The Yazoo Democrat., 1859-04-16
BOSTON. March is, 1859.

LO99oy, Member Of Congress from Ohio.
BOSTON; March is, 1859.
| DEAR BRoTHER have read your speech
Of the 2lst ultimo. delivered in the Hous,
Of Representatives It has points Of con
siderable smartness, and will be praised b,
your psrtisans as very clever effort; but
see no other effect that it can produce bu
to irritate the South, and ALLEVIATE one sec.
tion Of the Union still more from the other
Have we not at the North stimulated oul
own selforighteousness, in contras. with tht
sins of the South, quite up to-, or beyonc
the healthy point Would it not be vel
for US, for time, to look more at our owr
taiings and at the virtues Of our brethren
at the South?
You speak Of the change of tone and sen,
timent that has taken place during the last
twenty-five years on the subject of slavery
| plead guilty to the truth Of this charge
Il was one Of the dreams of my early life
that the condition of mankind might be
greatly improved by sudden political changes
The cry of the slave came to my youthful
ear, waited by the eloquent breath of ere.
witnesses from Virginia and New Jersey.
Almost every man at the South. at that
time, admitted that slavery was an evil,
moral, social, and political the horrors Of
the middle passage, the barbarian cruelties
OF Jamaica, came to US across the ocean
Wilberforee and ClarksOn had acquired a
world wide fame by their singular devotion
to the abolition Of the slave trade; the as,
sault was soon made upon slavery itself in
the British West Indies, and the FIRST of
August, 1888, was entered in the calendar
as one of the holy days of the year.
Campbell painted the wild chieftain on
his native plains, so noble, 81 free, so happy
caught, chained, doomed, suffering, till the
hurricanes In the West Indies were commits,
stoned to avenge his wrongs. The plaintive
Cowper wept out his compassion ia the
touching lines, ~ would not have o slave
for all the gold that sinews bought and sold
have ever earned J" aud these tones Of suffer-
ing, of compassion, of pity, were echoed by
every harp, and re-echoed by orator and
preacher, till the whole atmosphere of New
England was vocal with the cries of the
slave. have done my full share of it ;
but greater men have been mistaken, and
have III ripper years been compelled to revise
and revoke the opinions Of earlier days.
Burke once was enraptured with the voice
OF Liberty, as she cried from across the
channel; but in the full strength Of his
manhood, he was compelled to dcnouDce the
crimes committed in her name. Sir James
Mcintosh wrote his Vindicia Gallica :"
but was compelled, by longer experience
and wider observation, to cancel the opn.
ions of early life by those of maturer years
am compelled to cancel many things that
have said on the subject of slavery, and
substitute for them the opinions of ripper age.
have once said what, or nearly what, you
have said in your late speech in Congress
though | think should have left out those
portions which serve no other end than sim
ply to lrritate, without convincing. But my
convictions at the present time are, not only
hat the Shareholders have a complete vindi-
'ation of their present position but they are
entitled to be looked upon as benefacters to
'he country and to the human race.
The only ground on which I can claim
heir patience and forbearance toward us
with their affairs, and for abusing
hem as much as we have; and as some con-
inue to do, is this +: They gave US the false
PREMISES on which we reasoned correctly to
alse conclusions. They gave away their
ase by concession; for if slavery be SIN,
wrong, or an evil, no fair mind can resist
be conclusion that efforts ought to be made
IS soon as possible to do it away. This phi |
osophy, that slavery is wrong, sprang up in
Virginia, and was adopted and encouraged
u nearly all the slave States; and the seed
vas thence, in connection with the correct
md grand principles of human government
cattered wide over the free States. They
rave had their growth, and now it is not
title difficult to pull them up; but they
hall take the wheat with them also.
The South are impregnable. The consti-
ution protects them, the Bible protects them,
nd the experience of mankind protects
hem. Our fathers made covenant with
heir fathers. They came into the Union
With their African slaves on terms of equal
ty with us, and with all the rights that we
an claim under the same instrument They
would make no covenant except upon terms
# equality. We accepted those terms; we
ould get no better to-day; and yet we
hould be glad to make it, if it were not
made, or to renew it, if broken, and on the
anne conditions we now have The South
lain the right to 60 into new territory, and
ry the new land with their slaves, Till the
erritory becomes a sovereign State, and then
ow to its will, as before all other sover.
igns. This is a just and equitable claim,
ounded on fair Interpretation of the con
titution. Slavery should be permitted to
ow by natural laws to regions for which it
best adapted. 1t viii go nowhere else.
'ou could not force it into New Hampshire,
or keep it there if introduced. The exper
nent has been tried and failed Slavery
as given up in the Northern States not by
be force Of moral, but natural laws.
1t is true the discussions of the last twenty
We years have produced great deal of
'ntiment on the subject of slavery in the
orthern States but you know how utterly