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AN INQUIRY 
 
 INTO Tin: 
 
 NATURE AND REvSULTS 
 
 OF THK 
 
 ANTISLAYERY AGITATION, 
 
 VVri'H A VIEW AT THE 
 
 PROSPECT BEFORE US. 
 
 BY A CITIZEN OF ALABAMA. 
 
 PART I. 
 
 DADE, THOMPSON &. CO. PKINTERS. 
 
 issT. 
 
r 
 
 "\^ i 
 
THE PROSPECT BEFORE US. 
 
 The existence^of a general discontent through the 
 Southern States, founded upon the concessions to the 
 overbearing and aggressive spirit of the Northern peo- 
 ple, in the legislation of Congress, relative to the Pa- 
 cific territories, is undeniable. 
 
 Some division exists here, as to the nature of the 
 remedy to be employed, and some think that patient 
 submission is the best remedy ; but a vast majority 
 hold that the Southern States have endured great in- 
 dignity and injustice at the hands of Congress. 
 
 The Southern States in their material condition are 
 well situated. Their indu«try is amply rewarded. 
 Economy has relieved their people from debt. Loy- 
 alty to government, obedience to laws, care for State 
 interests, attention to local improvements, have stimu- 
 lated the growth of all their domestic interests. Averse 
 to rash innovations and radical changes in their insti- 
 tutions, they have been contented with a steady and 
 gradual progress. There is nothing to disturb their 
 peace.but the intermeddling and contumelious treat- 
 ment they have experiencedJn reference to their so- 
 cial institutions. The history of the past will show 
 that the Northern States for years ^(|^|pfhave manifest- 
 ed unfriendly purposes, while the Southern States 
 have borne with forbearance, reiterated oppressions 
 
and injuries. These have become of a character so 
 seT'ionc — involve to such a degree the honor, security 
 and peace of the Southern State.s — that the niost tor- 
 pid of their citizens have become anxious to see "the 
 prospect before us." Oar object is to examine the 
 nature of the evils which beset us, and the magnitude 
 of the dangers by which we are environed. 
 
 Slav3ry in the fcrmatlon of the Constitution of the U. States. 
 
 The mighty influence which the existence of slave- 
 ry operates upon the organization of a State, is dis- 
 coverable upon the slightest reflection. The difficulty 
 of adjusting the relations between .slaveholding and 
 non-slaveholding States, combined under a demo- 
 cratic form of government, was painfully evinced in 
 the proceedings, which terminated in the adoption of 
 the Federal Constitution. A proposition was made 
 by the Northern States a few days after the Declara- 
 tion of Independence, that contributions should be 
 levied and taxes paid by the confederate States in 
 proportion to their entire population. The Southern 
 States objected, that this apportionment was unequal, 
 and that slaves should be excluded from the enumera- 
 tion. In the Convention "Sfeat formed the Constitution, 
 ^ it was soon discovered that all grounds of difference 
 • could be removed^ and all occasions for mistrust ac- 
 commodated with more facility than those originating 
 in this institution. Varieties of climate, diversities of 
 pursuit, incongruities of character, and discordance in 
 rehgious opinions, found in the several StaJ:es. were 
 more readily reconciledj than the radical opposition 
 growing out of the tolerance of this instituticyi. It 
 was more easy to affoijd the proper guaranties for 
 every other interest than this great and controlHng 
 interest in the SfiHriiern States. The point of differ- 
 ence in the Convention lay, according to Madison, 
 Pincknev. King, Morris 7{x\(\ Butler, between th<^ 
 
Southern and Eastern States — arising Irunj the pre- 
 sence or absence of this institution in those States. 
 The minds of the ablest of that body were interro- 
 gated in vain for securities adequate to the protec- 
 tion of this pecuhar element. Compromises were 
 made here, concessions there, and to posterity was 
 bequeathed the office of a final solution of the difficul- 
 ties. The difficulties wdiich the convention could 
 not surmount, were covered over for the while, in the 
 hope, that time would affiDrd the solution. Whether 
 slaves are to be treated as persons or property, and 
 in what cases they are deemed persons, and what pro- 
 perty, are subjects of dispute now between the sections 
 of the country. Then, if regarded as persons, must 
 the government hold them to be slaves, and in what 
 places, and under what circumstances^ The word 
 slave is not mentioned in the Constitution, and stipu- 
 lations to avoid embarrassment seem to have been stu- 
 diously deprecated. The probability is, that this re- 
 serve, originated in the irreconcilable opinions of men 
 from opposite portions of the country. The most pal- 
 pable and essential subjects for settlement — those in- 
 which the relations of the slave population to the 
 government, as objects of taxation and commerce, 
 and as affiDrding a basis of representation — exercised 
 all the faculties of the Convention. They dared not 
 penetrate into the questions which might come to dis- 
 turb the confederacy. They adjourned those, until 
 they should legitimately arise. "vSufficientfor the day 
 is the evil thereof," is engraven in large characters 
 upon the frontispiece of the Constitution. This po- 
 licy, has guided those who, have since been charged 
 w^ith the administration of the o-overnment. From 
 time to. time, slavery and its inHuences have led to 
 commotions: after excitement and, exasperation, a 
 truce has been concluded, and a few more years of 
 uneasiness, but of peace, have been secured. 
 
Slavery tinder the Constitution. 
 
 There were broad lines of division between the 
 statesmen from the different sections of the Union 
 drawn in the first years of the Union, and which still 
 separate them into parties. Under the confederation, 
 especially, in regard to the territories, there was a 
 strong tendency to geographical parties. An ani- 
 mated and active feeling, concerning their ownership 
 at one time existed, in which sectional jealousies were 
 plainly discernible. These were calmed by the sur- 
 render, on the part of Virginia, of the Northwest ter- 
 ritory, and the interdict of slavery from penetrating 
 it. We shall hereafter state the account between the 
 two sections; we simply mention now that the West- 
 ern territories formed a bone of contention in which 
 sectional jealousies were displayed. The strength of 
 the two parties, formed in the first days of the repub- 
 lic, and which now exist under different names, lay in 
 different parts of the Union. 
 
 The Republican party, jealous of a Central power, 
 attached to the federative features of the system, de- 
 voted to the checks provided by a written constitution, 
 and confident in the capacities of the people, found 
 its support, principally, in the Southern States. The 
 National party, — cultivating power, fortifying authori- 
 ty, imposing checks and constraints, not upon the 
 government, but upon the people, — allied itself to 
 the navigation, manufacturing and trading interests, 
 and won their attachment and support by legislative 
 aids and bounties. This party found the resources of 
 its strength in the Northern States. A diversity of 
 interest engendered a diversity of opinion, and in 
 party hostility sectional rivalry sprung up. These 
 sectional rivalries are seen with some distinctness in 
 the civil revolution of 1800. They spoke out upon 
 the treaty for the acquisition of Louisiana; they rose 
 into violent agitation prior to and during the late war 
 
with Great Britain, They inflicted a fatal wound 
 upon the Constitution and the equality of the South- 
 ern States, by the adoption of the Missouri restriction 
 clause. They now menace the perpetuity of the 
 Union and the integrity of the Constitution. A care- 
 ful examination of the subject will show that from the 
 Declaration of Independence till 1833 the competi- 
 tions of statesmen and parties formed the principal 
 ground of the division. The public mind was under 
 the guidance of cool and calculating minds, who had 
 an immediate interest in preventing extremities. 
 
 During this long period there were no Abolition 
 societies, and but kw anti-slavery discussions. The 
 Colonization Society was reared by Southern men, 
 and served as an escape pipe for such of the con- 
 sciences of the Southern politicians as were tender and 
 SCRUPULOUS. Mr. Clay, as early as ]818, was quite a 
 patron of this institution. 
 
 Abolition Societies. 
 
 The first general Abolition Society formed in the 
 United States was organized in Boston, in 1832. The 
 Society announced "that every person, of full age and 
 " sane mind, has a right to immediate freedom from 
 "personal bondage of whatsoever kind, unless im- 
 " posed by the sentence of the law for the commis- 
 " sion of some crime. We hold that man cannot con- 
 "sistently with reason, religion, and the eternal and 
 "immutable principles of justice, be the property ot 
 " man." 
 
 Their objects were declared to be, "by all means 
 "sanctioned by law, humanity and religion, to effect 
 *^ the ABOLITION of slavery/ in the United States; to im- 
 " prove the character and condition of free people of 
 "color; to inform and correct public opinion in rela- 
 "tioti to their situation and rights, and obtain for 
 "them equal civil and political rights and pri- 
 
^'VJLEGES WITH THE WHITES."' Thev saj in tlieir 
 first address, " we believe slavery is an evil now; and 
 of course the slaves ought noio to be emancipated : if 
 the thief is found in possession of stolen property he is 
 required immediately to relinquish it." They say, 
 "the master must manumit his slave, or the slave will 
 manumit himself We have no doubt that the God of 
 Heaven, who is a God of justice, is at this moment at 
 his Word and Providence setting before the Southern 
 Planter this very alternative; and this alternative em- 
 braces life and death, a blessing and a curse. To 
 choose the first, and say to the slave be free, is to 
 shut the floodojates of human woe and human blood. 
 To choose the latter, and hold the colored man in 
 vassalage, must ere long break up the fountains of the 
 great deep, and have a direct tendency to unsheathe 
 the sword of vengeance, revolution and death." 
 
 Sombre, as these vaticinations are, the Society dis- 
 claimed the purpose of contributing to their accom- 
 plishment. They resolved not to interfere, except, 
 by the employment of ''moral means." They ex- 
 pressed unlimited confidence in the conclusion, that 
 there could be no arrest of the principles they put 
 forth, nor of their overpowering influence. This So- 
 ciety was local in its influence, and confined in the 
 sphere of its operation. They make no allusion in 
 their first address to political agents. They seemed 
 to regard slavery entirely from the position of morals 
 and religion, and the removal of it as a matter of con- 
 science. 
 
 The following year the American Anti-Slavery 
 Society was formed in New York, by men practised 
 in the business of the world, and whose views were 
 much more employed about worldly influences and 
 instrumentalities. This Society has its dogmas of re- 
 ligion and politics. The preamble, and two of the 
 articles of the constitution, exhibit so plainly its pur- 
 
poses, tlial we cannot furnish more precise informa- 
 tion of its objects than by copying them at large: 
 
 " Thfi most hiirh God IkuIi m-.ule of ono blood all the families of man to dw elf 
 on the face of all the earth, and hath eiidowod all alike with the same inalienablo 
 rights, of which are life, liberty and the pursuit of liappiness; yet tliere are now 
 in this land more than two millions of human beings, possessed of the same deatli- 
 less spirits, and heirs to the same immortal hopes and destinies with ourselves, 
 who are. nevertheless, di'prived of these their sacred rights, and Kept in the most 
 ci lie! and abject bondage; a bondage under which human beings are bred and 
 Jaltened for the market, and then bought, sold, mortgaged, leased, bartered, fet- 
 tered, tasked, scourged, beaten, killed, hunted, even hke the veriest brutes, — 
 nay, made often the unwilling victims of ungodly lust; while, at the same time, 
 their minds are, by law and cnsiorn, generally shut out from all access to letter"*, 
 and in various other ways all their upward tendencies are repressed and crushed, 
 so as to make their ' moral and religions condition such that they may justly bo 
 considered the heathen of this country;' and since we regard sucli oppressions a.n 
 one of the greaiest wrongs that man can commit against his fellow; and existing 
 as it does, and tolerated as it is, under this free and Christian government, sap- 
 ping its foundation, bringing its institutions into contempt among other nations, 
 thus retardinir the march of freedom and religion, and strengthening the hands of 
 despoiism and irreligion throughout the world; and since we deem it a duty to 
 ourselves, to our government, to the world, to the oppressed, and to God. to do 
 all we can to end this oppression, and to secure an immediate and entire eman- 
 cipation of the oppr?ssed; and believe we can act most efficiently in the cause 
 in the way of combined and organized action: — Therefore, we, the undersigned, 
 do form oiu'selvcs into a Society for the purpose." 
 
 "Art. 2. The object of this Society is the entire abolition of Slavery in the United 
 States. While it admits that each State in which .slavery exists has, by the Con- 
 stitution of the United States, the exclusive riglil to legislate in regard to its aboli- 
 tion in that Slate, it shall aim to convince all our fellow-citizens, by arguments 
 addressed to their understandings and consciences, that slave holding is a heinous 
 crime wj the sight of God; and thr.t the duty, safely and best interest of all concerned 
 require its iminediate abandonment, icithout exfatriation. The Societj' will also 
 endeavor, in a constitutional way, lo influence Congress to fut an end to the 
 domestic slave trade, and to abolish slavery in all those portions oC our common 
 country which come under its control, especially in the District of Columbia, and 
 likewise to prevent the extension of it to any State that may hereafter be ad- 
 mitted. 
 
 "Art. 3. This Society sliall aim to elevate the character and condition of the 
 people of color, by encouraging their intellectual, moral and religions improve- 
 ment, and by removing prejudice; that thus they may. according to their intel- 
 lectual and moral worth, share an equality with the whites of civil and political 
 privileges; but the Society will never countenance the oppressed in vindicating 
 their rights by resorting to physical force." 
 
 This Society undertook an arrangement of the 
 scheme of agitation for the country. Its means con- 
 sisted in the formation of auxihary societies, where- 
 ever they could be formed : In the iinspai-ivg circu- 
 lation of tracts, circulai's and pamphlets : In the en- 
 listment of Preachers to mingle anti-slavery inculca- 
 tions with their teachings: To engage the Pulpit and 
 Press in the cause oi abolition : To array the powerful 
 
orcranizution of the Church and pohtical parties as 
 allies in their work, and to give a preference to ihe 
 productions of free over those of slave labor. 
 
 At a very early day, they announced their purpose 
 *' to overthrow the most execrable system of slavery 
 that has ever been witnessed upon earth : to deliver 
 our land from its deadliest curse : to wipe out the 
 foulest stain which rests upon our national escutcheon : 
 and, to secure to the colored inqmlation of the United 
 States all the privileges and rights which belong to 
 them as men and as Americans" 
 
 It will be observed that immediate abolition is the 
 shibboleth of the party. There was to be no prepa- 
 ration of the community ; no expedients to lighten the 
 burden of this tremendous revolution. The consum- 
 mation, was to be instant with its commencement. 
 The array of means manifests no conviction that the 
 work would be an easy one. Their plans, required 
 the labors of j^ears and the dedication of lives. Stea- 
 dily, and perseveringly, have the labors been j^erform- 
 ed and the devotion been displayed. A careful an- 
 alysis of the various methods they have put in opera- 
 tion to effect "THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN THE UNI- 
 TED States" — the grand result placed before them — 
 enables us to reduce them to a single principle. Their 
 plan of action consists in the declaration, "7 loill cast 
 abominable filth upon thee, and make thee vile, and will 
 set thee as a gazing stock!' "That slavery is a hei- 
 nous crime in the sight of God," are the all-devouring 
 words .with which ^their assaults upon us are pointed. 
 
 The transmission of tracts, papers, prints and books 
 through the mails formed their primitive mode of ac- 
 tion. The strong hand of the people, South, was 
 raised at once in resistance to this, and an end was put 
 to it. For a time, a disposition was shown to send 
 anti-slavery lecturers, but these were repelled ; aux- 
 iliary societies, to the number of fifteen hundred, were 
 
9 
 
 formed over the Northern and Western States. Mo- 
 ney was collected for the main society, amounting to 
 between $40 and $50,000 per annum. Six or seven 
 hundred thousand papers, prints and pamphlets were 
 annually circulated, some of which display the high- 
 est order of literary talent, and were prepared by men 
 of extended reputation. The transactions of 1838-9 
 show the collection during that year of S47,lll 74c. 
 The circulation of 360,000 newspapers, 210,639 pam- 
 phlets, 19,958 bound volumes, 93,875 tracts, and 
 38,440 circulars. The same proceedings show the 
 employment of lecturers and agents to traverse the 
 country, to foster and propagate their enterprise. In 
 accordance with their fundamental object of blacken- 
 ing the institution of slavery, an early effort was made 
 to enlist Congress to their purpose. 
 
 Agitation in Congress. 
 
 The first debates incited by these societies, occur- 
 red in the early part of 1835. Petitions for the abo- 
 lition of slavery in the Federal District were intro- 
 duced and a motion was made to refer them to a spe- 
 cial committee. The object of the motion was to se- 
 cure a favorable report. The first counsel given and 
 embraced by the South was to answer the petitions. 
 This was done in an elaborate Report, drawn with 
 ability by the member representing the Charleston 
 district of South Carolina. The comment of the 
 New England Anti-Slavery Society upon the debate 
 in which these proceedings originated places their 
 purpose distinctly before us : This purpose, it will be 
 seen, was to blacken the institution of slavery, until 
 the slaveholder shall be regarded and treated as a 
 Barbary pirate. "Every thing the Southern mem- 
 bers said," declares the Society, "only confirmed us 
 in the persuasion that we must persist, until we get 
 the subject of slavery fULLY he/ore Congress. No mea- 
 
10 
 
 sure will be more effectual to diffuse information and 
 enkindle thought and feeling throughout the land. 
 Congress is as the central sun. It sends light and 
 warmth to the extremities of the system which re- 
 volves about it. The considerations which will lead 
 to the abolition of this horrible institution in the Dis- 
 trict will hear loitli equal weight against it in every 
 part of the country. At the same time we overthrow 
 the system there, loe shall heave the joundation every - 
 where. This our Southern hretJiren see, ajid therefore 
 will thetj resist all attempts of Congress to act upon 
 the subject, aye, even to entertain a j)etition. But they 
 must he given to understand, that we see this result of 
 the action of Congress as clearly as they do ; and for 
 this very reason, among others, shall never give over 
 our endeavor to induce our National Legislature to 
 remove slavery from within their own jurisdiction." 
 
 There are those who condemn the action of the 
 noble band of Southern statesmen, who resisted from 
 the beginning the effort to introduce that subject into 
 Congress. We hear it stated, and we read it in print, 
 that had a committee been appointed, with John 
 duincy Adams for chairman, we should have heard 
 nothing more of abolition after his report. Such 
 declarations betray absolute ignorance of the subject, 
 as well as the disposition to cast the blame of the 
 present crisis upon Southern patriots, to the relief of 
 the abolition pohticians and abolitionists, North. We 
 have quoted from the first Report of the leading Abo- 
 lition Society, to show wherefore petitions to Congress 
 were made. 
 
 That the conduct of Southern statesmen may be 
 fully vindicated, w^e shall abstract from an Address of 
 a prominent officer of the principal society, delivered 
 before it, and which is bound and circulated with its 
 Reports. "The committee to which the petitions 
 must be referred," he says, "should he friendly to jus- 
 
11 
 
 tice, determined to do its duty, and liave power to 
 send for persons and papers." The committee should 
 send lor all the codes of slave-laws of the several 
 States, "statute books of crime," "full of high treason 
 against God and humanity !' The committee should 
 send for ten experienced planters, to state, as honest 
 men, "whether the question has not often been discussed 
 among them which is most profitahle, to work slaves to 
 death in Jive years when cotton is 14 cents a pound, or 
 to work them twenty years with cotton at 10 cents." 
 yhen, let the committee send for an hundred free 
 men, from the Slave States, who never owned a slave, 
 themselves or their relations, and let them tell what 
 they know of the pollutions incident to slavery. Then, 
 let them send for Northern men, who have sold them- 
 selves, body and soul, as overseers : Interrogate them 
 "as to the modes of subduing a refractory spirit; of 
 detecting whether a slave feigns sickness or is sick, 
 and of the expedients by which an overseer builds up 
 a reputation as a labor getter." Then, send for one 
 hundred free men of color to testify of their wron<ys. 
 "Let each tell of the hairbreadth escapes he has made 
 from being kidnapped into slavery." Then, call one 
 hundred fugitives from the States, who have taken 
 refuge in Canada; hear them tell of "hopes crushed 
 and hearts broken," and the sufferings and. anxieties 
 through which they have passed into freedom. Fi- 
 nally, bring one hundred slaves from the cotton plan- 
 tations and sugar houses, to "give ocular demonstra- 
 tion of slavery. They should show their persons 
 abused, their wounds and gashes, their hacks cut from 
 the shoulders downwards ivith Republican stripes^ 
 
 Whether a report from Mr. John Q,uincy Adams 
 could have quieted people of this description, we 
 think it useless to discuss. We shall hereafter have 
 occasion to see what Mr. Adams would probably have 
 written. The Congress after Pinckney's Report was 
 
12 
 
 miirked by the reception of petitions containing 
 414,571 names. Within the same Congress, resolu- 
 tions came from Vermont, Ohio and Massachusetts, 
 conforming, in a greater or less degree, to the anti- 
 slavery model; while Maine, New York, Rhode Island, 
 Pennsylvania and Michigan simply opposed the an- 
 nexation of Texas. In the winter of l&a?, Mr. Slade 
 of Vermont, fitted out with these petitions, commenced 
 an anti-slavery harangue, full of violence, and moved 
 their reference, with instructions to report a bill to 
 abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. 'I'he South- 
 ern members, in much excitement, convened and de- 
 termined to present the resolution known as Patton's 
 resolution, which became the 21st rule of the House. 
 It was adopted by a vote of 122 to 74. During the 
 same session, the Senate adopted a series of resolu- 
 tions submitted by Mr, Calhoun, and which in a sub- 
 sequent part of this essay we shall set out at length. 
 During the next Congress, (1838-9) the resolutions of 
 Atherton, denouncing the designs of the abolitionists, 
 and re-enacting the 21st rule, were adopted. The 
 resolution of Patton was adopted by a vote of 127 to 
 78. This rule provided "that each petition, memo- 
 rial, resolution, proposition or paper, touching or re- 
 lating to slavery, or the abolition thereof, shall be laid 
 on the table without further debate." The same Con- 
 gress was signalized by the resolutions of Mr. John 
 Gluincy Adams, providing for amendments of the Con- 
 stitution for the abolition of hereditary slavery in 1852, 
 through the United States: For a prohibition upon 
 the admission of any State to the Union which tolerated 
 slavery, after the admission of Florida ; and for the abo- 
 htion of slavery in the District of Columbia in 1845. 
 At a subsequent session, Mr. Adams introduced a pe- 
 tition asking for a dissolution of the Union. In 1842, 
 Mr. Giddings introduced the whole abolition argu- 
 ment, and moved instructions to the Executive to 
 
cease the demand upon Great Britain tor indemnities 
 for slaves taken Irom the Creole by the British au- 
 thorities at Nassau. Massachusetts, by the unaniraous 
 vote of her legislature, 1843, called for an amendment 
 of the Constitution, so as to abolish the representation 
 founded on slaves in Congress. This was one of the 
 compromises of the Constitution. This decision of 
 sovereign States to aoitate on this subject, and brino^ 
 slavery ''fully before Congress'' occasioned the South- 
 ern representatives to abandon their ground. 
 
 "From this day forth and Ibrever," said Mr. Wise, 
 from Virojinia, "I withdraw from the fiuht. To Mr. 
 Adams and those with him I leave the responsibility 
 of doing what they will. But here in the name of God 
 and of nil/ country, upon whose altar 1 have sworn to de- 
 fend the Constitution, I tell those gentlemen of the awful 
 responsibUtty they incur I?y this attempt to destroy the 
 Constitution^ 
 
 The leaders of the anti-slavery hosts declared that 
 "at the close of each successive year we have reason 
 to rejoice and take courage, in the thickening signs 
 that portend the downfall of slavery. They whose 
 eyes are o])en to watch the portents which surround 
 them, see that slavery is overshadowed by an inexorable 
 destiny, which is achiecing her destruction withsdent but 
 inevitable power. Since the first word that was spo- 
 ken, breaking the enchanted slumbers of the North, 
 defying the sorceries and the power of slavery, and de- 
 manding her instant destruction, every thing has seem- 
 ed to conspire to accelerate her doom. The world 
 is arrayed against her. Her cliampions are fainting 
 from fear. Her mercenaries are drserting her for more 
 profitable service. Even her own fastnesses are not suf- 
 ficient to protect her. Voices are heard in the air, pro- 
 phesying her fall. Omens in the Capitols of the 
 Nations and of" the States, in the churches, in the 
 saloons, in the market place, in the workshop, in 
 
14 
 
 the field and by the wayside, tell that her hour is at 
 hand." 
 
 Since the time we have mentioned, slavery has had 
 a firm hold upon the attention of Congress. Those 
 who have not attentively regarded the subject, would 
 be mortified at the abuse of the time of Congress, and 
 the waste of national treasure, in discussions aimed to 
 loroduce discord, and to loosen the bonds of the con- 
 federacy. This waste of time and treasure is the 
 most insignificant concern connected with it. The 
 fundamental organization of every State, though pro- 
 perly the .subject of fair and temperate discussion, 
 ought never to be made the basis of violent and agi- 
 tating controversies.and the objects of systematic and 
 incendiary attacks. The prosperity of every com- 
 munity is dependent upon its confidence in its own 
 stability. There is a laith in the integrity of the in- 
 stitutions of the State, and that these institutions can- 
 not be the subject of a sudden, violent and reckless 
 overturn which is essential to the happiness, peace 
 and quiet of a people. In this case, aliens to our in- 
 stitutions have become their assailants. 
 
 The reputation and renown of the Southern peo- 
 ple are made the objects of persevering and unceas- 
 ing detraction. Calumny pursues individuals and 
 States. The societies of all civihzed States, Christian 
 sects in every land, are i-equired to shut us from their 
 communion. The interest of our nation, the Consti- 
 tution of our government, and the peace of our coun- 
 try, hold and exercise less control over a large party in 
 the Union, than the desire of delivering our Southern 
 communities to the consequences of immediate eman- 
 cipation. Texas would have been surrendered to 
 British supremacy, and our institutions exposed to 
 British abolitionism, at the behests of this party. The 
 mighty interests invested in the culture and manufac- 
 txixp of cotton would be prostrated at the instigation 
 
15 
 
 of the East India Cuiupany, if it-could l)e done by u 
 change in the social relations of the Southern States. 
 George Thompson, the abolition member of the British 
 Parhament, from one oi' the London districts, pledo-es 
 himself to destroy American slavery, by driving Amer- 
 ican cottons from the British market, f^e receives 
 from this country applause and encouragement. The 
 American minister in Great Britain was, a few years 
 ago, insulted there, and the news was received with 
 dehght here. The insult was given to a slaveholder, 
 and this atoned for the national indignity. 
 
 With such feelings existing in a community between 
 its dilFerent portions, it is obvious that there can be no 
 lasting or permanent union. If reputation abroad, and 
 peace at home, cannot be secured; if the reputation 
 of one part of the countr}^ is habitually diminished 
 abroad by another portion, and its peace at home 
 jeoparded, what moral basis is there for a Union ? 
 Without such a moral basis, of course, the law will 
 soon lose its power. Congress, by countenancing and 
 encouraging the agitation of the slavery question, has 
 gone very far to destroy the legitimate foundations on 
 which the confederacy alone can exist. 
 
 We shall notice hereafter other votes, that have 
 been given, showing the diseased condition of the 
 Northern mind. In one of the addresses, circulated 
 by the American Anti-Slavery Society, the measures 
 of the Society are elucidated with great distinctness. 
 The speaker says, " Before slavery can be abolished 
 in the District of Columbia, there must be a discus- 
 sion of the whole subject on the floors of both Houses 
 of Congress, All the arguments with which abolition- 
 ists havejiooded the North, would then be brought for- 
 ward to prove the intrinsic iniquity, the cruelty, the 
 impolicy of slaveholding. A thorough discussion of this 
 whole subject, in the halls of our National Legislature, 
 would be equal to a discussion in the Legislature of 
 
16 
 
 every slaveholding State in the Unio?i. The act of 
 abolition being clone, the moral ivjiuence of it mould 
 pierce to the }i,eart of the whole system. It would pro- 
 nounce and sign its death warrant. It icoidd he the 
 solemn verdict of the nation, decreeing the annihilation 
 of this dark ahominatiGn. The highest legislative body 
 of the Union, represen'ing the whole people, would 
 declare slavery to be unfit to live — for let us not for- 
 get that Congress trill abolish it, not because it has the 
 power, but because of its intrinsic wickedness. The act 
 would speak in authoritative tones to every slavehold- 
 ing State, Go thou and do likewise. It would write in 
 letters of flashing fire, over the gateway of the National 
 Capitol, ''No admittance for slavery.'' The whole sys- 
 tem would thus be outlawed, branded with ignominy^ 
 consigned to execration, and ultimate destruction." 
 
 Thus it will be seen that the indirect consequences 
 of the act are regarded with more interest than the 
 act itself The principle is sought, with far more avidi- 
 ty than the results to flcnv from its immediate applica- 
 tion. The same consequences are sought for, in the 
 abolition of the slave trade between the States. "Only 
 a small portion of the natural increase of slaves is 
 needed to cultivate the corn, the tobacco and hemp 
 of Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland, and parts of Vir- 
 ginia and North Carolina, and were it not for this 
 grand canal of horrors, the 'infernal slave trade,' the 
 dark waters would overflow and drown the profitable- 
 ness of the system in these States, and compel them to 
 EMANCIPATE in Order to save themselves from destruc- 
 tion. Therefore, it has been well said, that this trade 
 is the great jugular vein of slavery. And if Congress 
 will employ the same weapon with which it clove 
 down the foreign slave trade, to cut this infernal arte- 
 ry, the monster would die — starvation would slowly, 
 but surely, consume him in his Southern, and apoplexy 
 in his Northern abode. Fifteen years would number 
 him among the dishonored dead." 
 
17 
 
 The power to admit new States into the Union, is 
 also referred to as an auxihary in the object they have 
 so boldly and intrepid!}^ declared as the inducement 
 to their association. "See," say they, "that almost 
 boundless region stretching from Lakes Michigan and 
 Superior, westward, to the sunset — fertilized with its 
 hundred rivers, studded with its beautii'ul lakes, rich 
 in its luxuriant soil, unduloted with its gentle forest 
 slopes, and diversiiied with its unshadowed prairies, 
 all uniting to lure the huntsman and husbandman, the 
 mechanic and the merchant. See your Lowells and 
 your Springiields, your Rochesters and Buffalos — 
 your Pittsburgs — springing up, wdth scenic rapidity, 
 till the whole of this vast region is covered with Key- 
 stone and Empire States. And thanks be to the God 
 of Freedom, the footprint of a slave shall never pollute 
 and curse this modern Eden. Here, sir, is our final hope 
 
 for the extermination of slavery. Six or eight large 
 States shall yet ?narch info the Union, icithfree banners 
 
 floating in the breeze. Open the doors ivide, and beckon 
 in State after State, from the North-west and the Gen- 
 eral Government is in our hands. Then the perpetua- 
 tion of freedom wdll be the great idea of national legis- 
 lation. Slavery will melt away before its burning ac- 
 tion, till the last vestige of it shall have disappeared." 
 We have shown the votes of Congress upon several 
 questions, indicating a strong force in the Northern 
 States, at all times, in favor of the abolition views. 
 The examination will show that force constantly in- 
 creasing. Witness the votes on the right to petition, 
 or rather to agitate. Upon the admission of Florida, 
 J 845, the motion was made to exclude her until she 
 removed the clause from her Constitution prohibiting 
 her legislature from abolishing slavery, and author- 
 izinor the legislature to exclude the free blacks. The 
 vote was 77 yeas to'oS nays. 
 
 The Oregon proviso was carried by the Northern 
 
vote, in both houses of Congress, only four in the 
 House of Representatives to the contrary. The Wil- 
 mot proviso, repeatedly, received the same universal 
 demonstrations of favor. Mr. Palfrey asked leave to 
 introduce bills to provide for the abrogation of slavery 
 in the District of Columbia, which was refused, 82 to 
 69. These votes will indicate the continually in- 
 creasing subordination to the anti-slavery standard. 
 We propose now to consider another important 
 branch, of the abolition agencies. 
 
 State Legislatures, 
 
 The action of State legislatures has been principal- 
 ly concerned in rendering nugatory the act lor the 
 recovery of fuoitive slaves. The rule adopted in 
 Great Ijritain, that a slave became free by removal 
 beyond the jurisdiction of the law which maintained 
 the relation, was brought vividly to the public, by abo- 
 lition discussions, and is enforced by Northern courts. 
 Fugitive slaves, the Constitution provides, ''shall be 
 delivered'' on the claim of the master. There is no 
 room for equivocation or ambiguity. The act of 1793 
 looked to the agencies of State officers and tribunals 
 for its execution. New York, Massachusetts, Vermont, 
 Connecticut and Pennsylvania, at different periods, 
 provided jury trials to ascertain the fact of servitude. 
 The acts of the first mentioned States were contrived 
 to render the process of recovery of fugitive slaves 
 slow, costly and embarrassing. Ample provisions 
 were made for costs, continuances, &c. 
 
 These laws were highly esteemed by the anti- 
 slavery party, and strongly supported. "A trial by ju- 
 ry," says Dr. Channing, "ought to be granted to the 
 suspected fugitive, as being the most effectual provi- 
 sion for innocence known to our laws. It is said, that 
 under such a process, the slave will not be restored to 
 his master. Undoubtedly, the jury is an imperfect 
 
19 
 
 tribunal, and may often lail of a wise and just admin- 
 istration of the laws. Bat, as w^e have seen, the first 
 question to be asked is, — How shall the free man be 
 preserved from being sentenced to slavery? This is 
 an infinitely greater evil than the escgfpe oi* the fugi- 
 tive ; and to avert this, a trial by jury should be grant- 
 ed." It is obvious that Dr. Channing^was pressed fgpr 
 an argument to vindicate the abolitionists' demand, 
 being unwilling to adopt the one they put forward. 
 
 The abolitionists said, "Give the panting fugitive 
 this inestimable right, in every Northern State he is 
 safe — for where can you find twelve impartial men 
 among us, wdio will decide, on their oaths, that a man 
 has not a better right to himself, than another has to 
 him — that the blood ivhich runs in his veins is not his 
 own — that the right to liberty is not inalienable. Secure 
 this right to fugitives, and all the Northern States of 
 the Southern part of the confederacy will be drained of 
 their slaves!' 
 
 The principles on which these State laws w^ere form- 
 ed, were declared to be in conflict with the Constitu- 
 tion of the United States, by the Supreme Court. The 
 same States immediately after passed acts forbidding 
 their officers and citizens to aid in the recapture of a 
 fugitive, and imposing heavy penalties upon the mas- 
 ter for any interruption of the peace, in the recapture 
 of a slave. Thus, systematically, did the States, in 
 their corporate action, set at naught their confederate 
 and constitutional obligations. 
 
 The States North have employed, to the content of 
 the abolitionists, their powers of passing resolutions 
 condemnatory of slavery, and in advancing the pro- 
 gress of their measures before Congress. 
 
 We recollect but one State, which did not en- 
 force the adoption of the' Wilmot proviso, and which 
 does not countenance, directly, the agitation of other 
 measures upon the subject. The most flagrant case 
 
20 
 
 of this kind, is that of Massachusetts, — twice adopt- 
 ing the motion to amend the Constitution, abohshing 
 slave representation in Congress — a motion which re- 
 ceived the stern rebuke of our own General Assembly. 
 5 The refusal^ of the Governors of New York and 
 
 Maine to render felons accused of stealing slaves, T)&'/t<W 
 ajZother instancefof subserviency to the same abolition 
 yideas. 
 
 Partieiu. 
 
 We have shown the agencies employed by the abo- 
 litionists. The control over the political parties of 
 the country was another prominent feature in their 
 mode of action. In 1837, the American Anti-Slavery 
 Society adopted the resolution to interrogate candi- 
 dates as to their opinions. Are you in favor of the 
 right of petition? Are you in favor of the exclusion 
 of Texas from the Union? Do you favor the aboli- 
 tion of slavery and the slave trade in the District of 
 Columbia? Do you favor the abolition of the slave 
 trade between the States? were questions submitted 
 to candidates for Congress by the auxiliary societies, 
 under the direction of their principal. President Fil- 
 more, it may be recollected, answered these questions 
 satisfactorily to the Abolition Society of Erie county, 
 in 1838. The same questions were propounded, at 
 that time, to the candidates for Governor and Lieut. 
 Governor of New York. The Abohtion Report says, 
 *'0f the Whig candidates, Mr. Bradish, for Lieutenant 
 Governor, answ-ered fully and satisfactorily, in every 
 point; Mr. Seicard, jar Governor, was, on all 'points, the 
 reverse, though with much effort to make it appear he was 
 at heart the friend of freedom, The Democratic can- 
 didates, both, answered fully and promptly in the 
 negative." Gov. Marcy has, from the beginnino:, been 
 a faithful opponent oi' the abolitionists, and for that 
 reason, perhaps, has been totally overthrown in New 
 York. 
 
21 
 
 Tlie conduct of the other pohticiLins we hav<? 
 mentioned, furnishes matter for reflection. The 
 course of proceeding we have referred to has pro- 
 duced the most powerful changes through the North- 
 ern States. The old friends of the South, have either 
 been driven to obscurity, or have surrendered their 
 opinions. Marcy, Dickinson, Beardsley,of New York; 
 Vroom and Wall, of New Jersey ; Woodbury and 
 Pearce, of New Hampshire; Hannegan, Allen, Bu- 
 chanan and Dallas, have made room for the Sewards, 
 Hales, Coopers, Day tons. Millers, Chases, E wings. 
 The great parties of the Union hold together by the 
 cohesion of old connection and public office. Mr. Clay, 
 however, announces that the contest has finally come 
 to be whether the agitation on slavery shall destroy the 
 Union, or the Union shall suppress the slavery agita- 
 tion. This declaration, too, is made within three 
 months from the time peace was announced, through 
 one hundred guns, at the CapitaL 
 
 Churches. 
 
 The Church has been the chosen object of aboli- 
 tion proselytism from the inception of their enterprise. 
 To enlist the "Pulpit and the Press," and to purify 
 the church from the contamination of slavery, was 
 proclaimed as a primary point in their creed. With- 
 in two years, they had above 1500 ministers engaged 
 as members. The great denominations of Protestant 
 Christians at the North, have generally consented to 
 their views. The Unitarian ministers, in a body, very 
 early after the agitation commenced, proclaimed slave- 
 ry to be "a moral and social evil, offensive to God and 
 oppressive to man," "and ought to cease as soon as pos- 
 sible." This opinion has been reiterated in addresses 
 at home, and directed abroad, and is inculcatedsteadily 
 and consistently. The last instance is the expression 
 of their "detestation" for the late fugitive slave act, and 
 
99 
 
 €1 pledge to aid its repeal. The Freewill Baptists say, 
 "that slavery is a system, murderous in its nature, ten- 
 dency, and"^its actual results. A system of robbery 
 the most aggravated — robbing man of all his rights, 
 personal, civil and domestic — his rights, corporal and 
 intellectual — his rights, temporal, spiritual and eter- 
 nal." The Methodist Church, in consequence of an 
 attempt to depose Bishop Andrew, for holding slaves, 
 derived with his wife in marriage, was rent asunder, 
 and churches, North and South, were formed. Since 
 then, the Northern church has excluded the South 
 from all the common property of the Association : — 
 Furnishing a miniature in the Church, of the melan- 
 choly transactions going on in the State. The Amer- 
 ican Baptist Missionary Society adopted "a resolution 
 to exclude slaveholders from employment as Mission- 
 aries." This led to a disruption in that society. The 
 New School of Presbyterians, at their Convention, 
 1846, declared "slavery to be intrinsically unrighteous, 
 ^opposed to the law of God, and precepts of the Gos- 
 pel." A large body of Universalists ministers have 
 .concurred in a pubhc declaration of the same charac- 
 :.ter. The Old Church of Presbyterians, and the Amer- 
 ican Missionary Society, have been greatly agitated, 
 but have suppressed, thus far, a deliberate expression. 
 Books might be filled with the declarations of local 
 synods, conferences, conventions and assemblies of 
 .churchmen. 
 
 The oreat controllincr demand of the abolitionists, 
 
 of "NO COMMUNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS, baS not yet 
 
 Jbeen adopted, but no one can mistake the alarming 
 ■signs, which tend to this result. 
 
 Literature. 
 
 We have thus seen the condition of Church and 
 State. The literature of the country is equally un- 
 friendly. The abolitionists proper, boast of associates 
 
cy.y 
 
 of high ability. Their re[)orts are prepared with greaC 
 care, and display remarkable eloquence and vigor. 
 The brilliant mind of Channing, the striking rhetoric 
 of John Q,uincy Adams, the practical ability of Way- 
 land, the graceful oratory of Sumner; the erudition 
 of Barnes, the profound and impressive thought of 
 Dewey — to say nothing of Phillips, Jay, Bacon, Whit- 
 tier, Bowditch, Seward, and a host of others — have 
 given a wide spread to their rooted aversion to slavery. 
 Of Channing's works, hundreds of thousands have 
 been circulated. The writings of Dewey are in the 
 hand of every scholar. The seeds thus sown are ma- 
 tured and ripened by the constant culture, employed 
 by newspapers and in the periodical literature. 
 
 We have before noticed the prodigious operations 
 of the Society, in the circulation of their opinions. An 
 extract or two from these publications will show the 
 impression they communicate of slavery. We take 
 from the most eminent and authoj-itative of these wri- 
 ters. "A slave country," says Dr. Channing, "reeks 
 with licentiousness. It is tainted with a deadlier pes- 
 tilence than the plague. But the worst is not told. 
 As a consequence of criminal connections, many a 
 master has children born into slavery. Of these, most, 
 I presume, receive protection, perhaps indulgence^ 
 during the life of their fathers, but at their deatli, not 
 a kw are left to the chances of a cruel bondage. Still 
 more, it is to be feared, that there are cases in which * 
 the master puts his own children under the lash of the 
 overseer, or else sells them, to undergo the miseries 
 of bondage. If my impressions on this point are true, 
 our own country, calling itself enhghtened and chris- 
 tian, is defiled with one of the greatest enormities on 
 earth. We send missionaries to heathen lands. Among 
 the pollutions of heathenism, I know nothing worse 
 than this." John Cluincy Adams, in a formal and pub- 
 lic address, delivered the 4th day of July, declared. 
 
24 
 
 that since 1830, slavenj, slave holding, and slave breed- 
 ing, and slave trading, have formed the whole founda- 
 tion of the pohcy of the Federal Government, and of 
 the slaveholding States, at home and al^road. 
 
 Daniel O'Connell,. Theobald Mathevv, and 70,000 
 others, addressed their countrymen in America, "that 
 slavery is a sin against God and man: All who are not 
 for, must be against it. None can be neutral. We 
 entreat you to take the part of justice, religion and 
 liberty. It is in vain that American citizens attempt 
 to conceal their own and their country's degradation 
 under this withering curse." 
 
 These are favorable specimens of the treatment we 
 experience. 
 
 Foreign Aid and Comfort. 
 
 This movement at home, meets with aid and en- 
 couragement abroad. The abolitionists of Great 
 Britain, in a single. generation, overthrew West In- 
 dia slavery. In 1818, the Duke of Wellington threa- 
 tened to brino- the encourasfement given to the slave 
 trade by France before the Congress of Vienna. The 
 French provisional government abolished, in 1848, 
 slavery in her colonies, giving to the colonists but two 
 months for preparation. Denmark and Sweden have 
 followed the same career. Near one million three hun- 
 dred thousand slaves, in the West Indies, have been 
 liberated against their masters, under this European 
 agitation. 
 
 The ministers of the church are the principal agents 
 of this work. World conventions. Evangelical alliances, 
 formal addresses by hundreds of ministers, and tens 
 of thousands of people, to churches and communities 
 in this country, calling for activity in jDrosecuting their 
 work, contributions of money, expressions of anxiety 
 and interest there for measures conducted hei'e, are 
 the important and efficient means employed to testify 
 
25 
 
 that interest. The British government formally de- 
 clares its anxiety to promote abolition. Thomas B. 
 Macauley, Lord Palmerston and George Thompson, 
 have arraigned at the bar of Europe the institutions 
 and practices of the Southern people; while, the warn- 
 ing of the illustrious Peel is thus given: "There have 
 been mighty convulsions in Europe. Their mighty 
 heavings are already felt on the other side of the At- 
 lantic. Look at Martinique. These are useful lessons, 
 by which Brazil, Cuba, and the United States, will do 
 well to take a timely warning. My belief is that the 
 events which have just happened in Europe must pre- 
 cipitate the time lor the final extinction of this slavery, 
 and of the slave trade. I hope that the abolition will 
 be effected, by timely precautions on the part of 
 governments; but there will be an increasing sympa- 
 thy with the condition of slavery. But, whether there 
 be wise or providential legislation on the part of gov- 
 ernment, or not, I believe its doom is sealed : That 
 slavery cannot long survive ; that it must, at no re- 
 mote period, be extinguished." 
 
 Of the Efficiency of Countervailing Influences, 
 
 The question arises, what has sustained the country, 
 under this weight of adverse influences? 
 
 When this agitation commenced, the opinion gen- 
 erally yj re vailed over the country, that slavery was a 
 domestic concern of the Southern States, for which 
 no responsibility existed, beyond the States where it 
 was established by law. It was treated in Congress 
 as a subject of great delicacy, the discussion of which 
 was to be avoided. When abolition was started 
 as a Northern or National concern, it offended this 
 opinion ; it required much effort to remove the convic^ 
 tion and to destroy the sentiment of the danger invol?* 
 ved in its agitation. 
 
 The administration of General Jackson, which 
 1 
 
26 ^ 
 
 was then in power, was possessed of vast influence 
 and popularity, from its popular sympathies and 
 great principles, took an uncompromising attitude 
 of hostility to it. His party, embracing a large 
 majority of the country, sustained his position. The 
 influence of the impression he then communicated is 
 felt to this day. Through the long series of anti- 
 slavery reports, the hostility of his party is always 
 anticipated. 
 
 There was, moreover, a strong persuasion through 
 the country, that the agitation of this question serious- 
 ly menaced the perpetuity of the Union. The Union 
 was then a source of pride and power, of influence 
 abroad and security at home; and thoughtful and con- 
 siderate men eschewed the courses leading to its dis- 
 memberment. The active intellect of the country 
 looked to it for honors and preferment, and returned, 
 for the glad hopes it excited, acknowledgments of its 
 blessed influences. 
 
 The pecuniary interests of the country, depend- 
 ent upon the Union, are enormous. There are 
 office-holders and office-seekers — there are those 
 whose positions in the States, depend upon the suc- 
 cess of rival parties through the country : these 
 all desire moderate agitations, within constitutional 
 limits, barely sufficient to affect elections. The mdi- 
 rect influences were infinitely of more importance. 
 We feel them in the convention which framed the Con- 
 stitution. When the Constitution was under discus- 
 sion, the Southern States — apprehensive of monopo- 
 lies — demanded that navigation acts should only be 
 passed by a vote of two-thirds of Congress. Mr. 
 Gorham, of Massachusetts, said, "He desired it to be 
 remembered that the Eastern States had no motive to 
 Union but a commercial one. They ivere able to protect 
 themselves. They were not afraid of external danger ^ 
 and did not need the aid of the Southern States'' The 
 
'^/ 
 
 disagreement on the subject of the Navigation Act 
 was quieted by a toleration of the slave trade for twen- 
 ty years, of which our commercial friends became 
 the agents. The first Congress adopted a Naviga- 
 tion act which has secured till now a monopoly of the 
 coastino- trade to the marine of the Northern States. 
 The same tendency to compromise for Government 
 bounties, scruples of conscience, was shown by the 
 manufacturing interests in 1842. The "home league" 
 — representing the great interests of manufactures — 
 in their address of 1842, employs the following signi- 
 ficant language upon this subject : 
 
 " Now, neither the farmer nor mechanic are contented to be disfranchised, and 
 debarred the privileges of freemen, whilst a portion of their countrymen, pos- 
 sessing a sure market for tiie products of their slaves, deny them the right or 
 living by free labor, unless reduced to the degradation of working for the same 
 miserable subsistence allowed to slaves. Even viewed constitutionally, the owner 
 of a thousand slaves, chattels of industry, or labor saving machines, as they are 
 called at the South, (?) has surely no more right to be protected than the free far- 
 mer, with a thousand cattle, or the free manufacturer, with a thousand looms, 
 chattels of industry. 
 
 "Protection is due to all — we mean adequate, positive protection, whether it is 
 by favorable climate, or a peculiar chartered grant, or a discriminating Tari£. 
 Wherever labor, the great element of our growth, and independence as a nation, 
 requires security and protection, there the protecting hand of government should 
 be stretched out, with a wise beneficence. Let this principle be adopted, 
 
 AND STEADILV ADHERED TO. and there WILL BE AN END TO ANY INVIDIOUS INTER- 
 FERENCE OF ONE PORTION OF OUR CITIZENS WITH THE RIGHTS ANB PRIVILEGES 
 OF THE OTHER. We URGENTLY INTREAT OUR SOUTHERN FRIENDS, SERIOUSLT, 
 TO TAKE THIS VIEW OF THE SUBJECT." 
 
 Unquestionably if the Southern States had yielded 
 from time to time, to the demands of Northern cupid- 
 ity, passively, "invidious interferences" in some de- 
 gree might have been prevented. The enormous 
 bounties afforded to the manufacturing, navigation 
 and commercial interests, however, have had, and do 
 exercise a material influence in favor of those con- 
 clusions, which strengthen the Federpd Government 
 This is natural, and it is so. 
 
 There was another important condition of the con- 
 federacy, which weakened the force of this disturb- 
 ing element. This was its size. Ideas circulate 
 slowlv in the new and unsettled States. Slavery, in 
 
Texas would be comparatively a matter of unconcern 
 to Boston, while Boston abolition is but little heard of 
 in Texas. So in the Northwestern States, for a lime, 
 the ideas of Union, constitutional right, obligations to 
 party, were strong enough to counteract anti-slavery 
 agitation. The old ideas retained their hold there 
 with much fixedness upon the people. 
 
 The increase of the conveniences of intercommuni- 
 cation, and the prodigious immigration to those States 
 from New England and Europe, have overcome this 
 influence. Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Iowa seem 
 to pursue the ways of this fatal agitation. Those peo- 
 ple seem as much controlled by abolition ideas, as those 
 in the Eastern States. There are other influences of an 
 inferior value, but we believe that we have noticed the 
 most influencive. We testify to the vast power of 
 these influences. The wonder is, that they should 
 not silence all opposition to them. The fact that this 
 agitation has attained its present growth, against the 
 power of these influences, is, in our judgment, one of 
 the most ominous circumstances of the time, 
 
 The generation, tolerant of slavery from their long 
 and peaceful connection with it, is rapidly passing from 
 the earth. The men who will occupy their places have 
 been taught that slavery is an offence, an execration, 
 a blight, a sin. The warm, exuberant, united, sympa- 
 thetic Democratic party of the time of General Jack- 
 son, is extinct. The words Constitution and Union 
 have lost their spell. The Abolitionist boasts, with no 
 little cause, " We have disenchaoted the mind of the 
 people, in a good measure, as to the divinity of their 
 parchment idol. We have taught men to calculate the 
 value of the Union. The idea that loyalty and allegi- 
 ance are due to it is fast becoming ridiculous and con- 
 temptible. It is beginnivg to be looked upon as a maU 
 Ur of business'— a partnerskip in trade.'' When we re- 
 flect with candor for one moment, what else could we 
 
•^9 
 
 expect 1 A whole people is taught that their Consti- 
 tution supports and upholds the direst, most abhor- 
 red, disgracefid evil iJiar. ever dishonored a nation. 
 A religious people is taiioht that sin and crime were 
 compromised with, in the formation of th;it Constitu- 
 tion. Can we ex[)ect them to revere, or to abide the 
 terms agreed to I 
 
 The necessity for men to hold pro-slavery opinions 
 to reach office has long since been removed. Cor- 
 win, Ewing, CoUamer, Ashmun, Barnard, Hunt, Sew- 
 ard, Mann, Hale, Chase, are official proofs to the con- 
 trary. The South — reduced in its power in Con- 
 gress, reduced in the election of President, the foun- 
 tain of power — cannot count on her own sons, who 
 look for preferment at Washington. Clay, Benton, 
 Houston and others, openly woo anti-slavery power. 
 
 Then, commercial ideas — the pecuniary interests 
 of large, and, if you please, dominant classes, never 
 did and, never can maintain a party, or body politic, 
 long together, in opposition to the moral ideas of the 
 community. Institutions embody and manifest pre- 
 dominant thoughts and opinions. The mind of a 
 community in its highest developments, and noblest 
 aspirations, sooner or later, acquires the conduct of 
 the community. It is in vain that we hope for a stay 
 to this current Irom favor drawn from the transient in- 
 terests and ephemeral conditions of society. Commer- 
 cial ideas, connections, pursuits, are essentially unstable. 
 They are derived from circumstances fluctuating and 
 precarious. They do not bind the hearts and con- 
 sciences of men. Powerful, then, as the countervail- 
 ing influences we have noticed are, a fair inquirer 
 must see that they have already proven their own in- 
 adequacy to the demand upon them; and that their 
 value is m the course of daily reduction. 
 
30 
 
 Of the Opinions of Public Men. 
 
 An inquiry into the opinions of leading and rep- 
 resentative statesmen of the North, may be useful. 
 We can o-ather from these various marks of popular 
 sentiment, the lines of the prospect before us. " Some- 
 thing," says one of the older class of Virginia states- 
 men, of the Titan age of that Commonv^^ealth, " has 
 su^o-ested to the members of Congress the policy of 
 acquiring geographical majorities, 'i his is a very di- 
 rect step towards disunion, and must foster those geo- 
 graphical enmities by which alone it can be effected. 
 The something, must undoubtedly be a contemplation 
 of particular advantages to be derived from such ma- 
 jorities. If we can discover what these are, and can 
 also remove the temptations, we shall destroy the most 
 dangerous enemy to the best system of government 
 which ever existed. And is it not notorious that they 
 consist of nothing else but usurpation o^ internal pow- 
 ers over persons and propert]) by which they can regu- 
 late the internal voeallh and prosperity of individuals 
 and States." Unquestionably, the employment of the 
 Federal Government to affect the fortunes of classes 
 and individuals, in the shape of bounties, protections 
 and expenditures, has led to the sense of the overween- 
 ing power of that government — and the consequent 
 responsibility of our citizens — for all it does or omits 
 to do. The State Rights politicians, who opposed the 
 acts of the Federal Government of this character from 
 deference to the Constitution, form a small class, at the 
 North. Most of the Democratic politicians, acknow- 
 ledge the power of the Government, and dispute on 
 measures with reference to their expediency. Judge 
 Woodbury, who has given the wqight of his great 
 mind and great character to the support of strict doc- 
 trines, confesses, " the States become weaker and fee- 
 bler daily, as their number increase, and the whole 
 Union increases — being now thirty to one, instead of 
 
thirteen to one — and the Central Government be- 
 comes still stronger ;" and that the tendency is, " for 
 the authority of the Union by constructiori to absorb 
 and ovenvhelin the natural and aj,'i}ropriate rights of 
 sovereign States." He admonishes his brethren and 
 the country : "A course of harshness towards the 
 States by the General Government, or by anv of its 
 great departments — a course of f)rohibitions and nul- 
 litications, as to their domestic policies, in doubtful 
 cases, and by implied power, is a violation of sound 
 principle ; will alienate and justly offend, and tend 
 ultimately, no less than disastrously, to dissolve the 
 bonds of Union so useful and glorious to all around." 
 
 The class of politicians connected with that of 
 Woodbury, and in the politics of the country associ- 
 ated with him, are those who, with General Jackson, 
 opposed the incipient movements of the abolitionists 
 — who sustained the 21st rule and voted Calhoun's 
 and Atherton's resolutions ; who supported the annex- 
 ation of Texas ; who voted and supported in 1848 
 the Missouri Compromise to the Pacific Ocean, and 
 who — continually receding before the mighty torrent 
 of Anli-Slavery sentiment — have fallen back upon 
 " Non-intervention ;" who support the Fugitive Slave 
 Bill as a right of the South, and who vi^ould have done 
 more for the South, had it not been for the Southern 
 barriers of Clay, Benton, and their Southern confeder- 
 ates. The representatives of this class are Dallas, Bu- 
 chanan, Dickinson, Douglass, Bright, and we add Cass. 
 
 We think but little of their doctrine of Non-inter- 
 vention ; but it is no slight testimony to the disorder- 
 ed condition of the public mind at the North, that the 
 friends of the South have been driven to, and almost 
 driven from it. The doctrine that the Government, 
 holding the powers of peace and war, of making 
 compacts and alliances, of acquiring territories and 
 forming governments, owing no duties to the proper- 
 
32 
 
 ty of fifteen States on those territories, is a proposi- 
 tion addressed to the creduhty of the South, and 
 which nothing but creduhty can tolerate. Still we 
 recoonize the statesmen who hold it, as the nearest to 
 us of all who represent opinion from the North. 
 
 At a loner interval from these comes a class, which 
 constitutes w4iat is termed the Conservative class — 
 men who are wiUing to rest for a time on what they 
 have. Mr. Webster is the representative of this class. 
 We propose to examine his position. In August, 
 1848, Mr. Webster said — " My opposition to the in- 
 crease of slavery in this country, or to the increase of 
 slave representation, is general and universal. It has 
 no reference to the hues of latitude, or points of the 
 compass. 1 shall oppose all such extension at all times 
 and under all circumstances, even against all inducements 
 — against all limitations of great interests — against all 
 combinations — against all compromises." 
 
 In 1847 he said : " We should take the first, last and 
 every occasion which offers, to oppose the extension of 
 slavery" We might follow Mr. Webster from the 
 Boston meeting of 1819, when he urged the Missouri 
 restriction; to Niblo's Garden in 1837, when he forged 
 the thunderbolts he not long ago accused Mr. Wilraot 
 of stealing; to the Faneuil Hall address of 1845 on 
 the admission of Texas, and from thence to show the 
 ground for the statement in the Boston Atlas, " that 
 no man had done more than he to swell the volume 
 of Anti-Slavery sentiment." In March last, after es- 
 tablishing that slavery could not penetrate to the Pa- 
 cific territories after California was admitted, he de- 
 clared he would not " re-enact the ordinance of God, 
 or wantonly wound even the irrational pride of the 
 South." To those with whom the question is one of 
 pride simply, this declaration may afford subject for 
 gratitude. In reference to fugitive slaves, Mr. Webster 
 offered a bill conceding the trial of jury to slaves at the 
 
^L^ 
 
 33 
 
 place of hiftf arrest — that is, all iliat the Abolitionists ask 
 for, with the Constitution as it is. Mr. Webster's de- 
 fence of the Union is for the North, not the South. He 
 offers no reparation nor emolhent to the South, for the 
 wounds of the territorial legislation. He wishes to 
 raise a Union party North, to defend the Union 
 North. Mr. Webster suggested many things in his 
 speech in March last, that led us to expect he design- 
 ed something more. That speech has had no con- 
 clusion ; for the lame and impotent defence of the 
 Omnibus could not have been in his design. We 
 suppose he has found he could do nothing commensu- 
 rate with his opinion of the national necessity. 
 
 It is the most invincible proof of the power of that 
 anti-slavery sentiment which he aided to build, that 
 his most brilliant campaign — that in which he con- 
 quered the territories acquired from Mexico, and sur- 
 rendered them to free soil — has produced at home his 
 arraio-nment and condemnation. The first of the He- 
 brew kings was sent to smite the Amalekites, which 
 he did, putting the entire people to the edge of the 
 sword, and destroying their cattle, reserving, only, the 
 king, and retaining the choice cattle for an offering. 
 For this lenity his kingdom was rent from fiim. No- 
 thing could satisfy the demands of the exasperated 
 national sentiment but the entire, absolute and indis- 
 criminate proscription of their enemy. Mr. Webster, 
 from all appearances, will endure a similar punish- 
 ment for failing to heap scorn on that " irrational 
 pride of the South." 
 
 We come to that class whom we suppose repre- 
 sent the condition of the public mind as it now ex- 
 ists. These are the men who have no " combinations 
 or compromises" to make with slavery — who stand 
 where Mr. Webster stood in 1848 — whose opinion^ 
 have been embodied by Channing. and are enforced 
 by Gov. Seward, Their opinions are thus defined. 
 
Gov. Seward says, "the agitations which a1w»ni us, are 
 not signs of evils v^hich are to come, but ?nild efforts 
 of the commonwealth for relief from mischiefs past. 
 There is a way, and one way onh% to put them at rest. 
 Let us go back to the ground v, here our forefathers 
 stood. While^we leave slavery to the care of the States 
 where it exists, let us iiijiexibly direct the policy of the 
 Federal Government to circumscribe the limits u,nd favor 
 its ultimate extinguishment. Let those \vho have this 
 misfortune entailed upon them, instead of contriving 
 how to maintain an equilibrium that never had an ex- 
 istence, consider carefully how at some time — it may he 
 ten, or twenty, or even fifty years hence — by some means, 
 by all means of their own, and ivith our aid, without 
 sudden change or violent action — they may bring about 
 the emancipation of slave labor, and its restoration to 
 its just dignity and 2)ower." 
 
 We have here an abolition statesman acting under 
 and through the forms of law. The minority class- 
 North, then, allows of compromises with slavery — a 
 larger class, still a minority, permits non-interference 
 where non-interference is equivalent to and compati- 
 ble with non-extension. A third and larger, the lar- 
 gest class, i-equires the inflexible application of the pow- 
 ers of the Federal Government to weaken the interests of 
 slavery. 
 
 The position of this last class corresponds with that 
 of the Abolition Societies whose Constitutions we have 
 quoted, and who disclaimed all power over slavery in 
 the States. These societies, however, originated two 
 sects, one of which adheres to the doctrines of their 
 Constitutions, while the other have ascended to more 
 serene heiohts, of relioion and morals. The first 
 class, after purifying the Constitution, are willing 
 to adopt a " Non-Litervention ;" and they desire to 
 purify the Constitution that the perfect law oi' Non- 
 intervention may be executed. Under the Constitu- 
 
tion, this class leel '• bound to condnue i-itlt the utmost 
 strictness all the articles of the Constitution, so that they 
 mav DO NOTHING in aid of this institution bat what is 
 undeniably demanded by that instrument : and second- 
 ly, they are bound to seek earnestly such amendments 
 of the Constitution as will remove this subject wholly 
 from the coonizance of the General Government: 
 such as will release the North from all obligation what- 
 ever to support or sanction slavery, and as will insure 
 the South from all attempts by the ir^Q States to stir 
 up the slaves." The first branch of the proposition 
 above stated, constitutes the ground finally taken by 
 the most favorable class to Southern Rights in the le- 
 gislation on the territories, and which was upheld by 
 a large Southern class. Thus, the writer we quote, 
 in illustrating the position, insists, " that the fear of 
 bringing a free man of color should dictate the legis- 
 lation on the Fugitive Slave clause." The grand 
 principle to be. laid down is, "that it is infinitely more 
 important to preserve a free citizen from being made 
 a slave, than to send back a fugitive slave to his chain. 
 Let the fugitive be delivered up, but by such process- 
 es as will prevent a free man from being delivered up 
 too. For this end full provision should be made. On 
 this point the Constitution, and a still higher law, that 
 of nature and God, speak the same language." 
 
 Speaking of the former act for the recovery of fu- 
 gitive slaves, this expounder says: "A higher law 
 than the Constitution protests against it. According to 
 the law of nature, no oreater crime ao;ainst a human 
 beino- can be committed, than to make him a slave. 
 
 ... r* 
 
 This is to strike a blow at the heart and centre of all 
 his rights as a man ; to put him beneath his race." In 
 a former part of this essay, I have quoted the remedy 
 he suggests. He continues — " The Free States should 
 say calmly, but firmly, to the South : We cannot par- 
 ticipate in slavery. It is yours, wholly and exclu- 
 sively. 
 
36 
 
 " On yoLi alone the responsibility rests. You must 
 maintain and defend it by your own arms. Your sla- 
 very is no national concern. The nation must know 
 nothing of it — must do nothing in reference to it. 
 We will not touch your slaves to free or to restore 
 them. Our powers in the State and Federal Gov- 
 ernments shall not be used to destroy or to uphold 
 your peculiar institutions. We only ask such modi- 
 fications of the national charter as shall set us free 
 from all obligation to uphold what we condemn. In 
 regard to slavery, the hne between the Slave and the 
 Free States is a great gulf" 
 
 We find here, we beheve, the predominant princi- 
 ples among the moral, religious, and voting classes in 
 the Northern States, among those who still adhere to 
 the confederacy. 
 
 For it is not to he supposed that the spirit of Dis- 
 union is confined to Southern States. The situation 
 to those who hold slavery to be a crime, as the Ver- 
 mont and Connecticut Legislatures have denounced 
 it, in Union with States which maintain it, and under 
 a Constitution which guarantees it, is obviously of the 
 most inconsistent and painful description. To vote 
 for officers, to support a Constitution, which binds 
 them to pro-slavery legislation, must involve the most 
 distressing mental confiict. It is not strange that there 
 should arise a party who refuse to submit to the re- 
 quirement. *' They saw," is their frank declaration, 
 " that they could not execute the iiro-slavery commands 
 of the Constitution, and as honest men they could not 
 swear to perform them with the deliberate ^^urpose of 
 breaking their oaths. And what they might not do 
 themselves, they clearly could not appoint others hy their 
 votes to do for them. The only political action that 
 lay open to them was to labor outside of the Constitu- 
 tion, and not within it, for its overthrow. To convince 
 the |)oople that their form of govermnent wns the great- 
 
37 
 
 est enemy of tlieir safety, tlieir prosjyerUij and their 
 honor; that all their material prosperity and local ad- 
 vantages were in spite, not because of their covfeder- 
 ate Union ; and to persuade them openly to repudi- 
 ate the comjjromise by which they had delivered them- 
 selves up, bound in political sermtude to the tender 
 mercies of their enemies, and to erect a new govern- 
 ment, free from the disturbing and disgraceful ele- 
 ment of slavery, in which the experiment of self-go- 
 vernment can he fairly tried." They say the solution 
 of the problem of true political duties consists " in 
 refusing to be partakers in any voluntary degree in 
 the support of slavery in owx political, as well as in our 
 religious relations ; of disclaiming all connection with 
 a Constitution of Government instituted and used main- 
 ly for the perpetuation of slavery ; of demanding an 
 instant dissolution of the Union which hinds freedom to 
 slavery in the ties of an unhalloioed marriage ; of pro- 
 claiming as one grand principle of civil and religious 
 fellowship and conimunion, " No Union with Slave- 
 liolders." 
 
 This is the point to which the radical abolitionists 
 came after twelve years of Association. As the Nor- 
 thern mind made one advance toward them, they 
 demanded a further progress. 
 
 Look back from this point to the transactions of 
 the last eighteen years. See the revolutionary move- 
 ments of Europe, and the specihc action of England, 
 France, Denmark, and Sweden, upon the subject of 
 slavery. See the stimulus that governments, societies 
 and individuals there give to the anti-slavery move- 
 ment in this country. See how fuhy the spirit occu- 
 pies the churches, legislatures and people in the Nor- 
 thern States. See how it penetrates the literature, 
 and literary discussions of the land. See how politi- 
 cians and newspapers have been aftected by it. See 
 how it has eaten away the compromises of the Con- 
 
38 
 
 etitiitioii, and how its obligations are denied by sin- 
 cere and conscientious . men, and societies. Look 
 back at this prospect, and we shall then be prepared 
 to discern the prospect before us. 
 
 The Abolitionists. 
 
 The objection may be suggested here, that we over- 
 rate the importance of these visionary and mad fana- 
 tics, as they are popularly called. 
 
 The abolitionists have suffered great reproach, and 
 probably labor under the popular displeasure. We 
 admit that a large society at the North, would gladly 
 be rid of them. The inquiry arises, for what ? 
 
 The abolitionists have taken the colored race under 
 their protection, and faithfully do they perform the 
 trust they have assumed. They claim that equal civil 
 and 'political privileges may he granted to them. Not 
 only this, but that all partition walls, separating lines 
 and repelling prejudices, between the races, shall be 
 overthrow^n and effaced. Massachusetts prohibited 
 marriages between blacks and whites. The aboli- 
 tionists, demanded and procured a repeal of the en- 
 enactment. New York, Connecticut, Ohio and other 
 States, either in part, or altogether, disfranchised the 
 colored population. They have been called upon to 
 yield equality, and action of Conventions and Legisla- 
 tures has been compelled on their demand. Separate 
 schools have been maintained for the races, and sepa- 
 n*ate seats ni public vehicles : these have raised an 
 outcry in the same quarters. The churches will not 
 exclude the slaveholder from church privileges, nor 
 refuse contributions in money from church members. 
 Abolitionists denounce them as the " bulwarks of sla- 
 very." They tell office-seekers they ought not to take 
 office, because their oath to support the Constitution 
 js an oath to support slavery. They disorganize par- 
 lies and disturb election calculations. The accom- 
 
39 
 
 modating morals of trade, andythe suppleness of poli- 
 ticians and party newspapers are abominations to- 
 them, with which they hold no peace. In a word,, 
 they disturb the indolent repose, the fat slumbers, of 
 the self-satisfied ; they wound the self-complaisance of 
 the timorous and compromising; they interfere with 
 the selfish counsels and courses of the worldly-mind- 
 ed; they embarrass the policy of the discreet, mode- 
 rate and circumspect. 
 
 These facts account for their want of popularitv.- 
 It will be seen, that it is not what they do to society 
 South, which produces then- condemnation. It is the 
 demand of fraternity for the Colored population, and . 
 the levelling of the White population-^which awakens /fKrv 
 the popular indignation. The Northern mind, except 
 in the single dogma of "no union with slaveholders," 
 shows the most intense sympathy with their action. 
 This is natural, too. The Northern people concur 
 in the sentiment, that slavery is a sin and an offence. 
 Can they then feel unmoved, when declarations like 
 these are addressed to them ? " Ours is not the models 
 but the warning of Nations; and this is owing to the 
 disturbing element of slavery which our fathers intro- 
 duced, and we suffer to exist, in our national econo- 
 my. We see. plainly, that the elimination of this ab- 
 horred ingredient, must precede any successful at- 
 tempt to erect a true republic, enduring and flourish- 
 ing, under the auspices of a pure religion. To do 
 this, is the appointed and the chosen work of the abo- 
 litionists. In the presence of such a purpose the sec- 
 tarian strifes, the partisan struggles, the social comjje- 
 titions of the hour dwindle and disappear. Ours is 
 the only movement of this age and country, that will 
 impress itself indehbly on the destinies of all coming 
 time. While the ephemeral objects which agitate 
 the contemporary mind must soon pass away and be 
 forgotten, the change which we seek to achieve will 
 
40 
 
 influence the condition of millions, as long as the 
 earth shall endure. For such an end, we may well 
 forego the temptations of a vulgar ambition, and 
 cheerfullv dedicate to its accomplishment the best 
 powers of our minds, and the best years of our lives.. 
 For the blessings of our labors will never cease from 
 oflP the earth, and their memory will live forever." 
 
 This must satisfy us how idle the talk is, of the ar- 
 rest of this agitation. When Mr. Clay finished a 
 speech in 1837, Mr. Calhoun, supposing his party 
 would follow his movement against the abolitionists, 
 said the subject was ended. The New England Anti- 
 Slavery Society commenced with twenty members. 
 
 The perennial sprjng of the agitation is, the pro- 
 found moral conviction which rests upon the minds 
 of a considerate, thoughtfal, strong-willed people. 
 Men blind themselves, who do not recognize this 
 truth. If we can judge from the events of the last 
 few months, we should say that the question of disso- 
 lution win be decided at the North. We have not a 
 doubt, that the Union would fall under the animosities 
 which the deliberate and pubhc removal of one hun- 
 dred slaves, under the Fugitive Slave Act, would oc- 
 casion. This sterile and unproductive act may, for a 
 time, remain on the statute book. We do not believe 
 this will be submitted to. Its execution, in any con- 
 siderable degree, is simply impossible. Mr. Webster 
 recognizes the presence of this spirit. His pleas for 
 the Union have lost their character of holiday har- 
 angues. There is a soberness and seriousness about 
 them which implies conviction. Nor, do we of the 
 South, frighten him. The faint-hearteclness, creduli- 
 ty, easy submission to self-deception, visible in the 
 larger portion of the Southern States, have lowered 
 us so far, that he would hardly throw a trope or met- 
 aphor to us. He dreads, and well he may dread, 
 that stern and inexorable will — that eaniest and un- 
 
41 
 
 compromising spirit, which accosts him — to ask what 
 treaty he has made with " the irrational pride of the 
 South," and to tell him because he has not executed 
 the command for its humiliation and destruction, he 
 is rejected and scorned. 
 
 Legislation of Congress. 
 
 The *' Lucrative desires" of the Northern people, 
 to employ the evidence of Mr. Madison, were arous- 
 ed by the subject of the Western Territories dur- 
 ing the war of the Revolution. " The contest for 
 them," according to Chief Justice Marshal], "threat- 
 ened the existence of the Confederacy." Virginia 
 quieted the contest, by a surrender of the lands, and 
 the ordinance of 1787 interdicted slavery from reach- 
 ing them. When the peace of 1783 was concluded, 
 the States North of Mason & Dixon's line contained, 
 in square miles 164,081 
 
 The States now South,. 647,202 
 
 The surrender of Virginia effected the result so, 
 that the North measured (square miles) . . . 425,761 
 South 385,521 
 
 The next acquisition was of Louisiana. Its condi- 
 tion as to slavery was settled by the Missouri Com- 
 promise. The North took (square miles) . 904,607 
 The South retained 284,445 
 
 The acquisition of Oregon, Florida and Texas oc- 
 casioned another settlement. The North took Ore- 
 gon (square miles) 341,463 
 
 Santa Fe country. . , 102,000 
 
 The South obtained Florida 59,268 
 
 Texas , 212,000 
 
 The Mexican conquests, engrossed by the North 
 
 swell her limits, (square miles) • 526,000 
 
 in addition. Thus from 164,081 square miles, the 
 
 North has grown to (square miles) 2,382,903 
 
 while the South, from o , , 647,202 
 
 has only reached to .*...,,.........., . 860,631 
 
 6 
 
42 
 
 This result, it will be seen, in every case, has been 
 produced by false claims, and by the indulgence of 
 false clamor, on the part of the Northern States. 
 Their claim to the Virginia lands had no legal founda- 
 tion. The Missouri and the Oregon restrictions vio- 
 lated the. Constitution, and the attempt to coerce Mis- 
 souri to abolish slavery is now admitted to have been 
 unwarranted. So the Supreme Court of the United 
 States has in effect decided. The legislation of the 
 last Congress was a sanction to the hostile action and 
 hostile manoeuvring in Caliiorma ; and the refusal to 
 give full and adequate protection to Southern proper- 
 ty, on the common ground of the Union, was fraught 
 with injustice and wrong. We find by this review, 
 then, that the Abolition views of the Anti-Slavery 
 party North, have received powerful stimulants from 
 the cupidity and ambition generated in these States. 
 " The great consideration is," says Mr. Jacob Colla- 
 mer, "that the 'people of the North regard Slavery as a 
 moral and political, evil, and its introduction into these 
 territories would he not only an injury to them, hut 
 also to the nation. They consider that the extension of 
 slavery over more country, is to encourage and perpetu- 
 ate it. That the more it is circumsci'ihed, the less is it 
 productive, and the sooner will he emancipation!' 
 
 Mr. Cooper, of Pennsylvania, exulting over the ad- 
 mission of California, says it secures "a preponder- 
 ance of the Free States in the Senate, and the ability, 
 if true to themselves, to prevent the further acquisition 
 oi slave territory, or the extension of slavery heyond its 
 guarantied lirnits." " We are admonished," said Mr. 
 Hunt, Governor elect of New York, " that the inter- 
 diction of slavery in the territory that may be con- 
 quered or acquired, will bring the Union to an end. 
 With equal frankness, let me assure gentlemen that 
 the Free States will never consent to its admission as 
 slave territory. That must be regarded d& a settled 
 
43 
 
 question. The Nortliern iijiii<.l is formed and lixcd." 
 A recurrence to the late speeches and letters ol' Web- 
 ster, Clay, Cooper, Benton, will show that the most 
 friendly Northern party, to the rights and feelings of 
 the Southern people — did not for a moment contem- 
 plate a surrender of the principle o£ " no more slave 
 territory." It will be thus perceived that the non- 
 slaveholding communities have arrived to the conclu- 
 sion to prevent any addition to the limits of slavery — 
 any increase to the power of the slaveholding States. 
 
 Have we any assurance that other obligations to 
 the slaveholding States under the Constitution will be 
 respected? The Fugitive Slave act of 1793, was 
 rendered nugatory by the countervailing legisla- 
 tion of the States in the manner we have set fortH. 
 The evidence this legislation gives of opinion, then, 
 is conclusive, if evidence was wanting, of the hateful 
 nature of that act to them. We are assured by the 
 highest and calmest minds of the North, of a truth, 
 which we cannot ourselves deny, " that, in this coun- 
 try, no Law, no Constitution, can prevail against the 
 moral convictions of the people. These are stronger 
 than parchments, statutes, or tribunals. There is a 
 feeling in regard to slavery, spreading rapidly, which 
 cannot be withstood. It is not a fanaticism, a fever, 
 but a calm, moral and religious persuasion ; and what- 
 ever in our institutions opposes this, will be a dead 
 letter." 
 
 What would Northern feehngs dictate, in the case 
 of a servile insurrection ? One of the bitterest com- 
 plaints of the Abolitionists is, that the military arm of 
 the nation is pledged to crush " a righteous servile 
 insurrection." " We ought to say," says one of the 
 brightest and clearest minds of the North, and one of 
 those who prize the Union most highly, " We ought 
 to say to the South, to Congress, to the world, we 
 will not fight for slavery. We can die for Truth, for 
 
44 
 
 Justice, for Rights. We wilt not die, or ivflict deatli, 
 in support of ivrongs. In iriith, this spirit, this deter- 
 mination, exists noiv so extensively in the Northern 
 States, that it is impossiUe for a war to he carried on 
 in hehalf of slavery!' 
 
 How stands it with the grant of slave representa- 
 tion? How long will the Constitution abide the ex- 
 istence of a power to alter it ? Massachusetts has 
 demanded its alteration, by the unanimous vote of 
 her Legislature. John Uuincy Adams, whose report 
 was to suppress the anti-slavery agitation, imbued the 
 public mind North, "that when the powers of g-oi^em- 
 ment came to be delegated to the Union, the South — 
 i. e.. South Carolina and Georgia — refused their sub- 
 scription to the parchment, till it should be saturated 
 with the infection of slavery which no fumigation 
 could purify — no quarantine could extinguish. The 
 freemen of the North gave way, and the deadly ven- 
 om of slavery was infused into the Constitution of 
 freedom. By means of the double representation, 
 the minority command the whole, and a knot of slave- 
 holders give the law and prescribe the policy of the 
 country." Hostility to this provision constituted the 
 ground put forth prominently and distinctly in all the 
 discussions, in favor of the exclusion of the Southern 
 people, from the common ground of the Union. 
 
 The Existing Condition of the Public Mind. 
 
 The evidence we have exhibited shows that slavery- 
 is a pervading element in all the political discussions 
 in the Northern States, and opinions on that subject 
 give the hue to the parties existing there ; that, for 
 many years, it has equally formed a leading subject 
 of religious and literary inquiry. The result of the 
 discussions has been practically and efficiently to ne- 
 gate the claim of the Southern people to carry that 
 inslitution into the territories of the Union. We find, 
 
45 
 
 also, that the coni[)!ict in regard to lugitive skives, has 
 been evaded, and its obhgation denied ; finally, that 
 the question at issue there is, whether communities or 
 individuals can, m honor and conscience, live under 
 a Constitution whose privileges they enjoy, and whose 
 benefits they accept, and refuse or neglect the fulfil- 
 ment of the duties it imposes — the reason being, that 
 the fulfilment of the duty involves a violation of their 
 sense of right. The Radical Abolitionist plainlv and 
 frankly declares, that he cannot consent to hold of- 
 fice, or to give a vote under a Constitution which up- 
 holds slavery. That he cannot accept the privileges 
 of a Constitution and refuse its burdens. Therefore, 
 he says, "No Constitution to support slavery, and no 
 Union with slaveholders." The larger class say, " We 
 will accept the benefits of the Constitutioi:^ Our 
 cities, palaces, shipping, manufactures all, are due to 
 its blessed influences. As for slavery, we will oppose 
 it, wherever and whenever we can. We will not 
 suffer it to be extended. We will inflexibly apply 
 the powers of the Government to its limitation, with 
 the view to its extinction. Meanwhile, let us main- 
 tain Union. Abolition can best be accomplished 
 throuoh the Union," 
 
 There is not much room for doubt, as to the final 
 end of this contest North. The Radical Abolitionist 
 frankly admitting the obligations imposed by the Con- 
 stitution of the United States, and their total inability 
 to fulfil them, under their sense of duty, implores a 
 rescission of the contract and a dissolution of the Un- 
 ion. The Northern 2")eople generally, admitting their 
 obligations under the Constitution, yet under subter- 
 fuge and reservation, while they accept all the bene- 
 fits of the Union, escape the performance of their 
 confederate obligations. The Radical Abolitionist — - 
 planting himseli" on the high ground of religion, mor- 
 ality and conscience, says: "We will not support a 
 
• AG 
 
 Constitution that upholds slavery."' The others, look- 
 ing to the Navigation act, Tariff, Public Expenditure 
 and Public Lands, say, The Union must be preserved. 
 
 The war upon slavery, will be carried on with the 
 more steadiness by this party, in order to soothe the 
 consciences which their selfishness w^ounds. The 
 dano-er to the South from the war}^, politic and world- 
 ly minded counsels of this party to their more violent 
 associates, is painfully apparent in the history we 
 have given. When, the South has been thoroughly 
 aroused, they lull its mind to repose. When repose 
 is for a moment obtained, they then devise a new at- 
 tack. 
 
 The object of the first body of zealots who formed 
 a society, numbering twenty persons — some of whom 
 were females — tvas the abolition of slavery in the Uni- 
 ted States, This they have not yet accomplished. 
 They have excluded, it from Oregon, California and 
 New Mexico — a larger part of the United States than 
 ithe whole domain of slavery. They have united 
 the North to a practical nullification of the Fugitive 
 Slave law. 
 
 They have blackened the character of the slave- 
 holder to th^ degree, that his name is fast becoming 
 an execration. They have satisfied the minds of the 
 most thoughtful of the country, that the Union or 
 slavery must fall. 
 
 We consider it proper to present a picture of 
 the prospect before us, as it appears to our eyes. We 
 do not propose to discuss any remedy for the existing 
 ills, or any modes -or plans of redress'. No plan or 
 mode of redress can have any eflficacy until we see 
 plainly what is the nature of our disease. 
 
 The first step, then, in the progress to a remedy, 
 is to find the extent of the evil. The second, is to 
 make the decision that tise- remedy shall he ajipUed. 
 What that remedv shnll bo, we are cntirelv indifier- 
 
47 
 
 ent, provided it be efficient and adequate. The w«- 
 ion of Southern men, in our judgment on this conclu- 
 sion, is indispensable to the peace of the Southern 
 States. A remedy is demanded by every considera- 
 tion of public duty, and forms the condition of our 
 political and social life. History teaches us, that the 
 overturn in a State of its civil, social, and domestic in- 
 stitutions, by foreign influence is, in effect, a conquest 
 over, and enslavement of that State. We shall not 
 discuss here what the nature of the catastrophe 
 -would be, of an overturn of our social institutions. 
 Wealth dissipated, commerce destroyed, production 
 ending in the supply of earth's coarsest fare, improve- 
 ment terminated, arts, sciences and civilization ban- 
 ished, constitute but a portion of the immedicable ills 
 it would heap upon us. 
 
 The deliberate conclusion to bring down these 
 evils upon independent States, members of the same 
 confederacy, declared in the Northern States, and 
 the connection, in some degree, of the people of all 
 the Northern States, and in an extraordinary and 
 dangerous decree of the people of several of those 
 States^ in this conclusion, is the crime against us. 
 There is no Northern State which can plead her en- 
 tire innocence. 
 
 We close this essay by quoting from a philosophic 
 political writer, truths which contain lessons of the 
 mightiest import to both sections of the confederacy : 
 
 "In all political societies which have had a dura- 
 ble existence, there has been some fixed ]yoint ; some- 
 thing which men agreed in holding sacred — which it 
 might be lawful to contest in theory, but which no 
 one could hope ox fear to see shaken in practice ; which, 
 in short, was, in the common estimation, placed above 
 discussion. And the necessity of this may easily 
 be made evident: A State never is — nor until man- 
 kind are vastly improved, can hope to be, for any 
 
48 
 
 lono- time — exempt from internal dissension. For 
 there neither is, nor has ever been, any state of so- 
 ciety in which colhsions did not occur between the 
 immediate interests and passions of powerful sections 
 of the people. What, then, enables society to weath- 
 er these storms, and pass through turbulent times, 
 without any permanent weakening of the ties which 
 hold it together ? Precisely this : That, however im- 
 portant the interests about ivhich men fall out, the con- 
 Jlict does not affect the fundamental principles of the 
 system of social union lohich hap^Jens to exist ; nor 
 threaten large portions of the community with the sub- 
 version of that on ivhich they build their calculations, 
 and ivith which their hopes and aims are identified. But, 
 when the questioning of these fundamental principles is 
 (not an occasional disease, but) the habitual condition 
 of the body politic ; and lohen all the violent ani?nosities 
 are called forth, which spring naturally from such a sit- 
 uation, the State is virtually in a position of ci\il war; 
 
 AND CAN NEVER LONG REMAIN FROM IT IN ACT AND FACT." 
 
MR. CALHOUN'S RESOLUTIONS. 
 
 1. Resolved, That in the adoption of the Federal Constitution, 
 the States adopting the same, acted, severally, as free, independ- 
 ent, and sovereign States ; and tliat each, for itself, by its own 
 voluntary assent, entered the Union with the view to its increased 
 security against all dangers, domestic as well as foreign, and the 
 more perfect and secure enjoyment of its advantages, natural, po- 
 litical, and social. 
 
 2. That in delegating a portion of their powers to be exercis- 
 ed by the Federal Government, the States retained, severally the 
 exclusive and sole right over their own domestic institutions and 
 police, and are alone responsible for them, and that any intermed- 
 dling of any one or more States, or a combination of their citizens, 
 with the domestic institutions and police of the others, on any 
 ground, or under any pretext whatever, political, moral or reli- 
 gious, with the view to their alteration, or subversion is not war- 
 ranted by theConstitution ; insulting to the States interfered with, 
 tending to endanger their domestic peace and tranquiHty, subvers- 
 ive of the objects for which the Constitution was formed, and by 
 necessary consequences, tending to weaken and destroy the Union 
 itself. 
 
 3. That this Government was instituted and adopted by the sev- 
 eral States of this Union as a common agent, in order to carry into 
 effect the powers which they had delegated by the Constitution for 
 their mutual security and prosperity; and that, in fulfillment of this 
 high and sacred trust, this Governm,ent is bound so to exercise its 
 powers as to give, as far as may be practicable, increased stability 
 and security to the domestic institutions of the States that com- 
 pose the Union ; and that it is the solemn duty of the Government 
 to resist all attempts by one portion of the Union to use it as an 
 instrument to attack the domestic institutions of another, or to 
 weaken or destroy such institutions. 
 
 4. That domestic slavery, as it exists in the Southern and 
 Western States of this Union, composes an important part of their 
 domestic institutions, inherited from their ancestors, and existing 
 at the adoption of the Constitution by which it is recognized as 
 Qonstituting an essential element in the distribution of its powers 
 
50 
 
 among the States, and that no change of opinion, or feeling, on the 
 part of the other States of the Union in relation to it, can justify 
 them or their citizens in open and systematic attacks thereon, with 
 the view to its overthrow; and that all such attacks are in manifest 
 violation of the mutual and solemn pledge to protect and defend 
 each other, given by the States, respectively, on entering into the 
 Constitutional Compact, which formed the Union, and as such is a 
 manifest breach of faith, and a violation of the most solemn obli- 
 gjations, moral and religious. 
 
 5, That the intenneddling of any State or States, or their citi- 
 zens, to abolish slavery in this District, or any of the Terri.ories, 
 on the ground, or under the pretext, that it is iminoral or sinful ; 
 the passage of any act or measure of Congress, with that view, 
 would be a direct and dangerous attack on the Institutions of all 
 the slaveholding States. 
 
 6. That the Union of these States rests on an equality of 
 rights and advantages among its members ; and that whatever 
 destroys that equality, tends to destroy the Union itself; and that 
 it is the solemn duty of all, and more especially of this body, 
 which represents the States in tlieir corporate capacity, to resist 
 all attempts to discriminate between the States in extending tlie 
 benefits of the Government to the several portions of the Union; 
 and that to refuse to extend to the Southern and Western States 
 any advantage which would tend to strengthen, or render them 
 more secure, or increase their limits or population by the annexa- 
 tion of new territory or States, on the assumption or under the 
 pretext that the institution of slavery as it exists among them, is 
 immoral or sinful, or otherwise obnoxious, would be contrary to 
 that equality. 
 
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