Arkansas true Democrat., 1858-04-06

the same legal footing, ana shait cheeriuiiy vote for both. Each has, in the exercise of these rights" to form their domestic inStitu lions in their own way"-esabsh for them selves republican, forms of government.- This enables us to perform our constitutional duty and guarantees and exhausts our whole | power over the subject. All beyond that Is usur- | patton, and invites back here the very mischief | to which we thought we had bid adieu forever. | It robs the Kansas declaration of rights of its | chief virtue, and restores to us the power of in- tervention. none the less dstasteful or offensive because of the spurious pretext of intervention in their affairs to enforce nou-intervention.
 Mr. President, that may be nteligibe in my remarks upon the main subject of discus sion. must recall some of the history of the Kansas question, and advert to some consdera- tions connected with it. In doing so, 1 must draw largely on the labors of my colleague on the committee on Territories, whose finished logical statement of facts would if generally known spare me the labor of attempting to condense them.
 The contest in which now engaged is but another chapter in the history of the slavery question. The form has changed; the struggle is the same. Eight years ago scenes transpired in this chamber which many of us remember. No one desires 10 witness ther repetition How long and how arduous were the labors to put period to that state of things, are matters of fami liar history. We had approached period in our national career when no one could divine or cared to know its future. Our arms and our diplomacy had given Us an empire to govern, and the attempt to organize and fix Its political condition and to devote it to the north, had un- locked the pent-up elements of discord in our political system, and having escaped the control of the politics of parties, seemed armed only for ,,isoGiaf TT hn apt Of half a seemed to have been precipitated into a last conflict for supremacy, while the cohesive and conservative egamerts of the Union, auxiliaries of our constitution, either slumbered in repOse or awakened to task to which they seemed uneqal. The country had been dragged to the very threshold of revolution. The great dis ease of our system, planted at its birth, and ma | tured with its growth, menaced speedy dissOlu- ton. I speak of the anagouism, restless and ag ressive of the free States to the institutions of the southern States. If this array had been but a mere proxysm of party, it would have soon passed and after the storm we should have hailed the sunshine again; but thls antagou'Sm had outgrown it. original dimensions, and was forfited by others coincdug with it. The Mis- souri compromise had boldly avowed and taught the dangerous lesson that there wa, north and south, with hostile systems of institutions or ihtgDT- or Ilil4lNS IuNi db4 Jt bi llH OIl uoste sides. The project was boldly avowed ' to surround the southern States with cor \ don of free States, and forbid the further ex. rausion of the southern institutions; to line our ' border, with hostile influences, before which ' the security If property would melt away. To ! declare the ocean free, that the slave trade be- tween the 5 ate. might be paralyzed; to make ' free territory wherever the tag of the Union waved; to convert our forts and arsenas into refuge for fugitive slaves; and desecrate the stars and stripes of the Union to ideas and ob-
 "cts of section. A if to show with what precision this crusade had been planned, mem- Der from Massachusetts congratulated himself I that when consummatjon was, complete there would be less than two hundred miles between ! any slave in the southern States and his free ! dom.
 The struggle was for empire and dominion upon the one sid" and for self-preservation OF the other. Truth triumphcd, and this great agitation ended in the declaration of that just and universal principle that States may be ad. mitted into the Union "with or without slave ry their constitution may prescribe at the 1 time of their adm>Siou." This was no triumph of one section over another; it was a triumph of 1 the constitution over all The legislation in 1 which 1t was conceived confined to Utah and New Mexico, but the principle was univer- sal. ltwaS of necessity applicable to all Territo- | res, and bounded by no attitudes It was not alone a southern but an American idea. Sec l tons had been arrayed in the ceaseleSs hostility of rival svstems--defying all pacificaton, know | ing neither peace nor truce, and separated by broad ground of dehatable questions, about winch It were folly to suppose they could ever agree Here was common umpire, selected by the constitution, to W hich this question could ! ba in br1i++al c ! lndependence-not an act of emancipation. It | did not propose to emancipate the slave from l his master in the Territories. but to emancipate | the Territories themselves from the interyen ton ot the federal government It was the 1 higher freedom of government in the Territo- ! reS--the freedom of American citizens to shape their own destinies and to mould the institu- tions under which they are to live.
 Four years later it became necessary to test | the value of this great principle of territorial freedom in it's application to territory north of the Missouri line. In terms this had not been 1 repealed by the compromises of 1850. The | longer toleratjon of th.s restriction was plainly ncoLslStent with the principles of that act, and 1 considerations of the highest import demanded l It's total repeal. It was offensive as a statutory l rrproach of Congress upon the institutions of hali the States of the Union. It was anomal
 
 and non-lrtervention on the subject of slavery | south ot It. It was unjust as conferring diff terent measure of political rights on different l lerntores. Northern citizens could go into all ! parts of the common domain. while southern citlzeus were restricted by line. It had array l ed the country m hostile sections and foetered | the Idea that they had separate rights in the | um"n. It was an unm'tig1ted mischief. and by | itS tendency to create hostile systems develop mg m opposite directions, had half faccomplished the rupture of the Union. The history of is orlgn ceased to entite it to respect It was no compromise It Was accepted bv the south as an evll less than that of the alternatve-total exclusion from all the common territory. Such was the hard necessity of their couditi n. that they claimed as a triumph what was vast sweeping equalization. It had fulfilled it's mis- S.on, and its virtues were now gone; it had pur chased peace at the price of permanent source ot dlscord, and this was its whole virtue It was therefore repealed, and the Kansas and Ne braska act was passed
 have indulged in a seeming latitude of re- marks upon the chief features of the great dis cusNlons and agitations of 1921, 1850. and 1854 Tn which the subject of slavery in the Territo- reS was the only question; but it forms part of l my purpose to show that this is the only oues uon referred to the people of the Territories. and the only power abdicated by Congress in thelr favor It is worth while to repeat the words ot this enactment, which provides, in the exact language of the compromise measures of looO that "when admitted as State, the said Territory, or any portion of the same shall be received into the Union with or without slaUery. as their constitutions may prescribe at the time ot their admission.'' Again, after declaring the Missouri act imperative and void, as repugnant to theso principles, the purpose of Congress in passing the act is declared in these words:
 " It being the true intent and meaning of this net not to legisate slavery into any State or Ter ntory nor to exclude 1t therefrom but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the constitution of the ! Inlted Statesr