Boyle Roche Quotes
While I write this letter, I have a pistol in one hand and a sword in the other.
In the closest call to murder in the Senate, Stuart Foote of Mississippi drew a pistol and aimed it at Benton in the heat of a debate:. Foote reconsidered and was overpowered on the Senate floor and was disarmed. There was no disciplinary action taken however. During slavery debates guns in the Congress were so common that Vice President Martin Van Buren once presided over the Senate for two weeks with a loaded pistol in each pocket.
After the attack on Fort Sumter, the South Sent “diplomats” to negotiation with the Government. Unfortunately for all, the South really was not open to negotiations as they only had two predetermined positions they would agree to: The first was that the Government should guarantee the perpetual right of states to have slavery if they wished and that fugitive slaves would be returned by the non-slave states. The second was that the Union should recognize the Confederacy as an independent nation and have peaceful relations between the two. The first was impossible to deliver even if the Union would agree to continue slavery, there was no way that the Federal Government could enforce the return of fugitive slaves from many northern states where they were free the second they set foot in the state, and the Northern states demanded States Rights and not being forced to return Fugitive Slaves forcing the Southern States to oppose States Rights when it came to Fugitive Slaves while favoring it for slavery itself. The Federal government could not enforce the Dred Scott Decision under the pro-South Buchanan administration. And Lincoln and most of the Northern Politicians would not accept a complete dissolution of the Union. There are no other possibilities the South would accept and there was really nothing to negotiate.
Sir Boyle Roche, 1st Baronet was an Irish politician. After a distinguished career in North America with the British Army, Roche became a member of the Irish House of Commons in 1775, generally acting in support of the viceregal government. He is better remembered for the language of his speeches than for his politics – they were riddled with mixed metaphors ("Mr Speaker, I smell a rat; I see him forming in the air and darkening the sky; but I'll nip him in the bud"), malapropisms and other unfortunate turns of phrase ("Why we should put ourselves out of our way to do anything for posterity, for what has posterity ever done for us?"). Roche may have been Richard Brinsley Sheridan's model for Mrs Malaprop. While arguing for a bill, Roche once said, "It would surely be better, Mr. Speaker, to give up not only a part, but, if necessary, even the whole, of our constitution, to preserve the remainder!"
