What was the Committee of Safety? Was it a Justice of the Peace? No. Was it a Grand Jury? No. It was simply a committee of five or seven persons, more or less, appointed to watch over the town or county and see that these Tories were attending to their business and not interfering with the rights of the colonies. Whom were they to thus arrest and secure? Every man that had committed murder—that had taken up arms against America, or voted the Democratic or Tory ticket? No. "Every person whose going at large might in their opinion, endanger the safety of the colony or the liberties of America." It was not necessary that they had committed any overt act, but if in the opinion of this council of safety, it was dangerous to let them run at large they were locked up. Suppose that we had done that during the last war? You would have had to build several new jails in this county. What a howl would have gone up all over this State if we had attempted such a thing as that, and yet we had a perfect right to do anything to preserve our liberties, which our fathers had a right to do to obtain them.
What more did they do? In 1777 the same Congress that signed the immortal Declaration of Independence (and I think they knew as much about liberty and the rights of men as any Democrat in Marion county) adopted another resolution:
Resolved. That it be recommended to the Executive powers of the several States, forthwith to apprehend and secure all persons who have in their general conduct and conversation evinced a disposition inimical to the cause of America, and that the persons so seized be confined in such places and treated in such manner as shall be consistent with their several characters and security of their persons.—-Journal of Congress, vol. 2, p. 246.
If they had talked as the Democrats talked during the late war—if they had called the soldiers, "Washington hirelings," and if when they allowed a few negroes to help them fight, had branded the struggle for liberty as an abolition war, they would be "apprehended and confined in such places and treated in such manner as was consistent with their characters and security of their persons," and yet all they did was to show a disposition inimical to the independence of America. If we had pursued a policy like that during the late war, nine out of ten of the members of the Democratic party would have been in jail—there would not have been jails and prisons enough on the face of the whole earth to hold them. .
Now, when a Democrat talks to you about Lincoln bastiles, just quote this to him:
Whereas, The States of Pennsylvania and Delaware are threatened with an immediate invasion from a powerful army, who have already landed at the head of Chesapeake Bay; and whereas, The principles of sound policy and self-preservation require that persons who may be reasonably suspected of aiding or abetting the cause of the enemy may be prevented from pursuing measures injurious to the general weal,
Resolved, That the executive authorities of the States of Pennsylvania and Delaware be requested to cause all persons within their respective States, notoriously disaffected, to be apprehended, disarmed and secured until such time as the respective States think they may be released without injury to the common cause.—-Journal of Congress, vol. 2, p. 240.
That is what they did with them. When there was an invasion threatened the good State of Indiana, if we had said we will imprison all men who by their conduct and conversation show that they are inimical to our cause, we would have been obliged to import jails and corral Democrats as we did mules in the army. Our fathers knew that the flag was never intended to protect any man who wanted to assail it.
What more did they do? There was a man by the name of David Franks, who wrote a letter and wanted to send it to England. In that letter he gave it as his opinion that the colonies were becoming disheartened and sick of the war. The heroic and chivalric fathers of the Revolution violated the mails, took the aforesaid letter and then they took the aforesaid David Franks by the collar and put him in jail. Then they passed a resolution in Congress that inasmuch as the said letter showed a disposition inimical to the liberties of the United States, Major General Arnold be requested to cause the said David Franks to be forthwith arrested, put in jail and confined till the further order of Congress. (Jour. Cong., vol. 3, p. 96 and 97.)
How many Democrats wrote letters during the war declaring that the North never could conquer the South? How many wrote letters to the soldiers in the army telling them to shed no more fraternal blood in that suicidal and unchristian war? It would have taken all the provost marshals in the United States to arrest the Democrats in Indiana who were guilty of that offence. And yet they are talking about our fathers being such good men, while they are cursing us fordoing precisely what they did, only to a less extent than they did.