Oliver P. Morton

If it is worth a bloody struggle to establish this nation, it is worth one to preserve it.

Oliver Hazard Perry Throck Morton (4 August 1823 – 1 November 1877) was an American politician from the U.S. state of Indiana and a member of the U.S. Republican Party. He served as the 14th Governor of Indiana.

Quotes

Denounce treason and uphold the cause of the Union.

Every wolf in sheep’s clothing, who pretends to preach the gospel, but proclaims the righteousness of man-selling and slavery—everyone who shoots down negroes in the streets, burns negro school-houses and meeting-houses, and murders women and children by the light of their own flaming dwellings, calls himself a Democrat... The Democratic Party may be described as a common sewer and loathsome receptacle into which is emptied every element of treason.

• Denounce treason and uphold the cause of the Union.
  • As quoted in Indiana in the Civil War Era, 1850–1880: History of Indiana III (1995), by Emma Lou Thornbrough. Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, p. 102

• If it is worth a bloody struggle to establish this nation, it is worth one to preserve it.
  • Speech (22 November 1860), as quoted in Indiana in the Civil War Era, 1850–1880: History of Indiana III (1995), by Emma Lou Thornbrough. Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Society, p. 102

Arraignment of the Democratic Party (June 1866)

"Arraignment of the Democratic Party", speech to the Union Mass Meeting at Masonic Hall, Indianapolis (20 June 1866)

• The leaders who are now managing the Democratic Party in this state are the men who at the regular session of the legislature in 1861, declared that, if an army went from Indiana to assist in puting down the rebellion, it must first pass over their dead bodies.
  • As contained in Treason Exposed: Record of the Disloyal Democracy (1866), Republican Party (Ind.) State Central Committee, p. 1

• Every unregenerate rebel lately in arms against his government calls himself a Democrat. Every bounty jumper, every deserter, every sneak who ran away from the draft calls himself a Democrat.
  • As contained in Treason Exposed: Record of the Disloyal Democracy (1866), Republican Party (Ind.) State Central Committee, p. 2

• Every man who labored for the rebellion in the field, who murdered Union prisoners by cruelty and starvation, who conspired to bring about civil war in the loyal states, who invented dangerous compounds to burn steamboats and northern cities,, who contrived hellish schemes to introduce into northern cities the wasting pestilence of yellow fever, calls himself a Democrat. Every dishonest contractor who has been convicted of defrauding the government, every dishonest paymaster or disbursing officer who has been convicted of squandering the public money at the gaming table or in gold gambling operations, every officer in the army who was dismissed fur cowardice or disloyalty, calls himself a Democrat.

• Every wolf in sheep's clothing, who pretends to preach the gospel, but proclaims the righteousness of man-selling and slavery—everyone who shoots down negroes in the streets, burns negro school-houses and meeting-houses, and murders women and children by the light of their own flaming dwellings, calls himself a Democrat. Every New York rioter in 1863, who burned up little children in colored asylums—who robbed, ravished and murdered indiscriminately in the midst of a blazing city for three days and nights, called himself a Democrat. In short, the Democratic Party may be described as a common sewer and loathsome receptacle into which is emptied every element of treason, North and South, every element of inhumanity and barbarism which has dishonored the age.
  • As contained in Treason Exposed: Record of the Disloyal Democracy (1866), Republican Party (Ind.) State Central Committee, p. 3

External links

• Encyclopedic article on Oliver P. Morton on Wikipedia