The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1850-07-16

anti-slayery triumph, and would accelerate the
general movement against u.s. II not difficult
to perceive how TINT state of public sentiment,
has been produced there. The old abolition
societies have done good deal to poison the
popular mind. BY circulating an immense num-
Der OF infammatory pamphlets, filled with NIL
manner of falsehood and calummy against the
South, its institutions, and its men, because there
was no contradiction in that quarter, they had
created high degree of prejuice against us.
AS soon rs it became probable that there would
be an acquisition Of territory, the question at
once became a great practical one, and the poll
ticans Immediately took the matter in hand
With view at once Of strengthening their posi-
ton, they seized upon all this matter which the
abolition societies (whose aid both parties court
ed in the struggle) had furnished from time to
! TING. and diffused and strengthened it "a much
as possible, and thereby created an immense
amount of hostility to Southern institutions.
Everything there contributes to this movement;
candidates are brought out by the caucus sys-
tenn and if they fail to take that sectional ground
which is deemed strongest there, they are at
once discarded. The mode of nominating can
didates, as well as of conducting the canvass is
destructive of anything lie independence in the
representative. They do moi, as gentlemen often
do in the South and West, take ground against
the popular clamor, and sustain themselves by
direct appeals to the intelligence and reason of
heir constituents. Almost the whole of the
tNorthern press co-operated in the movement,
with the exception Of the New York Herald,
(Which, with its large circulation, published
matter on both sides,) and few other liberal
papers, everything favorable to the South has
been carefully excluded from the Northern
papers. BY these combined efforts, a degree of
feeling and prejudice has been COTTON up against
the South, which is most intense in all the inte-
rior.
/ was surprised last winter to hear Northern
Senator say, that in the town in which he lived
it would excite great establishment if it were
known that a Northern lady would at the time
of the meeting of the two Houses, walk up to
the Capitol with Southern Senator; that they
had been taught to consider Southerners gener-
ally as being so coarse and ruffianly in manner
that a lady would not trust herself in such a
presence. This anecdote, sir, does not present
too strong picture of the condition of senti-
ment in portions of the interior of the Northern
country. How far gentlemen on this floor are
to be influenced in their action by such state
Of opinion, leave them to decide
The great principle upon which the Northern
movement rests, which is already adopted by
most Northern politicians, and to which they all
current there if the question is unsettled till the
next Congressional election, is this: That the
Government of the United States must do moth
ing to sanction slavery; that it must therefore
exclude it form the Territories; that it mus abol-
ish it in the District Of Columbia, forts, and
arsenals, and wherever it has jurisdiction. Some,
too, carrying the principle to its extent insist
that the coasting slave trade, and that between
the States should also be abolished and that slave
labor should not be tolerated in public office of
the United States such as custom-houses, post
offices, and the like AS these things all obvi-
ously rest on the same general dogma, it is clear
that the yielding of one or more points would not
check, but would merely accelerate, the general
movement to the end Of the series. Before this
end was reached, they would probably append
as corollary, the principle that the President
should not appoint stakeholder to Office 1t is
sir, my deliberate judgment that, in the present
temper Of the public mind at the North, if the
territorial question remains open till the next
election, few if any gentlemen will get here
from the free States that are not pledged to the
full extent Of the abolition platform tits there
fore, obviously the interest of all Of us to settle
this question at the present session.
That the general principle above stated is at
war with the whole spirit of the Constitution of
the United States, which sanctions slavery in
several OF its provisions, need not argue here.
Taking, however, a practical view Of the matter
in controversy, look for moment at the terrific
rial question, the great issue in the struggle.
will do Northern gentlemen on this floor the JUS
tice to admit that they have argued themselves
into the belief that they right in claiming the
whole of the territory for free soil. Let me
state, for moment, the converse, or opposite OF
their proposition. Suppose it were to be claimed
that no one should be allowed to 90 into this
public territory, unless he carried one or more
slaves with him, it might then be said, just as
gentlemen now tell us, that it would be perfectly
fair, becuse it placed every man who might be
inclined to go there on an equal footing, and
might, by means of making thus homogeneous
population, advance the general interest North
em men would at once, Isupposc, object to this
arrangement. Then we should say to them, if
you do not like this restriction let it be settled
then, that every citizen of the United States may
go into the common territory and carry slaves or
not, Just as he pleases. This would seem to be
a perfectly equitable and fair arrangement
Northern men, however, object to this, and say
that they are not willing to live in territory
where others own slaves. Then we ofthe South
say to them, that we will consent to divide the
territory, and limit our possession with slaves to
a part of it, and allow them to 90 at will over
the whole. Even to this they object, and insist
that they will n IT allow us to occupy one foot
of the territory. Remember, sir, that this very
territory was acquired by conquest, and that
while the South, according to its population,
would have been required to furnish only one
third of the troops, it in point of fact did furnish
two-thirds of the men that made the conquest.
And the North, deficient as it was comparatively
in the struggle, now says that its conscience, or
its cupidtty, will not permit us to have the
smallest portion of that territory. Why, sir, this
is the most impudea proposition that was ever
maintained by any respectable body Of men.
Sir, give the North full credit for its feelings
in favor of liberty. j can well suppose that
Northern gentlemen would resist, in the most
emphatic manner, the attempt to make any man
who is now free a slave; but regard them as
too intelligent to believe that humanity, either
to the slave or the master, requires that they
should be pcnt up within territory which, af-
ter time, will be insufficient for their subsis-
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