He bore testimony to the “marvelous despatch with which the formal parts of the business had been done, and so the session greatly shortened.”
The resolution was adopted by a unanimous vote, and Mr. Blaine said,—
“Gentlemen of the House of Representatives:
“You will accept my most grateful acknowledgments for the very cordial manner in which you have signified your approbation of my course as your presiding officer. I beg in return to witness to the dignity, the diligence, and the ability with which you have severally discharged your representative trusts. We met, many of us, as strangers; may I not hope that we all part as friends, and parting, may we bear to our homes the recollection of duties faithfully performed, and the consciousness of having done something to promote the prosperity and welfare of our honored state. I bid you farewell.”
This was on the 18th of March, and on the 22d of April, the war having broken out, they were assembled again in extra session, Mr. Blaine in the chair. In three days and a half provisions were made for raising troops and money for the war, and legislation pertaining to militia-laws was enacted, etc. The wildest rumors filled the air. The country seemed transformed at once into a turbulent sea, but men did not lose their reckoning. Latitude and longitude were things too deeply fixed and broadly marked to be unseen or ignored. The storm blew from a single quarter. Its long gathering had made it black and fierce. It struck the gallant ship of state. She was reeling with the shock of war.
Never did the beauty and worth of federal states appear to better advantage than when the impoverished and plundered government called on them for aid. It was the parent’s call upon her children for defence against their own misguided sisters. Never was mechanism more finely adjusted, or power more equally balanced, than in the Republic. Very distinct and separate are head and feet and hands, eyes and ears, yet nothing is more perfect in its unity.
It is much the same with the great union of states. They are separated far, and quite distinct in varied interests, but one in powerful unity. But the time had come to show the strength of that unity. All there was of the great mind and heart and life of Mr. Blaine was given to the nation in holiest exercise of all his powers.
While eighty thousand of the foe are opposing thirty-five thousand of our troops at Manassas Junction, and Colonel Ellsworth is losing his life at Alexandria; while Stephen A. Douglas is delivering in early June his last eloquent words, straight and heroic for the nation; while the bankers of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia are casting one hundred and fifty millions of dollars into the national treasury at Washington, and the brave General Lyon with eight thousand men is routing twenty-three thousand of the enemy in Missouri, at the cost of his life,—while all the activities of that first summer of war are going on, Mr. Blaine is facing a political storm of great severity, as general-in-chief in the campaign that places Israel Washburn, Jr., again in the gubernatorial chair of the state, and keeps the reins of government in Republican hands.
It has been a question often debated whether the nation is most indebted to her warriors or her statesmen. There can be no hesitation in deciding, where the mere question of life is considered, or the hardships of camp and march and field are included in the account. And yet Lincoln, nor Garfield wore a uniform when the bullet struck.
No one thinks their patriotism less intense, or that of cabinet, or senators and members of the house, or governors and council, or members of legislatures less ardent in their love of country, and zeal for the honor of her imperilled cause. At such times all true hearts are one, and the blood that throbs in hands and heart and feet is all the same.