Are We Ready?

Daniel Webster in 1847

“God grants liberty only to those who love it and are always ready to guard and defend it. Let our object be our country. And, by the blessing of God, may that country itself become a vast and splendid monument, not of oppression and terror, but of wisdom, of peace, and of liberty, upon which the world may gaze with admiration forever!’’

— Daniel Webster (1782-1852), in a June 3, 1834 speech. He was a New Hampshire native who served as a senator from Massachusetts and secretary of state. Many historians rank him as the greatest American orator of the 19th Century.