Washington sentinel. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1853-1855, 1854-02-11


Missouri prohibition was superseded by the
j legislation of that year. Here, sir, sits the
senator from Virginia, Mr.. MASON j will he
say tnat at any time before the 23d OF January,
1904, be ever heard such proposition stated
or maintained anywhere, by anybody? No,
SIR, ne will not say it, There is no evidence
that the assertion was ever made before that
day, when tmade its appearance in the sena.
tors BILL 1t is remarkable circumstance,
that hive thousand copies of the committees
report have been printed by the order of the
Senate, and / know not how many for indi-
vidual subscribers, and circulated through the
country, sustaining the bill upon the ground
that the Missouri prohibition is neither repealed
nor affirmed, while the bill itself as now amend
ed expressly abrogates that prohibition. The
report as circulated condemns the bill as
amended, and the bill as amended contradicts
the report as circulated. All this must neces-
sarily mislead and confuse the public judg-
| ment.
have now proved that the doctrine of SUI
persedure is novelty. / will proceed to prove
that it is as groundless as it is novel.
The senator from Illinois, in his speech the
other day, made general charge of gross ig-
norance of the history and geography Of the
country against the .signers Of the independent
democratic appeal, and singled out several
paragraphs OF that appeal for special reprehen-
sion. 1t was rather adroit in the senator to
mix the defence of his own bill with an attack
| upon two senator's whose opinions on slavery
questions are at variance with those most
commonly received here. But this movement
| will not, think, avail him much. have no
| fears that he can refute any statement or over
| turn any proposition of that address. Sir, he
might as well attack Gibraltar True in all its
statements, and irrefragable, as believe, in all
its reasonings, it is impregnable to any assault
by him or any man.
The first specification under his general
charge ofignorance and Misrepresentation, de-
MES the truth of d statement which will now
read:
These acts were never supposed to abrogate
touch the existing exclusion OF slavery from what
is now called Nebraska. They applied 10 the Terri
tory acquired from Mexico. and 10 that only. They
were intended as a settlement Of the controversy
growing out of that acquisition, and of that con.
troversy only. They must stand or fall by their
own merits"
That the first sentence which | have read is
absolutely trle, | suppose no man now doubts.
Senators who were here during the discussions
of 1850 must remember that the report of the
Committee of Thirteen distinctly stated that the
compromise measures applied to the newly
acquired territory" The honorable and dis
tinguished senator from Michigan sits near me,
and can say whether any syllable was uttered
in the Committee of Thirteen or elsewhere, to
his knowledge, which indicated any purpose to
apply them to any other Territory. If am in
error, l beg the senator to correct me. Mr..
CAss remained silent. am right, then.
But the senator from Illinois says that the
| territorial compromise acts did in fact apply to
| other territory than that acquired from Mexico.
| How does he prove that? He says that part
of the territory was acquired from Texas. But
| this very territory which he says was acquired
| from Texas was acquired first from Mexico.
After Mexico coded it to the United States,
Texas claimed that that cession Injured to her
benefit. That claim, only, was relinquished to
the United States The case, then, stands thus;
we acquired the territory from Mexico; Texas
claimed it, but gave up her claim. This GER
tainy does not disprove the assertion that the
territory was acquired from Mexico, and as GER
tainly it does not sustain the senator's asser
ton that it was acquired from Texas.
The Senator next tells the Senate and the
country, that, by the Utah act, there was inclu
ded in the Territory Of Utah portion of the
old Louisiana acquisition covered by the Mis-
souri, prohibition, which prohibition was annul-
led as to that portion by the provisions of that
act. Every one at all acquainted with our
public history knows that the dividing line be-
tween Spain and the United States extended
due north from the source Of the Arkansas to
the AID parallel of north latitude. That arbi-
trary line left within the Louisiana acquisition
a little valley in the midst of rocky mountains,
where several branches Of the Grand river, one
of the affluents Of the Colorado, take their RISE
Here is the map. Here spreads out the vast
Territory of Utah, more than one hundred and
eighty-seven thousand square miles. Here is
the little spot, hardly pins point upon the
map, which / cover with the tip Of my little fin.
ger, which, according to the boundary fixed by
the territorial bill. was cut off from the Louisi
ana acquisition and included in Utah. The
account given of it in the senator's speech
would lead one to suppose that it was an i'm
portant part of the Louisiana acquisition. II
is, in fact, not of the smallest consequence
There are no inhabitants there. 1t is, as
have said, a secluded little valley in the Rocky
mountains, visited once by Fremont, and pen.
etrated occasionally by wandering bands Of
Arapahoes and Utahs. The summit Of the
Rocky mountains was assigned as the eastern
limit Of Utah. That limit in consequence OF
the curvature Of the mountain range, happened
to include this valley. Nobody here, at the
time Of the passage OF the Utah bill, adverted
to that fact. 1t was known that the Rocky
mountain range was very near the arbitrary
line fixed by the treaty, and nobody ever
dreamed that the adoption of that range as the
eastern boundary Of Utah would abrogate the
Missouri prohibition. The senator reported
that boundary line. Did he tell the Senate or
the country that its establishment would have
that effect? No, sir; never. The assertion of
the senator that a "close examination of the
Utah act clearly establishes the fact that it was
the intent, as well as the legal effect, of the
compromise measures of 1850, to supersede the
Missouri compromise and all geographical and
territorial lines, is little short OF preposterous.
There was no intent at all, except to make a
convenient eastern boundary to Utah, and no
legal effect at all upon the Louisiana acquisi.
ton, except to cut off from it the little valley
Of the Middle park.
The second specification Of the senator de.
MES the accuracy of the following statement OF
the address in relation to this pretence of super
seizure:
"'Tbe compromise acts themselves refute this
| prcienson. In the third article OF the second
section of the joint resolution for annexing Texas
a., lac