The Life and Work of James A. Garfield, Twentieth President of the United States / Embracing an Account of the Scenes and Incidents of His Boyhood; the Struggles of His Youth; the Might of His Early Manhood; His Valor As a Soldier; His Career As a Statesman; His Election to the Presidency; and the Tragic Story of His Death.

by John Clark Ridpath

“Let it be understood that I am not arguing the merits of any one of the three amendments. I am discussing the proposed method of legislation; and I declare that it is against the Constitution of our country. It is revolutionary to the core, and is destructive of the fundamental element of American liberty, the free consent of all the powers that unite to make laws.

“In opening this debate, I challenge all comers to show a single instance in our history where this consent has been coerced. This is the great, the paramount issue, which dwarfs all others into insignificance. Victor Hugo said, in his description of the battle of Waterloo, that the struggle of the two armies was like the wrestling of two giants, when a chip under the heel of one might determine the victory. It may be that this amendment is the chip under your heel, or it may be that it is the chip on our shoulder. As a chip it is of small account to you or to us; but when it represents the integrity of the Constitution and is assailed by revolution, we fight for it as if it were a Koh-i-noor of purest water. [Applause.]

“The proposition now is, that after fourteen years have passed, and not one petition from one American citizen has come to us asking that this law be repealed; while not one memorial has found its way to our desks complaining of the law, so far as I have heard, the Democratic House of Representatives now hold if they are not permitted to force upon another House and upon the Executive against their consent the repeal of a law that Democrats made, this refusal shall be considered a sufficient ground for starving this Government to death. That is the proposition which we denounce as revolution. [Applause on the Republican side.]

“And here I ask the forbearance of gentlemen on the other side while I offer a suggestion which I make with reluctance. They will bear me witness that I have in many ways shown my desire that the wounds of the war should be healed; that the grass that has grown green over the graves of both armies might symbolize the returning spring of friendship and peace between citizens who were lately in arms against each other.

“But I am compelled by the necessities of the case to refer to a chapter of our recent history. The last act of Democratic domination in this Capitol, eighteen years ago, was striking and dramatic, perhaps heroic. Then the Democratic party said to the Republicans, ‘If you elect the man of your choice as President of the United States we will shoot your Government to death;’ and the people of this country, refusing to be coerced by threats or violence, voted as they pleased, and lawfully elected Abraham Lincoln President of the United States.

“Then your leaders, though holding a majority in the other branch of Congress, were heroic enough to withdraw from their seats and fling down the gage of mortal battle. We called it rebellion; but we recognized it as courageous and manly to avow your purpose, take all the risks, and fight it out on the open field. Notwithstanding your utmost efforts to destroy it, the Government was saved.

“To-day, after eighteen years’ defeat, the book of your domination is again opened, and your first act awakens every bitter memory, and threatens to destroy the confidence which your professions of patriotism inspired. You turned down a leaf of the history that recorded your last act of power in 1861, and you have now signalized your return to power by beginning a second chapter at the same page; not this time by a heroic act that declares war on the battle-field, but you say if all the legislative powers of the Government do not consent to let you tear certain laws out of the statute-book, you will not shoot our Government to death as you tried to do in the first chapter; but you declare that if we do not consent against our will, if you can not coerce an independent branch of this Government against its will, to allow you to tear from the statute-books some laws put there by the will of the people, you will starve the Government to death. [Great applause on the Republican side.]

“Between death on the field and death by starvation, I do not know that the American people will see any great difference. The end, if successfully reached, would be death in either case. Gentlemen, you have it in your power to kill this Government; you have it in your power by withholding these two bills, to smite the nerve-centers of our Constitution with the paralysis of death; and you have declared your purpose to do this, if you can not break down that fundamental element of free consent which, up to this hour, has always ruled in the legislation of this Government.”

The question stated at the beginning of this chapter is: Was Garfield a Statesman? In view of what the reader has perused since that question was put, it must at this point be restated—Was Garfield not a Statesman? The burden of proof has shifted. It is, of course, too soon to form a complete estimate of Garfield’s stature. We are too near to the man we loved. It will be for some future generation, farther removed from the spell of his name, and more able calmly to contemplate his life apart from the bloody death. This is the task for the historian of the future.

But what we say enters into the contemporary estimate of the dead President’s life and work. While the relative height of the mountain peak can only be told by viewing it from a long distance, where the entire range pictures its upper outline on the eye, the people who dwell at the foot of the mountain know it as the highest of their neighborhood. Moreover, some of the strongest objections to the contemporary estimates of a public man are entirely wanting in the present case. One of these is the popularity of his opinions or achievements. Men are apt to overestimate the abilities of a man who agrees with them. But time and again, on different questions, as in the currency and the enforcement act, the Wade-Davis manifesto, and the defense of Bowles and Milligan, we have seen General Garfield, not merely opposing, but openly defying the opinions of the people who elected him. When he thought a thing was true, no personal consideration could affect his public utterance. Such a spectacle is rare indeed in American politics.