There were not wanting counsellors enough to urge the American
people that we should nurse this grievance and lie in wait
until the hour for our revenge should come. But the magnanimous
American people preferred peace and reconciliation to revenge.
I ought to except this from the list of achievements due to
the Republican Party alone. In the matter of the British
Treaty, the Democratic leaders contributed their full share
to its successful accomplishment. Mr. Justice Nelson of
the United States Supreme Court was a distinguished member
of the Commission that made the Treaty.
Under General Grant's Administration treaties were negotiated
with nearly all the great powers of the world by which they
renounced the old doctrine of perpetual allegiance, and the
American citizen of foreign birth is clothed with all the
rights and privileges of a native-born citizen wherever on
the face of the earth he may go.
The vast number of the National offices has ceased to be a
menace to the safety of the Republic and has ceased to be a
source of strength to the Administration in power, or to
become the price or reward of political activity.
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