Senator Sherman on Nationalism

Senator John Sherman (R-Ohio), speech in Congress on the new banking and currency systems, February 10, 1863.

The policy of this country ought to be to make everything national as far as possible; to nationalize our country, so that we shall love our country. If we are dependent on the United States for a currency and a medium of exchange, we shall have a broader and more generous nationality. The [lack] of such nationality, I believe, is one of the great evils of the times . . . It has been that principle of states rights, that bad sentiment that has elevated state authority above national authority, that has been the main instrument by which our government is sought to be overthrown.

Senator John Sherman (R-Ohio), speech in Congress on the new banking and currency systems, February 10, 1863.