WRITINGS oF SAM HousTOix, 1846
497
Allusion had been made by some gentlemen to the terms of annexation. lVIr. H. had no hand in prescribing them. They ought to have been so explicit that there could not by possibility be any misunderstanding in regard to them. He expected that, when they entered the Confederacy, all would be harmony. Texas had brought with her all the rights of sovereignty, but she had merged them in the sovereignty of the United States. She was content to abide by this arrangement. All she asked was a performance of those stipulations and pledges which had brought her into her present condition. She had been guilty of no delinquency in the discharge of her duty; she had furnished her full quota of the military forces called into the field; she had brought her vessels and armament with her and given them to the United States. She asked that her officers might command them. Those vessels had been spoken of very lightly by some gentlemen in the course of this debate; but Texas has brought all she had, and they were the best she could get. If they were not of a higher rate or greater weight of guns, ought that to prevent her from having her just quota of officers and men to navigate them? That was all she asked. All that he required was that Texas should be allowed to contribute a small portion to the naval glory of the Republic. Some of her officers had devoted themselves for years to naval pursuits alone, and had thereby been cut off from all other avo- cations. Nor could they in point of morals, demeanor, or honor- - able conduct, disgrace American officers as associates. They were themselves Americans; their origin was the same; their political and moral training the same; nor would they disappoint the just expectations of those with whom they were to be connected. In conclusion, Mr. H. observed that if, after reviewing the whole case, Senators considered the claim of Texas as not being in its nature just, he expected them of course to vote against the bill. But if the claim was just in itself, he conjured them, as being themselves just men, and as representing the members of the Confederacy, to sympathize with those citizens not only imme- diately around them, but whose lot was cast on the most distant borders of the republic. He entreated them to leave out of view all personal considerations, arising from individual friendships or partialities; to be governed by no promptings but those of eternal justice, and to remember that the eyes of a free people were ~xed upon them, as placed by their high duty on the watch- tower of their country to guard individual as well as national
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