The southern press. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1850-1852, 1850-09-28

| be IN Texas, las VIII be presently demOnstra
why should this Government,--wit more terri
tory than she can manage, wish to buy Of her
And ii il is not,--why should it pay her for it
But n the Government must buy it, why offer
price for IT so disproporIlonate to its worth !, TIE,
millions Of dollars! Why, when General Jackson
IN 1879, was SO anxious TO acquire Texas from
|, Mexico,-1fue million Of dollars, were the utmos
farthing he would offer for the ichoie Of it, Fol
less than half million, the entire strip of New
Mexico, lying east of the Rio Grande, could a
any time have been had of Mexico:--a less
than half that money would now buy every till
able acre of the useful domain it contans;-But the
Free soilers of Congress would not have voted q
tythe of the money for that. No, no, it was the
eminent domain they wanted ,-the jurisdiction
the sorereignty--the extinction in embryo of hct
Stare States, aWd the creation in embryo Of too
Free States in their stead through the junction OF
a heavy slice carved out Of the undisputsd terri
/ tory OF Texas,-and make the South contribute
SIX -and -a-half of the ten millions, towards the
| accomplishment of her own territorial spoliaton
| That was what was wanted That was the scheme
Of the Free-soilers to which President Fillmore
] lent himself! Ii was to ensure this triumph,
| through this spoliaton to his Free-soil confed-
crates that he brandshed the Federal sword and
menaced an Executive war against sovereign
State, without the sanction of Congress- And
for WHAT Because she resolves to suppress an
open rebellion within her own borders, to which
| service, the President himself was bound by his
oath and the Constitution, TO have aent to her aid
the very troops with which lie menaced her, had
Texas called on this Government for military as
sistance!
| Mind you, however! the amount of the appro-
praton is the least of my objections to it. 1t is
the unlawful intermedding the unconstitutional
agency Of Congress-in appropriating the public
money to the purchasing political dominion from
one of the great sections of the country bestow
upon the other; to devote the powers and means
Of the Government, to the impairment and sup
preston OF one species of domestic institutions,
for the establishment and advancement Of another
| in it's place to extort from the South the money
| cost of her own ACKNOWLEDGMENT, and make her
! the stutifed accomplish of her own undoing-il
is these the ends and aims OF Government, that
| | deEounce as UNCONSTITUTIONAL and reprobate as
iniquitous! To Texas, the South would not have
begrudged dollar OF the amount, had it been paid
her in lieu OF the lien upon her customs, which
had been pledged to her creditors prior to her an
nexation, and which had passed to this Govern
| ment unreeved OF the pledge; or though she had
coded portion of her public domain, provided she
had retained her jurisdiction and sovereignty the
IN which II should be situate, unaffected bu the
cession and ,cholly unimpaired. But to sell her Ju-
risdicti0n It part with her Sopereigniy!--To belt
the South around by Gordon of Free States,
| avowedly hostile to her institutions--with asyums
for fugilives strewn broadcast upon her borders
with all facilities for the plotters Of sanguinary
singsand lndlscrmnate massacres all the coun-
sells of wisdom, all the promptings of interest,
| every impulse of safely declare--it should never
have been thought of, and never been acceded to
| Much might be said for Texas, borne down with
the pressure of her irredeemable war-debt--with a
bankrupted exchequer---stinted Of all the active
revenues from her customs, which this Govern
ment had clutched in its misery grasp and with
| held from the creditors to whom they were
| pledged and the South should have struggled
| with the Government, until il came to her relief
mad Ohl ~ bor m hay q
consented to the spoation of her jurisdiction and
sovereignty--.Neper! No, Fellow Citizens of the
South--.Mrrer NEVER.
But it will be said, that this extraordinary sac
rfce was needed from the South, as "the only
means of preserving the peace Of the country !"-
| That the imposing deusion which secured
| the votes Of number of Southerners, and carried
| the bill. Without that incentive they never would
have voted for it, and without their it never
could have passed The only means Of preserr-
| ing the peace Of the country" Wells admit that
g the peace of the country was in jeopardy Who
| but the North, by menacing Texas with the Fed
eral stronghand and military violence, to despoil
her of her own, had put it in jeopardy But
come the jeopardy whence it may--are no other
sacrifices but Southern sacrifices to be heaped
up offerings upon the al liar of peace' Is the
North without an interest in all the lauded bless
| ings Of Union and Peace, that she yields an
| inch doit--a prejudice or caprice, to save
! either? Thirty years ago, the North demanded
| that the South be driven and excluded from four.
6fths of the Stare Territory of Louisiana For a
season, the South resoluteIy resisted this mon
strous Injustice but artfuI and treacherous APP
peals to her, to g preserve the peace Of the
| try and save tire Unon,' prevailed over her good
sense--the line of the Missouri Compromise was
stretched across her territoryand from that hour,
was her political Inferiority in the Union, des-
tiny and fate! Within year thereafter, the
most important portion of the Stare Territory of
Ora tu .
and, says the North to the South, Remember our
| Compact of Partition, on the line Of $50 Got is
SO g nominated in the bond" And the South did
| remember it, and ratify it, and faithfully adhere
to it ever after, and 30 the spound of flesh was
| yielded and the line again run Just five years
ago, the interests Of all concerned, suggested that
Texas with her vast area OF Stare territory, should
be annexed to the Union. Again speaks the North
to the South Remember our Compact of Parti-
ton on the line Of $50 3d. And it ,cas remem-
bered, and faithfully adhering to it, again did the
South consent the stretching Of that line Of the
| Missouri Compromise across the Slave Territory
Of Texas. Very well A little more than two
years ago, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo,
ceding California, New Mexico, &c, to the United
States, was up for ratification in the Senate. Mr..
| Baldwin, of Connecticut, moved the Wilmot Pro-
vso, entirely excluding the South from every por-
ton of the coded Territories, as an amendment to
the treaty Upon that, spake the South to the
North substantially thus :--Senators Of the Free
States If that's your game, we of the South want
to know it, We have the power to ratify re-
ject this Treaty, Git requiring two-thirds to
ratify,) and we shall reject it, unless this amend
ment is put down by decided vote, and with
perfect understanding, that the rights and
shares of the North and the South, to mi
grafton and settlement in the coded territories,
with without slaves, shall be indscrlmi-
nately mutual and scrupuIously equal. With
that understanding, ID down came the Senates
vote, and the Wimot Proviso fell crushed under
the weight Of the overwhelming odds,--of but
fifteen in its favor, in Senate of siriy mo form
of words, no solemnization in writing, could
have added an ota 10 the binding force of such an
understanding whetherexpressed or implied, when
passed upon at such Forum. Mark you!--The Sen
ate had met, disassocated from all its Legislative
| functions. The sovereign States had assembled,
to hold council with each other through their Sen
atoral PIenipotentaries upon their Foreign Re|a-
tons, involving the issues of Peace and War and
an enlargement Of boundaries and National do
minion.--The JPiimot Proriso is proposed. A
portion of the States ample in power and reso-
lutte Of purpose, - declare they will reject the
| Trpatv ~ If he not rejected and n ia voted down