Such is the crime which you are to judge. But the criminal also must be
dragged into day, that you may see and measure the power by which all
this wrong is sustained. From no common source could it proceed. In
its perpetration was needed a spirit of vaulting ambition which would
hesitate at nothing; a hardihood of purpose which was insensible to the
judgment of mankind; a madness for Slavery which would disregard the
Constitution, the laws, and all the great examples of our history;
also a consciousness of power such as comes from the habit of power;
a combination of energies found only in a hundred arms directed by
a hundred eyes; a control of public opinion through venal pens and a
prostituted press; an ability to subsidize crowds in every vocation
of life--the politician with his local importance, the lawyer with his
subtle tongue, and even the authority of the judge on the bench; and
a familiar use of men in places high and low, so that none, from the
President to the lowest border postmaster, should decline to be its
tool; all these things and more were needed, and they were found in
the slave power of our Republic. There, sir, stands the criminal,
all unmasked before you--heartless, grasping, and tyrannical--with an
audacity beyond that of Verres, a subtlety beyond that of Machiavel, a
meanness beyond that of Bacon, and an ability beyond that of Hastings.
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