The distinguished Chancellor Walworth said
that it would be "as brutal to send men to butcher our own brothers of
the Southern States as it would be to massacre them in the Northern
States." When DeWitt Clinton's son, George, spoke of secession as
"rebellion," the multitude hailed the word with cries of dissent. Even
at Faneuil Hall, in Boston, "a very large and respectable meeting" was
emphatically in favor of compromise. It was impossible to measure
accurately the extent and force of all this demoralization; but the
symptoms were that vast numbers were infected with such sentiments, and
that they would have been worse than useless as backers of a vigorous
policy on the part of the government.
With the North wavering and ready to retreat, and the South aggressive
and confident, it was exacting to expect Mr. Buchanan to stand up for a
fight. Why should he, with his old-time Democratic principles, now by a
firm, defiant attitude precipitate a crisis, possibly a civil war, when
Horace Greeley and Wendell Phillips were conspicuously running away from
the consequences of their own teachings, and were loudly crying "Peace!
peace!" after they themselves had long been doing all in their power to
bring the North up to the fighting point? When these leaders faced to
the rear, it was hard to say who could be counted upon to fill the front
rank. In truth, it was a situation which might have discouraged a more
combative patriot than Buchanan.
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