me to arrest; and I then felt it to be my duty to limit my efforts to
give such direction to the war as would, as far as possible, prevent
the evils and dangers with which it threatened the country and its
institutions."

Sir, I adopt all this as my position and my defence, though, perhaps, in
a civil war, I might fairly go farther in opposition. I could not, with
my convictions, vote men and money for this war, and I would not, as a
Representative, vote against them. I meant that, without opposition, the
President might take all the men and all the money he should demand, and
then to hold him to a strict responsibility before the people for the
results. Not believing the soldiers responsible for the war or its
purposes or its consequences, I have never withheld my vote where
their separate interests were concerned. But I have denounced from the
beginning the usurpations and the infractions, one and all, of law and
constitution, by the President and those under him; their repeated and
persistent arbitrary arrests, the suspension of _habeas corpus_, the
violation of freedom of the mails, of the private house, of the press,
and of speech, and all the other multiplied wrongs and outrages upon
public liberty and private right, which have made this country one of
the worst despotisms on earth for the past twenty months, and I will
continue to rebuke and denounce them to the end; and the people, thank
God, have at last heard and heeded, and rebuked them too. To the record
and to time I appeal again for my justification.




HENRY WARD BEECHER,