a hill, and then marched down again." ”

“ I believe in my heart that the young men of Texas are worthy of the glorious burden borne by them. Listen not to the serpent hiss of him who would counsel State or national division. He that would wish to dim and divide the splendor of the Lone Star's beams is as little a patriot as one who would seek to shatter the constellation of which Texas is the brightest member. ”

“ The South has no rights but what belong to the North; nor has the North any rights but what belong to the South. The North has excluded slavery; the South retains it. The North did it because exclusion was their interest; the South retain it because that is their interest. All the States have equal rights. You, gentlemen of the North, have the right to adopt slavery when you please. We have the right to abolish it when we please. You have the right to abolish it, and we to adopt it. Our rights are reciprocal under the Constitution. We hold no rights that are Southern that are not Northern ”

“ To bring such a population as hers into the Union would be to assume the gravest of responsibilities. To suffer her to be parceled out by filibusters—each chief perhaps a despot—would be to fraternize with every desperate adventurer in our own land, and to invite to our continent all the wild, vicious spirits of the other hemisphere. Nor could we consent, without palpable dishonor, to see her placed in the leading-strings of any European Power, even were there a disposition manifested to so place her. ”

“ Let them suffer what I have for this Union, and they will feel it entwining so closely around their hearts that it will be like snapping the cords of life to give it up. Let them learn to respect and support one Government before they talk of starting another. I have been taught to believe that plotting the destruction of the Government is treason; but these gentlemen call a man a traitor because he desires to sustain the Government and to uphold the Constitution. ”

“ Sir, the man who bears my country's flag, the man who represents her in a foreign country, the man to whose discretion and integrity the honor of the country is confided, should be a man of spotless character, of pure and exalted chivalry, of refined and delicate sensibilities, particularly when he has occasion to defer to that sex to whom every hero, every soldier, and every statesman is most honored in rendering the homage of his heart. ”

“ Sir, while people are seeking to civilize and Christianize men on the banks of the Ganges, or the Jordan, or the Brahmapootra, why should not the same philanthropic influence be extended through society, and be exerted in behalf of the American Indians.? Is not the soul of an American Indian, in the prairie, worth as much as the soul of a man on the Ganges, or in Jerusalem? Surely it is. Then let the American Government step forward; let it plant the standard of regeneration and civilization among the Indians, and it will command the co-operation of the citizens in their philanthropic efforts. ”