NO SHADOW OF A PRECEDENT OF DISLOYALTY
to law should be tolerated. If this General Assembly shall say by its vote that a plain declaration of the Constitution can be set aside, what hope have we that the laws which we enact shall be treated with greater respect and reverence? A statute is of less consequence than the Constitution. If law makers can ibid an excuse for violating the Constitution, which they are sworn to obey, what guarantee remains that the people, whose servants we are, will not treat with like disdain the laws we enact?
There comes to us, sir, on every wind that blows complaints of a growing disregard of law. We are told that Judges are corrupt and that Jurors are bribed. I could, without drawing largely on my memory, introduce instances of judicial debauchery well calculated to humiliate any one possessed of a high sense of honor and faith in the capabilities and possibilities of human nature. Nor do these shameful recitals include only Courts and Juries-they embrace Legislatures and Congress, and are so terribly authenticated that their demoralizing influence is felt far and wide. Is it not well, therefore, for this General Assembly to ask wherefore this depravity, this far-reaching contamination of the very fountains of public thought?
