nd acting without the
restraints of law; and has most wisely provided constitutional means of
escape and security. When the established authority of government is
openly contemned; when no deference is paid to the regular and authentic
declarations of the public will; when assembled masses put themselves
above the law, and, calling themselves the people, attempt by force to
seize on the government; when the social and political order of the
state is thus threatened with overthrow, and the spray of the waves of
violent popular commotion lashes the stars,--our political pilots may
well cry out:

"Nimirum haec illa Charybdis!"

The prudence of the country, the sober wisdom of the people, has thus
far enabled us to carry this Constitution, and all our constitutions,
through the perils which have surrounded them, without running upon the
rocks on one side, or being swallowed up in the eddying whirlpools of
the other. And I fervently hope that this signal happiness and good
fortune will continue, and that our children after us will exercise a
similar prudence, and wisdom, and justice; and that, under the Divine
blessing, our system of free government may continue to go on, with
equal prosperity, to the end of time.

[Footnote 1: Art. IV. sec. 4.]

[Footnote 2: Statutes at Large, Vol. I. p. 424.]

[Footnote 3: Mr. Tyler.]

OBJECTS OF THE MEXICAN WAR.

A SPEECH DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE 23D OF
MARCH, 1848, ON THE BILL FROM THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES FOR RAISING A
LOAN OF SIXTEEN MILLIONS OF DOLLARS.

[On the 2d of February, 1848, the treaty called a "treaty of peace,
friendship, limits, and settlement, between the United States of America
and the Mexican Republic," was signed at Guadalupe Hidalgo. This treaty,
with the advice and consent of the Senate, was ratified by the President
of the United States on the 16th of March. In the mean time, a bill,
introduced into the House of Representatives on the 18th of February, to
authorize a loan of sixteen millions of dollars for the purpose of
carrying on the war, passed through that house, and was considered in
the Senate. Other war measures were considered and adopted by the two
houses, after the signature and ratification of the treaty. On the 23d
of March, the Sixteen Million Loan Bill being under consideration, Mr.
Webster spoke as follows.]

MR. PRESIDENT,--On Friday a bill passed the Senate for raising ten
regiments of new