though they have not borne arms. They have
given of their money cheerfully and without
stint. They have been found wherever you
go, visiting our hospitals, caring for the
wounded and sick soldiers; they have been
found working for the good of those who
have been wounded in the common defence,
and aiding the widows and orphans who hive
been deprived of their protectors by the for-
tunes of war. Their position is not a new
one. If it were a thing brought here to-day
for the purpose of escaping the disastrous ef-
fects of this war, in their own person, the ar-
gument that every citizen ought to aid in the
common defence, would be good and unan-
swerable. But when we find that these people
have segregated themselves from the world
upon that main ground that they conscien-
tiously believed that the triumph of the doc-
trines of their denomination and of pure reli-
gion was a work of moral means and not of
force; when we find that they have taken as one
great theory of their religious views that the
time of the millenium, so to speak, upon the
earth, is lo be brought about by abstaining
from all contentions by arms; when we find
that they have passed through all cases of
tyranny merely by moral quiescent force, vis
inertia, and have succeeded time and again
in accomplishing their ends by the very sub-
limity of the spectacle of men who from prin-
ciple, rather than resort to means of force
which were within their reach, have quietly
endured all that could be done against them,
have quietly suffered and quietly died; the
imputation of cowardice cannot lie against
them, or the imputation that in this particu-
lar case it is an effort to evade their public
duties; but it is simply carrying out what
for long years they have persistently main-
tained to be their religious duty. And we
find too that in all civilized and Christian
countries, it has been found necessary, and it
has been sustained by the moral sense of the
rest of the community, to provide that those
having such conscientious scruples should not
be forced to bear arms.
Mr. PUGH. I will remind the gentleman
that even the last rebel Congress exempted
them.
Mr. CUSHING. Gentlemen will remember
that in the valley of Virginia a thrill of in-
dignation went through the whole community
because an old Quaker by the name of Daniel
had been forced into the military service by the
rebel forces. His grey hairs were disregarded
and his religious principles met with derision
from those men. I heard it said day after
day that the cause which required them to
force such men into their army, contrary to
the sentiment of the civilized world, could not
meet with success,
There comes a time ill every crisis of bisto-
ry in every case of war, when, if in order to
carry on the war you have not strength
enough to allow fair play to strong religious |
convictions, convictions which yon have re-
cognized in all the antecedent portion of
your history, you must fail. To attempt to
force these men into arms in defence of the
country is a confession which you would bet-
ter not put into your constitution. It is a
confession that you fear that without these
men you cannot defend your State. This we
know is not so.
It has been argued here that these men ask
you to protect them, and are unwilling to pro-
tect themselves. There never has been an in-
stance in which these men have asked you to
protect them by force of arms. The ordinary
protection against violence they pay for in
their taxes, and you are bound to furnish
them. They have never made a request for
any organized military force to protect them.
They have always taken the consequences.—
They have always said, these are our princi-
ples, and we are willing to stand our lot and
take the result.
They have been exempted by the federal gov-
ernment in the last draft from all military ser-
vice. Those of them who were drawn were
not lo be required in any single way to bear
arms or to yield military service; all the ser-
vice to be required of them is to attend the
sick and minister to the wounded. Even in
this time of calamity, in this time of national
distress, when it has called upon all other
classes of men, and when not even the minis-
ters of other Christian denominations have
been exempt from the provisions of this law,
. it is put on record as the result of the experi-
ence of this war, and as the opinion of the
military authorities that it is more advisable
not to force these men to arms; and they have
not done it.
In the whole history of our State they have
been practically exempt. I think, as my col-
league urged, that a great deal is due to them
for their unfaltering loyalty to the principle
that our constitution announces. We have
put things into this constitution not so much
from principle as because they would please
the loyal men in our midst. Here is a thing
which we are asked to put in, upon the ground
of principle, to relieve these men from viola-
ting their principles, rather than to violate
which they will die. I ask you if the preju-
dices of these men in tins matter are not quite
as much to be regarded as the prejudices of a
county or city as to the election of a sheriff,
or the tenure of office of a sheriff, or as to the
emolument of a judge.
Under this provision, as proposed by the
gentleman from Harford, testimony can be
taken whether they have been known in the
communities in which they live, to be men
who have born consistent testimony against
the bearing of arms, or whether they have
not. That is the reason I object to the sug-
gestion of the gentleman from Howard (Mr.
Sands) to put in their names. The gentleman
from Cecil (Mr. Pugh) told you that there are |
