Select Speeches of Kossuth by Kossuth
page 63 of 506 (12%)
page 63 of 506 (12%)
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Websters spoke, as if really they were speaking for my very cause. You
know how your citizens acted in behalf of that struggle for liberty in a part of Europe which is more distant than Hungary: and again when Poland fell, you know what spirit pervaded the United States. I have shown you how Washington's policy has been gradually changed: but one mighty difference I must still commemorate. Your population has, since Monroe's time, nearly doubled, I believe; or at least has increased by millions. And what sort of men are these millions? Are they only native-born Americans? No European emigrants? Many are men, who though citizens of the United States are, by the most sacred ties of relationship, attached to the fate of Europe. That is a consideration worthy of reflection with your wisest men, who will, ere long agree with me, that in your present condition you are at least as much interested in the state of Europe, as twenty-eight years ago your fathers were in the fate of Central and Southern America. And really so it is. The unexampled sympathy for the cause of my country which I have met with in the United States proves that it is so. Your generous interference with the Turkish captivity of the Governor of Hungary, proves that is so. And this progressive development in your foreign policy, is, in fact, no longer a mere instinctive ebullition of public opinion, which is about hereafter to direct your governmental policy; the opinion of the people is _already_ avowed as the policy of the government. I have a most decisive authority to rely upon in saying so. It is the message of the President of the United States. His Excellency, Millard Fillmore, made a communication to Congress, a few days ago, and there I read the paragraph:--"The deep interest which we feel in the spread of liberal principles, and the establishment of free governments, and the sympathy with which we witness every struggle against oppression, _forbid that we should be indifferent_ to a case in which the strong arm of a |
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