Whereas, Said association has made application to the authorities at Washington to have such monument put in statuary hall in the capitol building, and has been advised by the general government that before this permission could be granted a request from the legislature of the State of Kansas would be necessary: therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives, the Senate Concurring therein, That we hereby request the proper authorities in charge of the United States Statuary hall, at Washington, D. C., to permit such monument to be placed therein; be it further
Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be forwarded to each of our senators and representatives in Washington, D. C.
For a reason unexplained by his later biographers, the authority to confer this honor upon Brown—the highest honor within the power of the State to bestow—was never exercised; a delinquency which excites a suspicion that the resolution stated conditions, as existing, which did not exist.
At the head of the schedule of assumptions concerning the innocence of Brown's intentions, the purity of his motives, and the exaltation of his devotion to humanity, is his "martyrdom." This item has been illuminated with a halo of holiness. As "Christ died to make men holy," so Brown is said to have died to "make men free." No one has claimed that Hugh Forbes was an humanitarian, or other than an adventurer. Yet in relation to Brown's insurrection, the minds of the two men—John Brown and Hugh Forbes—met in full accord; there was agreement between them. Together they planned the invasion of the South, for the promotion of their personal fortunes. Their aims, their ambitions, and their hopes were identical. If Brown's exchequer had been ample, Forbes too would have appeared at Harper's Ferry and there would have been a pair of martyrs there: "Two of a kind."
The logic of the fiction of his martyrdom is founded upon the assumption that Brown held an option upon his life which he elected to forfeit; and that he offered it as a sacrifice: that he chose to die, as the Redeemer of Men died; and in thus dying made "the gallows glorious like the cross." Brown did not contemplate dying at Harper's Ferry any more than did Hugh Forbes, or Stevens, or Cook, or Kagi: and he would not have died at Charlestown if he could have controlled the event. These men knew that some of them would, probably, die, but each passed the subject over lightly, believing that in some inscrutable way, if fatalities occurred, it would be some of the others who would fall. Men of their type "die but once." Brown accepted the chances of war as did his followers, and as Forbes sought the opportunity of doing. Men who have similarly risked their lives, times almost without number, are not impressed by such martyrdoms. To his faithful Sanborn, Brown wrote: "I am now rather anxious to live for a few years."[500] He desired to live to organize, and to command the army of the Provisional Government: and to be the head of a new nation: a new "United States." He hoped for longevity, that he might wear the honors and enjoy the fame and the emoluments of his prospective achievement.
The years of Brown's life were a constant, persistent, strenuous struggle to get money. As to the means which should be employed in the getting of it, he was indifferent. In his philosophy, results were paramount; the means to the end were of no consequence. A stranger to honor, he violated every confidence that should be held sacred among men: and in his avarice trampled upon every law, moral and statute, human and Divine. Consistent with the speculative instinct so distinctly characteristic of his life, his greatest or principal object was to get money, and to get it quickly.
Mr. Villard asserts that Brown's greatest or principal object was to assault slavery, and so entitles an important chapter in the recent biography. Assuming his premises to be correct, he commences the chapter with this inquiry:
When was it that John Brown, practical shepherd, tanner, farmer, surveyor, cattle expert, real-estate speculator and wool merchant, first conceived what he calls in his autobiography "his greatest or principal object" in life—the forcible overthrow of slavery in his native land? The question is not an idle one, etc.[501]
The question, nevertheless, is an idle one. During the interview which Brown gave out at Harper's Ferry, October 18th, Mr. Vallandigham asked him this pointed question: "How long have you been engaged in this business?"[502] To which Brown replied: