Henry Clay - Sir Quotes

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I have heard something said about allegiance to the South. I know no South, no North, no East, no West, to which I owe any allegiance…The Union, sir, is my country.

Henry Clay

Alexander Smyth: You, sir, speak for the present generation, but I speak for posterity.
Henry Clay: Yes, and you seem resolved to speak until the arrival of your audience.

Henry Clay

I am not, sir, in favor of cherishing the passion of conquest. I am permitted … to indulge the hope of seeing, ere long, the new United States, (if you will allow me the expression,) embracing not only the old ….

Henry Clay

Sir, if you wish to avoid foreign commerce; give up all your prosperity. It is the thing protected, not the instrument of protection, that involves you in war. Commerce engenders collision, collision war, and war, the argument supposes, leads to despotism. Would the councils of that statesman be deemed who would recommend that the nation should be unarmed—that in the art of war, the material spirit, and martial exercises, should be prohibited—…—and that the great body of the people should be taught that the national happiness was to be found in perpetual peace alone? No, sir.

Henry Clay