Henry Clays Remarks in House and Senate | Page 4

are
impotent; and we defy all your power. Put the majority of 1834 in one
scale, and that by which this Expunging resolution is to be carried in
the other, and let truth and justice, in heaven above and on earth below,
and liberty and patriotism, decide the preponderance.
What patriotic purpose is to be accomplished by the Expunging
resolution? Is it to appease the wrath and to heal the wounded pride of
the Chief Magistrate? If he be really the hero that his friends represent
him, he must despise all mean condescension, all grovelling
sycophancy, all self-degradation and self-abasement. He would reject,
with scorn and contempt, as unworthy of his fame, your black scratches
and your baby lines in the fair records of his country. Black lines!
Black lines! Sir, I hope the Secretary of the Senate will preserve the
pen with which he may inscribe them, and present it to that Senator of
the majority whom he may select, as a proud trophy, to be transmitted
to his descendants. And hereafter, when we shall lose the forms of our
free institutions, all that now remain to us, some future American
monarch, in gratitude to those by whose means he has been enabled,
upon the ruins of civil liberty, to erect a throne, and to commemorate
especially this Expunging resolution, may institute a new order of
knighthood, and confer on it the appropriate name of "the Knights of
the Black Lines."
But why should I detain the Senate, or needlessly waste my breath in
fruitless exertions? The decree has gone forth. It is one of urgency, too.
The deed is to be done--that foul deed which, like the blood, staining
the hands of the guilty Macbeth, all ocean's waters will never wash out.
Proceed, then, to the noble work which lies before you, and, like other
skilful executioners, do it quickly. And when you have perpetrated it,
go home to the people, and tell them what glorious honors you have

achieved for our common country. Tell them that you have
extinguished one of the brightest and purest lights that ever burned at
the altar of civil liberty. Tell them that you have silenced one of the
noblest batteries that ever thundered in defence of the Constitution, and
bravely spiked the cannon. Tell them that, henceforward, no matter
what daring or outrageous act any president may perform, you have
forever hermetically sealed the mouth of the Senate. Tell them that he
may fearlessly assume what powers he pleases, snatch from its lawful
custody the public purse, command a military detachment to enter the
halls of the Capitol, overawe Congress, trample down the Constitution,
and raze every bulwark of freedom; but that the Senate must stand mute,
in silent submission, and not dare to raise its opposing voice. Tell them
that it must wait until a House of Representatives, humbled and
subdued like itself, and a majority of it composed of the partisans of the
President, shall prefer articles of impeachment. Tell them, finally, that
you have restored the glorious doctrine of passive obedience and
non-resistance. And, if the people do not pour out their indignation and
imprecations, I have yet to learn the character of American freemen.

END OF PROJECT GUTENBERG ETEXT "ON THE EXPUNGING
RESOLUTIONS" (CLAY)

***

Part 2
Henry Clay, "On the Seminole War," U.S. House of Representatives,
19 January 1819.

IF MY recollection does not deceive me, Bonaparte had passed the
Rhine and the Alps, had conquered Italy, the Netherlands, Holland,
Hanover, Lubec, and Hamburg, and extended his empire as far as
Altona, on the side of Denmark. A few days' march would have carried
him through Holstein, over the two Belts, through Funen, and into the
island of Zealand. What, then, was the conduct of England? It was my
lot to fall into conversation with an intelligent Englishman on this
subject. "We knew (said he) that we were fighting for our existence. It

was absolutely necessary that we should preserve the command of the
seas. If the fleet of Denmark fell into the enemy's hands, combined with
his other fleets, that command might be rendered doubtful. Denmark
had only a nominal independence. She was, in truth, subject to his sway.
We said to her, Give us your fleet; it will otherwise be taken possession
of by your secret and our open enemy. We will preserve it and restore it
to you whenever the danger shall be over. Denmark refused.
Copenhagen was bombarded, and gallantly defended, but the fleet was
seized." Everywhere the conduct of England was censured; and the
name even of the negotiator who was employed by her, who was
subsequently the minister near this government, was scarcely ever
pronounced here without coupling with it an epithet indicating his
participation in the disgraceful