ers to this congress, than to run
the risk of exciting the hostility of the states by refusing to send. In
other words, the gentleman wished to prove that the President intended
an alliance; although such intention is expressly disclaimed.

Much commentary has been bestowed on the letters of invitation from the
ministers. I shall not go through with verbal criticisms on these
letters. Their general import is plain enough. I shall not gather
together small and minute quotations, taking a sentence here, a word
there, and a syllable in a third place, dovetailing them into the course
of remark, till the printed discourse bristles in every line with
inverted commas. I look to the general tenor of the invitations, and I
find that we are asked to take part only in such things as concern
ourselves. I look still more carefully to the answers, and I see every
proper caution and proper guard. I look to the message, and I see that
nothing is there contemplated likely to involve us in other men's
quarrels, or that may justly give offence to any foreign state. With
this I am satisfied.

I must now ask the indulgence of the committee to an important point in
the discussion, I mean the declaration of the President in 1823.[1] Not
only as a member of the House, but as a citizen of the country, I have
an anxious desire that this part of our public history should stand in
its proper light. The country has, in my judgment, a very high honor
connected with that occurrence, which we may maintain, or which we may
sacrifice. I look upon it as a part of its treasures of reputation; and,
for one, I intend to guard it.

Sir, let us recur to the important political events which led to that
declaration, or accompanied it. In the fall of 1822, the allied
sovereigns held their congress at Verona. The great subject of
consideration was the condition of Spain, that country then being under
the government of the Cortes. The question was, whether Ferdinand should
be reinstated in all his authority, by the intervention of foreign
force. Russia, Prussia, France, and Austria were inclined to that
measure; England dissented and protested; but the course was agreed on,
and France, with the consent of these other Continental powers, took the
conduct of the operation into her own hands. In the spring of 1823, a
French army was sent into Spain. Its success was complete. The popular
government was overthrown, and Ferdinand re-established in all his
power. This