Washington sentinel. [volume] (City of Washington [D.C.]) 1853-1856, 1855-06-28

arrested. He would repeat again what he had
so often said on this floor. This was the only
| question OF sufficient magnitude and potency to
divide this Union, and divide it it would, or
! drench the country in blood, if not arrested. He
knew how much the sentiment he had uttered
would be misconstrued and misrepresented.
There were those who saw danger to the
| Union in the violation ofal its fundamental prin-
| ciples but who were full of apprehension when
danger was foretold or resisted, and who held not
the authors of the danger, but those who fore
warned or opposed it, responsible for conse-
quences.
'But the cry of disunion by the weak or de-
signing has no terror for him. fhis attachment
to the Union was less he might tamper with the
deep disease which. now affiicts the body polite
and keep silent till the patient was ready to sink
under its mortal blows. Ii is cheap, and he
must say but too certain a mode of acquiring the
character of devoted attachment to the Union
But seeing the danger, as he did, he would be
traitor to the Union and those he represented to
keep silence. The assaults daily made on the
institutions of nearly one-haf of the States of
| this Union by the other-insttutions interviewer
from the beginning with their political and so
cial existence, and which cannot be other than
that without their inevitable destruction-will and
must If continued, make tico people Of one by de-
stroyng every sympathy between the two great
sections, obliterating from their hearts the recol
| lection of their common danger and glory and
implanting in their place a mutual hatred more
deadly than ever existed between two neghborng
| people since the~ commencement or tne human
race He feared not the circulation Of the thous-
ands of incendiary and sanderous publications
which were daily issued from organized and
| powerful press among those intended to be Will
| fed. They cannot penetrate our section; that
was not the danger; it lay in different direc-
| ton. Their circulation IN the aon-siaueholding
States lohat to be dreaded 1t was nfusing
I a deadly poison into the minds of the rising gem
Grafton, implanting in them feelings of hatred,
| the most deadly hatred instead of affection and
love, for one-half Of this Union, to be returned,
on their part, with equal detestation. The fatal,
| the immutable consequences, if not arrested, and
| that without delay, were such he had pre-
sented.
s'The first and desirable object is to arrest it
in the non-slaveholdng States; to meet The disease
lohere IL originated and chere IL ersts and the first
step to this is to find some constitutional ground
on which rally, with that object, can be made
These resolutions present the ground, and the
only one, on which it can be made. The only
remedy is in the State rights doctrines; and if
those who profess them in slaveholding States do
not rally on them as their political creed, and
organize as party against the fanatics, in order
to put them down, the South and West will be
| compelled to take the remedy into their own
hands They will stand justified in the sight of
| God and man; and what in that event will fol-
| low, no mortal can anticipate
| " Mr.. President (said Mr.'C., we are reposing
| on a volcano. The Senate seems entirely igno-
rant of the state of feeling in the South"
| We clip the above extract of speech on the
slavery question of Mr. Calhoun from 9 Mr.
Benton's Thirty Years View," second volume,
chapter Of which is republished in the National
hteitigencer of Tuesday, from the New York
Erening Post. This speech was delivered in the
/ tn inth a &c
tention to this extract exhibiting the ar-seeng
sagacity of the great Carolinian.
He saw then that the chief dangerto our form Of
government--our governmental experiment based
on the capacity ofthe people for selfgovernment-
was in the invasion of the reserved rights of the
States BY the Federal Government-that the
evil to be apprehended was the subversion Of our
constitutional system, BY the absorption or usur-
patien by the General Government of powers
not granted, but by the express terms of the
Constitution reserved to the States respee-
lively to the people. = This in Mr.. Calhoun :
view, was the natural tendency fpower-to the
centre-towards consolidation.
1t was because he entertained this statesman
like view that Mr.. Calhoun was strict construc-
ZIONIST of the Constitution-that instrument, be-
sides being the chart BY which the ship Of State
should be steered, preserves the safe equilibrium
between the centripetal and centrifugal forces
Consolidation and State rights.
1t will be perceived that Mr.. Calhoun thought,
as far back as the date of his speech, that the
circulation Of Abolition pamphlets IN The non
siareholding STATES what was to be dreaded
that there the disease had originated and there
existed, and that the remedy should be applied
TO the seat Of the disease.
This wise and practical proposition was re-
sisted. Notwithstanding the presentation Of a
petition by the State of Vermont, demonstrating
against the annexation Of Texas to the United
States, and praying for the abolition Of slavery
in the District Of Columbia, followed by many
petitions from citizens and societies in the North
ern States to the same effect; and further, for
the abolition of slavery in the Territories, for the
abolition Of the slave trade between the States,
and for the exclusion of future slave States from
the Union, " the counter plan, commended by Mr..
Benton, was 10 ignore in Congress the existence
of the dangers, and "de az the fool deth''
How truly has time indicated the prediction
Vi MI 1dlnOun. = lneir circulation IN the nom
slaveholding States was what was TO be dreaded
The chief, if not the only, use which Mr. Ben
ton makes Of the extract we have re-published,
lin connection with other testimony is to con-
wet Mr.. Calhoun Of ''muiaiiOns'' or 'changes''
Of opinion, in order 'that responsibility man fol-
tO'o cuipabitity, and the judgment Of history fall
where il is DUE
Jeremy Bentham, in his work on faliacies, has
place for just such fallacous mode Of reason
ing as Mr.. Benton makes use Of above.
Admitting that Mr.. Benton has made out his
whole case, for the sake Of argument only, and
his argument stands thus: "Mr. Calhoun on a
previous occasion entertained different opinions
on this subject from those just oppressed there
fore his present opinions are erroneous"
The frequently used and bold fallacy here dis
played, is to make up one chapter Of the second
volume Of "Mr. Bcnton's Thirty Years View I"
The proper and only mode Of meeting Mr..
Calhoun's views is 10 show by fact and argument
that he was wrong. This will not be shown by
saying or proving that on a previous occasion he