WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1855
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be nothing else. But, fellow-citizens, I ask you, if you believe that General Jackson would have made such selections as these for public offices? If not, they are not Jacksonian, and I, being a Jackson man, cannot sanction them. We hear much, said about proscription of Catholics by the American Order. I deny that we proscribe any religion. We make war upon no sect; let all have their own religion; let them kneel at whatever shrine they please. I claim no other privilege. I am willing to concede that same privilege to others; but I will resist the political influence of Pope or Priest. Have not Catholics cursed and threatened us? Are not their doctrines opposed to republican institutions? We act merely upon the prin- ciple of resistance, and not aggression. I will resist the political influence of Pope and Priest as long as I have the rights of a freeman, and the powers of reason. I will resist the potency of the Pope whether it exhibits itself in the meek and humble air of Jesuitism, or in the bulls of excommunication. Is there a spot on earth where the Catholic religion prevails that liberty exists? Look at France in the terrors of the present revolution; thrice she has thrown off the chains of despotism, and thrice has priest- craft riveted the chains upon her again. It is said that no gov- ernment on earth grants universal freedom except America. We Americans are opposed to the union of Church and State. The Pope holds that all civil institutions are subordinate to him; that at once strikes at the root of all civil liberty, and would even- tually strike down our institutions. Has the Pope not already extended political jurisdiction to the United States? Has he not through his bishop proscribed the people of Buffalo and St. Louis, and brought them under the ban of excommunication? Cer- tainly he has; and is that religion, or is it political influence? England has comparative freedom. She has her Magna Charter; but the Pope denounced the nobility that wrung that charter from the British king, and he excommunicated them from the privileges of the Church. That Magna Charter was the corner stone of American liberty. Let us hold sacred and inviolable the rights of trial by jury, the elective franchise, habeas corpus, all rights enjoyed in no countries except England and America. Catho- licity and liberty cannot exist in the same government. It must be Catholic, or all liberty, for the moment we yield to the one, we resign the other. The first settlers of America fled the Romish persecution in the old world to come here to enjoy the liberty of iconscience. Brownson, in his review, taunts the American people
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