Political integrity

“ I submit this as a question of sound policy,—I will not say of integrity, but simply of sound policy on the part of our Government, a republic representing republican institutions, by whose conduct republican institutions are always judged. Surely you will not fail to protect the national honor ”

“ When we add the indirect effects- the distortion of the public news-service, the protection of vice, the insecurity of justice-the moral evils of political corruption are seen to be of gravest importance.
What is the political duty of the citizen? ”

“ If peace and unanimity are cherished, and the equalization of liberty, and the equity and energy of law maintain by harmony and justice, the present representative government may stand for ages, a luminous monument of republican wisdom, virtue, and integrity. ”

“ By melting down the fetters of moral and republican principles in party confidence, we abolish the only known remedy against the evil qualities of human nature, abandon our experiment of political law founded in these principles, and rest for security on ignorant mobs, guided by a few designing leaders, or on cunning combinations, guided by avarice and ambition. ”

“ The contending political parties in a republic should be such in point of mental and moral constitution and capability that the government may be intrusted to either without serious apprehension for the safety of the public interest. ”

“ The only power to counteract the faults and evil tendencies of political organization in our political concerns consists in the influence which the unrepresented may still exercise upon public opinion ”

“ In a system like ours, where almost every man has a vote, and votes as he chooses, public opinion is really the government. Whoever panders to it, is training a tyrant for our master. Whoever enlightens it, lifts the people to ward peace and prosperity. ”

“ The more that general and indefinite notions of our own liberty, greatness, happiness, &c., are made to give place to precise and accurate knowledge of the true merits of our institutions, the peculiar objects they are calculated to attain or promote, and the means provided for that purpose, the better will every citizen be enabled to discharge his great political duty of guarding those means against the approach of corruption, and of sustaining them against the violence of party commotions. ”

“ We have silently assumed the fundamental truth that, as it never can be the interest of the majority of the people to prostrate their own political equality and happiness, so they never can be seduced by flattery or corruption, by the intrigues of faction or the arts of ambition, to adopt any measures which shall subvert them. ”

“ The body-politic needs rest, but it can and it will have no undisturbed repose as long as there are classes of men who have to struggle for their rights. Our democratic system of government can stand with security only upon the foundation of impartial justice and right, equal to all. ”

“ In a free government like ours, the eclecticism of parties—by which we mean the affinity by which the members of a party unite on questions of national policy, by which all sections of the country are alike affected—has always been considered as highly conducive to the purity and integrity of the government, and one of the causes most promotive of its perpetuity. ”

“ I cannot perceive that a negative, able to prevent such aggressions, which may alter the theory of our government, is less necessary for the preservation of liberty, if the integrity of the State rights is necessary for that purpose, than the tribunitial, regal, executive, senatorial, representative, and judicial negatives. ”

“ Our legislatures were and still are the strongholds of special and local interests, and anything which undermines executive authority in this country seriously threatens our national integrity and balance. ”

“ If we want good government, is it not time that we should take our share in the struggle to secure it?” And hence that fresh political activity, that freedom of criticism, that breaking of party lines, that movement of independence all over the field, which makes political ringmasters tremble and patriotic citizens rejoice in new hope. ”

“ The antipathy of party spirit to publick spirit, sophisticated terms, for the purpose of deceiving nations, so that old as the world is, we still want a political word, to express the idea of national self government, unadulterated by orders or parties of interest. ”

“ Our robust political sense, which has discovered so many of the secrets of good government, which has given us freedom with order, and popular administration without corruption, and unalterable respect for law along with indelible respect for individual right, this, which has so long been our strong point, is fast becoming our weakness and undoing. ”

“ Let us hold fast the great truth, that communities are responsible, as well as individuals; that no government is respectable, which is not just; that without unspotted purity of public faith, without sacred public principle, fidelity, and honor, no mere forms of government, no machinery of laws, can give dignity to political society. ”

“ Yet, as it still remains true that the actual opinions and professions of men in office, and men in authority without office, are among the main landmarks [Pg 13] on which the public has to rely, it may seem that, in vindicating an apparent liberty of change, we destroy the principal guarantees of integrity which are available for the nation at large, and with these all its confidence in the persons who are to manage its affairs. ”

“ At the awful crisis at which we have arrived it is the bounden duty of all men to forget party distinctions, to divest themselves of party spirit, to have no object in view but the honour of God and the general good. Let, therefore, the claims of the people be dispassionately and impartially weighed; not, however, abstractedly, but with relation to the general good; and let these claims be conceded so far as they may be granted consistently with the rights of property, the integrity of the constitution, the interests of religion, and the welfare of the empire. ”

“ Why should nations invent a whole tribe of parties of interest, which are not necessary evils, when it is so difficult to manage one? Their unrestrained vices replenish governours with the bad qualities designed to be effaced by political law; and the loyalty of folly to party names, occasionally releases a government from the wholesome restraints of political law and good moral principles, so as to place arbitrary power within the reach of the human deities of the day. ”

“ If, in connection with these solid foundations for a natural religion, we add the important fact, that this is a republic, in which the wish of the majority, should become the law of the mass; we shall discover that politics become the natural channel, through which the wishes of the majority are expressed; that corrupt politics, result in bad government; that pure politics, insure good government; that a wise, just government, is the greatest political benefit which can be conferred on the people governed. ”

“ He viewed this practical political activity of the individual citizen, not only as one of the most effectual means of training the social feelings and practical intelligence of the people, so important in themselves and so indispensable to good government, but also as the specific counteractive to some of the characteristic infirmities of democracy, and a necessary protection against its degenerating into the only despotism of which, in the modern world, there is real danger—the absolute rule of the head of the executive over a congregation of isolated individuals, all equals but all slaves. ”

“ By nothing but the character and conduct of the man they vote for. What object can influence them when about choosing him? They have nothing to direct them in the choice but their own good. Have you not as pointed and strong a security as you can possibly have? It is a mode that secures an impossibility of being corrupted. If they are to be chosen for their wisdom, virtue, and integrity, what inducement have they to infringe on our freedom? We are told that they may abuse their power. Are there strong motives to prompt them to abuse it? Will not such abuse militate against their own interest? ”

“ After so much experience it can not be said that absolute unchecked power is safe in the hands of any one set of representatives, or that the capacity of the people for self-government, which is admitted in its broadest extent, is a conclusive argument to prove the prudence, wisdom, and integrity of their representatives. ”

“ XII. We regard the political government as absolutely necessary to maintain order, and to protect the good and honest and punish the wrong-doers; and no one can prove us to be untrue to the constituted authorities. ”

“ A democracy of individual rights, that is, must either suffer reconstruction by the logic of a process of efficient national organization, or else it may pervert that organization to the service of its own ambiguous, contradictory, and in the end subversive political purposes. ”

“ Nor do we imagine that the people of the United States will charge their servants with invading their privileges when they confine themselves to the preservation of a standard of official integrity which the common instincts of humanity recognize as essential to all social order and good government. ”

“ But the need of the fictitious explanation arises from a wrong way of putting the question; the power which regulates our conduct in political society is conceived in too abstract a way on the one side, and on the other are set over against it, as the subjects which it controls, individuals invested with all the moral attributes and rights of humanity. ”

“ But an analogous mistake lurks in all static forms of democracy. The bestowal and the exercise of political and civil rights are merely a method of organization, which if used in proper subordination to the ultimate democratic purpose, may achieve in action something of the authority of a popular Sovereign will. ”

“ The principle of republican governments, we are taught, is public virtue; and whatever tends either to corrupt this principle, to debase it, or to weaken its force, tends, in the same degree, to the final overthrow of such governments. Our representative systems suppose, that, in exercising the high right of suffrage, the greatest of all political rights, and in forming opinions on great public measures, men will act conscientiously, under the influence of public principle and patriotic duty ”

“ The fact is, that, in our present state of society, and under the operation of this Constitution, interest and integrity will be connected by the closest ties. Interest will form a check which nothing can overcome. On interest, sir, we rest our principal hopes of safety. Your state government has the unlimited power over the purse and the sword: why do you not fear that your rulers will raise armies, to oppress and enslave the citizens? Clearly, because you feel a confidence in the men you elect ”

“ Until now, a historical line of justice and integrity has been the sure means for the protection of our people and our State. On these eternal foundations we also base our national and righteous demands, side along our hopes. ”

“ For the honor, then, of the other members of our political compact who form a part of our shield against the outside world, and to enable them in view of the attached responsibility, to accord, with a clear conscience, full deference to our claim to the right of local self-government, it is incumbent upon us to act worthily here. ”

“ If reputable citizens refrain from active participation in our political conflicts, they voluntarily surrender the safety of their persons and property, and the good order and well-being of society, to those who are least fitted for the exercise of authority. When such results are visible in any of the various branches of our political system, turn to the true source and place the responsibility where it justly belongs. ”

“ Meanwhile, it may be laid down as a political truth, that by irresponsible monarchy rather than by representative government can a multitude of insignificant political units be welded into a people, with common feelings of cohesion, power enough to protect itself against conquest or foreign aggression, and affairs sufficiently various and considerable of its own to occupy worthily and expand to fit proportions the social and political intelligence of the population. ”

“ Supposing then the individual to have decided that some command of a 'political superior' is not for the common good, how ought he to act in regard to it? In a country like ours, with a popular government and settled methods of enacting and repealing laws, the answer of common sense is simple and sufficient. ”

“ The natural disposition of man to humanity, and the warmth of his temper, may raise his character to this fortunate pitch. His elevation, in a great measure, depends on the form of his society; but he can, without incurring the charge of corruption, accommodate himself to great variations in the constitutions of government. The same integrity, and vigorous spirit, which, in democratical states, renders him tenacious of his equality, may, under aristocracy or monarchy, lead him to maintain the subordinations established. ”

“ But the principles that underlie and constitute the basis of our political organism, are and will remain the same; and will never cease to demand constant vigilance for their perpetuation as the rock of safety upon which our federative system is founded. ”

“ American national cohesion is a matter of national integrity; and national integrity is a matter of loyalty to the requirements of a democratic ideal. For better or worse the American people have proclaimed themselves to be a democracy, and they have proclaimed that democracy means popular economic, social, and moral emancipation. ”