The Buchanan County guardian. (Independence, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1858-1864, 1860-01-19
Senator HarlaG.s Speech.

g Senator HARLAN, of this State,
on the 4th inst, delivered an able speech
in the Senate Of the United States, on
the motion of Mr.. BRIGHT TO print the
Presidents Message. in which he dis
cussed that part Of the Message relating
10 the power Of Congress over the Ter
ritories. We find the speech in full in
the Congressional Globe. and are tempted,
briefly. to reproduce some of its positions,
as ii is too long for us now TO publish en-
tire.
Mr.. HARLAN starts out with the prop
osilion that the two great political parties
Of the country may now begin to under
stand each other, inasmach as the Pres
ident's position that every citizen has a
RICH, to take his property, of any kind,
including slaves, into the common terri
tories belonging to all the States of the
Cenfederacy, and to have it protected
there under the Federal Constitution !;
and that neither Congress nor Terri
torial Legislature, nor any human power
has any authority to aunul or impair this
vested tight-has become the opinion Of
every Democratic member of the Senate,
with The exception Of two, and the avow-
cd opinion of nearly every Democratic
member Of the other branch of Congress,
and was therefore the doctrine of the par
ty. Admit the proposition Of the Pres
ident TO be true, and it must necessarily
follow that if this property, introduced
into the Territories under the provisions
of the Constitution of the United States,
be found to be insecure, it will become
the duty Of Congress 10 provide the
means for its legal protec,ion-in other
words, adopt slave code. The conclu-
sion, admitting the premises, is irresisti-
bic. The legislator who swears to sup
port the constitution, binds himself to
protect rights which he believes to be
guaranteed by that instrument. Repub-
licans deny tie premises. and were not
bound by the conclusions.
But the constitutional argument OF the
President, and of the Democracy, had
broader application than had yet been
given it. 1t is said that the citizens OF
each State bad a common right to go into
and enjoy the common territory of the
Republic, because it was purchased by
the common blood and common treasure
Of the nation. This reasoning was as
applicable, Mr.. HARLAN commended, to
States as to Territories. Iowa, California,
Oregon, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Hi
nois, from which Slavery is excluded,
have in them large quantities of public
lands, and tie STAKEHOLDER, on the com
mon blood and treasure argument, has
right to demand admission into all States
containing public domain.
The proposition to exclude Slavery
from the Territories had been complained
OF by Southern senators as stigma on
them. and on their institutions, and they
had declared that the Republican plat
form. in designating slavery and pol
ygamy as twin relies of barbarism, had
rendered them unable to associate with
its defenders on terms Of common
brotherhood and they had distinctly in
formed Republicans that the only GER
tain mode Of securing return of this
kindly intercourse was the abandonment
OF their platform and the dissolution of
their party. But the " stigma" was no
more marked in an act of Congress ex-
GLIDING slaves from the public domain.
than by the act OF each OF majority
of the States of the Union excluding |
slaves from within their respective juris-
dictions. and in some instances making
slaveholding felony and punishable by
imprisonment nor was the moral dis