Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1850-1854, 1854-05-05
BENTON'S SPEECH

0ohsioeF IL the most telling and
effective speech yet made in G ,noress
against the Nebraska bill-indeed a com
plete crusher out of the bill and the doc
trine it seeks to establish. When this
speech is read, people will understand
clearly the motives of the originators and
supporters Of this bill and the ends they
seek to accomplish-an exposure which
we think will finish the bill and its au-
thors too. Hear how the big giant de-
moiishes and scatters the structure of fol-
lies attempted to be reared by the little
giant:
should oppose any movement to i'm
pair that Compromise, made in an open,
direct manly manner: much more shall
oppose it if made in covert, indirect
unmanIy way. The bill, or bills before
us, undertake to accomplish their object
without protesting it-upon reasons
which are contradictory and unfornded
in terms which are ambiguous and in
consIstent-and by throwing on others
the responsibility of its own act. 1t pro-
tesses not to interfere with the sovereign
right OF the People to legislate for them
selves; and the very first line of this sol
emn profession throws upon them a
horse-load of law, which they have no
right to refuse, or time to read, or mon
ey to purchase, or ability to understand.
1t throws upon them all the laws of the
United States which are not locally in
applicable; and that compartments all
that are not specially made for other pla-
ces also, it gives them the Constitution
of the United States, but without the
privilege of voting at Presidential or
Congressional elections, or of making
their own Judiciary. This is non-iuter-
ference with n vengeance. A conlnu-
nifty to be buried under a mountain Of
strange law, and covered with a Consti-
tuition under which they are not to have
one single political right. Why this
circumlocution this extension OF
mountain of irrelevant law, with the OK
ception of the only one relevant and APP
pllcable! Sir, it is the crooked. insidi-
Gus, and pusillanimous way of ellecting
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise
line. 1t includes all law for the sake of
leaving out one law; and effects a repeal
by an omission, and legislates by an ex-
ceptlon. 1t is q new wa, of repeating
a law, and bungling attempt to SNUG
gle Slavery into the Territory, and all
the country out to the Canada line and
up the Rocky Mountains.
The crooked line of this smuggling
process is this: "abolish the Compromise
line, and extend the Constitution over
the country; the Constitution recognises
slavery; therefore, slavery is established
as soon as the line is abolished, and the
Constitution extended: and being put
there by the Constitution, it cannot be
legislated out" This Is the English of
this smuggling process; and certainly
nothing more unworthy Of legislation
more derogatory to legislative body
was ever attempted TO be made into law.
Sir, the Constitution was not made for
Territories, but for States. Its proyis-
ions are all applicable to States and can
not be put in operationiu territories. They
clnnot vote for President, or Vice Pres
ident, or members of Congress, nor elect
their own officers, or prescribe the quail
ifications of voters, or administer their
own laws by their own Judges, sheritfs,
and attorneys; and the clause extending
the Constitution to them is cheat and
an illusion, and trick to smuggle slave
~ into the Territory. Nor is it intend
ell that they shall have any legislative
right under the Constitution, even in
relation to slavery. They may admit it
because it is to be there 10y the Consti
tuition: they cannot exclude it, because
the Constitution puts it there That is
the argument; and it is juggle worthy
of the trick of one egg under three hats
at the same timc-and under neither at
any time. Besides, the Constitution is
an organic, not an administrative act.
1t is code Of principles, not of laws
Not clause IN it can be executed ex-
cept by virtue Of law made under it
not even the clause for recovering fugi-
tive slaves.
But | am not done vet with the beau
tias of this mode of rcpealug a law by
an exception. There is a further conse-
quence to be detected in it. The Mis-
sour Compromise consists of two dis
tinct parts first, an abolition of slavery
in all the ancient Louisiana north and
west of Missouri; secondly, a provision
for the recovery of fugitive slaves in the
territory made free. By the omitted
extension of this section, both these parts
are repealed. A tract of country larger
than the old thirteen Atlantic States.
and bordering thousand miles on the
British dOmInIons, Is made an asylum
for fugitive slaves. There will be no
Inv TO recover slave from all that vast
region. The constitutional provision is
limited to States; the provision in the
act of 1877 is limited to the Northwest
Territory; the second part Of the Mis>ou-
ii Compromise extended this right to
sll the territory north and west of Mis-
souri,; and that being repealed, that right
cf recovery is lost. | object to this on
the paT; Of the State Of Missouri-the
State to be most injured by converting
all the territory north and west of her,
quite out to the British line, into an asv-
nm for runaway slaves. The. hlunier
cannot be corrected, lat least in the opin-