Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1856-08-16
DUNN'S BILL.
A BOLTING REPUBLICAN,.


-
BE-. Letter the Representative in Congress from
the Stark, Portage and Sumit District refused to
vote for Mr.. Dunu's bill for the pacifcation of
Kansas, which passed the House a few days since.
His reasons for declining to support the bill are
good, and Mr.. Letter is to be hopored for his indie.
pendence. The Tribune referred to his vote with
disapprobation. Mr.. Letter gives his reasons fol
his vote in an extract of a letter published in the
Summit county Beacon, dated July Both.
ave passed Dunn's Bill for Kansas yesterday
in n very Objectionable manner. 1t has many
good provisions; but 1t extends the Fugitive Slave
Law over Kansas and Nebraska, and perpetuates
slavery there until 1853, and makes all children
born therein up to that time of slave mothers,
slaves. This was too much for mo. | have al
ways said-and now repent my pledges-that l
will never vote to recognize slavery. will never
vote to make any human being a slave. | will
never vote to extend slavery one single foot. |
will never vote for the Fugitive Slave Law or its
extension over any free territory. | therefore
voted against Dunn's Bill, solitary and alone Of all
our party"
One of the Objectionable provisions of the Bill is
as follows:
provided, however, That any person lawfully
held to service in either Of said Territories shall
not be discharged from such service by reason of
IsucH Tepedl anu revival Oh su'u Otn seCllOD, IL euCu
person shall be permanently removed from such
Territory or Territories prior to the LIST day OF Jan
uary, 1858; and any child or children born in
either of said Territories, of any female lawfully
held to service, if in like manner removed without
said Territories before the expiration of that date,
shall not be, by any reason of anything in this act,
cmancipa.ed from any service it might have owed
had this act never been passed. And provided
further, That any person lawfully held to service
in any other State or Territory oe the United States
and escaping into either the Territory of Kansas
or n sbraska, may be reclaimed and removed to
the person or place where such service is due, un-
der any law of the United States which shall be in
force upon the subject"
Mr.. Letter stands justified for refusing to do so
great an evil FOR tho sake of so small a good. Thus
the Republicans from Ohio and New England
voted for the Equalization and establishment of sla-
very in Kansas for the present as well as for slave.
hunting and slave rendition, under the fugitive
slave law they have so often cursed. The old
veterans of the cause consented to this sacrifice OF
principle, the immolation of the slave. Is it by
deeds such as this that the party is to purchase
power in Kansas and perpetuate the Union?
The editors of the Portage County Democrat
f Republican constituents of Mr.. Letter, look for
most astonishing results from this hill. Iii tc
prevent the admission of any more slave States tc
@ the Union and carry us safely over our present
/ fearful national crisis. We cannot exactly see
t how, Notwithstanding the following explanation:
e "Dunn's bill, which commanded the almost en-
tire Republican vote in Congress-, the veteran Gid
Idings among them, may not be entirely free from
Objectionable features, yet the good so much pre-
dominates, that its passage would be a great steT
Y gained for freedom. 1t would inevitably and posi-
lively sc cure the ultimate admission of Kansas as
a Free State, and that secuted, another Stare Stat
could never be admitted 10 this Union. The crisis
J would be passed, and passed safely for Freedom"
D We think there are many of the Portage County
I Republicans who would hardly be as ardent in
y the hope of good from this bill as the editors Of
! the Democrat, had they furnished their readers
= with the specimen we have given above. But Of
I course this bill shame fully wicked as it is, is moi
wicked enought to receive the appreciation of the
Senate at Washington. On the 18th inst, Mr.
Douglass reported against it. Douglass and hi
clan opposed the bill because it proposes TO Dc
some, in themselves, very excellent things, not
withstanding they are to be brought about by acts
! of very questionable morality. Nothing will sui
n Border Rufianism but doing the most diabolica
S things in the most diabolical manner.
S And here we have an opportunity which we can
let slip,of again illustrating our objection to Repub
t licanism. We most heartily approve of Mr.. Dunn
p proposition, Fillmore man as he is, to abolish ties
oaths in Kansas and to release Robinson, Deitzler
j Brown and others from the bloody hands of LIE
S compt and his marshals. But we object to doinj
o it by extending the fugitive slave law over tn
+ whole Of the United States Territory, by solemn
act of Congress and by the same act establishing
slavery in Kansas for two years, merely out o
d e ference to those villains who have introduced
e their slaves into the Territory in defiance of Law
a as well as of justice. In like manner we are ii
d favor, with Republicans, of making Kansas a fire.
IS State, but both from, policy and principle, we ART
IS opposed to doing it. or attempting to do it by pro
d tecting legal and constitutional slave hunting anC
kidnapping in the North, and slave-holding anC
slave, trading at the South.
THE DEMOCRATIC IDEA OF FREE Discussion, is
set forth quite lucidly in the following paragrap h
from an article in the New York Day Book. The
IT article is headed Free Discussion :"
"To discuss such a question or such a proposal