In other days, while the sinister influence prevailed, the States were surrounded by a Chinese wall so broad that horsemen and chariots could travel upon it abreast; but that wall has now been beaten down, and the citizen everywhere is under the protection of the same Equal Laws, not only without distinction of color, but also without distinction of State.
What makes us a Nation? Not armies, not fleets, not fortifications, not commerce reaching every shore abroad, not industry filling every vein at home, not population thronging the highways; none of these make our Nation. The national life of this Republic is found in the principle of Unity, and in the Equal Rights of all our people,—all of which, being national in character, are necessarily placed under the great safeguard of the Nation. Let the National Unity be assailed, and the Nation will spring to its defence. Let the humblest citizen in the remotest village be assailed in the enjoyment of Equal Rights, and the Nation must do for that humblest citizen what it would do for itself. And this is only according to the original promises of the Declaration of Independence, and the more recent promises of the Constitutional Amendments, the two concurring in the same national principles.
Do you question the binding character of the Great Declaration? Then do I invoke the Constitutional Amendments. But you cannot turn from either; and each establishes beyond question the boundaries of national power, making it coextensive with the National Unity and the Equal Rights of All, originally declared and subsequently assured. Whatever is announced in the Declaration is essentially National, and so also is all that is assured. The principles of the Declaration, reinforced by the Constitutional Amendments, cannot be allowed to suffer. Being common to all, they must be under the safeguard of all. Nor can any State set up its local system against the universal law. Equality implies universality; and what is universal must be national. If each State is left to determine the protection of Equal Rights, then will protection vary according to the State, and Equal Rights will prevail only according to the accident of local law. There will be as many equalities as States. Therefore, in obedience to reason, as well as solemn mandate, is this power in the Nation.
Nor am I deterred from this conclusion by any cry of Centralism, or it may be of Imperialism. These are terms borrowed from France, where this abuse has become a tyranny, subjecting the most distant communities, even in the details of administration, to central control. Mark, if you please, the distinction. But no such tyranny is proposed among us,—nor any interference of any kind with matters local in character. The Nation will not enter the State, except for the safeguard of rights national in character, and then only as the sunshine, with beneficent power, and, like the sunshine, for the equal good of all. As well assail the sun because it is central, because it is imperial. Here is a just centralism; here is a generous imperialism. Shunning with patriotic care that injurious centralism and that fatal imperialism which have been the Nemesis of France, I hail that other centralism which supplies an equal protection to every citizen, and that other imperialism which makes Equal Rights the supreme law, to be maintained by the national arm in all parts of the land. Centralism! Imperialism! Give me the centralism of Liberty! Give me the imperialism of Equal Rights! And may this National Capitol, where we are now assembled, be the emblem of our Nation! Planted on a hill-top, with portals opening North and South, East and West, with spacious chambers, and with arching dome crowned by the image of Liberty,—such is our imperial Republic; but in nothing is it so truly imperial as in that beneficent Sovereignty which rises like a dome crowned by the image of Liberty.
Nor am I deterred by any party cry. The Republican party must do its work, which is nothing less than the regeneration of the Nation according to the promises of the Declaration of Independence. To maintain the Republic in its unity, and the people in their rights,—such is this transcendent duty. Nor do I fear any political party which assails these sacred promises, even if it falsely assume the name of Democrat. How powerless their efforts against these immortal principles! For myself, I know no better service than that which I now announce. Here have I labored steadfastly from early life, bearing obloquy and enmity; and here again I pledge the energies which remain to me, even if obloquy and enmity survive.
OUR DUTY AGAINST WRONG.
Letter to the Reform League, New York, May 8, 1871.
