his election. So
likewise every member of her Diet (the supreme legislative body),
consisting of the King, the Senate, bishops and deputies of the nobility
and gentry of the palatinates, possessed a veto on all its proceedings;
thus making a unanimous vote necessary to enact a law or to adopt any
measure whatever. And as if to carry the principle to the utmost extent,
the veto of a single member not only defeated the particular bill or
measure in question, but prevented all others passed during the session
from taking effect. Further the principle could not be carried. It in
fact made every individual of the nobility and gentry a distinct element
in the organism; or to vary the expression, made him an _estate of the
kingdom_. And yet this government lasted in this form more than two
centuries, embracing the period of Poland's greatest power and renown.
Twice during its existence she protected Christendom, when in great
danger, by defeating the Turks under the walls of Vienna, and
permanently arresting thereby the tide of their conquests westward.

It is true her government was finally subverted, and the people
subjugated, in consequence of the extreme to which the principle was
carried; not however because of its tendency to dissolution _from
weakness_, but from the facility it afforded to powerful and
unscrupulous neighbors to control by their intrigues the election of her
kings. But the fact that a government in which the principle was carried
to the utmost extreme not only existed, but existed for so long a period
in great power and splendor, is proof conclusive both of its
practicability and its compatibility with the power and permanency of
government.

URGING REPEAL OF THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE

From Speech in the Senate, March 4th, 1850

Having now shown what cannot save the Union, I return to the question
with which I commenced, How can the Union be saved? There is but one way
by which it can with any certainty; and that is by a full and final
settlement, on the principle of justice, of all the questions at issue
between the two sections. The South asks for justice, simple justice,
and less she ought not to take. She has no compromise to offer but the
Constitution; and no concession or surrender to make. She has already
surrendered so much that she has little left to surrender. Such a
settlement would go to the root of the evil and remove all cause of
discontent; by satisfying the South, she could remain ho