civil cases, has not been guarded by the system;—and while they have been inattentive to these all-important considerations, they have made provision for the introduction of standing armies in time of peace. These, sir, ever have been used as the grand machines to suppress the liberties of the people, and will ever awaken the jealousy, of republicans, so long as liberty is dear, and tyranny odious, to mankind.
Congress, sir, have the power to declare war, and also to raise and support armies; and if we suppose them to be a representation of the states, the nexus imperii of the British constitution is here lost. There the king has the power of declaring war, and the Parliament that of raising money to support it. Governments ought not to depend on an army for their support, but ought to be so formed as to have the confidence, respect, and affection of the citizens. Some degree of virtue, sir, must exist, or freedom cannot live. A standing army will introduce idleness and extravagance, which will be followed by their sure concomitant vices. In a country extensive like ours, the power of the sword is more sensibly felt than in a small community. The advantages, sir, of military science and discipline cannot be exerted unless a proper number of soldiers are united in one body, and actuated by one soul. The tyrant of a single town, or a small district, would soon discover that a hundred armed soldiers were a weak defence against ten thousand peasants or citizens; but ten thousand well-disciplined soldiers will command, with despotic sway, millions of subjects, and will strike terror into the most numerous populace. It was this, sir, which enabled the pretorian bands of Rome, whose number scarcely amounted to ten thousand, after having violated the sanctity of the throne by the atrocious murder of a most excellent emperor, to dishonor the majesty of it, by proclaiming that the Roman empire—the mistress of the world—was to be disposed of, to the highest bidder, at public auction;—and to their licentious frenzy may be attributed the first cause of the decline and fall of that mighty empire. We ought, therefore, strictly to guard against the establishment of an army—whose only occupation would be idleness; whose only effort the introduction of vice and dissipation; and who would, at some future day, deprive us of our liberties, as a reward for past favors, by the introduction of some military despot.
