Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1856-12-06

the States, by O sectional organization and move
ment, to usurp the control Of the government OF
the United States.
/ confidently believe thai the great body of those
who inconsiderately took this fatal step, are sin.
cerely attached to the Constitution and the Union.
They would upon deliberation, shrink with unaflect-
ed horror from any conscious act of disuniOn or
civil war. But they have entered into a path,
which leads nowhere, unless it be civil war and
disunion, and which has no othei possible outlet.
They have proceeded thus far in that direction in
consequence of the successive stages Of their pro-
gress having consisted Of a series of secondary
issues, each of which protested to be confined
within constitutional and peaceful limits, but
which attempted indirectly what few men were
willing to do directly, that is, to act aggress-
lively against the constitutional rights of nearly
one half of the t%hirty-one States.
In the long series of acts of indirect aggression.
the first was the strenuous agitation, by citizens of
the northern States, in Congress and out of it, Of
the question of negro emancipation in the southern
States.
The second step iu this path of evil consisted of
acts OF the people OF the northern States, and in
several instances of the governments aimed to
facilitate the escape of persons held to service in
the southern States, and to prevent their extradi-
tion when reclaimed according to law and in virtue
of express provisions of the Constitution. To pro-
mote this object, legislative e%nactments and other
means were adopted to take away or defeat rights,
which the Constitution solemnly guaranteed. In
order to nullify the then existing act of Congress
concerning the extradition of fugitives from ser.
vice, laws were enacted in many States, forbid
ding their officers under the severesr penalties, to
partici pate in the execution of any act of Congress
whatever. In this way that system OF harmonious
cooperation between the authorities of the United
States and of the several States, for the mainten-
ance of their common institutions, which existed in
the early years of the Republic, was destroyed
and conflicts of jurisdiction came to be frequent;
and Congress found itself compelled, for the suu-
port of the Constitution, and the vindication of its
power, to authorize the appointment of new officers
charged with the execution of its acts, as if they
and the officers of the States were ministers, re-
spectively of foreign governments in a state of
mutual hostility, rather than fellow magistrates Of
q common country, peacefully su5sisting under
the protection of one well constituted UniOn.--
Thus here, also, aggression was followed by reac-
ton; and the attacks upon the Constitution at this
point did but serve to raise up new BARRIERS for its
defence and security.
The taird stage Of this unhappy sectional con-
tioversy was in connection with the organization
of territorial governments, and the admission of
new States into the Union. When it was proposed
to admit the State of Maine, by separation of ter
ritory from that of Massachusetts,, aud the State of
Missouri, formed of a portion of the territory ceded
by France 20 the United States, representatives in
Congress objected to the admission Of the latter,
unless with cond itious suited to particular views of
public policy. TheLmpositiJn OF such II condition
was successfully resisted. But, at the same period,
the question was presented Of imposing rcstri tons
upon the residue of the territory cGie1 10y France.
That question was, for the time, disposed OF by the
adoption of IL geographical line of Imitation.
In this connection it should not be forgotten
that France, of her own accord, resolved, for con.
siderations of the most flr-siahted sagncity, to
cede Louisiana to the United States, the latter ex-
pressiy engaged that the inhabitants If the ceded
territory shall be incorporated in the Union of the
United States, and admitted as soon as possible,
according to the principles of the Federal Consti-
tuition, to the enjoyment OF all the rights, ad'an-
tages, and immunities of citizens OF lthe Urlted
States and in the mean time they shall be main
tanned and protected in the free enjoyment of their
liberty, property, and the religion which they pro
foss'-that is to say, while it remains in o terri
torial condition, its inhabitants are maintained
and protected in the free enjoyment of their lib
erty and property, with a right then to pass into
the condition of States on II footing of perfect
equality with the original States.
The enactment which established the restrictive
geographical Zine, was acquiesced in rather than
approved by the States of the Union. 1t
stood on the statute book, howe ever, for Il mum.
of years and the people of the respective States
acquiesced in the re-enactment of the principle as
applied to the State of Texas; and it was pro-
posed to acquiesce in its further application to the
territory acquired by the United States from Mex
leo. But this proposition was successfully resisted
by the representatives from the northern States,
who, regardless of the statute line, insisted upon
applying restriction to the new territory generally
whether lying north or south Of it, thereby repeal
ing it ms a legislative compromise, and, on the
part of the North, persistently violating the com
pact, if compact there was.
Thereupon this enactment ceased to have bind
ing virtue in any sense, whether rs respects the
North or the South and 50 in effect it was treated
on the occasion of the admission OF California, and
the organization of the Territories Of New Next
co, Utah and Washington.
Such was the state of this question, when the
time arrived for the organization of the Terrific
ries Of Kansas and Nebraska In the progress
of constitutional inquiry and reflection, it had
now at length come to be seen clearly that Con-
gross does not possess Constitutional power to i'm
pose restrictions of this character upon any pres
emit or future State Of the Union. In a long ser
les of decisions, on the fa!iest argument and after
the most deliberate consideration, the Supreme
Court of the United States had finally determined
.his point, in every form under which the ques-
tion could arise, whether as affecting public or
private rights-in questions of the public domain
of religion, of navigation, and of servitude.
The several States of the Union are, by force
of the Constitution, co-equal in domestic legisla-
tive power. Congress cannot change Il law of
domestic relation in the State of Mrine no more
can it in the State of Missouri. Any statue which
proposes to do this is a mere nulGty; it takes away
no right, it confers none. If il remain on the stat
ute-book unrepealed, it remains there only as IL
monument of error, and a beacon of warning to
the legislator and the statesman. To repeal it will
be only to remove imperfectioR from the statutes,
without affecting, either in the sense of permiss-
ion or prohibition, the action of the States, or of
their citizens.
Still, when the nominal re striction of this ma
ture, already a dead letter in law, was in terms
repealed by the last Congress, in a clause of the
act organizing the Territories of Kansas and Ne
brasks. shat repeal was made the occasion of q
wide spread and dangerous agitation.
While therefore, in general, the people of the
northern States have never at any time, a~rrogated
for the federal government the power to interfere
directly with the domestic condition of persons in
the southern States, but on the contrary have disa-
vowed all such intentions, and have shruhk from
conspicuous utilization with those few who pursue
their ~fanatical objects avowedly through the con-
templated means of revolutionary change of the
government, and with acceptance of the necessary
Consequences civil and servile war-yet many