The North-Carolina standard., 1850-03-13
sPEECH OF MIR. VENABLE,

SPEECH OF MR.. VENABLE,
NORTH CAROLINA,
Delivered in the House of Representatives of the
United States, February 10, 1850. in Committee
of the Whole on the state of the Union, on the
Resolution referring the Presidents Message to
the appropriate Standing Committees.
MI. CHAIRMAN: 1t is matter Of regret to me
that the rule, which necessity has compelled to
adopt to the time allotted to each speaker, will
prevent me from the full discussion of the subject
before I shall, however, avail myself of the
privilege of publishing to the country those remarks,
which l shall be prevented from delivering.
The character of the discussion, and particularly
the proceedings of yesterday, have developed many
and important considerations which ought to be full
ly impressed on the public mind. We hear gentle
men declaring the one hand, that measures in pro-
gress must produce disastrous consequences. and
the other, there is cool annuncation that what
may be the result, these measures must be
summated. The issue must be made up, and at
whatever COST the strength of the antagonistc parties
must be tried. am satisfied that things tending
in this direction, and that the most desirable event
which can happen, is final adjustment, one way or
the other, of the great issue which divides US.
like frankness and candor. l abhor concealment
and indirection. l must, at least, respect the bold
ness of the open assaiant of my rights, when COM
pared with the covert ntrguer, who smiles to concil
late that his unjust purpose may be more edecually
accomplished. 1t was for that reason that heard
without excitement the declaration of the gentleman
from Ohio Mr.. Root on Friday last, that Heaven
had decreed the abolition of slavery, and warned gen.
tlemen of the South lest they should hurry the
cution of that decree. Neither l astonished to
hear the gentleman from Massachusetts Mr.. Mann1
that the institution must fall After taxing
his rich Imagination to describe the horrors of the
civil war which would follow disunion-after png
up the agony, amidst clouds and dust and smoke and
darkness with scenes of blood and carnage-distress
ing our sympathes with all the horrors of civil and
serve war, and still going on to draw from the re-
sources of mind rich in such pictures. and prolific
in such visions, my friend from Alabama Mr.. Bow
don arrested his progress for a moment, by asking
him whether he would consent to avoid these
dous consequences by assigning some portion OF the
public domain to southern shareholders, that they
might enaig CRATE to it and enjoy their property he
promptly replied that such concession could be
made. To him the horrors Of civil dscord, the ca
lamities of internecine war, tho thrilling errors of
fraterna and deadly conflict, were more desirable
than the relaxation of policy in which his heart and
feelings are absorbed. 1t was somewhat amusing,
however, to see him descend from his lofty soaring
in those regions of imag gnaton to warn u.s. an in
ducement submission, of the practical evil in the
way of negro stealing to which we should be sub
jected. The extended sea-coast bays and rivers,
and the succession of dark nights, were facilities with
which he seemed familiar in thought; and he con-
cuded perhaps Justly. that if the restraints of the
Constitution were some little obstruction to the
Kidnapping propensity of the sons of the Pilgrims,
that those restraints being removed, whole slave
population would be abducted. That the gentleman
has peculiar horror of that crime, was signally
shown in his zeal in defending or the mere love Of
robbed the people Of this District, short time since,
of near hundred slaves in sing lie night. can as
him that by far the greater part of our danger
from this species of daring crime will be removed,
by the fact that unless market for the kidnapped
negroes could be found we have no fear that New
England capital, or New England labor, would be
employed in that enterprise. The first impulses of
fanatical unprincipled feeling would abate before
+ the want of pecuniary profit which the employment
would yield. We are wiling to believe that the de-
scendants of those who filled their purses by seizing
the African his native shore and selling him into
bondage, mi ght too, for consideration be induced
to open trade in the descendants of those whose ia
thers their fathers made slaves and would readily
believe that those whose moral sense is paralysed
to crime in negro stealing, might easily be
pursuaded that there would be less objection to the
| business if it could be rendered profitable. They
have not forgotten the convenient morality which
"Compounds for sins they are inclined to-
By damning those they have no mind to-"
can assure him that we have not forgotten the
vast numbers of charming and interesting runaway
negroes at New Bedford, who, as his former col
league (Mr. Palfrey) remarked with manifest exul-
taon, had paid for themselves with their heels. We
not insensible the faternal kindness with which
those northern Anacharss Klootz orators of the hu-
man race regard US OF the South. Nothing can
equal the indifference with which we regard such
predictions of DANGER except detestation of the
means employed to bring the trouble and our alb.
horrence of the mock sanctity of those who would
be the agents in the work. Sir, there is no more
striking evidence Of the senty, the decay of peo
pie, than the reign of cant. No people have eve
recovered from its effects, and never can. Nothing
but cant could have suggested the atrocities will
which the gentleman's speech abounded. Let hin
blush when he speaks of the sins and crimes of any
people on earth. Crime and sickly mental cultur
have kept pace in his section. No southern calen
dar OF crime can afford such as the Salem mur
ders OF some years since, the horrors of th
Parkman ASSASSINATION by professor of the mode
University of New England If we add to this tn,
cool assurance with which the gentleman from indians
Mr.. Fitch designated portion of the southern
members as madmen, we are constrained to admi
the force of the maxim quoted BY himself " Whom
the gods intend to destroy they first make mad. ,
The gentleman from Ohio MI. Root stated hi
points with 'clearness and fankness, and with bold
ness declared that compromise could be made upol
question OF the exclusion of slavery from the Ter
rtories-an issue in which we Join, and shall at eas
have the satisfaction of understanding each other
On some future occasion, when this question shal
come more practically in relation to California AM
New Mexico, intend to reply to his remarks.
turn, with qualification, TO my friend and col
league, [Mr. CIingman,] who some time since ad
dressed the committee in manner which afforde
me nigh pleasure. / avail myself of this, the frs
OCCASION to congratulate the country that the tim
mas arrived when party ties yield to the call of ou
country on great occasion, and when the voice
Pa'iousm can be heard above the clamor excited b