y the legality of its foundations. We stand as an equal among
nations, claiming the full benefit of the established international law;
and it is our duty to oppose, from the earliest to the latest moment,
any innovations upon that code which shall bring into doubt or question
our own equal and independent rights.

I will now, Mr. Chairman, advert to those pretensions put forth by the
allied sovereigns of Continental Europe, which seem to me calculated, if
unresisted, to bring into disrepute the principles of our government,
and, indeed, to be wholly incompatible with any degree of national
independence. I do not introduce these considerations for the sake of
topics. I am not about to declaim against crowned heads, nor to quarrel
with any country for preferring a form of government different from our
own. The right of choice that we exercise for ourselves, I am quite
willing to leave also to others. But it appears to me that the
pretensions to which I have alluded are wholly inconsistent with the
independence of nations generally, without regard to the question
whether their governments be absolute, monarchical and limited, or
purely popular and representative. I have a most deep and thorough
conviction, that a new era has arisen in the world, that new and
dangerous combinations are taking place, promulgating doctrines and
fraught with consequences wholly subversive in their tendency of the
public law of nations and of the general liberties of mankind. Whether
this be so, or not, is the question which I now propose to examine, upon
such grounds of information as are afforded by the common and public
means of knowledge.

Everybody knows that, since the final restoration of the Bourbons to the
throne of France, the Continental powers have entered into sundry
alliances, which have been made public, and have held several meetings
or congresses, at which the principles of their political conduct have
been declared. These things must necessarily have an effect upon the
international law of the states of the world. If that effect be good,
and according to the principles of that law, they deserve to be
applauded. If, on the contrary, their effect and tendency be most
dangerous, their principles wholly inadmissible, their pretensions such
as would abolish every degree of national independence, then they are to
be resisted.

I begin, Mr. Chairman, by drawing your attention to the treaty concluded
at Paris in September, 1815, be