Part 3 (1/2)
MR. SHERMAN. I second the motion.
MR. FRANKLIN. Gentlemen, you have heard the motion. As many as favor the same make it known by saying ”aye.” (_Response of ayes; Mr. Adams is silent_.) The ayes seem to have it, the ayes have it, and the motion is carried for Mr. Adams to so report this Declaration. The committee is adjourned.
CURTAIN
ACT III.
SCENE I.--_The Continental Congress again in session._
MR. HANc.o.c.k. (_Looking at his watch, as he calls the Congress to order._) Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--The time has come to which we adjourned yesterday in order to give the Committee of Five, appointed to draft the Declaration, due time to prepare the same. Are the gentlemen of the Committee present and ready to report?
MR. ADAMS. Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--At the request of Mr. Jefferson and the other members of the Committee, I beg leave to submit the following Declaration for your consideration after it has been read by the secretary of this Congress. Permit me to say here, however, that the credit for the authors.h.i.+p of this paper belongs entirely to Mr. Jefferson. It is his work, which the other members of the Committee are unanimous in approving.
(_Charles Thomson, secretary of the Congress, reads the Declaration of Independence. This part should be a.s.signed to one who has a good clear voice and is a good public reader. If it is thought best not to read all of the Declaration, its most striking paragraphs should be read. Do not forget to have the famous paragraph on slavery read. If it were omitted the great speech of George Walton would be out of place._)
JOHN ADAMS.[6] Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand and my heart to this vote in favor of this Declaration of Independence.
It is true, indeed, that in the beginning we aimed not at independence.
But there's a divinity which shapes our ends. The injustice of England has driven us to arms; and, blinded to her own interest for our good, she has obstinately persisted, till independence is now within our grasp. We have but to reach forth to it, and it is ours. Why, then, should we defer the Declaration?
Is any man so weak as now to hope for a reconciliation with England, which shall leave either safety to the country and its liberties, or safety to his own life and his own honor? Are not you,[7] sir, who sit in that chair, is not he,[8] our venerable colleague near you, are you not both already the proscribed and predestined objects of punishment and of vengeance? Cut off from all hope of royal clemency, what are you, what can you be, while the power of England remains, but outlaws? If we postpone independence do we mean to carry on, or to give up the war? Do we mean to submit to the measures of Parliament, Boston Port Bill and all? Do we mean to submit, and consent that we ourselves shall be ground to powder, and our country and its rights trodden down in the dust? I know we do not mean to submit. We never shall submit. Do we intend to violate that most solemn obligation ever entered into by men, that plighting, before G.o.d, of our sacred honor to Was.h.i.+ngton, when, putting him forth to incur the dangers of war, as well as the political hazards of the times, we promised to adhere to him, in every extremity, with our fortunes and our lives? I know there is not a man here who would not rather see a general conflagration sweep over the land, or an earthquake sink it, than one jot or t.i.ttle of that plighted faith fall to the ground. For myself, having twelve months ago, in this place, moved you, that George Was.h.i.+ngton be appointed commander of the forces raised, or to be raised, for defense of American liberty, may my right hand forget her cunning, and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I hesitate or waver in the support I give him.
(_At the close of Mr. Adams' speech there is loud clamor for recognition. The president recognizes Edward Rutledge of South Carolina, who speaks against the Declaration._)
EDWARD RUTLEDGE. [9]Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--Let us pause! This step, once taken, cannot be retraced. This resolution, once pa.s.sed, will cut off all hope of reconciliation. If success attend the arms of England, we shall then be no longer colonies, with charters, and with privileges. These will all be forfeited by this act; and we shall be in the condition of other conquered people--at the mercy of the conquerors. For ourselves, we may be ready to run the hazard; but are we ready to carry the country to that length? Is success so probable as to justify it? Where is the military, where the naval power, by which we are to resist the whole strength of the arm of England? For she will exert that strength to the utmost. Can we rely on the constancy and perseverance of the people?--or will they not act as the people of other countries have acted, and, wearied with a long war, submit in the end, to a worse oppression? While we stand on our old ground, and insist on redress of grievances, we know we are right, and are not answerable for consequences. Nothing, then, can be imputable to us.
(_At the close of Mr. Rutledge's speech there is a clamor for recognition. The president recognizes Roger Sherman of Connecticut._)
ROGER SHERMAN. [10]Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--The war must go on. We must fight it through. And if the war must go on, why put off longer the Declaration of Independence? That measure will strengthen us. It will give us character abroad. The nations will then treat with us, which they never can do while we acknowledge ourselves subjects, in arms against our sovereign. Nay, I maintain that England herself will sooner treat for peace with us on the footing of independence, than consent, by repealing her acts, to acknowledge that her whole conduct toward us has been a course of injustice and oppression. Her pride will be less wounded by submitting to the course of things which now predestinates our independence, than by yielding the points in controversy to her rebellious subjects. The former she will regard as the result of fortune; the latter she would feel as her own deep disgrace. Why, then, why, then, sir, do we not as soon as possible change this from a civil to a national war? And since we must fight it through, why not put ourselves in a state to enjoy all the benefits of victory, if we gain the victory?
If we fail, it can be no worse for us. But we shall not fail. The cause will raise up armies; the cause will create navies. The people, the people, if we are true to them will carry us, and will carry themselves, gloriously through this struggle. I care not how fickle other people have been found. I know the people of these colonies, and I know that resistance to British aggression is deep and settled in their hearts, and cannot be eradicated. Every colony, indeed, has expressed its willingness to follow, if we but take the lead. Sir, the Declaration will inspire the people with increased courage. Instead of a long and b.l.o.o.d.y war for the restoration of privileges, for redress of grievances, for chartered immunities, held under a British king, set before them the glorious object of entire independence, and it will breathe into them anew the breath of life. Read this Declaration at the head of the army; every sword will be drawn from its scabbard, and the solemn vow uttered to maintain it, or to perish on the bed of honor. Publish it from the pulpit, religion will approve it, and the love of religious liberty will cling around it, resolved to stand with it, or fall with it. Send it to the public halls; proclaim it there; let them hear it who heard the first roar of the enemy's cannon; let them see it who saw their brothers and their sons fall on the field of Bunker Hill and in the streets of Lexington and Concord, and the very walls will cry out in its support.
(_At the close of Mr. Sherman's speech there is a loud clamor for recognition. The president recognizes John d.i.c.kinson of Pennsylvania._)
JOHN d.i.c.kINSON. [11]Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--If we now change our object, carry our pretensions farther, and set up for absolute independence, we shall lose the sympathy of mankind. We shall no longer be defending what we possess, but struggling for something which we never did possess, and which we have solemnly and uniformly disclaimed all intention of pursuing, from the very outset of the troubles. Abandoning thus our old ground of resistance only to arbitrary acts of oppression, the nations will believe the whole to have been mere pretense, and they will look on us, not as injured, but as ambitious subjects. I shudder before this responsibility. It will be upon us, it will be upon us, if, relinquis.h.i.+ng the ground we have stood upon so long, and stood so safely, we now proclaim independence, and carry on the war for that object, while these cities burn, these pleasant fields whiten and bleach with the bones of their owners, and these streams run blood. It will be upon us, it will be upon us, if failing to maintain this unseasonable and ill-judged Declaration, a sterner despotism, maintained by military power, shall be established over our posterity, when we ourselves, given up by an exhausted, a hara.s.sed, a misled people, shall have expiated our rashness and atoned for our presumption on the scaffold.
[Ill.u.s.tration: BENJAMIN FRANKLIN]
(_At the close of Mr. d.i.c.kinson's speech there is a loud clamor for recognition. The president recognizes Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania._)
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. [12]Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--I know the uncertainty of human affairs, but I see, I see clearly, through this day's business. You and I, indeed, may rue it. We may not live to the time when this Declaration shall be made good. We may die; die colonists; die slaves; die, it may be ignominiously and on the scaffold. Be it so. Be it so. If it be the pleasure of Heaven that my country shall require the poor offering of my life, the victim shall be ready, at the appointed hour of sacrifice, come when that hour may.
But while I do live, let me have a country, or at least the hope of a country, and that a free country.
But whatever may be our fate, be a.s.sured, be a.s.sured that this Declaration will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost blood; but it will stand, and it will richly compensate for both. Through the thick gloom of the present, I see the brightness of the future as the sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious, an immortal day. When we are in our graves, our children will honor it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires, and illuminations. On its annual return they will shed tears, copious, gus.h.i.+ng tears, not of subjection and slavery, not of agony and distress, but of exultation, of grat.i.tude, and of joy. Sir, before G.o.d, I believe the hour has come. My whole heart is in it. All that I have, and all that I am, and all that I hope in this life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off as Mr. Adams of Ma.s.sachusetts began, that, sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I am for the Declaration. It is my living sentiment, and by the blessing of G.o.d it shall be my dying sentiment, independence _now, and_ INDEPENDENCE FOREVER!
(_There is a loud clamor for recognition, and the president recognizes George Walton of Georgia._)
GEORGE WALTON. [13]Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Continental Congress:--I am for this Declaration if the paragraph on slavery is struck out. But I will oppose it to the end if that paragraph is permitted to remain a part of it. There is not one good reason for introducing the slavery question at this time. The relations between individual master and slave have no place here in the greater and graver matter of differences between the British Government and the American Colonies. But since the issue is thrust upon us, I propose to meet it squarely and fearlessly.
Mr. President and gentlemen, you cannot make equal what G.o.d Almighty has made unequal. Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? The Bible commands in the most emphatic language that servants obey in all things their masters. Liberty loving Greece had her slaves.
Shall liberty loving America have less? Strike out that obnoxious paragraph and every delegate from the Southern colonies will fall in line for the Declaration of Independence, but if you make that paragraph a part of the Declaration many delegates from the South will withdraw from this convention, and then you will fight your own battles.