The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1850-08-08


same way. Great Britain and the United
States closed a dangerous conflict of claims re-
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between their possessions T7tP cG'-sxseg. tI'
volved no moral principle, for none was at stake
in the claim of either party. Governments
are often obliged to resort to compromise, with a
view to the settlement of domestic controversies.
The antagonisms Of class or section interests may
sometimes be fit subjects for mutual concession,
each class or section yielding something for the
sake of system of legislation that shall in the
main be beneficial to all
But there are limits to this policy which must
be determined sometimes by large views of expe-
diency, sometimes by considerations of conscience.
A very common vice among statesmen is to re-
gard all conflicts of claims, all issues between
interests, as questions Of expediency-devoid of
any moral element, and therefore admitting Of
compromise. 1t so happens that in the course Of
human legislation, questionsfrom time to time are
springing up, for the just settlement of which
the law of Eternal Rectitude must be appealed to.
If the question be one, which it may be decided
afirmatively or negatively, involves the psxpe-
tration or avoidance of moral wrong, we sub
NIT to every man Of conscience, that it is one adj
hitting Of no compromise. No man in such a
case can serve two masters He must either do
right or do wrong-there is no midway line
where he ceases to be an accountable being, and
his acts are neither good nor evil. If he owe a
duty, no considerations of expediency can justify
his failure to discharge it, or his attempt to dis
charge half of it. Nor has he any right to enter
into covenant binding himself to do wrong to a
certain extent, if the other party will do right
to certain extent
Questions of financial or commercial policy
and disputes about boundaries do not necessarily
involve moral right or wrong, and therefore may
be compromised but, questions respecting HUI
man Rights, the continuance or extension Of Sla-
very, where we have jurisdiction over the subject,
are primarily moral questions, and nothing is
more certain than that no mode of settling them
ought to be adopted, which is not in perfect hsr-
mony with Moral Principle. However exacting
its demands whatever difficulties oppose them,
however formidable the interests with which they
conflict, Reason and Religion enjoin prompt, un-
hesitating entire conformity to them An OPP
posite course is practical atheism, implying denial
Of the existence of God, or of his right and
power to prescribe law for the government Of his
creatures. The controversy which arose in the
Federal Convention in relation to the suppression
of the foreign Slave Trade, was eminentiy a
moral question. Many Of the States regarded it
as crime against God and man, and felt that
should it be allowed to continue under the flag Of
the Union they were forming, they would be in
volved in the guilt of supporting it, South Car
DINA and Georgia had no conscience about it, and
insisted that it should be let alone Beyond all
doubt, this was no question for compromise. If
the slave trade were criminal, the States belev-
ing So made themselves criminal, by consenting
to its protection by the Union, for year, day,
an hour But, this moral question together with
one of mere policy was sent to Committee,
with view to secure arrangement by compro-
mise and the result was that Massachusetts, rep
resentng the anti-savery States, at last consented
to sacrifice her conscience for pecunary con-
sderation; to allow an immoral traffic under the
protection of the flag of the Union, for twenty
years, on condition that South Carolina and
Georgia would permit Navigation law to be
passed by bare majority of Congress IL is
easy to say that necessity demanded this COM
promise-that the Union could not have been
formed without it but, the question arises, are
there any considerations of policy, however ur-
gent, that can justify an immortality If so, then
Right and Wrong resolve themselves into Expe-
diency and Inexpediency-the terms Moral and
Immoral are synonymous with Polite and lmpol-
itic-the distinctions between Vice and Virtue
are to be determined by a calculation Of loss and
profit-Conscience is a mockery, and God non
entity
No--the Slave Trade was criminal, and the
Compromise which secured it protection by the
flag of the Union twenty years, was immoral
and the fruit Of that Compromise has been death.
Men do not gather grapes of thorns or figs of
thistles. Agreements wrong in themselves be-
come the prolific source of wrong doing. The
Compromise between Massachusetts and South
Carolina fastened upon this country the body of
death under which it now groans. Had the
Moral Sentiment of q majority Of the States not
been compromised, had it stamped itself upon the
Constitution, and procured the immediate prohi-
ton of the Slave traffic, the probability is that
the system of slave labor would never have ac-
quired sufficient vitality to subject to its baleful
domination the new Territories subsequently
added to the Union.
The Missouri Compromise, as it is called, was
of the same kind The Moral Sentiment of the
North resisted the admission of Missouri as a
slaveholdng State and demanded the exclusion
of Slavery from territory under the jurisdiction Of
the Federal Government; but it consented to
Compromise by which slave State was admitted,
and Slavery allowed In all the territory south Of
800 80. Northern representatives violated the
convictions of their constituencies, and gave
their sanction TO the continuance, under the
exclusive jurisdiction Of the General Govern
ment, of what they knew to be wrong. And
what are the consequences? We see them in
the vast growth of the Slave System, the infinite
arrogance of the Slave Power, its enormous de-
msnds, and the perils with which it menaces the
Union. II WAS easier to confront the power
Of Slavery in 1920 than it is now.
To Mr. Clay attaches the discredit Of having
carried through that fatal Compromise. His To-
cality-a Western State, bordering free State,
and rather liberal in it's sentimeuts-snd the fact
that he was stakeholder without the ultraisms Of
the slaveholding caste, believer in the evil
Of Slavery, without regarding it as involving its
supporters in wrong doing, qualified him to play
The part of Compromises on the Slave Question.
He saw no moral considerations which should
prevent concessions on both sides The South
certainly could commit no wrong by yielding
portion Of the territory to Frcedom--the North