I will not trespass much longer upon the time of the committee; but I trust I shall be indulged with some few reflections upon the danger of permitting conduct, [Gen. Jackson’s arbitrary court-martial], on which it has been my painful duty to animadvert, to pass without a solemn expression of the disapprobation of this House. Recall to your mind the free nations which have gone before us. Where are they now?
“Gone glimmering through the dream of things that were,
A school-boy’s tale, the wonder of an hour.”
And how have they lost their liberties? If we could transport ourselves back to the ages when Greece and Rome flourished in their greatest prosperity, and, mingling in the throng, should ask a Grecian whether he did not fear that some daring military chieftain, covered with glory, some Philip or Alexander, would one day overthrow the liberties of his country, the confident and indignant Grecian would exclaim, No! no! we have nothing to fear from our heroes; our liberties shall be eternal. If a Roman citizen had been asked whether he did not fear that the conqueror of Gaul might establish a throne upon the ruins of public liberty, he would have instantly repelled the unjust insinuation. Yet Greece fell; Cæsar passed the Rubicon, and the patriotic arm even of Brutus could not preserve the liberties of his devoted country. The celebrated Madame de Staël, in her last and perhaps her best work, has said that in the very year, almost the very month, when the president of the Directory declared that monarchy would never show its frightful head in France, Bonaparte with his grenadiers entered the palace of St. Cloud, and, dispersing with the bayonet the deputies of the people, deliberating on the affairs of the state, laid the foundation of that vast fabric of despotism which overshadowed all Europe.
I hope not to be misunderstood; I am far from intimating that General Jackson cherishes any designs inimical to the liberties of the country. I believe his intentions to be pure and patriotic. I thank God that he would not, but I thank Him still more that he could not if he would, overturn the liberties of the Republic. But precedents, if bad, are fraught with the most dangerous consequences. Man has been described, by some of those who have treated of his nature, as a bundle of habits. The definition is much truer when applied to governments. Precedents are their habits. There is one important difference between the formation of habits by an individual and by government. He contracts it only after frequent repetition. A single instance fixes the habit and determines the direction of governments.
Against the alarming doctrine of unlimited discretion in our military commanders, when applied to prisoners of war, I must enter my protest. It begins upon them; it will end on us. I hope our happy form of government is to be perpetual. But if it is to be preserved, it must be by the practice of virtue, by justice, by moderation, by magnanimity, by greatness of soul, by keeping a watchful and steady eye on the executive; and, above all, by holding to a strict accountability the military branch of the public force. . . . . . . Beware how you give a fatal sanction, in this infant period of our republic, scarcely yet two score years old, to military insubordination. Remember that Greece had her Alexander, Rome her Cæsar, England her Cromwell, France her Bonaparte, and that, if we would escape the rock on which they split, we must avoid their errors.
FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.
1780=1843.
Francis Scott Key was born in Frederick county, Maryland, and was educated at St. John’s College, Annapolis. He became a lawyer, was appointed District Attorney of the District of Columbia, and spent his life in Washington City.