John A. Dix, 
 Speech on War with Mexico 
 1848, 
 
 Contains other speeches 
 
Weldon N. Edwards 
 
 and 
 
 Marmaduke J.Hawkins 
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 Purchased by 
 
 TRINITY COLLEGE LIBRARY 
 
 May, 1921 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
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 https://archive.org/details/speechofmrdickin01dick 
 
SPEECH 
 
 OF 
 
 MR. DICKINSON OF NEW YORK, 
 
 ox <^ 
 
 ESTABLISHING A GOVERNMENT FOR CALIFORNIA. 
 
 DELIVERED IX THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, FEBRUARY 28, 1849. 
 
 The Civil and Diplomatic Appropriation Bill having been reported to the Senate from the 
 Committee -of the Whole, and the question being on concurring in the amendment of Mr. Wal- 
 ker in relation to the Territori^. acquired from Mexico — 
 
 Mr. DICKINSON said : I do not forget, Mr. President, nor do I intend the 
 country shall forget, that more than six months have rolled away since the Sen- 
 ate, after mature deliberation and full debate, passed a bill erecting efficient civil 
 Governments in the Territories of New Mexico and California, and sent it to 
 the House of Representatives for concurrence ; where it still reposes upon the 
 table unacted on; though by the joint rules of the two Houses, it has vitality 
 at this, as it had at the last session, and needs only the concurrence of that 
 branch, and the signature of the President to become a law. Under these cir- 
 cumstances, had 1 been left to consult my own wishes. 'I would have taken no 
 further steps until the immediate representatives of the people should, in their 
 wisdom, so far sympathize with the necessitous condition of the Territories in 
 question, and the demands of the people throughout the Union, as to- act upon 
 this bill which we sent them, and either pass it as it is, or with amendments, or 
 reject it altogether. The responsibility of leaving these Territories without gov- 
 eminent has heretofore rested with the popular branch, and there I would have 
 left it ; for I am confident nothing will pass there, unless it contains some ele- 
 ment of discord which cannot and ought not to receive the sanction of the Sen- 
 ate. But other Senators, whose hopes are more sanguine than my own, in view 
 of the peculiar and alarming circumstances, have thought proper to make fur- 
 ther efforts, and to that end have brought forward various propositions for the 
 consideration of the Senate ; some giving a temporary, and some a more perma- 
 nent government for the Territories, and among them that of the Senator from 
 Wisconsin (Mr. Walker) now under consideration. It is now at the close of 
 the session, and the last hope of providing a government rests in this amend- 
 ment: for, if it is not adopted, nothing else on this subject will be. It well came 
 as an offering of peace from that young and cherished State which has just 
 been admitted to the Union ; and her Senator who offers it, for his patriotic de- 
 vction, is entitled not only to the thanks of his constituents, but to the grateful ac- 
 knowledgments of the whole people of the Union. 
 
 These Territories, with the inhabitants residing therein, I need not say, were 
 recently transferred by a foreign Government to the United Sta'es, under a 
 treaty of peace. We have taken them from their former government, if gov- 
 ernment it can be called, to our protecting arms, and since it is our practice to 
 fashion governments for our Territories, we are admonished by every considera- 
 Towers } printer, corner of Louisiana avenue and bth street. 
 
2 
 
 tion that can influence human action, to extend to them that security of life, lib- 
 erty, and property which our Constitution guaranties to the humblest American 
 citizen. The amendment under consideration attains this end ; and, although I 
 would have preferred it in another place and in another- form, it being this or 
 nothing, I have cheerfully yielded all objection either to form or substance, and 
 shall vote hereafter, as I have before, with a view to enact it into a law. And 
 I crave the indulgence of the Senate for a few moments while I state the rea- 
 sons which influence me — an indulgence I would not have sought, but for the 
 somewhat extraordinary, and, as I think, inconsistent reasons taken against it 
 by my honorable colieage. The leJading objection urged in this regard is, that 
 it confers too much power upon the Executive ; and, although my colleague pro- 
 fesses to repose high confidence in the distinguished individual who is soon to 
 be invested with the responsibility of the Executive functions, he declares he 
 'will commit to the hands of no Chief Magistrate powers so extensive and plen- 
 ary. At the last session a bill was under consideration conferring no unusual 
 power on the Executive, and this one,too, my colleague opposed and voted against 
 lor other reasons. Under other and ordinary circumstances, I should regard a pro- 
 position of this kind with disfavor; but a peculiar emergency has arisen in our his- 
 tory, demanding prompt and decisive measures, and for one I am prepared to 
 meet it with corresponding action. I have no honeyed phrases for the ear of 
 the incoming President. It is enough for me that 1 have done him no injus- 
 tice, in thought, word, or deed. If he is interested to know my sentiments con- 
 cerning him, lie will best learn them by the manner in which 1 discharge 
 the relations in which we are soon to be placed, and I shall judge of him by his 
 public and official conduct. For all the purposes of this question, I wiii not in-r 
 quire upon what name is cast the powers and responsibilities of the Executive,, 
 nor by what por tion of the people elected. I shall regard him only as the great 
 and honored agent of the American people, upon him as such I shall seek 
 to devolve the duties, and in him as such I shall confide for their discreet and 
 judicious exercise ; holding him at all times, as those whose servant he is will 
 hold him, to a most rigid and severe accountability. He is clothed by the Con- 
 stitution with the whole power of the army and navy of the United States, of 
 which he is commander-in-chief, and in that capacity will wield for the preser- 
 vation of order in these Territories all that is arbitrary and despotic in our insti- 
 tutions, and I fear not to mitigate the rigor of this sanguinary code by substitut- 
 ing the Constitution for the sword, the minister of justice for the bayoneted sol- 
 dier, and the rectifying influences of the common law for military rule. It is 
 merely permitting the President temporarily, and until Congress shall make fur- 
 ther provisions, through legal and constitutional agencies, to extend to the people 
 civil instead of military government ; for the purpose of enforcing the perform- 
 ance of contracts, of punishing crime, and for the preservation of social order,. 
 And when its propriety is rendered obvious by circumstances of such extreme 
 urgencv, I shall favor it with my whole heart, let who will oppose, and for what- 
 ever reasons, alleged or real. Nor can those consistently resist it who believe 
 that a government of opinion and law is superior in its moral influences to a 
 government of force. Without descending to details, as tedious as they are 
 profitless, it is sufficient for my purpose to say, that the amendment imder con- 
 sideration is the same in substance as the laws by which Florida and Louisiana 
 were successfully governed for a number of years after their acquisition, respec- 
 tively, by the United States. They were acquired as were New Mexico and 
 California, with a foreign population. Under this Executive form of govern- 
 ment prosperity attended them ; they were admitted into the Union as equal 
 members of the Confederacy, and no detriment came to either government or 
 people. It is far easier to cavil over and multiply objections against any and 
 
3 
 
 every proposition which can be suggested, than to procure the passage of some 
 reasonable measure which will give law and protection to those which haw 
 neither. 
 
 But my colleague, in detailing his reasons for opposing this amendment, has 
 employed some of the strongest arguments in its favor ; reasons which doubt- 
 less induced its introduction in this form by the Senator who moved it. He re- 
 minds us that the inhabitants residing there on the ratification of the treaty were 
 a semi barbarous race, who could neither read, write, speak, nor understand our 
 language ; that they are utterly unacquainted with the character of our institu- 
 tions, and have none of the essential qualifications of freemen ; that the tempo- 
 rary inhabitants and those who have migrated there are many of them deserters 
 from the army and navy — outcasts and adventurers from all parts of the world, 
 of the most desperate and abandoned character, attracted thither by a spirit of 
 avarice, without the moral restraints which uphold civilized communities ; and 
 that the bonds of society are virtually dissolved. And yet, when this is the last 
 hope of extending them any protection, in the same breath he inveighs against 
 giving them a temporary government peculiarly suited to their anomalous con- 
 dition, and strong enough to hold in check the violence and anarchy which so 
 alarmingly prevail there, lest it may not be, word for word and letter for letter, as 
 some other territorial government, at some other time and under some other cir- 
 cumstances, has been ; and lest, too, more power may be temporarily- confided 
 to the President than ordinarily would be prudent or desirable.' He tells .-us this, 
 people must pass through the process of fermentation, to employ his own term, 
 before they will be qualified to discharge the duties of citizens ; and he proposes 
 to encourage that process by administering to them the ordinance of 1787.. This, 
 he seems to suppose, would at once put their fermental qualities in motion? and 
 carry off all physical, moral, and political impurities, and leave them fitted ta 
 discharge understanding^ many, if not all, the high functions of self-govern- 
 ment. They are now depressed and degraded, is the argument, and they must 
 be raised, by the leaven of this celebrated ordinance, from vice and barbarism 
 and ignorance to the highest privileges of freemen. By its magic influences all 
 shall then read, write, speak, and understand our language and comprehend the 
 spirit of our institutions ; and the avaricious aspirations of the worshippers of 
 mammon, who are digging for the root of all evil upon the shores of the Sacra- 
 mento, shall be chastened to the temper and quiet of the most self-denying and 
 orderly. Empirics in medicine usually have some one infallible remedy for ail 
 manner of diseases which afflict our nature, whether chronic or acute, whether 
 of body or of mind, or howsoever originating or tending; and, I say it with be- 
 coming respect, disclaiming all application of the remark except to a political 
 organization or class, the ordinance of 1787 is by some prescribed at all times 
 and upon all occasions as a catholicon for all political ills or embarrassments fa 
 which society is heir. 
 
 But amongst other propositions submitted to the Senate, have been those pro- 
 viding for the admission of California as a State. One of these has been before 
 us. It was ably discussed and fully considered, and was rejected, receiving oniv, 
 four votes in its favor ; and, although a duplicate is yet upon our orders, no one 
 proposes to revive it, or to attempt the hopeless task of breathing into it life. 
 My colleague has, however, thought proper, for reasons to me utterly incompre- 
 hensible, to exhume the remains, and sabject them in detail to a post mortem 
 examination — a process evidently distasteful to himself, and certainly unneces- 
 sary for the benefit of either dead or living. The proposition is not before us in 
 form or substance, in whole or in part, and is not to be. Whenever it or a 
 like project is, it will be soon enough for me to discuss it. It will be in 
 season for me to justify it whenever I propose to vote for it or sustain it ; but 
 
4 
 
 ihe meantime I shall leave it to its repose, and shall not permit objections, 
 whether of form or substance, whether real or imaginary, taken against that 
 bill, to be urged against, argued into, or interwoven with the provision under 
 consideration, for the purpose of raising a prejudice against it, when the two 
 are about as unlike as they could be framed in the same language. Accustomed 
 £o discuss the question before us, I cannot consent to depart from my usual 
 course. I concede the victory over the dead bill, under the circumstances, to 
 be complete and triumphant, and as easy withal as was that of a distinguished 
 warrior over his celebrated knights in buckram. 
 
 He further informs us that he will not consent to the dismemberment of Cali- 
 fornia, or to play towards New Mexico the part of Russia and other Powers to- 
 wards Poland ! Nor will I ! Nor will I ever consent to play towards our Territo- 
 ries the part of Great Britain to the American colonies ! And does he inform us 
 who will do what he disclaims ? Why, I inquire, this declaration here ? Is it 
 pretended that this amendment proposes any merger of the one or dismember- 
 ment of the other, or any thing of th.e kind 1 Certainly not ; for it merely pro- 
 vides for the administration of law and the preservation of order in the whole 
 territory acquired by the treaty, until Congress shall make further and more 
 ample provisions. If it is intended to insinuate that those who favor this 
 amendment would either merge or dismember, the remark is unjust. If a mere 
 abstract declaration of patriotism, quite well, but at least gratuitous. 
 
 But, sir, the for-a-time concealed objection against providing this temporary 
 government has finally had developement, where I supposed it would, in the agi- 
 tation of the question of slavery. I listened with unfeigned pleasure to the 
 startling appeals against the danger of Executive power and patronage which 
 this amendment proposed to confer, and to other criticisms of that class, well 
 calculated to interest the Senate, and amuse the public. I experienced a mo- 
 mentary gratification that some other bugbear than the extension of slavery had 
 been brought out, and that ?ome other dish than black broth was to be served 
 up v and was ready to exclaim with Macbeth, "take any other shape than that." 
 It soon, however, degenerated to the same^old cry, which, without having accom- 
 plished one good or humane purpose, has for the last few years arrestecHhe legis- 
 lation of Congress, and served to array one section of the Union in strife and 
 bitterness against the other. Upon this miserable question, which is all that has 
 heretofore prevented, and now prevents the organization of these Territories, I 
 propose a iew general considerations ; and that we may properly appreciate the 
 present, and have due regard for the future, we • should not be unmindful of the 
 Mstory of the past. 
 
 When a portion of these States were colonies of Great Britain, that Gov- 
 ernment insisted upon abolishing the Colonial Legislatures, and subjecting 
 our people, in matters that concerned their domestic condition, to the legisla- 
 tion of Parliament ; and the controversy which arose over this question, more 
 than any other, produced that revolution which resulted in declaring the 
 colonies to be free and independent States. Not only were they free and inde- 
 pendent of other Governments, but as independent of each other as they were 
 of the gigantic Power whose acknowledgement of independence they had con- 
 quered. Although they had successfully struggled for liberty, by a united effort 
 in a common cause, and were bound together by a feeling of sympathy and of 
 interest, they were united by no political bonds whatsoever, and no single State 
 nor any number had the right, in either a moral or political sense, to interfere 
 with or question the institutions of any other. Slavery then existed in all the 
 States, and it was easily seen that while it would speedily be abolished in some, 
 from natural causes, it would long continue in others, whether or not a union of 
 the States was formed ; and as slavery must exist, it was wisely deemed better 
 
5 
 
 to have a Union with slavery, than slavery without a Union. Its existence was 
 then as now deplored, but then not as now the spirit of patriotism rose above the 
 spirit of a sickly philanthropy and local benevolence, and the patriots of that day, 
 with the spirit of the revolution upon them, saw that the triumph which, under the 
 blessing of Heaven, they had achieved, would be best secured, and the general 
 welfare of the States and of the people best promoted, by uniting together in one 
 great confederacy for purposes specially defined. And, animated by the influen- 
 ces which impelled them onward, the Constitution, which binds together this 
 family of sovereign States, and secures by abundant guaranties the rights and 
 interests of each and all, was formed and adopted, and still each State, in all that 
 concerns its domestic condition, is as sovereign and indeoendent as it was before. 
 And how, from that auspicious moment, has our progress been upward and on- 
 ward ! From three we .have advanced to twenty millions of people — from thir- 
 teen to thirty sovereign S^tes, with almost boundless territorial possessions. 
 Peace and prosperity attend us ; industry is amply rewarded ; labor is not bur- 
 dened ; want and famine are unknown ; we are respected among the great na- 
 tions of the earth ; and, so far as has been vouchsafed to fallen man. life, liberty, 
 and the pursuit of happiness are secured to all. Haman could not enjoy the 
 honors and blessings with which he was laden, because Mordecai the Jew was 
 permitted to sit at the king's gate ; and, like that envious and malignant demon, 
 there are those amongst us to whom all these blessings avail nothing, so long 
 as a portion of the States continue, under the guaranties of the Constitution, that 
 which existed in all at the time the Confederacy was formed; and they openly 
 demand and deliberately petition that the Union be dissolved for this cause alone, 
 I am aware it will be said that this extreme and frantic outcry proceeds only 
 from a few madmen and fanatics, and is the joint effort of the weak and the 
 wicked, and that- those who are now in the incipient stages of the same disease 
 do not propose to follow them, and only oppose the further extension of slavery. 
 But it was only yesterday, as it were, that many of those who now cry loudest 
 and go furthest were where others have commenced ; and again, to-morrow, 
 those who have just taken their first lessons will find themselves where others 
 who have travelled in the same direction have gone before them. It has been 
 unfortunately discovered that "the ambitious youth who fired the Ephesian dome 
 survived in fame the pious fool who reared it," and a thirst for notoriely has 
 been the order of the day. For three years we have been unable to organize 
 a territory, to pass a bill of appropriation, to declare war, to feed and clothe a 
 famishing army, or to ratify a treaty of peace, without encountering in our path- 
 way the hideous and hag like shadow of slave agitation. Even this attempt to 
 give to an unprotected people the temporary benefits of law and order is resisted 
 in the same quarters and by the same arguments and; influences that others have 
 been, and my colleague tells us he can vole for no bill unless it oontains the 
 provisions of the ordinance of 1787. This, like the voracious rod of Aaron, 
 with him, swallows up all other considerations. By way, doubtless, of investing 
 it with additional consideration, he has given us the benefit of its history, and 
 shows that Mr. Jefferson proposed one of a similar character in 1734, which 
 was not adopted. I will spend no time in commenting upon the historic tru- 
 isms, with which it is sought to surround and magnify* this provision and the pro- 
 ceedings in which it originated ; for it has, in my judgment, no more application 
 to our present condition, as mere authority, than an extract of equal length froir. 
 the Koran of Mahomet. But my colleague has seen the orignal draught of the 
 one offered by Mr. Jefferson which was rejected, and is able to testify that it is 
 actually in the handwriting of that distinguished statesman. W ell, suppose it is. 
 However interesting this may be to the curious in such matters, and especially 
 to the collectors of autography, I am yet unable to perceive what practical value 
 
6 
 
 k affords for the purposes in question. Suppose it could be found in the lan- 
 guage of inspiration, in the original Hebrew, and in the handwriting of a pro- 
 phet or an apostle, this ought not td, and would not, with those who judge of a 
 matter by what it contains rather than the source from which it comes, give it 
 any additional fitness for a purpose entirely foreign to that for which it was pre- 
 pared and proposed, and to which it has not now, and never had, any just appli- 
 cation whatsoever. 
 
 The ordinance proposed by Mr. Jefferson in 1784, which was rejected, and 
 that which was proposed by Mr. Dane, of Massachusetts, and others, and was 
 adopted in 1787, were, it will be seen, proposed before the States were united 
 ander a Constitution, and while our fathers were groping, by the dim lights 
 which the history of that period afforded, for some plan of confederacy by which 
 the territory in question, ceded or to be ceded by particular States, for the benefit 
 of all, should be governed. There was then no Constitution creating the Federal 
 Government and defining and limiting its powers, and it was competent for in- 
 dividual States ceding their territory to prescribe such terms and provisions as 
 they should choose, and for the States generally, by such special agreement or 
 compact as they could unite upon, to specify the terms and conditions on which 
 the ceded territory should be governed. It was a contract proposed to be enter- 
 ed into by all the parties interested, and as such derived all its character and 
 force. And now, because a certain agreement was made by the parties inter- 
 ested for the government of the Northwestern Territory, ceded by particular 
 States for the benefit of all, before we had a Constitution to guide us, it is in- 
 sisted that, under the Constitution, from which Congress derives all its authority, 
 and in which no such power is specified, Congress shall do, as a matter of right, 
 m defiance of the protest of a portion of the States, to the common property, that 
 which was done by the consent of all, including the sole owner, before the Con- 
 stitution was adopted. The difference, when properly illustrated, being simply 
 this: Three individuals enter into an agreement for their mutual benefit and 
 advantage, and abide by its provisions. Three others of equal rights, under 
 other circumstances, not being able to agree satisfactorily, two of them, finding 
 that an agreement had once been voluntarily made by three, insist that the pre- 
 cedent ought to be followed, and compel the third by force to submit to their 
 terms. Besides, if there is any particular charm belonging to this ordinance 
 which entitles it to be adopted, whether applicable or not to our condition, it 
 should be taken as a whole — in all its parts and with all its provisions. One of 
 ■these is as follows, and its perusal will, show the utter absurdity of its applica- 
 tion to our present condition : 
 
 " That both the temporary and permanent Governments shall be established on these princi- 
 ples as their basis; that they shall be subject to pay a part of the Federal debts, contracted or to 
 be contracted, to be apportioned on them by Congress according to the same common rule and 
 measure by which apportionments thereof shall be made on the other States." 
 
 A proposal at this time to impose upon the temporary Government of a Ter- 
 ritory a portion of the federal debts, contracted or to be contracted, would be 
 universally received throughout the Union with derision and indignation; and 
 yet it may be as fairly insisted upon as a valuable precedent of binding authority 
 as any other provision of the ordinance. We must not go forward, but all legis- 
 lation must be arrested until the burial-field of deceased documents can be ran- 
 sacked, and the marrowless bones of the ordinance of '87 be clothed anew with 
 flesh and sinews, that it may perform, regardless of the Constitution, an office it 
 was designed to discharge without one. We must be dragged back from a per- 
 fect Union to a patched-up Confederacy, and our mature manhood of this cen- 
 iury be cramped and fettered by the swaddling habiliments of the infant of a 
 past one. Anarchy must reign, and bloodshed and crime and disorder triumph 
 
7 
 
 in the Territories, until we can demonstrate a political problem from some musty 
 precedent, and, instead of acting for ourselves, as the occasion requires, we 
 must try to ascertain how others have acted at some other time, upon some other 
 occasion, that we may act like them. 
 
 But it seems that the cognomen by which this ordinance has recently been 
 known, and under which it has transacted a somewhat extensive business, is no 
 longer deemed desirable, and that a change, which is seldom sought for slight 
 or transient causes, has been thought prudent, if not necessary. My honorable 
 colleague, feeling an interest in the success and welfare of this deceased pape 
 not only burst its cerements and brought it up again to revisit earth, bit him- 
 self led it to the political font, and performed the priestly ritual of christening it 
 the "Jefferson proviso!" If the illustrious and venerated statesman whose 
 impress rests upon all that is enduring and beautiful in our political system could 
 so far participate in the affairs of the living as to see his acts for good perverted 
 to pernicious purposes ; hear his memory desecrated by associating his history 
 with this causeless agitation ; his authority invoked for casting amongst us this 
 apple of bitterness and discord ; and, finally, hear those who would still 
 fan the fires of disunion, disturb his repose by calling upon his great and 
 spotless name, he would exclaim, as did the prophet, raised by the incan- 
 tations of the familiar spirit, fe when the guilty Saul would have escaped from 
 * the consequences of his perfidious career, " why hast thou disquieted me to 
 bring me up?" My colleague is proverbial for his strong sense of justice, 
 and his scrupulous regard for the rights of property, and yet he has, quite un- 
 consciously, I am sure, proposed to do an act which must be a violation of both — 
 an act which his generous instincts will prompt him to correct the first moment 
 he sees the consequences which must ensue. He is well versed in classic and 
 political readings : the first of which must have taught him that Mark Antony 
 gave up all for women, and the latter that a distinguished individual gave up all 
 else that the " proviso" might bear his name ; and yet he coolly proposes to 
 transfer this name, with all its accumulated honors and invaluable advantages, 
 to another. Sir, in the name of common justice, I most solemnly protest against 
 this marked and wanton violation of private and individual tight. Call it the 
 44 Jefferson Proviso!" Should this be attempted, the person by whose name 
 it has been known might cry out somewhat in the language of lago — 
 
 " Who steals my purse, steals trash ; 'tis something, nothing ; 
 'Twas mine, 'tis his ; and has been slave to thousands. 
 But he that filches from me my proviso, 
 Robs me of that which not enriches him, 
 And makes me po»r indeed." 
 
 My colleague, notwithstanding the degraded and disorderly condition and unfit 
 character for self-government which he attributes to the people of these Territo- 
 ries, would give them a full territorial government if it could contain his favor- 
 ite clause of restriction. Now, a full territorial government, as heretofore given, 
 authorizes the election by the people of a territorial legislature, and the passage 
 by such legislature of their municipal laws, usually, but not always, subject to 
 the supervision of Congress ; and in these relations it will be seen that they are 
 called upon to exercise some of the highest privileges of freemen. If, then, they 
 are so ignorant, degraded, and barbarous as to be unfit for any of the duties of 
 self-government, why propose to require them at their hands, or object to the 
 preservation of order in a more summary form, until they shall be better quali- 
 fied ? But, in arguing the justice and. propriety of applying the restriction to 
 the organization of a territorial government, he states that Congress stands in 
 the same relation to the people of a Territory that the State Legislatures do to 
 the people of a State. From this doctrine I respectfully but most unqualifiedly 
 
8 
 
 dissent, and insist that the relations are entirely dissimilar. The State Legis- 
 latures are the creations of the people of the respective States. The members 
 of the State Legislature are elected by the people of the State, and are their 
 representatives and servants; but no such relation exists, or has ever existed, 
 between Congress and the people of a Territory. Congress is not created by 
 the people of the Territory. They have no vote in it ; its members are not 
 elected by, nor are they, the servants or the representatives of the people of the 
 Territories, or in the remotest degree answerable to them. Congress holds the 
 same relation to the people of the Territories that the British Parliament held 
 to the American colonies ; and the doctrines sought to be enforced by those who 
 advocate the restrictive policy are the same old exploded theories of George III, 
 against which our fathers rebelled, dressed up in new clothes, that the imposition 
 may be the more successful. The principle that a distant people, in the forma- 
 tion of a Government, need a master to administer restrictions to preserve them 
 from running headlong to ruin in their policy, is founded in a distrust of popular 
 intelligence and virtue ; and, whether emanating from an Eastern despotism, the 
 British Parliament, or the American Congress, violates the first principles of 
 free Government, and seeks to rule a people rather than permit them to rule 
 themselves. The American people, when colonies, being no further from the 
 mother country than our Pacific possessions are from us, insisted, to revolution 
 and blood, upon the right to legislate for themselves ; and now, shouM they seek 
 to enforce the same doctrine upon the people of their own Territories, they would # 
 be like him who, after his own debt was forgiven him, took his fellow-servant by 
 the throat that he might enforce the payment of a two- penny demand. 
 
 I have urged, for the government of the Territories, when a sufficient number 
 of American cifizens or others who can appreciate the obligations of freemen 
 shall be there, a free Territorial Government — not that kind of freedom which, 
 with liberty on its lips, distrusts the capacity of man for self-governmen(, and 
 seeks to hedge him about witlr provisos and restrictions ; nor that freedom which 
 must be kept in leading strings, held by some master power three thousand miles 
 distant, lest man shall care less for himself than his distant fellows shall care for 
 him, and be less wise in governing himself than others would be in acting as 
 his governor ; but that freedom which springs from the best instincts of the 
 heart, and believes that man is better qualified to Yule himself than to govern 
 his neighbor. The Constitution has given no authority to Congress to legislate 
 for the peojile of a Territory, and consequently it has no such right ; and Mr. 
 Madison has pronounced any such attempt to be without the shadow of constitu- 
 tional law. But, in legislating for the property of territories, which Congress may 
 do, and in aiding the infant settlements to erect their government, Congress has 
 prescribed general enactments, serving as constitutions for the people of the 
 Territory rather than laws, and has sent out officers to aid in enforcing them. 
 This course has in all cases been received with favor by the people of the Ter- 
 ritories ; they have adopted as their own what Congress has been pleased to 
 send them, and have framed their own local laws, from time to time, in accord- 
 ance with the legislation of Congress. The whole doctrine of a just Gov- 
 ernment, according to the republican theory, consists in the consent of the gov- 
 erned ; and any other, no matter by what name it is known, is despotism and 
 slavery. And it is from the consent of the people of the Territory, and the ac- 
 quiescence of the States, that this usage has derived all its force. But those 
 who advocate restriction seek to repudiate this principle of true self-government, 
 and then proclaim it too feeble for the sphere of its duties. I do not contend that 
 the people of a Territory have sovereign power as a Government, because the 
 sovereignty of a Government as such is a creation of man. But, as man de- 
 rives his sovereignty from his Maker,.! insist that the people of a Territory are f 
 
9 
 
 as much sovereign there, as in a State, (unless, which will not be contended, they 
 may lose their birthright by residing in a Territory.) and in all that concerns o: 
 relates to their domestic condition, should, in conformity with our federative sys= 
 tern and the principle of self-government, be permitted to make their own tem- 
 porary regulations of domestic policy — of course in harmony with the principles 
 of the Constitution and the rights of the States. This would give to the people 
 of the Territories the rights that belong to them ; would turn the vexatious and 
 agitating question of slavery out of Congress, where it has no business, and 
 should never have entered, and leave the constitutional rights of the States upon 
 this question to be decided by the judicial tribunals, when any one shall see fit to 
 raise it. To this complexion it must come ; for, if the Constitution confers the 
 right to carry slaves to a Territory, all the acts which Congress can pass forever 
 cannot take away the right, nor transfer it to other tribunals. It is a judicial 
 question, and must be disposed of as the Constitution has provided. 
 
 In further proceeding with his argument in favor of the restrictive principle, 
 my colleague describes slavery as amongst the greatest evils, both apparent and 
 real, that can afflict and debase a people ; and yet he will not trust our brethren, 
 friends and neighbors, who are emigrating there in thousands from the Northern 
 States, who will shape the destinies of this country, and control the course of its 
 legislation, and are as well qualified to legislate as the people of the States who 
 they have left behind them, lest they may. against their own interests, wishes, 
 and convenience, erect slavery there in spite of themselves. Does he not fear 
 the people of Xew York will re-establish it? There is no proviso to prevent, 
 them from doing so whenever they please ; and perchance our friends, when 
 they reach California, and will be no further from us than we are from them, may 
 have fears about equally just that slavery may be again authorized in the North- 
 ern States. Besides, while seeking to protect them from themselves against this 
 great and overshadowing evil, if they are indeed incapable of self-government 
 and self-preservation, there are some of minor moment to which they must stand 
 exposed ; and I would suggest to those who believe in governing other commu- 
 nities that, they should be exempted by law from drowning by the waters of the 
 Pacific, and from destruction by fire ; or, as the poet expresses it, from " sinking 
 in the devouring flood, or more devouring flame." 
 
 We have been told in this debate, what I have often heard before, that those 
 who are constantly agitating this question have no intention of interfering witb 
 slavery in the States. Oh, no ! as though a forbearance so generous was en- 
 titled to great commendation. And what merit, pray tell, is claimed for this i 
 Would any one take to himself credit because he did not enter the jurisdiction 
 of a sovereign State and trample upon its laws, and subject himself to a charge 
 of" felony, and set himself up to regulate the standard of its political and social 
 morals, and claim the right to overthrow that which he disliked and help himself 
 to whatever he should desire 1 He certainly would not ; and yet he would have 
 as good a right to do all this, in a moral or political sense, as he would to inter- 
 fere with this institution in the States where it exists by law. Why are we not 
 also told, if there is a merit in abstaining from matters in which we have no con- 
 cern, that there is no intention to interfere with the manufacturing system o: 
 Massachusetts, or the banking in Indiana, or the rights of primogeniture in 
 England, or the Republican Government in France ? We have as much right 
 to dq either as we have to interfere in any respect with the domestic affairs of a 
 sovereign State. 
 
 The great mass of the Northern people, and I speak of the peop.e 01 New 
 York, are less excited upon the subject of slavery than would appear from the 
 declarations of those who claim the right to speak for them. They regar: 1 •• 
 very as an evil, but they know that it is not now and was not at the adoption of 
 
io 
 
 ■the Constitution an original question ; but was, as my colleague has stated, L 
 planted here while we were subjects of the British Crown, against the wishes 
 
 and without the consent of the colonies. New York abolished slavery herself c , 
 
 when it suited her own sense of propriety and her interest, wishes, and conve-, ; a 
 
 nience, without the gratuitous and impertinent interference of other States, or f 
 
 the officious dictation of Congress. And the mass of her people are willing u 
 
 other States shall foll©w her example, when in like manner it shall seem to « 
 
 them "best : and they believe such States to be the most proper judges in the 0I 
 
 premises. They have no doubt that emancipation has been retarded in a number foj 
 
 by the ill-timed proceedings and intermeddlings of fanaticism and bigotry. They r 
 
 believe that the advantages and burdens, the good and the evil, the responsibility ; , : 
 Ibere and the responsibility hereafter, belong to the States where it exists and 
 
 not to them ; that they are not entitled to reap the fruits of its labor, nor re- 0 
 
 quired to care for its endless vexations, nor to answer for its sins. Having j ; 
 
 abolished it themselves, they do not, like the Pharasee, thank God that ihey are y, 
 
 not as other men ; but they believe the people of the Southern States as intelli- ' t \ 
 
 gent and as virtuous as themselves, and as regardful of the principles of sound a 
 
 morality, just law, and pure religion. They see that this great matter cannot j - 
 
 be hastily disposed of; that the mere question whether they shall be emancipa- \ 
 
 ted or longer held in servitude, were it practicable, is but a single verse in the r 
 
 dark and difficult chapter of its history; and that it is wiser to leave it to the I c 
 
 guidance of those whose institution and property it is, and who have a right to t , 
 control it, under the benificent care of -that 
 
 " Providence that shapes our ends, a 
 Rough hew them how we will." 
 
 Nor have the great mass of the Northern people any desire to interfere with ] 
 this institution, under some plausible pretence, for the purpose of accomplishing , 
 by circuity and indirection that which they have not the manliness to attempt j 
 openly ; and hence they will not, under the plea of preventing the extension of ; 
 slavery, set on foot and prosecute a bootless guerrilla warfare of irritation against j f 
 their sister States by agitating the question of slavery in the Territories, in the | 
 District of Columbia, or in the arsenals, navy yards, and other places where | 
 Congress has jurisdiction. They read, too, in the Constitution that fugitives 
 held to service by the laws of one State escaping into another are to be deliv- 
 ered up to the jurisdiction from whence they fled, not to be enslaved, if they are 
 freemen, as is the cant phrase of the times, but to have their rights adjudicated 
 by the laws of the State where the service is claimed. All reflecting men must 
 see and know that it is as much a violation of the letter and spirit of the Consti- 
 tution, in the sight of God and in the judgment of men, to harbor and secrete a 
 fugitive from the laws of a State which held him to service as to shelter and 
 protect a fugitive from justice, and that the one is no less questionable in expe- 
 diency or flagrant in morals than the other. These provisions are clearly written 
 in our fundamental law, and he who violates them or either of them, under the 
 shallow justification that they are of no moral force, violates the primary duties 
 of citizenship and commits treason against his Government. They see and 
 know that they cannot elevate this unfortunate race, either as individuals or as 
 a people, by the angry agitation of the question, or by harboring and secreting 
 fugitive slaves, and that the only fruits produced by it will be to multiply wretch- 
 ed outcasts and swell the volume of misery, pauperism, and crime — to add phy- 
 sical want and suffering to moral ana 1 mental depression, increase the number of 
 vagabonds, and literally degrade degradation. The North, as a people, want 
 not this race among them, as is suggested by this bastard philanthropy. They 
 want not the sick, the decrepit, and the infirm to be supported in their poor- 
 houses ; nor the vicious and immoral for their prisons ; nor the few whose in- 
 
11 
 
 tegrity and health shall survive a transition from a genial to a rigorous clime — 
 from a long state of tutelage to one of self-preservation and self-dependence — to 
 come among them without social or political rights, to degrade the honest white 
 laborers of the North by mingling with them and competing for their labor. 
 'They see that two races of men so dissimilar in physical development, whether 
 as slaves or freemen, cannot exist together upon terms of equality without de- 
 grading both. Heaven has so ordained and man cannot subvert the decree — 
 one will be elevated and the other degraded. A woe has been pronounced upon 
 him who shall sever what God hath joined, and a like one should be proclaimed 
 against him who joins that which Heaven by such marked physical laws has 
 sundered. 
 
 We have heard many pceans sung to the dignity of free labor, and have been 
 often told of the especial regard which slave agitators of all others entertain for 
 it. But let it be remember.ed that their whole effort has the effect, if it has not 
 the benefit of the design, to infuse among the free white laborers of the North 
 the fumes of free negroism, with its moral and political beauties, and introducing 
 .among them the fugitive slaves of the Southern States and the emancipated ne- 
 groes of the District of Columbia, and degrading the poor white men of the 
 North to the level of the black. Nor do the people of New York, generally, 
 indulge that kind of benevolence which, as has been heretofore suggested, would 
 confine the colored race within boundaries so limited that, by suffering, impo- 
 tency^ barrenness, and death, the whole race, as existing, thall be exterminated. 
 They are willing the colored race should go out into any community who are 
 anxious or willing to receive them. The direction to man to replenish the earth 
 was not limited in its operation by Him who gave it to any particular race or color. 
 But modern benevolence essays to correct the error; and, not satisfied with 
 placing restrictions upon the laws of man, proposes to extend a proviso to this 
 mandate of Heaven, and to confine the multiplication hereafter to the while race 
 alone. Let not the great mass of the Northern people be held responsible for 
 the slavery agitation which is carried on in their name — originating in the mis- 
 taken benevolence and dark designs of a few, and yielded to and fostered by 
 timid and time-serving politicians, who hold* the people as weak and irrational 
 as themselves, and believe them capable of hazarding *he integrity of the Union 
 lest, against existing legal and physical impediments, there shall purchance be 
 one dark skin less in Maryland and one more in California. 
 
 I am too well aware that all who advocate the doctrine of non-interference, 
 who stand up for the sovereign rights of the States and the guaranties of the 
 Constitution, must breast the blind fury of a fearful storm, and be covered over 
 with epithets of bitterness and opprobium. He- is, say they, a friend to the ex- 
 tension of slavery ; he is sold to the South ; he is the apologist of slave aggres- 
 sion, and wishes to degrade free labor and abolish freedom ! But, sir, while I 
 can look with becoming pity upon ignorance and weakness, I hurl from me with 
 hissing and contempt alike the whine of the hypocrite and the bluster of the 
 demagogue. I see spread out before us a great and happy country, with such 
 institutions as Heaven has never before vouchsafed to fallen man ; and 1 see, 
 too, that when once they are riven and uprooted, the night of despotism, in 
 which the genius of evil and violence and anarchy will hold her awful court, will 
 be long and gloomy. Oh, may our glorious tree of liberty sink its roots deeper 
 in the soil of freedom, and extend its branches until all the oppressed and strick- 
 en of earth may find beneath it shelter and repose ! This was the chosen asy- 
 lum of the genius of liberty on earth, and when it shall be banished hence, after 
 coursing over the worlds desolate waste and finding no rest for the sole of its 
 foot, will it not return, fluttering for admission like the dove at the window ofthe 
 ark, to the "bosom of its father and its God?" 
 
12 
 
 P 
 en'- 
 pt. 
 ve:> 
 fat 
 
 ID) 
 
 I am not one of those who assume to be wiser or more benevolent than weiP . 
 the fathers of the Constitution. They did not tremble and quake because slavei 
 had existence, but they rose above the influences of a spurious philanthropy, an 
 a more spurious philosophy, and ^formed a confederacy of sovereign equal: 
 They listened not to that fearful and ominous cry which falls harshly on raj ea 
 the North ! the North ! the South ! the South ! but taught us alone the magi 
 words, "the Union." I do not fear soon its dissolution in form, but I fear fa 
 more its dissolution in spirit. That union ordained of Heaven, which lies 
 the foundation of society, and upholds and adorns all that is sacred and beaulifi 
 in our social system, displays not its value or its moral beauty, because man an 
 woman are bound together in the bonds of legalized matrimony, but becaus 
 they fulfil the relations which a wise Providence ordained, and mutually height 
 en the joys and alleviate the sorrows which attend us through the chequer^ 
 ed scenes of this eventful pilgrimage ; and when they hopelessly fail to discharge! 
 these reciprocal duties, and mock each other with crimination and recrimina 
 tion, it is better that the tie which binds them as one were severed. The vaiut 1 
 of this Union does not consist in the binding together of thirty sovereign State* 
 with hooks of steel and chains of adamant, but because they stand united togeth 
 er for beneficent purposes, forming one great and shining light — a beacon to thi 
 weary and tempest-tossed — a terror to tyranny and usurpation — and each stii' r °-' 
 an independent star in the constellation of political hope. But, if they musjj 
 stand arrayed against each other, or section against section — if, instead of kinc 00 
 offices and friendly relations, they are to exchange angry reproaches and threat-' a!i 
 ening menaces, that moral beauty which has hitherto attended them has depart-" 
 ed- — the life and spirit which gave birth to the Union has ceased to animate ifJ 3 
 and one fatal step has been taken upon the road to dissolution. 
 
 Nothing can subvert this happy Union but the formation of sectional parties j ne 
 and that, if successful, will. It is but an institution of man, and cannot and? 1 
 ought not to survive the successful organization of factions. If a sectional Pret! 1 
 sident and Vice President should be elected upon an irritating sectional issue,! 1 ', 
 and a sectional Cabinet be formed — and no other could be — if from the South,! 11 ' 
 no Northern representative having the least remains ot the spirit of his fathers; 0 ' 
 would ever enter the councils of such a Government: and, if from the North, no j6 
 Southern man could be found so debased as to come into one, formed upon terms ^ 
 of compromise for the whole, when the principles had been subverted, that a de- 
 stroying faction might rise upon its ruins. As a Northern man, I would never 
 cross the portals of a Government brought into power upon a Southern sectional 
 issue, and I would animate my countrymen to flee from it as from contagion. 
 And I boldly declare, after the manner of Pitt, that, were I a Southern man, asj 
 I am a Northern one, I never would consent to recognise for a moment an Admin- 
 istration brought into power upon a Northern sectional issue — never, never,' 
 never ! This attempt to create sectional parties is the evil tendency of the times, j 
 and he who seeks to foster them, be his purpose, real or avowed, what it may — j 
 whether to minister to the cravings of a mean ambition or to gratify a fiendish 
 lingering revenge ; whether he has been laden with the honors of the people, 
 and pampered at their treasury; or whether he be the incendiary, whose price 
 of purchase is less than thirty pieces of silver — the taint of treason and perfidy 
 will cling to him in after times like the poisoned tunic of mythology ; God will- 
 set a mark upon him, as upon the brow of the first murderer of man, that all shall 
 know him ; out it will be a mark for destruction, and not for safety, and society 
 will hunt him from its abodes like a ferocious and venomous beast. He will not 
 be saved by the counterfeited cry that he is merely opposing the extension of 
 slavery; but, like the murderous captain of the host, the vengeance of an indigo 
 nant people will slay him at the very horns of the altar. 
 
13 
 
 But the hour of the greatest danger has passed, and agitation is lowering its 
 ont. It has well near completed its course of mischief; it has discharged its 
 igrant errand ; it is functus officio. Its profane and unholy temples are crumb- 
 ng to their downfall, and will soon tell only in their gloomy ruins of a period 
 f error, folly, and delusion. The impious priesthood who ministered at their 
 Diluted altars have been disrobed and deposed, and their deluded and idolatrous 
 orshippers are about returning to the worship of their fathers. 
 Bui my colleague, in justifying his course, tells us that he is not fully a free 
 Tent, having been instructed, although the instructions accord with his judg- 
 ient. Therein my colleague differs widely from me, for I am a free agent in 
 eery sense, and cannot consent to stand here otherwise ; for I belong to the 
 moo] of a statesman, venerated by every friend of liberty, who believed in 
 taking the responsibility." I am a free agent to do as duty may require, and 
 .11 ready to co*nt personal consequences afterwards. I understand where I am 
 leaking far too well to enter upon domestic matters here ; for neither this body, 
 or any of its members, have a right to sit in judgment upon me. I shall enter 
 tto no explanations, claim no merit, or accord none, so far as supposed instruc- 
 ons are concerned : nor shall I permit myself here to inquire whether they 
 manate from a majority or minority of the people : whether they seek to violate 
 le spirit of the compact, .or whether they come from those who believe in 
 ad practice the doctrines they inculcate ; but, at the proper time and upon the 
 roper occasion, before those whose servant I am, I tender the guantlet to him 
 'ho shall choose to take it up, and I hold myself in readiness to justify my ae- 
 on before the only pure and true source of power. I intend to know whether one 
 in resist this mischievous and licentious spirit of sectional agitators, and those who 
 3rve as sappers and miners of the Constitution, and survive. I have no fear that I 
 aall not be most triumphantly sustained, when the storm has swept by. Nor 
 r ould I change a course so clearly demanded by considerations of duty, if I 
 new i was to be overwhelmed. It is better that an humble individual should 
 erish, if in his struggle he should arouse the attention of the people to the 
 angers which threaten them. Sir, I stand upon the watch-tower of liberty, 
 mere my fathers stood before me. and I invoke the spirit of my country's Con- 
 itution. Like Burke, when speaking of the controversy with the American 
 olonies, I stand not here to demonstrate points of law, but to quiet agitation. 
 ,et the storm howl on — let the battlements rock if they will — let faction toss 
 nd roar and hurl her impotent arrows of detraction, and I will laugh them to 
 2orn, for I did not take up my position without counting the cost. If I had 
 parted momentary elevation or personal eclat, I might have cried loudest among 
 favery agitators, and rode high upon the whirlwind, if I could not have directed 
 le storm. But I have choson to do my duty and to meet the responsibilities in- 
 idenl to my position ; and in my vacant and solitary hours I shall feel that grati- 
 cation which a consciousness of rectitude and a firm discharge of duty alone 
 an give, and which the world cannot take away. I have never favored the in- 
 titution of slavery or its extension, either immediately or remotely, and whoever 
 harges or insinuates the reverse, originates a base and deliberate, and, unless 
 e is ignorant of my sentiments, a wilful calumny. Equally untrue is it that 
 ny one has proposed to legislate for the extension of slavery. It has often been 
 sserted, knowing its falsity, and is persisted in, doubtless under that questiona- 
 le axiom in morals, that a falsehood persevered in is equivalent to the truth, 
 ly habits, thoughts, feelings, education, instinct, nay, my very prejudices, are 
 igainst slavery ; but I would not interfere in what is no concern of mipe, to ob- 
 iin a greater evil and no good. The South have simply asked that they may 
 ^e left to their sovereign rights as States, and to such rights in the Territory as 
 tie ;egal tribunals may decide are theirs under the Constitution. They do not 
 
14 
 
 ask any legislation in favor of slavery, or its extension or diffusion, but protes 
 against its agitation in the Federal Government, or any legislation by Congres 
 upon the subject ; and in this the South are right, and I for one shall stand b 
 them and sustain them, let who will cry and clamor, or come what may, so Ion. 
 as they stand upon a ground so clearly reasonable and constitutional as this. ] 
 is urged, as another reason for legislating against slavery in this Territory, b 
 my colleague, that, unless we do, it may shock the tender susceptibilities c 
 Mexico. I certainly shall not call in question the force of this very singula 
 authority ; but, not proposing to draw lessons of political economy or pubji 
 morals from that nation just now, I will simply suggest that if she has any sur 
 plus benevolence she had better invest it in the elevation of her own semi-bar 
 barou? people and her cruel and degrading system of peonage. Let her plucl 
 out the beam in her own eye before she discourses concerning the mote in ours 
 And merry England, too, with her starving people perishing for bread, wil 
 doubtless bewail it. An eminent British poet has exultingly sung that " slave; 
 cannot breathe in England ;" and if he had added that millions of her own mis 
 called freemen, to say nothing of groaning and oppressed Ireland, found the pro 
 cess of respiration difficult, by reason of her system of murderous inequality, h(' 
 would have given us a practical and interesting but melancholy truth at the ex 
 pense of poetic beauty. 
 
 But why press, in ail times and upon all occasions, this process of restriction 
 My colleague admits that the laws of that Territory, as it came to us, prohibited 
 slavery ; which he says was abolished by the decree of her President, again bv 
 an act of Congress, and yet again by the Constitution. Most lawyers in the 
 free and many in the slave States hold that the laws prohibiting slavery remain 
 the law of the land until changed by competent legislation, and my colleague hag 
 often so argued and insisted. I have already shown that there was no intention 
 or desire to legislate for their change even by the South. Besides, he admits 
 that slave labor is not demanded there, nor white labor excluded, either by cli 
 mate, soil, or productions ; and yet he, and those who act with him, will consent 
 to the passage of no bill, unless it excludes slavery over again, which they argue 
 is excluded by three laws of man, and three of Heaven ; and they insist, tooJ 
 which is the fact, that the people there, so far as they have spoken, are opposed 
 to having the institution among them. Was ever absurdity carried further, or 
 more pertinaciously enforced ? But I am asked, if slavery is already excluded; 
 by law, and prohibited by natural impediments, why object to the restriction ? 
 I object to it because one-half of the States of this Union have solemnly pro- 
 tested against it, and believe it will be a sentence of condemnation against them, 
 and I have sufficient regard for their wishes to abstain from an act so offensive 
 to them bringing no practical good ; and I object too because the true principles 
 of self-government forbid that one community shall legislate for another. The! 
 whole truth may as well be told. Politicians have invested their whole capital 
 in this Provisoism, and although the dividends have been far less than was an- 
 ticipated, and the stock is sadly depreciated, they hope to keep it alive until they 
 can sell out without suffering a total loss. 
 
 But do we not all see that it is better to meet this agitation now than here- 
 a ft er — "at the door-sill than the hearth-stone." Sir, I understand too well the 
 purposes for which this agitation originated and is prosecuted, and the law which 
 governs all kindred questions, to give heed to the professions, however often ex- 
 pressed, that they are merely endeavouring to prevent by law the further exten- 
 sion of slavery, though I admit that many who act with them are sincere in their 
 professions, and by no means include them in the remarks I extend to others. I 
 would meet it before its poisonous roots have sunk deeper in the soil of liberty,, 
 or its upas branches spread wider. You may this day organize every inch of 
 
15 
 
 territory held by the United States, and engraft upon it the restriction ; to-morrow 
 uhe leaders in this same interest will clamor on as they have already commenced 
 (for its abolition in the District of Columbia ; and, this being accomplished, they 
 jj will openly and directly assail the rights of sovereign States, which they have 
 theretofore done by indirection, and their innocent dupes will be borne along with 
 ' them. Whoever knew the ferocity of a tiger tamed by a taste of blood, or ?. fanatic 
 i or a demagogue, or a hypocrite satisfied by yielding to his demand ? And. although 
 ithere are many who have now no intention of proceeding to such extremities, 
 ■they will be subject to the laws which control such questions, and be swept along 
 2 witn the general current. But a few years since this disturbing and ferocious 
 : * spirit of abolition reared its hydra-head in the halls of our National Legislature, 
 r |but it was met by manly resistance and put down. Again, restless as the unclean 
 ^ spirit of old, it returns with others more wicked than itself to render, unless 
 ; ': speedily put to flight, the last state worse than the first. 
 
 I My colleague has told us, in conclusion, as he has often before, what New 
 ?i fYork will do concerning this question — that she will not consent to the extension, 
 (of slavery, and that by no act of hers can it be done. While I acknowledge his 
 right to his opiuions and speculations upon the subject of what will be the course 
 of New York, I shall claim at least an equal privilege of expressing my own of 
 what she will not do also. The gift of prophecy is not mine, and I can only 
 I judge of the future by the past and the present, and the general laws which con- 
 Erol human agencies ; and, however much the reverse maybe desired by despe- 
 • a jrate politicians, in my judgment New lork, though occasionally swayed from 
 I her great purposes by the mutations of political parties and the efforts of com- 
 jt jbined factions, will content herself with that which belongs to her, and treat with 
 ^becoming respect — the rights of her sister States. She has abundant elements 
 ^within herself to employ her choicest energies, and ,she will devote them to the 
 ^1 still higher improvement of her own internal condition, and to elevate yet more 
 ;!s Jher three millions of happy people. Though the sun of her political prosperity 
 may occasionally pass beneath a cloud, the obscuration will be but momentary, 
 and" the eclipse not total. She will soon shine forth in her meridian splendor, 
 diffusing among her sister States, from her lofty eminence, her genial ip.ftue-nces 
 of light, hope, and joy — the proudest star in the constellation of political glory. 
 • : She will leave all puerile sectional agitations to the machinations of the weak 
 and designing and those who traffic in the disturbance of the public peace. Her 
 isons will stand f.gain, as they stood in the dark days of our Revolutionary ^strug- 
 gle, in the second war of independence, and again in a war with a neighboring 
 nation, by the side of the brave spirits of the South, as when they shed their 
 choicest blood in defence of her own fromier ; and, as then, she will scorn to 
 inquire whether their domestic policy is more or less wise than her own. She 
 will stand by the principles non-interference and the Constitution^ and will 
 spurn all attempts at sectional policy and disunion. She will blot no stars nor:: 
 the constellation. Her pride will reach throughout the Union, and her Republic 
 be ocean bound. 
 
 What motive have I to disregard her wishes, or disobey her mandate ? What 
 have I to ask of the South but the merest justice ? W 7 hat else can she have in 
 store for me ? Whatever I have of public character or station is the generous 
 gift of my own great State. From early childhood I have been nursed in her 
 lap, and in manhood she led me from humble private avocations, through various 
 honors, to the highest station her sovereignty could confer. There, next to 
 Heaven, are my choicest offerings due : there shall my first vows be paid. My 
 destiny is in her keeping; there my best affections cluster ; there arise my live- 
 liest aspirations : there all my hopes are concentred : there have I lived ; there 
 reoose the remains of my beloved dead, and when it shall please Heaven, to call 
 
16 
 
 me hence, I would rest from the agitations of an eventful life in her peaceful 
 bosom. Her very name is dear to me. Her character and her institutions dearer 
 still. Her political escutcheon is yet unstained and spotless. Although she has 
 nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against her, her degra- 
 dation has not been completed. The cup which had been drugged for her hu- 
 miliation by a paracidal hand, in mercy was permitted to pass, and she has not 
 been left to sanction by her sovereign voice the attempt to desecrate the Presi- 
 tial office by pandering to the bad passions of a section. That she may long be 
 spared from this base infliction, whether at the instance of one of her own de- 
 generate sons or another, I invoke the universal prayer of our common country. 
 
Date Due 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 APR 20 "K 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 'Mi 1 3 f 2 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ■m- 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 3 '21 
 
 
 
 
 
 A 
 
 
 
 Mug27'34 
 
 
 
 
 JUL 8 '4 
 
 P 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 L. B. Cat. No. 1 137 
 
D619W 
 
 71569 
 
 Duke University Libraries 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 DOOi 
 
 $81 ( 
 
 )847