186
TEXAS ST.\'l'E LIBRARY
people who would no longer sustain him f I insist upon it then, that it is certainly the interest and duty of Texas, if she intend to re- trieve and sustain her constitution, and keep herself free from col- Usion and difficulty; to organize herself befoTe she feel the entire want of the governmental rein. There is no reason why she should remain in anarchy, or subject herself to the whims, and caprices of lawless mobs. She has a goqd and sufficient plea, if timely pled, before the proper tribunal. 'l'hat plea is, physical inability on her part, to directly punish the aggressors, and to reinstate, and sustain the constitutional authorities, while located in Coahuila.- This is the only legal plea which Texas can have, to excuse her citi- zens from being equally guilty, with Coahuila. If she fail or neglect to plead before the proper tribunal, it amounts at once to a tacit acquiescence on her part, and she will be left without excuse, having forfeited all her claims to the guarantees of the civil compact. The committee tells you that the plan I propose seems fraught with many evils, containing principles of a revolutionary character, cal- culated to bring us into collision with the general government; anil wonld be certain to· produce anarchy, &c. Let us now investigate this mattel' and see if I have not advised the only plan to evade all these evils f We know as constitutional men we arc bound to sustain the civil authorities? That I deem impracticable for Texas, and plead hm· excuse; for in attempting to disC'har1?e thnt dutr. she would <'ome in direct collision with Coahuila, and the General Government troops'/ Instead of this, we evade both; by organizing provisionally, we reclaim ourselves from anarchy and restore our violated constitu- tion: , I have told you that the situation of Texas was not only crHical, but peculiar to herself alone? The history of nations will scarcely furnish a parallel case. It is not one state contending with another, nor a state contending with a paramount government: but two pro- vinces, widely separated by a desert region, connected, as it "·ere, by a political marriage contract, forming one whole, constitnting one political family; each bound to the whole,. and the whole to each one; to submit themselves to, and be governed by the provisions of the civil compact; pledging them.selves to sustain that contract in good faith. 'This contract, thus entered into, having received the ~auction of the paramount authority, has been filed as a matter of record in the public archives of the great :ilfexican Republic; with full guaranties, that the two ancient provinces should be thus united, assimilated and governed, for the mutual in rt]crest and benefit of all parties concerned. Now it is plain in marriage contracts, that the parties are mutually protected in their interests. in accorilance with the stipulations of the contract. The husband being, in the eyes of the Jaw, considered the most suitable, has the control and manairement of the joint property: but still he is not permitted to <'Ommit a violation of the contract, by inflicting abuses on the wife, or wasting her dotal effects. If he does, the law affords her Jll'Ot<'c- tion for both person and property: by awarding a separation in both. This separation however, is not perpetual, but provisior.sl, calculated to afford the wife the needed· protection, as prayed fnr;
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