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STATE OF THE UNION. 
 
 rK t^v <3 ^ 'Speech .of the 
 
 / 
 
 HON. D. C. DE JARNETTE, 
 
 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, FEBRUARY 14, 1861. 
 
 The House haring nnder consideration the report from the Select Committee of 
 Thirty-three— 
 
 Mr. DE JARNETTE said: .— - — ^ ^^ . 
 
 3Ir- Spkakkr : There are times when I am contemplating the history of my coun- ^ ^^ 
 try — its rise, progress, and rapid development — when the picture becomes so pleas- 
 ing, and I am so filled with hope and delight, that I am lifted above the raging ele- 
 ments which have now eo nearly destroyed it ; and from such a stand-point, view the 
 grandest system of government ever yet devised by human agency for the happiness 
 of man. 
 
 I have gone back to the earliest period of our history, when a few bold hearts first 
 penetrated the dark forests, to find the home of the savage, and share with him his 
 freedom, sooner than submit to the tyranny and oppression of the Old Woild. They 
 were guided by the sparks of liberty which they had seen emitted by the concussion 
 of the dynasties of the Old World ; which, as they arose, were carried by the winds 
 of heaven to the shores of America. 
 
 It was here, sir, guided by the Unseen, and protected by the arm which they never 
 felt but to praise, they reared an altar of liberty, around which soon stood the op- 
 pressed of every land, who soon so replenished its fiies that its flames licked the 
 clouds, the bright effulgence of which cast a shadow under the thrones of tyranny 
 and oppression throughout the earth. 
 
 In viewing it from this stand-point, I have seen no North, no South ; I have looked 
 upon the whole, and been proud that all of it was my country- 1 have forgctten, and 
 expelled from my mind, nil grievances of which the t^outli now so justly complains, 
 and viewed my country as it should be, and not as it is. Mr. Sjicakei-, I am proud of 
 what it has already accomplished ; but with the eye of faith I pemtiate the distant 
 future, and behold one hundred million freemen, whose sublime destiny it is to break 
 the chains of tyianny, to feed the hungry, and clothe tlie naked over the earih. 
 
 Sir, we have reached that point in our national progress when every step we take 
 is felt throughout the earth. The eyes of the world are upon us. To us beloiii: the 
 jealousy, hate, and envy of the dynasties of the earth. This they will not admit, even 
 to themselves or to each other; but the foot of oppre.«sion is raised ; the reins ot Gov- 
 ernment are loosed ; and the oppressed throughout the earth begin to recover their 
 long-lost liberties. 
 
 This is what our free institutions have accomplished ; this is what we have accomp- 
 lished, without regard to any other object than our own development. 
 
 Still, the eyes of the world are upon us; our movements arc watched and felt 
 throughout the world. 
 
 When we stepped from the banks of the Mississippi to the Pacific ocean, the earth 
 moved heavily on its axis, because its balance was disturbed. All Europe telt the 
 shock ; and now feel and know that another center must be found, around which they 
 in turn must revolve. Nor was its influence confined to Europe ; it penetrated .\si'a 
 to the Celestial Empire; aroused the slumbering millions in their stiong-walled cities 
 and caused their gales to creak under the accumulated rust of centuries. 
 
 Indeed, far beyond, in the remote kingdom of Japan, a hundicd million more were 
 aroused to shake ofi' the dust of centuries, and again to walk the earth. 
 
 It was that step which (if this Union wera not doomed to perish) wotild make this 
 
2 
 
 comiiry the center of t])e trade of the earth, by Kiving us'the control nf +I.0 u,.^ f 
 
 the eight hundred .nilh-on people of Asia ; a'trad/whifh hn^f Len e^t'ed^ Eurone 
 
 for more than SIX hundred years; a trade which 'has been so fnutfirthat it ha ?n \'y,Ar. 
 
 turn, made every nation v.hich er.joyed it at the time the greatest Power t e eakh ^ ^^ 
 
 It was to aeconnnodate that trade that Columbus started on his voyage of dis^ovel 
 ry ; he w.shed to hnd a nearer way to India, and in the line of that mofe d rec wlr 
 he stumbled on th.s c-onrinent. It was to that trade Spain owed her grea ne4 he; 
 wealth, and her vast donnmon. From Spain it fell to Denn.ark, which kingdom held 
 It for more than a hur.dred years, and by it grew to the {.osition of the then mo t for 
 midable Power of the earth. England was attracted by 'the glittering pize and bv 
 diplomacy and by threats wrenched it from the gr.sp of that kin ..don. Profithur h"! 
 the errors of Spain and Denmark, England, by the most .i.anticlSust.^i Sve' 
 ment winch cur.es the pages of history, subjugated one hundred million of the peopL 
 of India, and, with their own money, has hired armies to keep them in the dust Since 
 then, she, in order to guar.l it effectually, until recently never suffered any natio of 
 Europe to hold a navy comparable to her own. Standing over France, as soon as ha 
 nation could equip a navy at all calculated to cope with hev, she has in;ariabrv cashed 
 t She has stood with one foot on the Danish Belt and the other on the DaXel 
 feast h' the eIsL ''"'•■ ""'""'' ''" ^"^'^ ^''''' ''' ^^e Russian bear from tie rich 
 
 Thus, for nearly two hundred years, has England enjoyed uninterruptedly the trade 
 of the eight hundred millions of Asia. ' ^uij uie udue 
 
 Since the purchase of- Louisiana by the United States, England has been uneasy 
 Napoleon I, when he sold that country west of the Mississippi to us gave as a easo" 
 that he could not hold it ; that England, to guard her trade in the' Ealt' would wUh 
 her immense navy take it; that he wished the young giant of America to poss;ss it 
 higXt tilSe.'"' '' "''' '' "' ^'"''"''' '^'''' ^^■""'^' '-eak England's power by poissl 
 
 I will not stop here to show all the impediments which England has thrown across 
 our path to prevent our march to the Pacific. She began with a proposition for the 
 joint occupancy of our Pacific shore. That was agreed to ; but it soon resulted Z hS 
 clam, to the only harbor on that coast owned bv the United States. The riirht of 
 search which she asserted, and which resulted in the war of 181:^, was instituted with 
 he v.cvy of breaking the j,res^ic,e of our power, a..d giving her the occupation of As- 
 toria the only li^ubor on the Pacific. The war con.menced by the seizure of that 
 
 arClKMit " '* ""' ^'°'"* ^'''^'^'"^ '''^"^ ^^'^ ^'^'**-^ "^'P'^^*^'^ was made 
 
 Failing in this, she now holds all the South American States u.ider bonds which 
 they dare not disregard, to prevent an American vessel, in time of war from enter- 
 ing their ports, eyen for shelter. When the transit of the Isthmus is found practica- 
 ble, she appears at that point and undertakes to cont.-ol that. When in I850 we 
 proposed to const.uct a lailroad to the Pacific, she immediately begins the construc- 
 tion of a road from Newfoundland to Puget Sound, and has, through the polar cold 
 constructed fifteen hundred miles of that road. And still more recently, impelled bv 
 the spur of ou.' rapid advancement, she has purchased an island in the'Pacitic in our 
 track tq L.dia, Ui)on which she is this day building a Gibraltar almost in sight of our 
 
 Ui ihi.=;. -^ir, will avail not ; >,he isstriving agninst what the finger of destiny has 
 ■'■ ■ u'" J"'" 0";^-"comphshn,ent. Sir. civilizat on, knowledge, and commerce started 
 in -he hasi. Ihey have progressed and are piogrcssing westward. When thev shall 
 have reached the ut.ern.o,t vn-g.. of the f'Hcific shore, they must retrooade; aiid the 
 sublm,e_(iesiiny of retu i.ing thes^ ble.-^sings to their ancient seats will 'be ours Sir 
 the ge.nus ot .\me.Mc:. has l.ft the .ock-bound coast of New England and taken its pol 
 siiion on the sho.e.of the Pacific; and there it will work oui'our mighty destiny by 
 placing in our control the trade of the world- . ' 
 
 Mr. Speaker, caii there be a heart so dead as not to beat with exultant pride when 
 contemplating such a destiny for his ONvn native land? Sir, since I have been thus 
 hopeful of tue des^tiny of my country, I have known that the accomplishment of that 
 destiny could be hastened or delayed by mutu.al good offices, good feeling, and fra- 
 ternal regard between the North and South, or the rever.-e. 
 
 _ I have, sir, watched with much anxiety the storm-cloud which I have seen gather- 
 ing and advancmg from the Korth for ten years past. I have noted its every move- 
 
3 
 
 ment, and, heuce not unexpectedly, seen its darkness increase, and heard its loud 
 thunders rattle. I have known that this dark and threatenincr tornado wouhi spread 
 it8 fury and hurl its thunder bohs on the devoted licads of my people. Conscious of 
 rectitude, they have not souscht, nor will they, seek, to avoid its fury ; because they 
 know they are clothed in the armor of Virginia's sovereifsfiity, which cannot be pene- 
 trated. Let me warn you, therefore, not to misinterpret her present position. It is 
 butj,he hush before the storm. She, in her wisdom, has called her people together, 
 because their liberties and her sovereignty are assailed. Rcspec.t the one, and recog- 
 nize the other, and all may yet bo well. But if not, every sword in Virginia will leap 
 from its scabbard, and flash defiance to a world in arms. There are no submissionists 
 there. The North has now become maddened by prosperity. The empire of com- 
 merce we have cheerfully conceded to them. We of the South have exulted in their 
 success, though it has been the result, in a great degree, of a tax on our labor. Still 
 we would be content if we were allowed to live in security and repose. We have 
 cheerfully divided the products of each day's labor at the South with you of the North; 
 we have never attempted to disturb your social and domestic institutions, or taught 
 others so to do ; we have been faithful to every engagement, and performed every 
 obligation imposed on us by the Constitution. 
 
 Sir, no man now lives, or has ever lived, who has said, or can say, that we of the 
 South, though heretofo"e controlling the Government, have ever withheld a rio-ht 
 from or inflicted a wrong on the North. Can you of the North say that you have ful- ■ 
 filled all the obligations imposed upon you by the Constitution ? Have you at the 
 North, while enjoying a tax which we impose on our labor for your beneflt, eve ma- 
 nifested the slightest interest in our welfare 'i Have you ever been as considerate of 
 our welfare as you have been of that of your foreign neighbors in Canada? Along 
 your border, with them, you have lived in peace and friendship. Along your border, 
 with us, there has not been a moment of repose for twenty years. You have through- 
 out the North societies organized with no other object than to employ men to excite 
 your own people to war on your brethren of the South. It cannot be slaA'ery that vou 
 war on ; because slavery exists in its worst form in sight of your own shore — in Cuba. 
 
 I have never heard of your sending an emisary to Cuba, though you have more fre- 
 quent intercourse with Havana than you have with any of our ports. Who ever 
 heard that you have ever made an eflbrt to rob a master on that island of his slave ? 
 Who ever heaid one word said by your most malignant Abolitionist against slavery 
 as it exists anywhere else, except with your brethren of the South V From their hands 
 you have received nothing but kindness. In return you send emissaries, educated 
 among you, to rob, poison, burn, and, with the assassin's dagger, to murder our 
 people. 
 
 For twenty years we have submitted to this ; we loved the Union because we have 
 been taught to love it. It was the work of our fathers ; and if it could be preserved 
 in the spirit in which they made it, it would live fresh in eternal youth, and exempt 
 from mutability and decay. But, sir, it exists no longer. Its spirit has fled ; and when 
 in the spirit laud, from the tomb it shall arise to testify against the authors of its un- 
 timely fate. The South, with conseious imiocenee, will await the sentence because it 
 will be just; and the North will be pronounced guilty of the deep damnation of this 
 taking oft'. 
 
 I have known. My. Speaker, for ten years that dissolution must come. I have seen 
 the irrepre8sii)Ie conflict between labor and capital at the North, and known that it 
 could but result in favor of the former, inasmuch as that labor poss .sseii the revolu- 
 tionary power there, to wit : the elective franchise. W^herever, sir, th'TC is free com- 
 petition between labor and capital, and that labor is armed with the unrestrieted right 
 to vote, the labor being always in the majority, nnist .sooner or later so control ihe 
 law-making power as to hold the capital subject to its will. That lalior has for many 
 years past controlled the law-making power of New En-jland. It has now gained con- 
 trol of the law-making power in many States west of the Hudson ; ami in liu^ last pres- 
 idential contest, it aspired to, and obtained, the control of the law-making power of 
 this Government. Wherever there is free competition of labor and capital, and that 
 labor vindicates its power to control the Government, liberty cannot long survive. 
 But the wor.^t form of despotism will exist as long as there is capital left upon which 
 it can feed. When this fails, the only result which can follo\V is, for such a people to 
 return to barbarism. 
 
 Thus, society at the North is now pregnant with the seeds of its own destruction. 
 
ris only salvation is a stronger Governmpnt, and a restriction of the electlTe francbije. 
 This is' not f^peculative tiipory. but fact; it is not wild imaginings, but history. The 
 8tnndin<^ armies of the Old World are maintained to keep labor from warring on ca- 
 pital; not by contiollin^ the law-making power, for that labor has not the elective 
 franchise, and hence cannot aspire to the forms of justice to legalize it8 robberies; 
 but those armies are maintained to protect tliat capital from mob violence. What 
 protection has your capital from the legalized robbery to which it is even now some- 
 times subjected ? Does not this free labor now eet at naught your State decrees, if 
 they are annoying to it ? Has it not scaled the ramparts of the Federal Government, 
 destroyed the Constitution, enthroned the higher law in its stead, and justified such 
 action by alleging that their own State laws, which they had made to aerne themselves, 
 required them to despise the authority of the General Government? It is the free 
 suffrage and free labor of the North which now controls the press, the bar, the schools, 
 and the pulpit. It is the free labor of the North which has invaded the sanctity of 
 God's altar, and compelled its ministers to acknowledge its divinity by dethroning Je- 
 hovah and worshipping Belzcbub. It is the free labor at the North which has in- 
 vaded the highest judicial tribunal of justice, destroying its prerogatives, and teach- 
 ing men to despise its decrees. Sir, it has so shattered the framework of society, that 
 society itself exists only in an inverted order at the North. Capital at the North for 
 a long time waged an unequal contest with labor. It looked then to the Government 
 and fonnd that impotent for aid. For momentary security, it seemed to sympathize 
 in the objects of the fanatics, and to point to the institutions of the South as fit ob- 
 jects for attack. Fatal delusion! They not only introduced the Trojan horse into 
 their counting-houses, but drove away their best customers, by their efforts to enslave 
 them. 
 
 At the South, our new republic will have no euch element of discord. Capital there 
 owns all labor which, from its nature, so lowers the man as to make him unfit for so- 
 ciety and self-government. Thus capital and labor in our new republic will work in 
 beautiful harmony ; and it is thus that African slavery furnishes the only basis upon 
 which republican liberty can bo preserved. 
 
 You may ask me if we have not free labor at the South. I answer, yes, in its na- 
 tural form ; not warring on capital, but sustained by it. We are proud of that labor. 
 It is cnligthened. It constitutes the main pillar in our structure. It is the sword of 
 our defense, because it is elevated and dignified by the conservative influence of Afri- 
 can slavery. It will thus, in our new republic, be the only place on the globe where 
 free suffrage and free labor constitute conservative elements in the structure of re- 
 publican liberty. It will be there alone where free labor will not be in antagonism to 
 capital; because capital owns the only labor which can be oppressed by it, and be- 
 cause labor, being the capital, will be, as such, carefully preserved. 
 
 Thus African slavery constitutes'the keystone of the arch which supports the only 
 structure which free labor, together with free suffrage, will not and cannot destrov. 
 It must not be supposed by the people of the North, that the free labor of the South 
 can ever desire to disturb the relation of master and slave ; on the contrary they will 
 and must, from necessity, defend it, as it is alone on the profit of slave labor that free 
 labor finds employment and lives in peace and plenty. It is thus that African ylave- 
 ry elevates and dignifies the free labor of the South, by freeing it of all menial serv- 
 ice. Thus relieved, that labor constitutes a valuable social and political element in 
 our Republic, by working with mutual dependence in beautiful harmony with capital, 
 consolidating in one compact mass and brotherhood all the white men' of the South. 
 Sir, this system of ours, thus purged from all opposing elements, cannot be over- 
 thrown ; it will go on to prosper with accumulating vigor ; for by it the labor of the 
 white man is freed from the oppression of capital. 
 
 It is vain, then, for the free labor of the North, by the exercise of its revolutionary 
 power, to attempt fm-thi-r the corruption of the free labor of tiie South. That labor, 
 Mr. Speaker, has higher aspirations and holier purposes to accomplish; it.s mission, 
 sir. is to bui'd up, not to destroy an empire : to observe all the restraints of law and 
 the Constitution, and not to despise the restraints of law and trample in the (hwt the 
 ConsMtution ; to protect society by carefully guarding the pulpit, not to destroy so- 
 ciety by corrupting it. The ficc labor of the North now seeks the destruction of this 
 beautiful system of Government. It knowH the secret of our strength, and has judged 
 rightly where the power of this Samson is. They have planted their batteries againat 
 the institution of slavery. They know it to be the Redau of our Rystem ; they know 
 
\t* conserrative power, and as long as it exists they know the free labor of the South 
 cannot be corrupted. For this reason has slavery been assailed ; and now that you 
 have got it in the "course of ultimate extinction," you are resolved to use your pow- 
 er, and we are determined to resist your authority. 
 
 What cause do you allege for thus warring on us ? Have we of the South ever 
 withheld a right given you by the Constitution, or inflicted a wrong ? Have we not 
 contributed to your success and rejoiced in your prosperity V Did not Virginia, (may 
 God bless her in this hour,) in order to destroy jealousy between the North and South, 
 and give peace to tiie country, give to the North the empire of the Northwest? And 
 now, in this hour of her peril, she turns her eyes to that powerful empire, the fruit of 
 her womb ; huiiianity would apply the full breast of that youthful exuberance to the 
 mouth of its atfiicted parent ; but tyranny would, Nero like, march to the throne over 
 the prostrate form of its own motiier. You, too, Nero like, when your proud Ca])itol 
 is being consumed by tiie torch which your hands have applied, are reveling amid the 
 ruins which you made. In the name of an outraged and oppressed people — in the 
 name of freemen who know their rights and will defend them, and in the name of a 
 just God, I charge you to let this parricidal sin jmss from you. You are now about 
 to assume the reins of Government over what you have left of the Americ^ui Union. 
 You, as you know, have acquired that power, pledged to the accomplishment of a 
 single object : the ultimate extinction of our cherished domestic institution — African 
 slavery. 
 
 Before we surrender the authority by which you are to govern us, we only ask that 
 you will give us gurantees by which you cannot deprive us of that protection which 
 the Constitution of the United States, as interpreted, not by us, but by the Supreme 
 Court, guarantees to us. This you refuse to do. You obtain power by pledges to war 
 on the institutions of the South. We ask you to throw away the weapons wliich you 
 have drawn for our destruction before we yield to your autliority. This you con. 
 temptuously refuse to do; and then, sir, in the memory of Virginia's history, you ap- 
 peal to her to prenerve the Union ! 
 
 Then, sirs, beware : Virginians will defend their liberties, and preserve unrestricted 
 the sovereignty of their State. They and the gallant men of the South will not sur- 
 vive their Hberties. They were born freemen, and will never die slaves. 
 
 While all propositions for an honorable adjustment have come from the injured, out- 
 raged, and insulted section, we of that section have felt that they should come from 
 the assailing party. We have felt this to be wounding to our pride, and, in some de- 
 gree, tarnishing to our honor. However, it was a sacrifice upon the altar of our coun- 
 try, and it was cheerfully made. Wv owed this to the memory of our fathers; we 
 owed this to our generous constituents, who would give their lives to preserve the 
 Union in its primitive purity ; we owed it to humanity to prevent our laud from being 
 torn in civil strife and drenched in fraternal blood. We have discharged every duty 
 that honor, patriotism, and fidelity to our people demanded. In short, we have done 
 everything but surrender the liberties of our people. This we will never do. I, for 
 one, sir, would sooner see this Union shattered into atoms, never again to be reunited, 
 than to return to my people, and tell them that we had saved the Union, but enslaved 
 them, 
 
 I have, Mr, Speaker, in contemjilating the new arrangement of the States which 
 now must be made, outstripped the wheel of time, and viewed our southern republic 
 as it will be seen in 18()4. Then the machinery of our govcrimient will be in full op- 
 eration and perfected. The most skillful mechanist will not be able to detect the 
 slightest inei|ua!ity in its bearingn. Its movements will be silent, but powerful. Its 
 balance-whci 1 will be African slavery, so well adjusted that its power will be irresist- 
 ible, because its motion will be perpetual. Then will tlie southern States be united 
 in bonds of perpetual union ; then will our peoiile be united in interest, in heart, and 
 sympathy; then will v\c prosper as a peojile nover before luive prospered; because 
 our labor will be freed from taxation and the product of that labor will have no com- 
 petition. 
 
 If, then, we have failed to pr^*erve the Union by making, in the nanie of our peo- 
 ple, every snciilice except that oTthcir libtrties, we will have acconiiilished this much. 
 
 What, Mr. Speaker, will the Kepublicans of this House, whiii they rttnru to their 
 people, cari'y wiiii them to comp<'nsate for the ruin and havoc which they have crea- 
 ted? To them will belong the responsibility of disrupting this once happy Union. 
 To them will be attached the awful responsibility of exciting thirty uiillion of the hap- 
 
6 
 
 piest people on God's earth to forget that they are brethren and with all the destruc- 
 tive machinery of f^rira-visasjed war, to destroy each other in civil strife. On them 
 will fall the cui'ses of niillious at the North, whose trade they have destroyed, and 
 whose homes they have made desolate. It is on you, Republicans, will fall the curses 
 of the widowed mother who can no lonpfer find bread for her starving children. Go 
 to your crowded cities, not to the gilded palaces of your inerchant princes, but to the 
 lanes and alleys, and when you hear the cries of thousands, frantic with hunger and 
 despair, and behold here a mother with her innocent children clasped around her in 
 the agony of death from starvation, and th«re another tearing her bosom because it 
 can no longer afford nourishment to her dying infant, will you see the result of your 
 devotion to your party platform. You will have saved your party, but you will have 
 lost your country. You will have vindicated your devotion lo the negro by disre- 
 gardin.g the voice of humanity and the dcerees of Heaven. This is what you have 
 already done. If, then, the prospect of civil war, which you have created, has done 
 all, and much more than all this, what, I ask, must be the misery, agony, and death 
 which twenty-five million brave people will inflict on each other '? 
 
 Sir, when the flames of civil war have swept over our once happy land, from St. 
 John's to the Hio (irande, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific; when your cities and 
 ours no longer resound with the busy hum of industry, because they will be the first 
 victims which the relentless mouths of cannon will demand f when our beautiful coun- 
 try, where innocence resides and virtue sits enthroned, shall return to its primitive 
 occupants — because nothing save the hyena can live amid such scenes of desolation 
 and death — then you mil behold the work of your own hands. If you have not yet 
 seen enough to make you pause before you declare war on the South, and thus invoke 
 on your heads the wrath of humanity and the vengeance of Heaven, those of you who 
 survive when it shall have been ended, will witness a scene which will melt your 
 hearts, tho\igh they may be harder than adamant. . When yon are called on to wit- 
 ness the procession of ten million mourners, and hear their cries for those who have 
 fallen in battle, and hear that mighty multitude, with one voice, proclaim you the 
 author of all their affliction, you will, indeed, cry that the rocks may hide and the 
 hills may cover you from their sight. All this wiU you inflict on your country and 
 yourselves sooner than let slavery alone. 
 
 It is an institution for which you are not responsible, and about which you know 
 nothing. You say it is wrong, and you will put it in the course of ultimate extinc- 
 tion, bec;iuse slaves are sometimes treated with cruelty. That they are sometiines, 
 but rarely, treated with cruelty, I will admit ; but such acts are punished by law, and 
 punished by society, with great severity. Still, I know that there is more humanity, 
 there is more unalloyed contentment and happiness, among the slaves of the South, 
 than any laboring population on the globe. Where else but at the South are the la- 
 borers lun-sed when sick, and taken care of when tliey get too old to work ■* Where 
 but at the South is it the interest of capital to provide food for the families of labor- 
 ers when they are young and helpless? It then being the interest of capital that the 
 slave and his family should be well cared for in sickness and in health, what stronger 
 reason can be given that he will not be abused V It is this interest in his labor that 
 you would deprive liin\ of. 
 
 After you do this, have you not deprived him of his home, and all the comforts he 
 now enjoys? Will you give him another home, and provide him other cnmforts? 
 You know you will not. You will not do this to your neighbors of your own race, 
 aud the starving poor among you ; but you will stand by and see the negro, whom 
 vou have deprived of his iiome, driven, by the free white labor of the North, from 
 every occupation of honest toil. 
 
 If* then, the merit of your opposition to slavery is that yon would abolish an in.sti- 
 tution which is sometimes oppressive, go ho;ue and abolish your banking system; go 
 home and destroy your magnificent churches, because some of your ministers have 
 l)een bad men; and go home and abolish the institution of marriage ; because I know 
 that, for every master who cruelly treats his slave, there are two v/hite men at the 
 North who torture and murder their wives. We knCj^vv that it is not because you love 
 the slave, or desire to benefit his condition, that you' thus war on the South ; because 
 when you have enticed him from his happy home, we have seen you, like the croco- 
 dile, mingle your tears with the blood of your victim. We know it is done to keep 
 the nortliern mind in agitation, never permitting it to settle down on your own pro- 
 ductive elements of domestic discontent. But for this agitation at the North, society 
 
could not'stand the shock. The revolutionary element at the North coustitutes no 
 part of that society. That element now controls the law-making power, and thus has 
 the semblance of justice for its action. It is thus that the capital of Boston is held 
 subject to its command. 
 
 As the best meaTis of defense against this mighty power, which knows no control 
 but its will, society at the North is divided. There arc those who, to avoid offense, have 
 declined to take part in local elections, as shown by the thousands of slumbering votes 
 in the States east of the Hudson. There are others, who, still having hopes of con- 
 trolling it, having joined in, and desire so to direct it as to prevent any disaster to 
 themselves or the country. For several years, they did hold the reins of restraint, 
 and so checked its movements as to prevent injury. But now, it has burst the dams 
 and levees with which you for a time restrained it, and, by its resistless flood, sweeps 
 away and destroys all who oppose it. Communities at the North, or f'ven their State 
 governments cannot resist its march. Nothing at the South can now resist it, but 
 State sovereignties; and each State must throw this protection around their people, 
 or they are lost. 
 
 I have, Mr. Speaker, attempted to show the appreciation of those I represent for 
 the Union. I know of none who would not even rejoice to perpetuate it as it was 
 made by our fathers. I have shown them that it was not because they loved the 
 Union less, but their liberties more, that they have made up their minds to leave it, 
 unless you give them such guarantees as will insure them safety. I have shown you 
 that the South has never, though smarting under insults and injuries, retaliated,'" be- 
 cause she had observed the restraints of the Constitution. That instrument has never 
 been wounded by a southern hand or agen(;;-y. It has alwajs been held sacred by 
 our people ; and now, finding that they cannot live peaceably with you of the North, 
 they will quietly leave your company. They have made no threats; they propose 
 no violence to you. In secession they assail no one, threaten no one ; it is a remedy 
 which is purely defensive, and not aggressive, because it is passive and not active . 
 
 Your party desire to get rid of slavery, because you say that the moral influence of 
 the world is against slavery, and by your contact with it are compromised. We pro- 
 pose quietly to relieve you of any contact or association with it. Thus, to preserve 
 your refined sensibilities, we propose to take slavery out of tb.e Union, and give you 
 relief. And now that the cotton States have done this, and the border slave States 
 are going to follow their example, and thus do what you have been trying to do for 
 tw^enty years ; you get into a violent rage, and call the gods to witness that you will 
 whip us into submission, because we will not let you do it in your own way. If you 
 of the North would pause and reflect for one moment, you would see the ridiculous 
 position in which you thus place yourselves before the world. But you will not, you 
 cannot stop. You are impelled by a power which you cannot resist. It is the power 
 of England, exerted on the revolutionary element of the North, which cannot and 
 will not permit you to pause, now that the object which England so devoutly wishes 
 for is so near its accomplishment. This Union must be destroyed, or England will 
 soon lose her hold on the trade of Asia. England has made every effort to check our 
 advancement and development, because she knew we were now her only rivals for 
 commerce. 
 
 Since the declaration of Sir Robert Peel — made in advocacy of the appropriation of 
 $100,000,000 to emancipate the negroes in the West Indies — that "this was the best 
 investment ever made for the overthrow of American institutions, " England has con- 
 tinued to agitate this abolition of slavery, with a view of destroying our power by 
 dividing us. England knows that our commercial tonnage is greater than her own, 
 and is rapidly increasing and that the time for decisive action has come. By her 
 gold-, as well as by agitatiiig this anti-slavery sentiment, she obtained great ascendency 
 over the revolutiom;ry elements of the North. No man doubts but that vast sums of 
 England's gold, drawn from the attenuated fingers of her slaving poor, are sent here 
 to keep alive the flames of fanaticism in which alone the political salamanders of the 
 North can live. The visits of Fred Douglass and William H. Seward to England some- 
 times become m cessary to keep alive and excite the sometimes slundjering masses of 
 their followers. England by way of a spur to their movements, occasionally confers 
 the honor of knighthood on some sable swain, and by way of variety insults our min- 
 ister for the amusement of the gentleman from Africa. 
 
 This, sir, is not the result of an abolition sentiment in England, as abundantly shown 
 by her unwillingness to force Spain to execute a treaty long since made, to abolish 
 
slaVery in all her possessions. Nor is it because she respects the rights of men or 
 their freedom ; bccaiue she is to-day engaged in the coolie trade, by which she con- 
 signs white men to most cruel and perpetual bondage. But it is because by this means 
 alone she can hope to break the power of her most dangerous lival for the trade of 
 the East. Cannot the people of the North, now^ on the verge of the precipice, stop 
 one moment for reflection V Would it not be better for you to live ou terms of equal- 
 ity and friendship with those who were once your brethren at the South'? Can you 
 show in what particular, England, after she, through your instrumentality, has disrupt- 
 ed this Union, wiil be benefited by trading with you? Are you not England's rivals 
 for most of the goods sold in the States ? She, you declare by your tariff' bill, can 
 manufacture the articles which we consume thirty-five per cent, cheaper, on an aver- 
 age, than you can ; and hence you, by that bill, will compe] us to give you thirty-five 
 cents in every dollar, to enable you to meet her at your own fectories. 
 
 If this tax should be continued in our new confederacy, the trade of England will 
 be no more restricted than it is now. How will it be with you? Instead of receiving 
 the thirty-five per cent, which you propose to give yourselves in this new tariff, you 
 will have to pay that much duty. Thus, you will receive on all goods sold at the 
 South thirty-five cents in every dollar less than you would receive if you had not de- 
 stroyed the Union. We, then, being now the consumers of the northern manufac- 
 tures, and the North no longer being protected in our markets, she will be driven 
 to abandon manufactures only for the northern States, except such as those where 
 the cost of raw material constitutes the chief element of its manufacture. This is 
 shown more conclusively in a correct analysis of the elements constituting the cost 
 of manufacture. 
 
 In all manufactures the elements of cost are thus enumerated and classified; first, 
 the wages of labor ; second, the interest on capital; and third, the value of the raw 
 material — labor forty per cent. ; capital fifty per cent. ; and the raw material ten 
 per cent. This, I beheve is found correct, -except in coarse ftibries. In such the 
 raw material enters as the chief element of co.st, as in coarse cotton. Our factories 
 having the advantage of ten per cent, in the cost of cotton, can, for this reason, clothe 
 the operatives in the English factories; for in such a fabric, the raw material consti- 
 tutes a very great part of its value. 
 
 The English manufacturers pay but half what we pay for labor and capital; and 
 those two elements constitute ninety per cent, in cost of the fabrics sent here. You 
 of the North cannot compete with them. It is thus that you lose and England gains 
 by your folly. Again ; you can never induce England to remain hostile to the South, 
 because she is dependent on the South. From her trade with the South she derives 
 annually an income of more than six hundred million, besides giving employment to 
 millions of her starving population. What does she derive fiom the export trade of 
 thc^orth? hot one cent ; because it is all consumed. Herbiead, when there is a 
 lailuie in Europe of crops, she sometimes gets fioni your ports. This is all. This 
 does not constitute a basis of trade ; because it is consumed, and, hence, no source of 
 income. 
 
 We at the South understand the strength of .our position. The step we are about 
 to take is not one of our own choosing, but from necessity. That necessity you have 
 created, against our repeated protests, as well as against our threats. You have not 
 heeded our solemn protests, and you have laughed to scorn our threats. As you have 
 scorned our threats, so we now .scorn yours, and we defy your power. 
 
 Do not, I implore you, suppose that Virginia will submit to oppression. She loves 
 this Union, and will sacrifice all, except her honor and the liberties of her people, to 
 preserve it. You now assail both. She has called her young men and her old men 
 together around the council board. They have left their swords at home, because 
 their presence sometimes engenders strife. 
 
 They want peace, and not war ; but if you do not acknowledge the sovereignty of 
 Virginia, and the ef[uaiity of her people, you will find them, too, on the war path. 
 
 Printed by F. H. Sage, Washington, D. C. 
 
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