Daily national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1854, 1854-07-21
CONNECTICUT ON THE NEBRASKA BILL.
SPEECH OF HON. Mr.. GILLETTE, OF CONN.
In the Senate, July 8, 1854.
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| point would here raise the question, whether
under the Constitution Of the United States
Connecticut has not as much right to enact
laws for the protection of the rights Of her
people, as South Carolina has to enact laws for
the destruction of the rights Of her people
Whether freedom may not be protected under
the Constitution as well az slavery? Cannot
Connecticut be iadulged little with the priv
lege Of protecting tho rights and liberties OF
her own people upon her own soil, when o part
of them, at least, have no protection, except
such es is furnished by prison-walis 10 Ger
tain other States Of this Uniona Mr.. Presi-
dent, has it come to this, that we of the North
arc oil centralized, absorbed, melted down,
swallowed up consolidated into this great, CEN
tral, usurpiDg Government, and the Northern
States are nero appendages, shorn and rayIess
satellites, to revolve around this allabsorbing
centre in borrowed light? God forbid To
this momentous question Connecticut, rejoice
to cay, true TO her ancient fame, as the yieilant
champion Of State rights, and mindful of her
grand historic eminence as a defender Of iiber-
ty, answers, No. feel somewhat as the great
friend of America and liberty felt, when Civ
ing voice TO these words in the British Parlia-
ment in 1916:
81 rejoice that America has resisted Three
millions Of people SO dead to all tho feelings of
liberty as voluntarily to submit to slavery,
would have boon fit instruments to make slaves
of the rest"
So do rejoice that in the great conflict be-
tween Democracy and Despotism, now begun
in good earnest Connecticut has been so prompt
to take her position on the side of freedom, and
to call upon us to restore this Government TO
the old foundations on which her Ellsworth
and Sherman were 80 active in establishing it,
- g.
ever. She has done with al! compromises with
the perfidious vlolators and naughty contem-
ners of the public faith, ard now says return
to the early policy of this Government, that Of
discoIraging, restricting, and disccuntenancing
slavery everywhere under its jurisdiction. She
calls upon us to discard the vile and contempt
IDLE dogma, that the Constitution Of the United
States is a shield of slavery, or anywise coun-
tenances that most cruel and terrific despotism
that has ever crushed humanity despotism
which denies the natural right Of a man to his
own body; of husband to his own wife; Of
father to his own child; which sells husband,
wife, and child, separate or together, in the
market places; which asserts chattal-slavory
to be Divine and Democratic institution, and
ayows its base purpose indefinitely to extend
and forever to perpetuate the terrific CURSE
| thank God Fir, Connecticut is washing her
hands from this blood, and calls upon US, in
her old voice Of freedom, to cleanse this Gov
eminent from its guilty participation in the
diabolical work of enslaving and imbruting
man. She inyokes us to dsabuse the Consti-
tuition Of the miserable dogmas which elave-
holders have foisted into it, to serve their own
nefarous purposes, and restore to it the original
construction in which It's illustrious trainers
conceived and established it-not 30 much as
admitting into it according to Madison, Sher-
man, aud others, the blssphemous I" idea that
man can hold property in man" She inyokes
us to return to the original policy of this Gov
eminent as inaugurated by Jefferson, and in
terdct slavery on every rod of territory under
it's juriediction She would have us see to it,
that this Government, President, Judges, Con-
gress and all, be speedily rescued from the
foul embraces of the great Southern Syren,
raised up from its low debauchment, to virtue
and freedom, vitaized anew by the inspiring
breath Of liberty, and replaced on the old
foundations upon which the great fathers es
tablished and left it, there to be rcsolutely and
actively on the side Of freedom.
1t is meet and proper that the State of Els
worth and Sherman, who would not admit
slavery into the Constitution On any terms, the
State Of Putnam and Hale, who fought hero
ically for freedom, should speak out clearly at
such crisis, and call upon US to tear off from
this Government the accursed vampire of sla-
very.
My honorable colleague has undertaken for
the third or fourth time, to prove the Missouri
Compromise line unconstitutional / will not
tax the patience of the Senate with any reply,
further than to Offset the opinion OF President
Monroe, together with those of all his unrivaltd
Cabinet, Calhoun, Crawford, Writ and John
@ Adams against the argument aud opinion
of my colleague.
have the happiness to agree with my col
league in the principle OF popular sovereignty,
only we chance to have opposite views in car
ryiDg it cut IIo favored the Nebraska Kansas
bill for one great reason that opposed it. he
regarded IL Us prcmotive Of the principle Of
popular sovereignty, whereas considered il, in
all its details and tendencies as subserung the
ants gonistc principle Of slaveholding sover-
eignty and every days development, since its
passage, has been confirming the correctness
Of this view.
He has also animadverted on the Fcgitive
Act, and he ia welcome to bis opinions upon
that subject. do not intend ever to be drawn
into discussion of that measure. It might
have an awkward tendency toward pacifca-
ton No, Mr. President, am not the man to
discuss the Fugitive Act. will not do it.
can never cast 30 great an lnuignlry upon the
Constitution Of my country as to admit by the
remotcst implication, tho possibility that it
could kennel euch Cerberean monster Toll
me not Of the consitutionalty Of an act which,
by one bound, vaults over all tho bulwarks Of
liberty in all the States Of this Union, and
strikes down, at one blow, the writ of habeas
corpus, and the right of trial by jury; which
commits the great question Of personal liberty,
not to q Judicial trial, but to summary pro-
cess before magistrate, appointed, not By the
President with the concurrence Of the Senate,
but by the court which forbids the exercise OF
Christian charity toward the poor and perish
ing, under severe penalties; which seeks to de-
grade man below the beasts which perish, by
accounting him and his precious rights Of too
little value TO be entitled to a jury trial, less
than $40; which holds out the bribe Of
double fee to the petty commissioner for doom
ing human being to slavery; which, in short