In that case I
shall be most happy to reverse the vote I gave the other day. I have a
selfish motive for desiring that the President may do this--I expect to
gain some votes, in connection with the war, which, without his so doing,
will be of doubtful propriety in my own judgment, but which will be free
from the doubt if he does so. But if he can not or will not do this,--if
on any pretence or no pretence he shall refuse or omit it then I shall be
fully convinced of what I more than suspect already that he is deeply
conscious of being in the wrong; that he feels the blood of this war,
like the blood of Abel, is crying to heaven against him; that originally
having some strong motive--what, I will not stop now to give my opinion
concerning to involve the two countries in a war, and trusting to escape
scrutiny by fixing the public gaze upon the exceeding brightness of
military glory,--that attractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood,
that serpent's eye that charms to destroy,--he plunged into it, and was
swept on and on till, disappointed in his calculation of the ease with
which Mexico might be subdued, he now finds himself he knows not where.
How like the half insane mumbling of a fever dream is the whole war part
of his late message! At one time telling us that Mexico has nothing
whatever that we can get--but territory; at another showing us how we can
support the war by levying contributions on Mexico.
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