The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1850-09-20

cession of any of the old ones As far back as
| 1903 did New England denounce the acquisition
| of Louisiana unconsututlonal, and maintain
| ing that the admission Of new States under the
Constitution, was limited such, as should be
| formed out Of territory within the limits Of the
Union at the date or the Constitution, -she mena-
ced secession for the unconstitutional al mission of
Louisiana In 1912, she alleged that act to be-
But much more recently, March 3, I843)
upon the hrst dawn of the prospect ofre-annex king
Texas to the Union,--the famous John Quincy
Adams drew up, and with number of New Eng
land members Of Congress-, signed and addressed
a very memorable manifesto to g the people of the
Free States, in which they declared among other
things, that:
''We hesitate not to say, that .anneration eff
fected by any or proceeding ofthe Federal Gov
ernment any of its Departments, ,coitid be den-
teal 10Th dissolution. IL would be violation of
our National Compact, its objects, designs, aud
The great elementary principles which entered into
It's composition"
At the very next session of her Legislature
U843-D Massachusetts herself trailing in the
wake of her boldest aud greatest statesman
promptly resolved that,
I" The project of the annexation of Texas, I'M
less arrested on The Threshold, may tend to drive the
States to a Dissolution offhe Union.
Again, at the succeeding session of her Legis-
lature, QS44-5,) she soemnly declared, that
. The Constitutions contains po,ccr irhatsper,
to admit States Territories Without and beyond
the bounds Of The Union as established tetes toas
formed and adopted"
To the proposition to unite Texas as Stare
State, /" she makes anwer calmly, and deliberately
and firmly, Massachusetts piH nerer consent to enter
into any such relations. -
And she finally declared that the Act Of Adms-
sion ",couid hare no binding force Whaterer upo,t
the people Of Massachusetts ~
You were incontestby right in your doctrine,
Massachusetts, if you believed that the admission
of Texas would he an unconstitutional act--(for
none but yourself could decide that matter for you)
but then, august Madam, there way in
which you could have avoided entering into g such
relations" with Texas, Of preventing the act
admitting her from having any g binding force
whatever upon the people, of your State, but by
throwing yourselfu upon your reserved rights, pick
ing up your bonnet and walking out of the Union!
And pray, most gracious Madam, what would
Massachusetts and New England have to say,
should the South, embracing your doctrine and
maintaining your principles, and having as much
right to complain as you habitat Congress had
admitted California into the Union, out of Terri
tory foreign to the Union in I7S9--but the far
graver and weightier objection that had admitted
her without any previous Constitutional organiza-
tion-but through single tyrannOus fiat had done
irreparable violence to the Constitution, in Great
ing State-providing her Constltution-ap-
pointing her Senators and representatives., and
admitting her into the Union-l repeat, what
would they haveto say, If the South seeded from
the Unon'
But mind you though, men Of the South a Sc
cession from the Union would involve dissolu
ton of the partnership, to the extent Of the inter
ests of the retiring partners and that the dissou
ton of political OF commercial co-partnerships
calls for settlements of the neutrality-suspicious.
for the neutrality-suspicious. of the property, and
distributions of the assets. Should the South be
driven to the extremity Of seeding from the
Union she would still make it a point of honor to
nd or har full cha ,F
the public liabilities and that being done, she
would expect, and she would claim, her full share
(among many other things of value) of the Federal
Ships of Har and Of the Federal Territory--in-
GLIDING, Of course, California and her gold mines,
whom she could not regard a member of
the Union, and whom she would not exempt
from that law of partition, sanctioned for centuries
by the Worlds Code and the World s Usage,,
upon the severance and close of all political Fedora
tons! That would be no more than the South s
right, and once having the will, she might soon
have the way, of making it her own The North
would not withhold it, If just to her obligations,
and could not withhold it against the South's con-
sent, though she were not. But that's "by the
aoay!"
Once more and will part with the California
question. Those who 90 turthest in the advocacy
of constructive powers must be constrained to adj
nit, that without the act of admission, the whole
proceedings of the people of California towards
State organization, were and must have remained
absolute utilities, and void, for the want Of juris-
dicton and authority from Congress. Her Con-
stution, then, well all its provisions, incud-
ing its assignment of boundaries, and it's Wi!moi
Propiso, excluding Southerners with their Slaves,
were utilities, and void at the time it was pre-
scented the acceptance of Cong ess, for Congress
itself was powerless to have passed the Proviso,
though exclusively invested with the power to max
call needfulrues and regulations" concerning it.
Bear it in mind, that the same want of authori-
ty that had annued and avoided that Constitution
and its Wimot ProvisO, utterly incapacitated
California from reviving either, or giving them
the smallest validity or force during the whole off
the time that the question pending before
Congress Bear il in mind, that California, even
had she had the power, had never attempted the
revival of either, but had remained wholly mpas-
sive in the premises, from the moment she had APP
piled for admission into the Union. Very well I
What we now? Why the Wilmot Proriso in
full force and operation throughout California s
dimensions from the 32nd to the 42nd de-
gree of North Latitude Very well again Now,
who put the Wimot Proviso in full force and OPP
Grafton throughout California; 1t was not CalifJr-
mia, certainly, for l.have demonstrated that she was
without the capacity and immovably impassive
that she did not do it, and that she could not do
it! When was 1t put therea On the lth of Sep |
TENDER, 1850. How it put there' Through
the action of Congress, in creating California a
State, in appointing her Senators and Representa- |
lcih ihe Uilmot Proriso contained in Il, and receiv
ing her into the Union as Sovereign State? Who |
then but The Congress Of The United States did put or
could have put the Wimot Proviso in full force
and operation throughout California; 1t would be
an abuse of the reasoning faculty to add another
demonstration to that which is already past a ca
vii or adoubt. will say no more than this, then
BE il kno,cn to all who may be in any wise ag-
grieved or oppressed, wronged or insulted by the
acts herenbefore and by these presents set forth,
that he Congress Of The United States, did, in the
course of the second week of the month of Sep
TENDER, palpably and purposely impose The Hi
met Proriso, (ald ,Cifh the cypress and apoced
tent If excluding Souiheners and their siares oreper)
and put it in full force and operation throughout
California! ind be further kno,cn, that the same
Congress did during the same week, recognize the
Merican Propiso land triM like inteni to ercIude
Souiherners NTH their siares forerer) prohibiting
slavery throughout the Territories of Utah and
New Mexico, and that by virtue thereof, South
erners with their slaves forever forbidden By
Congress to occupy one foot of the territories, for
which they to provide three fourihs qftte moneg
cost and have already contributed, t,oo-hirds Of the
men AND roUR-FIFTHs or THE GRAVES
From all this it plainly results that Congress H.
self has imposed The gPilmot Proriso throughout