F 685 
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 Copy 1 
 
 Kansas — The Lecompton Constitution. 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 v^' 
 
 OF 
 
 HON. JAMES BUrriNTON, OF MASS. 
 
 Delivered in the House of Representatives, March 24th, 1858. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, a little less than two years ago, 
 I had the honor to address the House of Repre- 
 sentatives upon the application of the people of 
 Kansas to be admitted into the Union with a con- 
 stitution which they had formed for themselves. 
 That constitution was unexceptionable in its char- 
 acter and general provisions. It embodied the 
 will of a large majority of the people ; and, had it 
 been accepted by Congress, and had Kansas been 
 admitted as a State, the then existing difficulties 
 would have been settled, and the subsequent 
 scenes and events which form the blackest stain 
 upon our national reputation would have been 
 prevented. I advocated, sincerely and earnestly, 
 the admission, as an act of justice to the people 
 who asked respectfully and in a proper manner to 
 be permitted to join the Union, and also as a wise, 
 just, and politic means of removing this exciting 
 and dangerous question from the national coun- 
 cils. The administration party then in power op- 
 posed the admission successfully ; and during the 
 time that has since elapsed, Kansas has been the 
 theatre of crime and disorder unparalleled in our 
 history. 
 
 The arm of the Federal Government, which 
 should have have shielded and protected the peo- 
 ple in the enjoyment of their rights, has sustained 
 the invasion of those rights, and has sustained the 
 minority in establishing its supremacy over the 
 majority, until the executive power, instead of 
 being respected and loved as a protector and 
 friend, is slighted and detested as an enemy and 
 an oppressor. Since the first session of the last 
 Congress an entire revolution has taken place. 
 Now there is an application that Kansas shall be 
 admitted as a State; but under how dififerent cir- 
 cumstances! Instead of a constitution embodying 
 the will of the people, one is offered to which five- 
 sixths of the people have expressed their opposi- 
 tion. Instead of institutions which the people 
 have chosen and prefer, there are provisions in 
 the organic law which they loathe and detest. 
 
 And this constitution, framed by a minority of a 
 convention authoiized by a Legislature chosen by 
 a minority of the people, and adopted by a mi- 
 nority of one-sixth of the legal voters, is attempted 
 to be forced upon an unwilling people by the Ad- 
 ministration and its friends. The reasons which 
 led me to favor the adoption of the constitution 
 presented to Congress two years ago, cumpel me 
 to oppose the acceptance of that which is now pre- 
 sented to us. And I propose to submit, as briefly 
 as possible, the considerations which influence my 
 opposition to it. 
 
 The debate upon this question has taken so wide 
 a range, that almost all the issues between the two 
 sections of the country have been discussed, and 
 the extreme views on both sides have been pre- 
 sented to the House. I think that some of these 
 do not necessarily present themselves. The ques- 
 tion has enough of the elements of discord in itself, 
 and I regret that topics that do not necessarily 
 appertain to it should have been introduced. In 
 the conclusions which I have formed upon the 
 subjects now legitimately before us, I have not 
 found it necessary to consider whether slavery is 
 or is not a just, moral and humane institution. 
 It is not merely because slavery would be estab- 
 lished in Kansas by the Lecompton constitution, 
 that I oppose its admission as a State. There are 
 a sufficient number of other objections which 
 compel me to oppose it ; objections which arise in 
 the incipient steps which were taken to organize 
 a government of the Territory, and which increase 
 in number and force from the first invasion of the 
 Missourians to overpower the actual residents, 
 down to the present time. Had a constitution 
 recognizing and authorizing slavery been legally 
 adopted by tiie people, and had they clearly and 
 unequivocally offered such a constitution, endorsed 
 by a majority, and demanded admission under it, 
 the question whether slavery would be a sufficient 
 objection to the admission of a State would be 
 fairly before us. Should a State ever ask to be 
 
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 admitted into the Union with a pro-slavery consti- ] 
 tution while I am a member of Congress, 1 shall 
 then feel obliged to determine whether or not 
 the pro-slavery provisions would be a sufficient 
 objecion to the admission to require me to vote 
 against it. 
 
 While I say that there are enough other con- 
 siderations besides that of slavery which require 
 me to oppose the imposition of the Lecompton 
 constitution upon the people of Kansas, it is not 
 because I wish to avoid a discussion of that ques- 
 tion of slavei'y which has produced at diiferent 
 times so great excitement in the i-ountry ; and 
 which is now convulsing the people and attracting 
 the eyes of the whole civilized world upon us, 
 ■watching (o see if our institutions can stand firm 
 against these violent political shocks. Could the 
 men who frained our Federal constitution have 
 foreseen the extent of the danger which then lay 
 hidden under this question, they undoubtedly 
 would have provided for its settle -nent, either by 
 giving Cot'gress the power, clearly and unequivo- 
 cally, to control the establishment of slavery in 
 the Territories, or, whut is perhaps more piobable 
 considering the prevailing dissatisfaction with, and 
 hostility to, the inst tution existing both North 
 and South at that time. Congress itself would have 
 prohibited forever its extension in all Territories, 
 as it did in the Northwestern Territory. No hu- 
 man foresight could then have apprehended that 
 slaverv, which Virginia and North Carolina, equally 
 with Pennsylvania and Mas achusetts, denounced 
 as a great evil, the gradual and entire abolition of 
 which had, as was supposed, been secured by its 
 prohibition in the Northwestern Territory, and 
 the prohibition of the importation of slaves after 
 the year 1808, could have grown into such im- 
 portance, and so absorbed all other questions as {o 
 threaten the continuance of the Union, which was 
 then being consolidated. The causes which have 
 made the slaveholding interest one of such magni- 
 tude, so deaily cherished by the South, did not 
 exist at the time of the formation of tlie consti- 
 tution. 
 
 The subsequent discovery and development of 
 the immense agricultural resources of the South, 
 unknown at that time, offered the opportunity of 
 rapidly accumulating great wealth by the employ- 
 ment of slave labor in the cotton fields, and cu- 
 pidity and avarice at once operated, to convert 
 what till then had been thought an evil and a 
 curse, into a blessing, from which all moral and 
 political good flowed. While the sentiment of the 
 South underwent this change, perhaps naturally 
 enough, considering the infirmities of human 
 nature, the North became more confident in its 
 hostility to slavery, and this speck upon the dawn 
 of our prosperity soon enlarged and became a black 
 lowering cloud, beaiing a tempest in its bosom, 
 threatening to overwhelm and destroy the fabric 
 which was yet scarcely established upon its foun- 
 dations. Timid apprehensions of the conse- 
 quences, or still baser influences, have at different 
 times operated upon a portion of the North suffi- 
 ciently to avoid and delay a definitive settlement 
 of the question. Concession of Northern rights 
 and principles, falsely called compromises, have 
 been yielded to the clamorous demands of the 
 South, until the natural result has ensued of an 
 
 attempt at absolute domination, regardless of even 
 the forms of justice or fair proceeding. Had the 
 North been unanimous in its opposition to the so- 
 called Missouri compromise act, had there been no 
 traitors to the sentiment. and interests of their con- 
 stituents, it is my belief that our history would 
 not have furnished the subsequent instances of 
 violent sectional strife which now tarnish its pages. 
 The question would never again have assumed 
 sufficient imj5ortance to have produced serious agi- 
 tation, the North then conceded all that the South 
 asked, and received in return some promises, to 
 be fulfilled in a distant future, for which fulfillment 
 there were no guarantees, except the good faith 
 and honor of the South. 
 
 Now, when the first occasion arises to test the 
 good fliith of the South, how is it kept ? Tiie Mis- 
 souri compromise, unjust as it was, had been uni- 
 versally acquiesced in for thirty-one years; the 
 agitation on the slavery question hud almost en- 
 tirely subs'ded, and the most friendly relations and 
 feelings existed between the different sections, 
 when the South, with a few Northern co operators, 
 by organizing a Territorial government when none 
 was there needed, and where, if there had been, 
 there was no demand for any unusual provisions 
 in its organization, wantonly threw a firebrand to 
 reillumine the flames of civil dissension and revive 
 the sectional bitterness which always attends the 
 agitatioH of the slavery question. The solemn en- 
 gagements of the South were disregarded. The 
 faith which they had pledge 3, and for which they 
 had received a consideration, was broken. Their 
 honor, which they profess to regard ?o highly, 
 and which had been plighted that if we would let 
 them have Missouri, they would ask lor nothing 
 more north of the line of thjrtysix degrees thirty 
 minutes, was violated. We ought not now to be 
 surprised that the consummation of the act is at- 
 tempted by the most odious frauds. In the repeal 
 of the Missouri compromise were the "seids and 
 roots of iniquity and shame." From this egg was 
 hatched all those subsequent atrocities which have 
 cuhniirated in an attempt to enforce upon Kinsas 
 a tyranny as monstrous as any ever attempted by 
 a despotic go7ernment. 
 
 The North pronounced its judgment irpon this 
 first act in the series, by consigning those of their 
 Representatives who had so basely betrayed them, 
 to a political grave. But specious arguments and 
 delusive pretences were not wanting to appease 
 the indignation which was aroused. Squatter 
 sovereignty, the right of the people to regulate 
 their own domestic institutions, tickled the ears 
 and deluded the judgment of honest men at the 
 North. Assurances were loudly proclaimed and 
 often repeated thi-oughout all the free States, from 
 the Penobscot to "Lower Egypt," that if the can- 
 didate of the Democratic party shou d be eltcted, 
 the whole influence of the Administration would 
 be used to secure to the people of Kansas, the 
 rights guarantied to them by the Nebraska act. 
 The votes of thousands of honest Democrats were 
 obtained by these falsehoods, who would have 
 seen their hands wither before they would have 
 deposited a ballot for this Administration, could 
 they have foreseen that it would go beyond its pre- 
 decessor in its base prostration before the shrine 
 of slavery. 
 
 \ 
 
The pro-slavery pirty, having just broken their 
 faith and violated their solemn pledges, by the 
 repeal of the Missouri compromise, now offered 
 new pledges; and to relieve, if possible, the odium 
 which always attaches to an act of perfidy, pro- 
 posed a substitute, and plighted the publ c laiih by 
 an act of Congress, assuring the people in terms 
 as clear as language can make them, that the in- 
 habitants of the Territories shall be K-ft " to form 
 and regulate their domestic institutions in their 
 own way. " And here begins the series of acts 
 always attended by fraud or violence ; the direct 
 result of which, if Congress accepts the Locomp- 
 ton constitution, will be to deprive the people of 
 Kansas, of the rights in tlie exercise of which the 
 Federal Government had solemnly assured them 
 they should be protected. 
 
 Contrary to expectation, however, the precon- 
 ceived plan of makin:r Kansas a slave State was 
 not to be accomplished without a struggle. Emi- 
 grant aid societies were formed, and an " organ- 
 ized emigration " poured i.ito the Territory a pop- 
 ulation who had the courage, the energy, and the 
 ■will, to contend with firmue-s and patience, by all 
 lawful means, against a desperate party which, 
 sustained by the whole influence and power of the 
 Federal Government, was striving to wrest the 
 Territory from freedom. The projectors of the 
 scheme to make Kansas a slave State were sorely 
 troubled by the success of this emigration, and, 
 in the bitterness of their rage, heaped oppi'obrious 
 epithe<;s upon the emigrants — the late Executive 
 of the United States even descending to denounce 
 them in special a message. They were called fac- 
 tious, impudent intruders into a place where they 
 did not belong, and where they went only for a 
 special purpose, which interfered giavely with 
 ihe projects of certain political schemers. Sir, 
 ^^\At business was it of the President, or is it of 
 yo^lpf or mine, or any one else, for what p irpose 
 they went there, as long as that purpose was law- 
 ful? They were a people whose education and 
 whose moral and physical condition reflected 
 credit on the count'y from which they emigrated, 
 and gave assurance of as useful, law-loving, and 
 law-abiding population, as ever formed a new 
 State. If they made any sacrifices in leaving 
 homes abounding with all the comforts of civili- 
 zation, to make their abode in a wilderness, for 
 the sake of accomplishing what they believed to 
 be a great and good result, all honor to them for 
 their devotion to freedom, and for their readiness 
 to encounter hardships and dangers for the ettab- 
 lishment of their principles, and the principles of 
 their revolutionary ancestors, in a new State. 
 They went to the Territory with their families 
 and household g )ods, intending to remiin there, 
 to establish their homes there, to build up villages, 
 and erect churches and school-houses and mills, 
 and rear up their children to be good and useful 
 citizens. No new Territory has received a better 
 class of emigi ants, many of whom are far superior 
 in moral worth and intellectual cultivation to those 
 who have denounced them. 
 
 This population formed a part of the census of 
 1855 ; and the election of March 30th, of that year, 
 having been ordered, the pro-slavery party found 
 that something nuist be done to defeat the decided 
 majority which clearly existed against them. Less 
 
 than one year previous, the public faith had been 
 pledged that the peonle of the Territory should 
 govern themselves as they saw fit; but the astute 
 ai d unscrupulous managers of the pro-slavery 
 party took the liberty, under the unexpected state 
 of things which had arisen, of making piactically 
 an informal and somewhat illegal amendment to 
 the act, so that in effect, in-tead of the people of 
 Kansas, it was the people of Missouri, wIjO should 
 1 e left to foim and regulate the domestic int^titu- 
 tions of Kansas in their own way. Duiing the 
 few days preceding the election, the roads leading 
 from the Missouri border into Kansas, were filled 
 with armed men, without women or children; 
 with no furniture, except that of the camp ; every- 
 thing indicating an invasion, and not an immigra- 
 tion. The distTicts where they voted, were dot- 
 ted with their camp-fires, and "night was made 
 hideous by their revels. " 
 
 The few days succeeding the election, the roads 
 were again filled by these men, with their backs 
 turned on Kansas, making their way home, to 
 relate to their families the incidents of their little 
 jaunt over the border. Can there be any doubt 
 what was the duty of the government officials at 
 that election? Unquestionably they should have 
 so ordered it that the bona fide inhabitants should 
 have voted, and those alone. If their arrange- 
 ments to secure this were defeated by the irrup- 
 tion into certain districts of an overwhelming 
 armed force, against which they had not the means 
 to contend, they should have so reported it, and 
 have never consented to make returns, for there 
 were no legal returns to be made, until a fair elec- 
 tion had been held by actual residents, who alone 
 had the exclusive right to make an election. 
 
 15ut it was not the power, it was the will to do 
 justice and cairy out the pledges which Congress 
 had given, that was wanting. Kansas must be 
 made a slave State at all hazards. That had been 
 determined upon. But as the people would not 
 do it, if, as h-jd been promised them, they should 
 be loft perfectly free to form their own laws, the 
 unscrupulous official agents and instruments of 
 'the slave power returned tbe Legislature elected 
 by the Missouriaus, and these representatives of 
 a foreign people thus fraudulently returned, im- 
 mediately proceeded to perform the work which 
 they had been chosen to execute. 
 
 The free-State people were to be opprsssed, in- 
 timidated, and, if possible, crushed out and ex- 
 pelled ; and this was attempted by robbery, arson, 
 and inu'der in the country, and by tyrannical and 
 intolerable laws in the Legislature. 
 
 The houses of the fiee-State inhabitants were 
 burned, their crops were destroyed ; hey were sub- 
 jected to the most cruel persecutio.is, and when 
 they sought redress in the courts, they could pro- 
 cure scarcely a show of an eflbct to punish or ar- 
 rest the ruffians. This is no exaggerated picture ; 
 it is well attested by men entitled to credit, and 
 who came home to the communities where they 
 were well known, to relate it. The Legislature 
 passed laws which no one dare d-ifend in a free, 
 civilized connnunity. The right of free speech, 
 the freedom of the press, the rights of conscience 
 were destroyed. There cannot bo found to-day, 
 in the records of any government, however arbi- 
 trary and tyrannical, laws so infamous, so dls- 
 
graceful to tbe enacting power, as those enacted 
 by this foreign Legislature, established by an 
 armed invasion, over a people who are derisively 
 told that they may form and regulate. their institu- 
 tions in their own way. 
 
 The pro slavery party, however, had mistaken 
 their men. The people of Kansas were not of 
 that material which could be cowed by intimida- 
 tion, or crushed by persecution, sustained though 
 it was by Federal dragoons. Accustomed to obey 
 the laws of a real government, they disdained and 
 disregarded the enactments of a usurpation. They 
 held a convention, chosen by a majority of the 
 people, and framed a constitution, adopted by the 
 same majority of the people, and formed a State 
 government, and for this they have been declared 
 rebels, guilty of treason. Where was the rebel- 
 lion, and what acts constituted it ? There was no 
 insurrection against the legal authorities ; there 
 was no resistance to the enforcement of legal en- 
 actments ; there was never an attempt to put the 
 Topeka government in operation against the laws 
 or officers of the United States. There was sim- 
 ply an organization which Congress was respect- 
 fully petitioned to recognize ; and it was never 
 contemplated by any body of men, as far as I 
 know, that it should go into operation without 
 such recognition. The whole proceeding, from 
 beginning to end, was entirely legal and proper, 
 and in accordance with precedents established in 
 the formation of other States. 
 
 The troops of the United States compelled an 
 obedience to laws which the people did not be- 
 lieve to lave any validity, because they were not 
 permitted to have any voice in tbe enactment of 
 them, and because they were the tyrani'ical and op- 
 pressive enactments of a usurpation. They would 
 not have obeyed them if they had not been com- 
 pelled to ; but they have made no armed resistance 
 to their enforcement. It is an every-day occurrence 
 in all the States for the officers to be obliged to 
 enforce some law or other; yet I never heard that 
 those who were so compelled to a reluctant obe- 
 dience were called rebels or considered such. Had 
 the inhabitants resisted with arms the enforce- 
 ment of the acts passed by the usurpers, there are 
 many who would have applauded them, and had 
 the people called for aid, undoubtedly they would 
 have had it, and matters would have been precipi- 
 tated. But they took the wiser and more prudent 
 course, and deserved great praise and honor for 
 their temperance and patience. They resolved to 
 tyust to the justice of their cause. They would 
 "test the truth of God against fraud of man." 
 They relied upon the justice of their countrymen, 
 who, they believed, perhaps too confidently, would 
 indignantly hurl the usurpers from their places, 
 as soon as they learned the true history of their 
 Climes. The party who sustain the oppressors 
 would have been very glad if the free-State people 
 had resisted ever so little, so that it had been 
 enough to afford a slight foundation for the charges 
 of factious and rebellious conduct which are re- 
 peated with as much persistence as if they had 
 been true. But the free- State men heroically en- 
 dured the sufferings and persecutions to which 
 they were subjected, rather than involve them- 
 selves and thi ir friends in a direct opposition to 
 the United States Government, with the immense 
 
 possible consequences. There would be time 
 enough for that when there was no hope of relief 
 or redress in any other way. 
 
 But this majority, so patient and cautious to keep 
 within the strict pale of the law, continued to in- 
 crease in numbers and grow stronger in their reso- 
 lution. The foreign force, which had established 
 a nominally legal authority over them by armed 
 violence, must now devise some new mode of op- 
 pression to prevent this continued accrttiou to the 
 strength of the majority. They determined to ex- 
 pel, if possible, some of its members, and to ren- 
 der it impossible to those who remained to exer- 
 cise the rights guaranteid to every citizen of the 
 United States, and especially promised to the peo- 
 ple of Kansas by the Kantas-Nebraska act. Laws 
 were passed such as are not uncommon in coun- 
 tries subject to a despotic Government ; for there 
 the rulers make no pretence of deference to the 
 will of the people ; but here, under our Govern- 
 ment, whose fundamental principle is that the peo- 
 ple shall have perfect freedom of speech and con- 
 science and of action, we have, for the first time, 
 an instance where the people are deprived of all of 
 them. There is an attempt made to establish, by 
 violence, or fraud, or any iniquity which may be 
 necessary to accomplish the purpose, the relation 
 of slavery among a people, a great majority of whom 
 I detest it ; a great majority of the people of the 
 whole country sympathizing with them in their ab- 
 horrence ofit. They oppose it becau.^e they believe 
 it an institution nefarious in itself, and pernicious 
 in its influence. It is a curse upon any State 
 where it exists ; it affects all the relations ' of a 
 community, internal and external ; it is a blight 
 upon moral and social progress ; it affects all the 
 material interests ; it depresses the value of lands, 
 it discourages and debases free labor ; and gives 
 the political control and social predominance to a 
 few aristocratic proprietors of slaves ; it retards 
 and prevents the development of all the resour- 
 ces of a State, and is a withering blight upon its 
 prosperity. 
 
 The free-State people of Kansas resist this 
 scourge, which would aiilict and injure them, and 
 would be a curse upon their posterity. Yet by 
 those laws, which are upheld by the pro-slavery 
 party, they are forbidden to write, speak, or circu- 
 late in any way, the expression of their hostiUty 
 to this great wrong ; and the National Adminis- 
 tration emulates the oppression of foreign despo- 
 tism, in its efforts to sustain, by the employment 
 of United States troops, the enforcement of this 
 tyranny. 
 
 The people were also required to take an oath 
 to support the organic actof the Territory, and the 
 fugitive slave law. Wiio ever heard before of a 
 people being required to swear that they would 
 support a statute ? If it is proper to require an oath 
 to support one legislative enactment, why not 
 another ? why not the tariff, why not the sub- 
 Treasury, wh} not any act, good, bad, or indifferent, 
 insignificant or impotent, wbich Congress or a Le- 
 gislature, in its wisdom or its folly, may have 
 passed ? Officers are required to sweai- fidelity to 
 a constitution because that is the source of all law. 
 It is an embodiment of the sovereignty of the 
 people, to which they owe their allegiance ; and if 
 it was not sustained and enforced, there would be 
 
anarchy an an entire absence of authority for any 
 law. But the requirement of an oath by the citi- 
 zen to sustain any law, is a requirement to give 
 up one of his dearest privileges, which is to op- 
 pose any law as far as he can do so legally. The 
 law may be unconstitutional, and he may think it 
 his duty, as a good citizen, to resist its enforce- 
 ment. And where, as in Kansas, the people are 
 required to sustain a law which many of them do 
 believe unconstitutional, and which is repugnant 
 to their consciences and their sense of right, be- 
 fore they can vote, it is a wanton act of injustice, 
 calculated and designed, not to pr(tect the law, 
 but to oppress the citizen, and deprive him of his 
 right, by requiring him to do what, if he is an ho- 
 nest man, it is morally impossible for him to do. 
 Tliese two sections, eleven and twelve, of the law 
 should be preserved and go down in history as ex- 
 amples of the extremes to which the passions and 
 the rage foi' power will carry men. The law accom- 
 plished its intended purpose and sustained as it was 
 by armed numbers, from a neighboring State effect- 
 ually prevented the attendance of the free-State 
 TOters at the polls, at the election in October, 1856, 
 and another House of Representatives was chosen 
 by a foreign people " to form and regulate the 
 institutions of Kansas in their own way." 
 
 By this Legislature was called the convention 
 to frame a State constitution. The facts and inci- 
 dents attending the choice and action of that con- 
 vention have been so often repeated of late that I 
 shall not recite the details. The people had the 
 most solemn and earnest assurances from the Fe- 
 deral officers, the faith of the Executive being 
 pledged thereto, that the constitution should be 
 submitted to the popular vote ; and strange to 
 say, considering the number of pledges to them 
 which had not been kept, they once more trusted 
 to the honor of their opponents. It is due to the 
 Governor and his Secretary to say that they did 
 all they could to keep their word, and for so doing, 
 one was compelled to resign, and the other was 
 removed by the Executive. The convention 
 framed a pro slavery constitution. As if in mock- 
 ery, they offered it to the people, with the power 
 to vote upon the slavery clause alone, while, if 
 every vote ii* the Territory had been for the "con- 
 stitution with /(oolaveiy," slavery would have been 
 continued :ind established there by that constitu- 
 tion. Here were a people who believed that the 
 question of the establishment of slavery was of 
 greater importance than any other in the forma- 
 tion of their State Government. It was one 
 which would have immense influence upon their 
 present and future prosperity. The value of their 
 property, and their means of increasing it, would 
 be seriously affected by it, yet they were not per- 
 mitted to decide that question. 
 
 It is asserted that this, the only question of great 
 importance to the people of Kansas, was submit- 
 ted to their vote. There are many men upon this 
 floor, who support the acceptance of this consti- 
 tution, who I was unwilling to believe would con- 
 sent to countenance and sustain so great and pal- 
 pable an injustice as this is. The right to inter- 
 fere with the property of slaves in the Territory 
 is expressly exempted They, and, of course, 
 their increase, must remain and continue blares. 
 The vote, " conjtitutiou with no slavery, " could 
 
 not affect them. Xow, I ask any man of candor and 
 fairness to show me how he can maintain that the 
 question of slavery was fairly submitted to the 
 people. Suppose that all the people had been 
 willing to vote upon the acceptance of the consti- 
 tution ; I ask in what manner any means had been 
 provided by the convention, or by the Legisla- 
 ture, by which the people could have rejected sla- 
 very ? ' The vote for the Legislature, in October, 
 1857, showed clearly that a large majority of the 
 people were opposed to slavery. The convention 
 resolved to impose slavery upon them, against 
 their expressed will; and the Administration now 
 ask us to sustain and confirm this imposition. 
 To make assurance doubly sure, the absolute con- 
 trol of the election and the returns was given to 
 the president of the convention ; he appointed the 
 commissioners who appointed the judges of the 
 elections, and the votes were to be returned to 
 him ; he was entirely irresponsible ; he could cre- 
 ate or destroy votes with perfect impunity. It is 
 stated, by men competent and having the means 
 to judge rightly, that there are not more than 
 twenty-five hundred pro-slavery voters in the Ter- 
 ritory. One of the Government officials who was- 
 here, in frequent communication with the Gov- 
 ernment, some three weeks before the vote on the 
 constitution was to be taken, asserted that there 
 would be about six thousand pro-slavery votes 
 for the constitution. He returned to Kansas, and 
 about six thousand votes were returned for the 
 constitution. 
 
 The constitution had been framed and adopted 
 by a minority of all the members of the conven- 
 tion. The people of Kansas have voted upon it ; 
 and, admitting all the votes to have been cast 
 which were returned, there is a clear majority of 
 five thousand against the constitution. And now 
 it is before us, the product of a singular series of 
 minorities. It is adopted by a small minority of 
 the people, and framed by the minority of a con- 
 vention chosen by a minority of the people, and 
 appointed by a Legislature itself elected by a mi- 
 nority. And this is done in the name of popular 
 sovereignty ! This is leaving the people perfectly 
 free to form and regulate their own institutions 
 in their own way ; and to carry out this new dem- 
 ocratic system of the party which calls itself, par 
 excellence, the Democratic party ! 
 
 The first act, after this scheme comes before us, 
 is to give the control of a committee, which the 
 majority of the House voted to raise to investi- 
 gate the facts, to the minority who opposed such 
 investigation, so that this House cannot carry out 
 their wishes in what relates to this project of forc- 
 ing slavery upon Kansas. This has the merit of 
 consistency, at least ; and I do not know but what, 
 if we reject the Lecompton constitution, there will 
 still be foand some means to annul our action, so 
 that the voice of Congress will have as little effect 
 against the will of the South, operating through its 
 instrument, the Administration, as the voice of the 
 people of Kansas, has had against the violence of 
 border ruffians, sustained by Government officials 
 and Government troops. I have not given the au- 
 thorities for the facts which I have stated, because 
 they have been before us, and the public know 
 them well, and I did not wish to occupy the time 
 of the House more than was necessary to give the 
 
6 
 
 reasons which govern my vote on tliis question. 
 The facts are sustained by the report of the Kan- 
 sas investigating committee of the last Congress, 
 by the statements of the Government (>fficials, the 
 evidence taken by the Kansas Legislature, and 
 the statements of individuals worthy of credit. 
 They are sustained beyond all dispute, and are, 
 for the most part, uncontradicted. Can there be 
 a stronger argument than the recital of them ? 
 They show that there has been fraud, violence, 
 or Clime, at every stage of the proceedings which 
 result in the presentation of this constitution for 
 our acceptance. Must we use argument to con- 
 vince men that they should oppose ciime? Must 
 we reason with tl.eni to persuade them to condemn 
 the wrong and uphold the right? 
 
 Those who -ustain this constitution must show 
 that an armed invasion did not prevent a large 
 portion of the people from coming to the polls. 
 They must show that laws were not passed which 
 unjustly required their submission to conditions 
 which an honest man could not submit to, before 
 they could vote. They must show that the people 
 have had a fair opportunity to express their wi-hes 
 regarding this constitution ; or, if they cannot 
 show tiiat, these charges, which now stand upon 
 uncontroverted evidence, are untrue. In advo- 
 cating the acceptance of this constitution, they 
 must give their support to the crimes which have 
 attended its progress : 
 
 " They see the right, and they approve it too ; 
 They know the wrong, and yet tire wrong pursue." 
 
 The Governors who have been sent to Kansas 
 to enforce the policy of the Administration in 
 compelling submission to the yoke, have returned 
 disgusted with the duties imposed upon them. 
 Once removed from the baneful influence of im- 
 mediate contact with the Administration, which, 
 like the "deadly upas," seems to poison all who 
 seek shelter under it, they see the iniquity of the 
 scheme, and the enormity of the wrong by which 
 it is attempted to enforce it. They depart for 
 their post resolved to carry out the views of the 
 Executive, believing, as many here believe, or 
 profess to believe, that the free-State men are 
 factious, rebellious fanatics, who have selected 
 Kansas as the theatre of their turbulence, for no 
 other purpose than to effect party political objects. 
 They find them peaceful, well-disposed citizens, 
 who have gone into the Territory intending to 
 make their homes there, practising the mechanical 
 arts, pursuing agriculture, and forming all the 
 machinery of a republican community, only asking 
 that they may be permitted to do so themselves, 
 without the interference of another people, and 
 the intimidation of the Federal troops. Five Gov- 
 ernors have gone there ; their sympathies and 
 their prejudices, if thsy had any, wholly with those 
 who support this constitution; their private and 
 political interests being to carry out the slavery 
 policy, sure of the support of the Executive and 
 of the South, in any measure they might adopt to 
 crush out the free-soil sentiment in the Teiritory. 
 In every instance, possibly with one neutral ex- 
 ception, the scales have fallen from their eyes after 
 a sliort residence among the people of Kansas, 
 
 Actual observation, the evidence of their own 
 senses, converted them; and their testimony hi 
 
 favor of the free-State men and their cauie is over- 
 whelming. 
 
 The Executive sends out the Governors to afflict 
 the people of Kansas, as we read in Scripture, Ba- 
 lak sent Balaam to curse Israel — "Come, curse me 
 Jacob, and come defy Israel." But Balaam found 
 that it was the will of God that the people should 
 be blessed. He answers, "And he hath blessed, 
 and I cannot reverse it. He hath not beheld in- 
 iquity it! Jacob ; neither liath he- seen perverseness 
 in Israel." And Balak angrily says, "I called 
 thee to curse mine enemies, and behold, thou hast 
 altogether blessed them these three times. There- 
 fore, now, flee thou to thy place. I thought to 
 promote thee unto great honor ; but lo! the Lord 
 hath kept thee back from honor." In the same 
 manner our Democratic Balak angrily rebukes the 
 Governors of Kansa?, because they obey the mani- 
 fest will of the people, instead of his own. He 
 removes them from office, and withholds all in- 
 tended promotion and reward. I ask those gen- 
 tlemen who say that the statements favorable to 
 the free-State cause are misrepresentations, and 
 that the arguments against the pro-slavery cause 
 are the result of sectional animosity, to consider 
 the fact, which I think is entitled to have great 
 weight with you, that men taken from among you, 
 believing as you do, and acting with you, who 
 have been on the ground, and have se3n with 
 their own eyes, and heard with their own ears, 
 with the very best opportunities of confirming 
 their belief, have renounced the opinions which 
 they had upheld, and tellyou that they were de- 
 ceived. They tell you that this Lecompton con- 
 stitution is a monstrous iniquity ; and that if you 
 persist in forcing it upon the p "Ople, you commit 
 an act of oppression upon an unoffending popula- 
 tion. Has this opinion of your comrades, your 
 former co-operators, no weight with you ? Does 
 it not compel the reflection that it is you who may 
 be blinded by sectional prejudice, and actuated by 
 partisan political influences ? 
 
 The consequences of the acceptance or rejection 
 of this constitution have been introduced into this 
 discussion. We hear one day that the pro-.=lavery 
 ticket has been elected, and the next day that the 
 free State ticket has been elected. Tlie president 
 of the convention maintains an oracular silence 
 regarding the result of the election. I condemn his 
 silence, which I cannot believe is maintained with 
 an honest purpose; but the result of tliat election 
 will not affect my vote. Were every officer on the 
 fieeState ticket elected, executive, judicial, and 
 legislative, I should oppose the acceptance of the 
 constitution while it appears that the people have 
 had nothing to do with its presentation to us, and 
 a majority of them are opposed to it. The people 
 say that they will resist wiih arms any attempt to 
 force this constitution upon them. I think it 
 more than probable that they will do so. I should 
 justify and applaud such a course, as I do the re- 
 resistance of our ancestors to the illegal and op- 
 pressive impositions of the mother country. I 
 should deplore the occasion of the revolution as I 
 sh luld the consequences likely to follow it ; but 
 my belief and apprehensions do not influence me 
 to vote for the rejection of the constitution. I 
 believe that on a question which involves a prin- 
 ciple it is better to vote for the right, according 
 
to one's best knowledge and judgment, and leave 
 the conscqiif-ncos to Ood. 
 
 It is Paid, that if the constitution is rejoctod 
 there will be attempts to secede made by some of 
 the southi^rn States. I do not believe it. I have 
 no doubt that there are men who wonM gladly 
 see such an attempt, and wlio have labored and 
 intrigued to bring it about. But the people will 
 not sustain them, and thiir traitorous effort.-^ would 
 be as abortive as tho.=e of Catiline. But if I am 
 mistaken, and serinus attempts to secede sliall be 
 made —if any men are resolved to try to break up 
 the Union for this Cause, I say, let them try it. 
 We have listened with patience to these threats 
 of disunion for a long time They may or may 
 not have hid their intended effect ; but the South 
 has alwaysi obtained wlial; it demand'd. It was 
 the intention of tho>e who formed our Govern- 
 ment, to restrict sluvery to it* then existing limits. 
 
 Had the North been true to itself at the time 
 of the Missouri compromise, and firmly maintained 
 that slavery and slave representation should ne- 
 v»r be extended into fee territory, the question 
 would have beon settled forever. The South 
 carried thiir point then, thi^y carried it in the nd- 
 mission of Texas, and ir, the passage of the Kansas- 
 Nebraska bill, alvva^s growing moie exorbitant 
 in their demand-^, and more violent in insisting 
 upon them, until now they claim everything. The 
 Executiee is wholly theirs. The Supreme Court 
 have degraded t'e bench to the purposes of the 
 political stump, and from their tribunal have ut- 
 tered political huangues upon a subject whicli 
 
 they had but just before declared was not before 
 them for judicial action. The South are exulting 
 in the expectation that the North will coniinue to 
 yield until the toleration of slavery, more or less 
 temporary, shall he compelled in all the States of 
 the Union. Unquestionably a large majoiity of 
 the people are opposed to the fuithcr extension of 
 slavery, and it is full time to try whether our Con- 
 stitution, which is called the greatest example of 
 popular government that has ever existed, has 
 suificient strcneth to cairy out the principle that 
 the ni:'joiity shall govern. 
 
 This question has been suffered to agitate the 
 countiy for neaily forty years. It is now before 
 us in the most odious form it has ever assumed. 
 Heretofore we have been required only to permit 
 slavery to remain where it had existed for a long 
 time, and where the people wished to retiin it. 
 Now we are asked to as.-ist you to establish it 
 wherp seven-eighths of the people hate and detest 
 it. To force this upon us is tyranny as manifest 
 an i as oppressive as any that was ever exercised. 
 It is worse than the threatened overthrow of the 
 Constitution, for it is a violation of the grent princi- 
 pl(! on which the Constitution i.-< founded. If men 
 will Pttike this blow at the foundation of our Re- 
 pui)lic, can they expect that the superstructure 
 will long stand ? I oppose the adoption of this 
 Loeoinpton constitution now and always, let the 
 consequences be what they may. Conscious that 
 lam right, I leave the result to that Providence 
 which has protected and favored us so long. 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C. 
 
 B U E L L & B L A N C n A II D , PRINTERS, 
 1858. 
 
LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS 
 
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