more lasting humiliation upon that haughty but exhausted country than has been visited upon any other nation in modern times. The riches from the tributes of enslaved peoples, succeeded by luxury and effeminacy, proved to be apples that turned to ashes in the mouth. Take the case of Bonaparte, who would have made, to borrow the language of one of our best American thinkers, "the earth for his pasture and the sea for his pond," and where are his possessions now? The ode of Byron fitly answers: Is this the man of thousand thrones, Since he, miscall'd the morning star, nies and revolts--but are there not eruptive social and political symptoms at home which at present tax all the resources of the most consummate British statesmanship? Even Gladstone's constituents petition him to resign because he has made them paupers. In the event of internal commotion, or of a great war, Great Britain has no colony which could take her part or that would contribute a penny to her exchequer or a man to her army. Charles XII said he taught his enemies how to conquer him, and it may be found that the British will have taught the Irish, as well as the Indian Sepoys, an art which may hereafter plague even British conquerors. At any rate, it is apparent that Russia, Denmark, and Spain, as well as England, no longer cling to colonies with their ancient tenacity. They can part with them without any heart-breaking. The framers and founders of our Government seem to have been diligent students of history, and the debates in the constitutional Convention, as well as the papers composing the Federalist, show that they were keenly alive to all the facts bearing upon the career and fate of republican forms of government. Under the old Confederation a union of Can There is, however, still another recent example. I mean that of the famous house of Hapsburg, or the emperor of Austria, who recently, besides Germans, held under his command Italians, Poles, Croats, Dalmatians, Slovaks, Romans and Hungarians; but the battle of Sadowa left Francis Joseph among the poorest and saddest monarchs of Europe, and from the first rank, Austria, cut in twain by the astute and relentless Bismark, fell to a second-rate posiada and other British provinces with the United tion among the nations of the earth, henceforth with ample leisure to reflect upon the hollowness and folly of incongruous annexations under one dominion of separate, remote, and diverse peoples. Are we to shut our eyes to such significant facts, which stand forth, as light-houses upon dangerous coasts, in all the pages of history? Can any one be under the delusion that human nature has greatly changed or that the United States are to have a charmed life and be exempt from all perils however recklessly guided? It appears to me that these great historic facts should have their proper influence-and I ask no more in the decision of the question before us. Shall we not first of all preserve the inheritance of our fathers? It may be said that England has not endangered its permanence, or its solid foundations, by its extensive colonial system. That remains yet to be solved. Her mastery has been maintained at the immense cost of her present national debt and her present and past system of taxation, and of such a navy as makes it not inappropriate for her poets to boast that "Britannia rules the waves;" but it must be borne in mind that no British colony is represented, or has any control, in the home government. British statesmen are not embarrassed by any such foreign admixture. Australia, New Zealand, India, and the African and North American colonies may not forever submit to imperial control, nor will their separation from it be likely to be restrained by force. At present the British empire in India stands firmly-bating rather too frequent muti States was openly contemplated and provided for, but when the Constitution of 1789 was ordained and established such a union had become apparently hopeless, and the expatriated Tories having made the provinces their home, it was then undesirable, and perhaps repugnant to the ardent patriotism of the States. States. At all events, the peril which tracks the unlimited extension of territory in the progress of nations in all ages of the world was so obvious and so grave in its character that no power was anywhere given, under our Constitution, by which such acquisitions were to be ever authorized, directly or indirectly. In other words, they were all forever soberly and silently renounced. This should be a barrier high enough at least to make us pause before we attempt to leap over it. It is not enough that the plain and palpable force of the Constitution has been disregarded; ought it to be again and now? The advantages should be overwhelmingly in favor of any scheme of annexation before it should be even mooted, and its character such as would be cordially approved by the people of all sections and of all parties of our country. Nothing less can justify any annexation. It should not be a doubtful question carried by a beggarly and reluctant vote. Can it be doubted, if ever carried at all, it must be by hesitating votes and by the leanest of constitutional numbers, whether by treaty or the legerdemain of a joint resolution? Can it be doubted that the annexation of Santo Domingo, with the long, dark train which drags just in the rear, would have been rejected with sponsibility for its decision invoke the largest scorn by the wise founders of our Govern- It will not be pretended that there has been any enlightened public judgment in favor of the annexation of Santo Domingo. There has been all that in favor of President Grant; and his well earned popularity, in spite of his Dominicanism, itutes the entire strength, the back-bone of the measure. Unindorsed by him, may I not venture to say it would not have had or have a corporal's guard of supporters? To me, as well as to some others, it would have given peculiar pleasure to have been able to support the measure because of the countenance lent to it by the present Administration, of whose integrity of purpose I have not a shadow of doubt; but it was and is a question in its scope beyond the life of any party and far above all parties, and my responsibility began at the point where that of the Executive most properly leaves off;. and if I could not independently and conscientiously acquit myself of my whole duty on a question which so profoundly concerns the destiny of our country, and, which once decided in the affirmative, is irrevocable, I should hold myself unworthy of my place. My age, if not my experience, warns me to endeavor to be earnestly for the right. The question and the measure of re Individuals occupy but a brief space in the march of time, and a generation blots them out, perhaps forever, but nations have a continuity lasting for ages and a character to be transmitted to the immortal pages of future history. The past of our country is secure, and I would not jeopardize the future by the empty mockery of an exchange of moral grandeur for apparent or even for real material greatness. If I can divine the secrets of my own heartand what I claim for myself I cordially concede to others there is no passion, no sentiment lurking there which does not bow to a profound desire that our country should stand foremost among the nations of the earth, foremost in free and liberal institutions, foremost in its moral fiber and intellectual reach, foremost in literature, arts, and laws, and foremost in all the glories which crown the most elevated civilization and the most liberal, and, I hope I may add, stable form of human government. But, regarding the annexation of Dominica in all its aspects, present and future, foreign and domestic, as boding no good to our country, as a policy withering to its highest and noblest aspirations, and as at war with the "Unity and married calm of States," which all of us should most diligently seek, I shall vote against any measure even squinting at such an annexation, should such ever again come up, with a solemn and abiding conviction that I shall never have an oppor tunity of tendering to my country a higher service. |