ad hostility against
all established institutions. They would choke up the fountains of
industry, and dry all its streams.

In a country of unbounded liberty, they clamor against oppression. In a
country of perfect equality, they would move heaven and earth against
privilege and monopoly. In a country where property is more equally
divided than anywhere else, they rend the air with the shouting of
agrarian doctrines. In a country where the wages of labor are high
beyond all parallel, and where lands are cheap, and the means of living
low, they would teach the laborer that he is but an oppressed slave.
Sir, what can such men want? What do they mean? They can want nothing,
Sir, but to enjoy the fruits of other men's labor. They can mean nothing
but disturbance and disorder, the diffusion of corrupt principles, and
the destruction of the moral sentiments and moral habits of society. A
licentiousness of feeling and of action is sometimes produced by
prosperity itself. Men cannot always resist the temptation to which they
are exposed by the very abundance of the bounties of Providence, and the
very happiness of their own condition; as the steed, full of the
pasture, will sometimes throw himself against its enclosures, break away
from its confinement, and, feeling now free from needless restraint,
betake himself to the moors and barrens, where want, erelong, brings him
to his senses, and starvation and death close his career.

REMARKS ON THE POLITICAL COURSE OF MR. CALHOUN, IN 1838.

FROM THE SAME SPEECH.

Having had occasion, Mr. President, to speak of nullification and the
nullifiers, I beg leave to say that I have not done so for any purpose
of reproach. Certainly, Sir, I see no possible connection, myself,
between their principles or opinions, and the support of this
measure.[1] They, however, must speak for themselves. They may have
intrusted the bearing of their standard, for aught I know, to the hands
of the honorable member from South Carolina; and I perceived last
session what I perceive now, that in his opinion there is a connection
between these projects of government and the doctrines of nullification.
I can only say, Sir, that it will be marvellous to me, if that banner,
though it be said to be tattered and torn, shall yet be lowered in
obeisance, and laid at the footstool of executive power. To the
sustaining of that power, the passage of this bill is of the utmost
importance. The administration will