They must be paid, unless a promise can be delayed so long as to amount to a fulfillment. They must be paid. The question is, "How?" The answer is, "By the industry and prosperity of the people." They cannot be paid by law. Law made them; labor must pay them; and they must be paid out of the profits of the people. We must pay the debt with eggs, not with goose. In a terrible war we spent thousands of millions; all the bullets thrown; all the powder burned; all the property destroyed, of every sort, kind, and character; all the time of the people engaged—all these things were a dead loss. The debt represents the loss. Paying the debt is simply repairing the loss. When we, as a people, shall have made a net amount, equal to the amount thrown, as it were, away in war, or somewhere near that amount, we will resume specie payment; we will redeem our promises. We promised on paper, we shall pay in gold and silver. We asked the people to hold this paper until we got the money, and they are holding the paper and we are getting the money.
As soon as the slaves were free, the Republican party said, "They must be citizens, not vagrants." The Democratic party opposed this just, this generous measure. The freedmen were made citizens. The Republican party then said, "These citizens must vote; they must have the ballot, to keep what the bullet has won." The Democratic party said "No." The negroes received the ballot. The Republican party then said, "These voters must be educated, so that the ballot shall be the weapon of intelligence, not of ignorance." The Democratic party objected. But schools were founded, and books were put in the hands of the colored people, instead of whips upon their backs. We said to the Southern people, "The colored men are citizens; their rights must be respected; they are voters, they must be allowed to vote; they were and are our friends, and we are their protectors."
All this was accomplished by the Republican party.
It changed the organic law of the land, so that it is now a proper foundation for a free government; it struck the cruel shackles from four million human beings; it put down the most gigantic rebellion in the history of the world; it expunged from the statute books of every State, and of the Nation, all the cruel and savage laws that Slavery had enacted; it took whips from the backs, and chains from the limbs, of men; it dispensed with bloodhounds as the instruments of civilization; it banished to the memory of barbarism the slave-pen, the auction block, and the whipping-post; it purified a Nation; it elevated the human race.
All this was opposed by the Democratic party; opposed with a bitterness, compared to which ordinary malice is sweet. I say the Democratic party, because I consider those who fought against the Government, in the fields of the South, and those who opposed in the North, as Democrats—one and all. The Democratic party has been, during all these years, the enemy of civilization, the hater of liberty, the despiser of justice.
When I say the Democratic party sympathized with the Rebellion, I mean a majority of that party. I know there are in the Democratic party, soldiers who fought for the Union. I do not know why they are there, but I have nothing to say against them. I will never utter a word against any man who bared his breast to a storm of shot and shell, for the preservation of the Republic. When I use the term Democratic party, I do not mean those soldiers.
There are others in the Democratic party who are there just because their fathers were Democrats. They do not mean any particular harm. Others are there because they could not amount to anything in the Republican party. A man only fit for a corporal in the Republican ranks, will make a leader in the Democratic party. By the Democratic party, I mean that party that sided with the South—that believed in secession—that loved slavery—that hated liberty—that denounced Lincoln as a tyrant—that burned orphan asylums—that gloried in our disasters—that denounced every effort to save the nation—they are the gentlemen I mean, and they constitute a large majority of the Democratic party.
The Democrats hate the negro to-day, with a hatred begotten of a well-grounded fear that the colored people are rapidly becoming their superiors in industry, intellect and character.
The colored people have suffered enough. They were and are our friends. They are the friends of this country, and cost what it may they must be protected. The white loyal man must be protected. They have been ostracized, slandered, mobbed, and murdered. Their very blood cries from the ground.
These two things—payment of the debt and protection of loyal citizens, are the things to be done. Which party can be trusted?