Daniel Webster

“ It has been the labor of other men, at other times, to mitigate & reform the powers of Government by construction; to support the rights of personal security by every species of favorable & benign interpretation, & thus to infuse a free spirit into Governments, not friendly in their general structure & formation to public liberty.
The supporters of the measures before us act on the opposite principle. It is their task to raise arbitrary powers, by construction, out of a plain written charter of National Liberty. ”

“ The Constitution is libelled, foully libelled. The people of this country have not established for themselves such a fabric of despotism. They have not purchased at a vast expense of their own treasure and their own blood a Magna Carta to be slaves. Where is it written in the Constitution, in what article or section is it contained, that you may take children from their parents, & parents from their children, & compel them to fight the battles of any war, in which the folly or the wickedness of Government may engage it? ”

“ She is much too wise to entertain such purposes. She has had too much experience, & has too strong a recollection of the blessings which the Union is capable of producing under a just administration of Government. It is her greatest fear, that the course at present pursued will destroy it, by destroying every principle, every interest, every sentiment, & every feeling which have hitherto contributed to uphold it. Those who cry out that the Union is in danger are themselves the authors of that danger. They put its existence to hazard by measures of violence, which it is not capable of enduring. ”

“ Nor is it, Sir, for the defense of his own house & home, that he who is the subject of military draft is to perform the task allotted to him. You will put him upon a service equally foreign to his interests & abhorrent to his feelings. With his aid you are to push your purposes of conquest. The battles which he is to fight are the battles of invasion; battles which he detests perhaps & abhors, less from the danger & the death that gathers over them, & the blood with which they drench the plain, than from the principles in which they have their origin. ”

“ It is enough to know that that instrument was intended as the basis of a free Government, & that the power contended for is incompatible with any notion of personal liberty. An attempt to maintain this doctrine upon the provisions of the Constitution is an exercise of perverse ingenuity to extract slavery from the substance of a free Government. It is an attempt to show, by proof & argument, that we ourselves are subjects of despotism, & that we have a right to chains & bondage, firmly secured to us & our children, by the provisions of our Government. ”

“ Have they considered whether it will be found easy to execute laws which bear such marks of despotism on their front, & which will be so productive of every sort & degree of misery in their execution? For one, Sir, I hesitate not to say, that they can not be executed. No law professedly passed for the purpose of compelling a service in the regular army, nor any law, which under color of military draft, shall compel men to serve in the army, not for the emergencies mentioned in the Constitution, but for long periods, & for the general objects of war, can be carried into effect. ”

“ The tyranny of Arbitrary Government consists as much in its means as in its ends; & it would be a ridiculous & absurd constitution which should be less cautious to guard against abuses in the one case than in the other. All the means & instruments which a free Government exercises, as well as the ends & objects which it pursues, are to partake of its own essential character, & to be conformed to its genuine spirit. A free Government with arbitrary means to administer it is a contradiction; a free Government without adequate provisions for personal security is an absurdity ”

“ The administration asserts the right to fill the ranks of the regular army by compulsion. It contends that it may now take one out of every twenty-five men, & any part or the whole of the rest, whenever its occasions require. Persons thus taken by force, & put into an army, may be compelled to serve there, during the war, or for life. They may be put on any service, at home or abroad, for defence or for invasion, accordingly to the will & pleasure of the Government. The power does not grow out of any invasion of the country, or even out of a state of war. ”

“ I trusted that the existing state of things would have impressed on the minds of those, who decide national measures, the necessity of some reform in the administration of affairs. If it was not to have been expected that gentlemen would be convinced by argument, it was still not unreasonable to hope that they would listen to the solemn preaching of events. If no previous reasoning could satisfy them, that the favorite plans of Government would fail, they might yet be expected to regard the fact, when it happened, & to yield to the lesson which it taught. ”

“ Under what concealment has this power lain hidden, which now for the first time comes forth, with a tremendous & baleful aspect, to trample down & destroy the dearest rights of personal liberty? Who will show me any constitutional injunction, which makes it the duty of the American people to surrender everything valuable in life, & even life itself, not when the safety of their country & its liberties may demand the sacrifice, but whenever the purposes of an ambitious & mischievous Government may require it? ”

“ If you scatter them abroad, like the fabled serpents' teeth, they will spring up into armed men. A military force cannot be raised, in this manner, but by the means of a military force. If the administration has found that it cannot form an army without conscription, it will find, if it ventures on these experiments, that it can not enforce conscription without an army. The Government was not constituted for such purposes. ”

“ This, then, Sir, is a bill for calling out the Militia, not according to its existing organization, but by draft from new created classes;—not merely for the purpose of "repelling invasion, suppressing insurrection, or executing the laws," but for the general objects of war—for defending ourselves, or invading others, as may be thought expedient;—not for a sudden emergency, or for a short time, but for long stated periods ”

“ It will be the solemn duty of the State Governments to protect their own authority over their own Militia, & to interpose between their citizens & arbitrary power. These are among the objects for which the State Governments exist; & their highest obligations bind them to the preservation of their own rights & the liberties of their people. ”

“ There is no relation so tender or so sacred, that, by these accursed measures, you do not propose to violate it. There is no happiness so perfect, that you do not propose to destroy it. Into the paradise of domestic life you enter, not indeed by temptations & sorceries, but by open force & violence. ”

“ It must come to the draft at last. If the Government cannot hire men voluntarily to fight its battles, neither can individuals. If the war should continue, there will be no escape, & every man's fate, & every man's life will come to depend on the issue of the military draught. Who shall describe to you the horror which your orders of Conscription shall create in the once happy villages of this country? Who shall describe the distress & anguish which they will spread over those hills & valleys, where men have heretofore been accustomed to labor, & to rest in security & happiness. ”

“ It is entirely within the reasoning of the Secretary, & it is a result of his argument, outraging the rights of individuals in a far less degree, than the practical consequences which he himself draws from it. A compulsory loan is not to be compared, in point of enormity, with a compulsory military service.
If the Secretary of War has proved the right of Congress to enact a law enforcing a draft of men out of the Militia into the regular army, he will at any time be able to prove, quite as clearly, that Congress has power to create a Dictator. ”

“ I am anxious, above all things, to stand acquitted before GOD, & my own conscience, & in the public judgments, of all participations in the Counsels, which have bought us to our present condition, & which now threaten the dissolution of the Government. When the present generation of men shall be swept away, & that this Government ever existed shall be a matter of history only, I desire that it may then be known, that you have not proceeded in your course unadmonished & unforewarned. ”

“ But it is said, that it might happen that an army would not be raised by voluntary enlistment, in which case the power to raise armies would be granted in vain, unless they might be raised by compulsion. If this reasoning could prove any thing, it would equally show, that whenever the legitimate power of the Constitution should be so badly administered as to cease to answer the great ends intended by them, such new powers may be assumed or usurped, as any existing administration may deem expedient. ”

“ All who are ready to set Heaven & earth at defiance at the same time, to violate their oaths, & run the hazard of capital punishment, & none others, will yield to your solicitations. And these are they whom you are allowing to join ranks, by holding out to them inducements & bounties with one hand, while with the other you are driving thither the honest & worthy members of your own community, under the lash & scourge of conscription. In the line of your army, with the true levelling of despotism, you propose a promiscuous mixture of the worthy & the worthless, the virtuous & the profligate ”

“ But he general nature & object of the Constitution impose as rigid a restriction on the means of exercising power, as could be done by the most explicit injunctions. It is the first principle applicable to such a case, that no construction shall be admitted which impairs the general nature & character of the instrument. A free constitution of Government is to be construed upon free principles, & every branch of its provisions is to receive such an interpretation as is full of its general spirit. No means are to be taken by implication, which would strike us absurdly, if expressed. ”

“ Both they & myself live under a Constitution which teaches us, that "the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power & oppression, is absurd, slavish, & destructive of the good & happiness of mankind." [1] With the same earnestness with which I now exhort you to forebear from these measures, I shall exhort them to exercise their unquestionable right of providing for the security of their own liberties.
In my opinion, Sir, the sentiments of the free population of this country are greatly mistaken here. The nation is not yet in a temper to submit to conscription. ”

“ All that we have yet suffered will be found light & trifling, in comparison with what is before us, if the Government shall learn nothing from experience but to despise it, & shall grow more & more desperate in its measures, as it grows more & more desperate in its affairs.
It is time for Congress to examine & decide for itself. It has taken things on trust long enough. ”

“ They shall not enjoy the happiness of dying before their children. They shall totter to their grave, bereft of their offspring, & unwept by any who inherit their blood. Does it fall on a husband? The eyes which watch his parting steps may swim in tears forever. ”

“ Are we to measure out our confidence in proportion to our disgraces, & now at last to grant away every thing, because all that we have heretofore granted has been wasted or misapplied? What is there in our condition, that bespeaks a wise or an able Government? ”

“ It may stalk above the cognizance of human law, but in the sight of Heaven it is murder; & though millions of years may roll away, while his ashes & yours lie mingled together in the earth, the day will yet come, when his spirit & the spirits of his children must be met at the bar of omnipotent justice. ”

“ Fresh from the peaceful pursuits of life, & yet a soldier but in name, he is to be opposed to veteran troops, hardened under every scene, inured to every privation & disciplined in every service. If, Sir, in this strife he fall—if, while ready to obey every rightful command of Government, he is forced from his home against right, not to contend for the defense of his country, but to prosecute a miserable & detestable project of invasion, & in that strife he fall, 'tis murder. ”

“ Let us examine the nature & extent of the power, which is assumed by the various military measures before us. In the present want of men & money, the Secretary of War has proposed to Congress a Military Conscription. For the conquest of Canada, the people will not enlist; & if they would, the Treasury is exhausted, & they could not be paid. Conscription is chosen as the most promising instrument, both of overcoming reluctance to the Service, & of subduing the difficulties of the Exchequer. ”

“ Without these they will not circulate, nor is there a device more shallow or more mischievous, than to pour forth new floods of paper without credit as a remedy for the evils which paper without credit has already created. ”