371
PAPERS OF !IRA.BE.\U BUONAPARTE LAM,\R
barrassi11g question, not in accordance with tho e of a majority of the body with whom I have the honor to act; but however variant our opinions, there can be but one motive of action, which is pa- triotism, and but one object to attain, which is the good of the country.- Feeling as 1 ! do, a great reliance upon both your ability and willing- ness to perceive and pursue the right. I cannot urge my peculiar opinions with that ardor and zeal which I might do in cases where those with whom I might differ, possessed a smaller share of my perrnnal esteem and public confidence. But notwithstanding this unaffected deference to your virtue and wisdom, my convictions are not the less clear and stable, and my obligation to enforce them as far as my official voice can do it, is not the less imperious and·binding. Coming to my task with a clear conscience, and &warding the same to those with whom I di agree, I will in the first place premise that the different conclusicns at which we have arrived in former discussions in relation to our distinguished prisoner, has arisen from the fact that whilst he has been considered by most of the Cabinet exclusively as a prisoner of war, I have been disposed to regard him more a an apprehended murderer. The conduct of General Santa Anna will not permit me to view him in any other light. ·A chieftain battling for what he conceives to be the rights of his Country, however mi taken in his views, may be privileged to make hot and vigorous war upon the foe; but, when in violation of all the principles of civilized con- flict, he avows and acts upon the revolting policy of extermination and rapine, slaying the surrenderina, and plundering whom be slays, he forfeits the consideration of mankind by sinking the character of the hero into that of an abhorred murderer. The President of l\Iexico has pursued such a war upon the citizen of this Republic. He has caused to be published to the world a decree denouncing a pirates beyond the rea-ch of his clemency, al1 who shall be found rallying round the standard of our Independence. In accordance with this decree, he has turned over to the sword the bravest and best of our friends and fellow citizens after they had grounded their arms, under the most solemn pledge that their lives should be pared. He has fired our dwellings; laid waste our luxuriant ,fields; excited servile and insurrectionary war; violated pliahted faith; and inhumanly ordered the cold blooded butchery of prisoners who had been be- trayed into capitulation by heartle s prof sion . I humbly con- ceive that the proclamation of such principles, and the perpetration of such crimes, place the offender out of the pale of negotiation, and demand at our hands other treatment than what is due a mere pris- oner of war. Instinct condemns him as a murderer, and reason jus- tifies the verdict. · or should the ends of justice be averted because of the exalted tation of the criminal; or be made to give way to the ngge ticns of interest or any cold considerations of policy. He who sa-crifices humc!n life at the shrine of ambition is a murderer, aud de erves the punishment and infamy of one. The higher the offender, the greater reason for its infliction. I am therefore of the opinion that our prisoner, General Santa Anna, has forfeited· his life by the greatest of all crimes, and is not a suitable object for the exercise of our pardoning prerogative.
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