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“General Smith’s Views of the Powers and Policy of the Government of the United States,” circa 26 January–7 February 1844, Thomas Bullock Copy
Source Note
Source Note
JS, “General Smith’s Views of the Powers and Policy of the Government of the United States,” , Hancock Co., IL, ca. 26 Jan.–7 Feb. 1844. Version copied ca. 7 Feb. 1844; handwriting of with insertions in handwriting of ; dockets in handwriting of and unidentified scribe; seventeen pages; JS Collection, CHL.
Historical Introduction
Historical Introduction
See Historical Introduction to General Smith’s Views of the Powers and Policy of the Government of the United States, ca. 26 Jan.–7 Feb. 1844.
of credit and comfort. A hireling pseudo priesthood will plausibly push abolition doctrines and doings, and “human rights”, into Congress and into every other place, where conquest smells of fame, or opposition swells to popularity: Democracy, Whiggery and Cliquery, will attract their elements and foment divisions among the people, to accomplish fancied schemes and accumulate power, while poverty driven to despair, like hunger forcing its way through a wall, will break through the Statutes of men, to save life, and mend the breach in prison glooms.
A still higher grade, of what the “nobility of the nations”, call “great men”, will dally with all rights in order to smuggle a fortune at “one full swoop”; mortgage : possess : and claim all the unsettled regions of the World for hunting and trapping: and should a humble honest man, Red, Black, or White, exhibit a better title, these Gentry, have only to clothe the Judge with richer ermine, and spangle the lawyer’s fingers with finer rings, to have the Judgment of his Peers, and the honor of his Lords, as a pattern of honesty, virtue and humanity, while the motto hangs on his nations’s escutcheon: “Every man has his price”!
Now, oh! people! people! turn unto the Lord and live; and reform this nation. Frustrate the designs of wicked men: Reduce Congress at least two thirds: One <Two> Senator<s> from a State and two members to a million of population, will do more business than the army that now occupy the halls of the National Legislature: pay them two dollars and their board per diem: (except Sundays) that is more than the farmer gets and he lives honestly. Curtail the Officers of Government in pay, number, [p. 13]
Source Note
Source Note
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Footnotes
Footnotes
Insertions in the handwriting of William W. Phelps.