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WRITINGS OF 5AM HOUSTON, 1858
88
our unfortunate neighbor from the lion's mouth. England, as I shall presently show, would be well enough pleased to have it so extricated. Mr. President, I have looked, but looked in vain, in both wings of this Capitol, for a fellow-member who was a fellow-member with me when the celebrated Monroe doctrine was announced. Of the two hundred and sixty-one Senators and Representatives who constituted the Congress which commenced its session on the first Monday of December, 1823, I stand here alone, and I will not dis- guise it, as one who regards himself as among the last of his race, as one who feels that he is approaching his journey's end on life's pilgrimage, and who has now no other ambition to gratify than to render "the State some service." All those worthy spirits, alas! have, one by one, quitted earth with the exception of President Buchanan, ex-President Van Buren, ex-Senator Branch, ex-Senator Rives, Governor Letcher, and Governor Wickliffe of Kentucky, Governor Johnson of Virginia, General Mercer, General Campbell of South Carolina, Mr. Saunders of North Carolina, Mr. Stuart of Pennsylvania, Mr. Blair of Tennessee, and possibly two or three others. To say nothing of the distinguished merits of the survivors, in that great Congress might have been seen in the full meridian of strong intellect, the Jacksons and Clays, the Websters and Randolphs, the Macons and Forsyths, the Bentons and Livingstons, the Barbours and Johnsons, the McLanes and McDuffies, the Kings and Smiths, the Taylors and Hamiltons, the Floyds and Holmeses, the Rugglesses and Bartletts. It was to such men, chosen alike for their wisdom and integrity, repre- senting twenty-four sovereign States, and thirteen millions of inhabitants, that Mr. Monroe (counseled by a Cabinet composed of John Quincy Adams, William H. Crawford, John C. Calhoun, Samuel L. Southard, William Wirt, and John McLean) addressed himself in such confident and resolute language with reference to the ulterior purposes of this country. I shall never cease to remember the exultant delight with which his noble sentiments were hailed. They met not only with a cordial but an enthusiastic reception within and out of Congress. They were approved with as much unanimity as if the entire population of the Union had been previously prepared to reecho their utterance. At that glo- rious epoch, there was a broad, towering spirit of nationality e:x.--tant. The States stood in the endearing relation to each other of one for all, and all /01· one. The Constitution was their political textbook, the glory of the Republic their resolute aim. Practically, there was but one party, and that party animated by but one
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