sixteen years, a term equal to that which covers
the whole Administration of Washington, the whole Administration
of John Adams, and the first term of Jefferson. It has been
one of those periods in which all experience teaches us to
expect an unusual manifestation of public corruption, of public
disorder, and of evils and errors of administration. A great
war; the time which follows a great war; great public debts;
currency and values inflated; the exertion of new and extraordinary
powers for the safety of the State; the sudden call of millions
of slaves to a share in the Government--any one of these things
would be expected to create great disturbances, and give rise
to great temptations and great corruptions. Our term of
office has seen them all combined. And yet I do not scruple
to affirm that not only has there been less dishonesty and
maladministration in the sixteen years of Republican rule
proportionally to the numbers and wealth of the people than
in the first sixteen years after the inauguration of Washington,
but there has been less absolutely of those things.

"Now, Mr. Speaker, I do not wish to be misunderstood. I do
not wish to be misrepresented in this matter. Let no man
assert that I refer to the evils of those days as either
excuse or palliation for the evils of ours. That generation
was a frugal and honest generation in the main, and they
would have visited with the swiftest condemnation and punishment,
every breach of public trust, whether through dishonesty or
usurpation. But they did not send to England for Benedict
Arnold. They did not restore the Tories to power. They did
not go down on their knees to George III. and ask him to
take them back into favor. They believed that if the Constitution
could not be administered honestly by a majority of the friends
of the Constitution, it could not be administered honestly
by a majority of its enemies; that if liberty were not safe
and pure in the hands of those who loved her, then liberty
was a failure upon the earth, and they did not think of intrusting
her to the hands of those who hated her. So in this generation,
had they lived to-day, they would have done simply what a
distinguished president of the convention in my own State,
whom the gentleman quotes, recommended; they would have taken
the Government from the hands of the lovers of liberty who
are dishonest and put it into the hands of men who entertain
the same sentiments but who are