Select Speeches of Kossuth Part 18

In that condition you can see the key of the remarkable fact, that when I left my Asiatic prison under the protection of the star-spangled flag--nations of different climates, different languages, different inst.i.tutions, different inclinations, united in the p.r.o.nunciation of sympathy, expectation, encouragement, and hope around my poor humble self,--Italians, French, Portuguese, the people of England, Belgians, Germans, Swiss and Swedes. It was the instinct of common danger, it was the instinct of necessary union. It was no mere tribute of recognition paid to the important weight of Hungary in the scale of this intense universal struggle. It was still more a call of distress, entrusted by the voice of mankind to my care, to bring it over to free America, as to the natural and most powerful representative of that "Spirit of Liberty"

against which the leagued tyrants are waging a war of extermination with inexorable resolution. Yes, it was a call of distress entrusted to my care, to remind America that there is a tie in the destinies of nations; and that those are digging a bottomless abyss who forsake the Spirit of Liberty, when within the boundaries of common civilization half the world utters in agony the call of universal distress.

That is the mission with which I come to your sh.o.r.es; and believe me, gentlemen, that is the key of that wonderful sympathy with which the people of this republic answers my humble appeal. There is blood from our blood in these n.o.ble American hearts; there is the great heart of mankind which pulsates in the American breast; there is the chord of liberty which vibrates to my sighs.

Let ambitious fools, let the pigmies who live on the scanty food of personal envy, when the very earth quakes beneath their feet, let even the honest prudence of ordinary household times, measuring eternity with that thimble with which they are wont to measure the bubbles of small party interest, and, taking the dreadful roaring of the ocean for a storm in a water gla.s.s, let those who believe the weather to be calm because they have drawn a nightcap over their ears, and, burying their heads into pillows of domestic comfort, do not hear Satan sweeping in a hurricane over the earth; let envy, ambition, blindness, and the pettifogging wisdom of small times, artistically investigate the question of my official capacity, or the nature of my public authority; let them scrupulously discuss the immense problem whether I still possess, or possess no longer, the t.i.tle of my once-Governors.h.i.+p; let them ask for credentials, discuss the limits of my commission, as representative of Hungary. I pity all such frog and mouse fighting.

I claim no official capacity--no public authority--no representation; boast of no commission, of no written and sealed credentials. I am nothing but what my generous friend, the Senator of Michigan, has justly styled me, "a private and banished man." But in that capacity I have a n.o.bler credential for my mission than all the clerks of the world can write, the credential that I am a "man,"--the credential that I am "a patriot"--the credential that I love with all sacrificing devotion my oppressed fatherland and liberty; the credential that I hate tyrants, and have sworn everlasting hostility to them; the credential that I feel the strength to do good service to the cause of freedom; good service as perhaps few men can do, because I have the iron will, in this my breast, to serve faithfully, devotedly, indefatigably, that n.o.ble cause.

I have the credential that I trust to G.o.d in heaven, to justice on earth; that I offend no laws, but cling to the protection of laws. I have the credential of my people's undeniable confidence and its unshaken faith, to my devotion, to my manliness, to my honesty, and to my patriotism; which faith I will honestly answer without ambition, without interest, as faithfully as ever, but more skilfully, because schooled by adversities. And I have the credential of the justice of the cause I plead, and of the wonderful sympathy, which, not my person, but that cause, has met and meets in two hemispheres.

These are my credentials, and nothing else. To whom this is enough, he will help me, so far as the law permits and is his good pleasure. To whom these credentials are not sufficient, let him look for a better accredited man.

I have too lively a sentiment of my own modest dignity, ever to condescend to polemics about my own personal merits or abilities. I believe my life has been public enough to appertain to the impartial judgment of history, but it may have perhaps interested you to hear, how, in a small and inconsiderable circle of the Hungarian emigration, the idea was started that I must be opposed, because I have declared against all compromise with the House of Austria, or with royalty, and because by declaring that my direction will be in every case only republican, I make every arrangement, without revolution, impossible.

That I should be thus attacked at this crisis, does look like an endeavour to check a benefit to my country, but I cannot forbear humbly to beseech you, do not therefore think less favourably of my nation and of the Hungarian emigration, for which I am sorry that I can do very little, because I devote myself and all the success I may meet with to a higher aim--to my country's freedom and independence. Believe me, gentlemen, that my country and its exiled martyr sons are highly worthy of your generous sympathy, though some few of the number do not always act as they should.

They are but few who do so, and it would be unjust to measure all of us by the faults of some few. Upon the whole, I am proud to say that the Hungarian emigration was scrupulous to merit generous sympathy, and to preserve the honour of the Hungarian name. Remember that though you are Republicans, still here, in the very metropolis of Ohio, a man was found to lecture for Russo-Austrian despotism, and to lecture with the astonis.h.i.+ng boldness of an immense ignorance.

But that good man I can dismiss with silence, the more because it is with high appreciation and warm grat.i.tude that I saw an honourable gentleman, animated with the most generous sentiments of justice and right, take immediately upon himself the task of refutation. I may perhaps be permitted to remark, that that learned and honourable gentleman, besides having n.o.bly advocated the cause of freedom, justice, and truth, has also well merited of his co-religionaries, who belong together with himself, _to the Roman Catholic Church_.

Gentlemen, I have but one word yet, and it is a sad one--the word of farewell. Cincinnati, Ohio, farewell! May the richest blessings of the Almighty rest upon thee! In every heart, and in the hearts of my people, thy name will for ever live, a glorious object for our everlasting love and grat.i.tude.

x.x.xIII.--HARMONY OF THE EXECUTIVE AND OF THE PEOPLE IN AMERICA.

[_Speech at Indianapolis_.]

Kossuth was received at the State House of Indianapolis by Governor Wright, who, in the course of his address said:

Although I partic.i.p.ate with my fellow-citizens in the pleasure occasioned by your presence among us, yet it is not as an _individual_ that I greet you with the words of welcome and hospitality. No, sir,--it is in the name of the people of the State, whom I represent, and whose warrant I feel that I have; and I bid you welcome to-day, and a.s.sure you not only of my own but of their sympathy and encouragement in the great cause you so ably represent.

He closed with the words:

If it shall be your fortune to lead your countrymen again in the contest for liberty, be a.s.sured that the people of the United States, at least, will not be indifferent, nor, if need be, inactive spectators of a conflict that may involve, not only the independence of Hungary, but the freedom of the world.

Again I bid you a most cordial welcome to the State of Indiana.

Kossuth replied:--

Governor,--Amongst all that I have been permitted to see in the United State's, nothing has more attracted my attention than that part of your democratic inst.i.tutions which I see developed in the mutual and reciprocal relations between the people and the const.i.tuted public authorities.

In that respect there is an immense difference between Europe and America, for the understanding of which we have to take into account the difference of the basis of the political organization, and together with it what the public and social life has developed in both hemispheres.

The great misfortune of Europe is, that the present civilization was born in those cursed days when Republicanism set and Royalty rose. It was a gloomy change. Nearly twenty centuries have pa.s.sed, and torrents of blood have watered the red-hot chains, and still the fetters are not broken; nay--it is our lot to have borne its burning heat--it is our lot to grasp with iron hand the wheels of its crus.h.i.+ng car. Destiny--no; Providence--is holding the balance of decision; the tongue is wavering yet; one slight weight more into the one, or into the other scale, will again decide the fate of ages, of centuries.

Upon this mischievous basis of royalty was raised the building of authority; not of that authority which commands spontaneous reverence by merit and the value of its services, but of that authority which oppresses liberty. Hence the authority of a public officer in unfortunate Europe consists in the power to rule and to command, and not in the power to serve his country well--it makes men oppressive downwards, while it makes them creeping before those who are above. Law is not obeyed out of respect, but out of fear. A man in public office takes himself to be better than his countrymen, and becomes arrogant and ambitious; and because to hold a public office is seldom a claim to confidence, but commonly a reason to lose confidence; it is not a mark of civic virtue and of patriotic devotion, but a stain of civic apostacy and of venality; it is not a claim to be honoured, but a reason to be distrusted; so much so, that in Europe the sad word of the poet is indeed a still more sad fact.--

"When vice prevails and impious man bears sway The post of honour is a private station."

So was it even in my own dear fatherland. Before our unfortunate but glorious revolution of 1848, the principle of royalty had so much spoiled the nature and envenomed the character of public office, that (of course except those who derived their authority by election--which we for our munic.i.p.al life conserved amongst all the corruption of European royalty through centuries) no patriot accepted an office in the government: to have accepted one was to have resigned patriotism.

It was one of the brightest principles of our murdered Revolution--that public office was restored to the place of civic virtue, and opened to patriotism, by being raised from the abject situation of a tool of oppression, to the honourable position of serving the country well.

Alas! that bright day was soon overpowered by the gloomy clouds of despotism, brought back to our sunny sky by the freezing gale of Russian violence. And on the continent of Europe there is night again. There is scarcely one country where the wishes and the will of the people are reflected in the government. There is no government which can say:

"My voice is the echo of the people's voice--I say what my people feels; I proclaim what my people wills; I am the embodiment of his principles, and not the controller of his opinion: the people and myself--we are one."

No, on the continent of Europe people and governments are two hostile camps. What immense mischief, pregnant with oppression and with nameless woe, is encompa.s.sed within the circle of this single fact!

How different the condition of America! It is not _men_ who rule, but _the law;_ and law is obeyed, because the people is respecting the general will by respecting the law. Public office is a place of honour, because it is the field for patriotic devotion. Governments have not the arrogant pretension to be the masters of the people; but have the proud glory to be its faithful servants. A public officer ceases not to be a citizen; he has doubly the character of a citizen, by sharing in and by executing the people's will. And whence this striking difference?

It is because the civilization of America is founded upon the principle of Democracy. It was born when Royalty declined, and Republicanism rose.

Hence the delightful view, not less instructive than interesting, that here in America, instead of the clas.h.i.+ng dissonance between the words "government" and "people" we see them melting into one accord of harmony.

Thus here the public opinion of the people never can fail to be a direct rule for the government, and reciprocally the word of the government has the weight of a fact by the people's support. When your government speaks, it is the people which speaks.

Sir, I most humbly thank your Excellency, that you have been pleased to afford to me the benefit of hearing and seeing that delightful as well as happy harmony between the people and the government of the State of Indiana, in the support of that n.o.ble and just cause which I plead, on the issue of which, not the future of my country only depends, but together with it, the future condition of all those parts of our globe which are confined within the boundaries of Christian civilization, which, be sure of it, gentlemen, in the ultimate issue, will have the same fate.

Sir, it is not without reason, that at Indianapolis in particular,--and to your Excellency, the truly faithful, the high-minded, and the deservedly popular Chief Magistrate of this Commonwealth, I speak that word. It is not the first time that your Excellency, surrounded as now, has spoken as the honoured organ of the public opinion of Indiana. It is not yet two years since your Excellency did the same on the occasion of a visit of the favourite son of Kentucky, Governor Crittenden. I well remember the topic of your eloquence. It was the solicitude of Indiana in regard to the glorious Union of these Republics. May G.o.d preserve it for ever! But precisely because you, the favourite son of Indiana and the honoured representatives of the sovereign people of Indiana--in one accord of perfect harmony esteem the Gordian knot of the Union above all, allow me to say once more, that if the United States permit the principle of non-interference to be blotted out from the code of nations on earth, foreign interference mingling with some domestic discord, perhaps with that which two years ago called forth your patriotic solicitude for the Union; yes, foreign interference mingling with some of your domestic discords, will be the Alexander who will cut asunder the Gordian knot of your Union, in this our present century.

Republics exist upon principles: they are secure only when they act upon principles. He who does not accept a principle, a.s.serted by another, will not long enjoy the benefit of it himself; and nations always perish by their own sin. Oh may those whom your united people entrusted with the n.o.ble care to be guardians of your Union--be pleased to consider that truth ere it be too late.

Sir, to the State of Indiana I am in many respects particularly obliged.

True, I have had invitations to visit many other States, but the invitation from the State of Indiana was first received. Please to accept my warmest thanks. I have seen in other States a harmony between the people and the government, but nowhere has the Governor of a State condescended to represent the people in a public welcome, nowhere stepped out as the orator of the people's sympathy and its sentiment. I most humbly thank you for this honour.

In Maryland, the Governor introduced me to the Legislature. In Pennsylvania the chief Magistrate was the organ of a common welcome of the Legislature and Citizens. In Ma.s.sachusetts he took the lead as the people's elect in recommending my principles to the Legislature--and in Ohio the chief Magistrate, by accepting the Presidency of the a.s.sociation of the friends of Hungary, became generally the executive of the people's practical sympathy, which so magnanimously responded to the many political manifestations of its Representatives in the Legislature.

Let me hope, sir, that as you have been generously pleased to be the interpreter of Indiana's welcome and sympathy, you will also not refuse to become the Chief Executive Magistrate to the practical development of the same.

I may cordially thank, in the name of my cause, the people of Indiana, its Governor, and Representatives, for the high honour of the Legislature's invitation, and of this public welcome.

x.x.xIV.--IMPORTANCE OF FOREIGN POLICY, AND OF STRENGTHENING ENGLAND.

[_Speech at Louisville, March 6th_.]

At the Court House, Louisville, Kossuth was addressed by Bland Ballard, Esq., and replied as follows:

Whatever be the immediate issue of that discussion about foreign policy, which now so eminently occupies public attention throughout the United States, from the Capitol and White-house at Was.h.i.+ngton down to the lonely farms of your remotest territories, one fact I have full reason to take for sure, and that is: That when the trumpet-sound of national resurrection is once borne over the waves of the Atlantic announcing to you that nations have risen to a.s.sert those rights to which they are called by nature and nature's G.o.d--when the roaring of the first cannon-shot announces that the combat is begun which has to decide which principle is to rule over the Christian world--absolutism or national sovereignty--there is no power on earth which could induce the people of the United States to remain inactive and indifferent spectators of that great struggle, in which the future of the Christian world--yes, the future of the United States themselves is to be decided. The people of the United States will not remain indifferent and inactive spectators and will not authorize, will not approve, any policy of indifference.

You yourself have told me so, sir.

In the position of every considerable country there is a necessity of a certain course, to adopt which cannot be avoided, and may be almost called destiny. The duty as well as the wisdom of statesmen consists in the ability to steer, in time, the vessel into that course, which, if they neglect to do in time, the price will be higher and the profit less.

There is scarcely anything which has more astonished me than the fact--that, for the last thirty-seven years, almost every Christian nation has shared the great fault of not caring much about what are called foreign matters, foreign policy. Precisely the great nations, England, France, America, which might have regulated the course of their governments for a very considerable period, abandoned almost entirely that part of their public concerns, which with great nations is the most important of all, because it regulates the position of the country in its great national capacity. The slightest internal interest was discussed publicly and regulated previously by the nation, before the government had to execute it; but, as to the most important interest--the national position of the country and its relations to the world, Secret Diplomacy, a fatality of mankind, stepped in, and the nations had to accept the consequences of what was already done, though they subsequently reproved it. In England, I four months ago, avowed that all the interior questions together cannot equal in importance the exterior; _there_ is summed up the future of Britain: and if the people of England do not cut short the secrecy of diplomacy--if it do not in time take this all absorbing interest into its own hands, as it is wont to do with every small home interest, it will have to meet immense danger very soon, as this danger has already seriously acc.u.mulated by former neglect. Here too, in the United States, there is no possible question equal in importance to foreign policy, and especially in regard to European matters. And I say that, if the United States do not in due time adopt such a course, as will prevent the Czar of Russia, and his despotic satellites, from believing that the United States give them entirely free field to regulate the condition of Europe, which cannot fail to react morally and materially on your condition, then indeed embarra.s.sments, sufferings, and danger will acc.u.mulate in a very short time over you.

Great Britain, it is clear as matters now stand, can avoid a war with the continental powers of Europe only by joining their alliance, or at least by giving them security, that England will not only not support the liberal movement on the Continent, but that it will submit to the policy of the absolutist powers. It is not impossible that England will yield. Do not forget, gentlemen, that an English ministry, be it Tory or Whig, is always more or less aristocratic, and it is in the nature of aristocracy that it may love its country well, but indeed aristocracy more. There is therefore always some inclination to be on good terms with whoever is an enemy to what aristocracy considers its own enemy, that is, democracy. This consideration, together with the above mentioned carelessness of the people about foreign policy, gives you the key to many events which else it would be impossible to understand.

People against another people should never feel hatred, but brotherly sympathy. The memory of oppression suffered from governments should never be imparted to nations, and children should never be hated, despised, or punished, because their fathers have sinned. We Hungarians wrestled for centuries with Turkey, and now we are friends, true friends, and natural allies against a common enemy. Several of my own ancestors lost their lives in Turkish wars, or their property in ransom out of Turkish captivity; yet to me it is a Turkish Sultan who saved my life and gave bread to thousands of my countrymen, which no other power did on earth. Such is the change of time. It is Russia which crushed my bleeding fatherland, yet the inexorable hatred of my heart does not extend to the people of Russia. I love that people--I pity its poor, unfortunate instruments of despotism. Wherever there is a people, there is my love. Therefore, let the pa.s.sionate excitement of past times subside before the prudent advice of present necessities. You are blood from England's blood, bone from its bone, and flesh from its flesh. The Anglo-Saxon race was the kernel around which gathered this glorious fruit--your Republic. Every other nationality is oppressed. It is the Anglo-Saxon alone which stands high and erect in its independence. You, the younger brother, are entirely free, because Republican. They, the elder brother, are monarchical, but they have a const.i.tution, and they have many inst.i.tutions which even you retained, and, by retaining them, have proved that they are inst.i.tutions congenial to freedom, and dear to freemen. The free press, the jury, free speech, the freedom of a.s.sociation, the inst.i.tution of munic.i.p.alities, the share of the people in the legislature, are English inst.i.tutions; the inviolability of person and the inviolability of property are English principles. England is the last stronghold of these principles in Europe. Is this not enough to make you stand side by side with those principles in behalf of oppressed humanity?

If the United States and England unite in policy now and make by their imposing att.i.tude a breakwater to the ambitious league of despotism, the Anglo-Saxon race, with all who gathered around that kernel, will not only have the glorious pleasure of having saved the Christian world from being absorbed by despotism, but you especially will have the n.o.ble satisfaction of having contributed to the progress and to the development of freedom in England, Scotland, and Ireland themselves: for the principles of national sovereignty, independence, and self-government, when restored on the continent of Europe, must in a beneficent manner reach upon those islands themselves. They may remain monarchical, if it be their will to do so, but the parliamentary omnipotence, which absorbs all that _you_ call _State_ rights and self-government, will yield to the influence of Europe's liberated continent. England will govern its own domestic concerns by its own parliament, and Scotland its own, and Ireland its own, just as the states of your galaxy do; the three countries are destined to mutual connection, by their geographical relations, by far more than New York with Louisiana or Carolina with California. By conserving the state-rights of self-government to all of them they will unite in a common government for the common interest, as you have done. _Union, and not unity, must be the guiding star of the future_ with every power composed of several distinct bodies, and though I am a republican more perhaps than thousands who are citizens of a republic, inasmuch as I have known all the curse of having had a king--still such a development of Great Britain's future, were it even connected with monarchy, I, a true republican, would hail with fervent joy. To contribute to such a future, I indeed should consider more practical support to the cause of freedom, to the cause of Ireland itself, than, out of pa.s.sionate aversions either for past or present wrongs, to discourage, nay, almost force Great Britain to submit to the threatening att.i.tude of despots or even to side with them against liberty. Out of such a submission there can never result any good to any one in the world, and certainly none to you--none to the nations of Europe--none to Ireland--but increased oppression to Europe and Ireland, and danger to you yourselves.