New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1860-12-05
THE MESSAGE.


a long Presidential lecture wherein Reason is In
suited Humanity outraged, History trayested
and Common Sense defed, in the interest OF
Human Slavery and for the qualification of its
upholders. Whatever evils the future may have
in store for us, this one, at least, is for season
intermitted if not forever put away.
The man who in this day talks of the oppo-
nents of Slavery as blind, besotted fanatics, and
represents the current agitation as utterly unpro-
voked and gratuitous, is simply dishonest. Mr..
Buchanan knows better He knows that the
means whereby Texas was thrust into our Union
were emnently calculated to arouse any latent
Anti-Slavery conviction that slumbered III the
breast of our non-slaveholding citizens. He knows
that, when the War on Mexico was made to
result in the transfer of vast and thinly peopled
regions from that republic to our Union, 1t was
inevitable either that Slavery should be excluded
from those Territories or that the People of the
United States as o whole, and not those Of the
South exclusively, should take upon their souls the
responsibility of extending 90 the peculiar lnstltu-
ton 4" over region half so large as Europe-iar
larger than the United States east of the Mssis-
and quotes the Supreme Court his authority that
every foot of Federal territory is necessarily slave
holding territOry-hat is territory subject TO the
law of Slavery-frOm the moment that it passes
under the sway of our Union. He knows
that the Kansas-Nebraska bill was expressly and
avOwedly introduced to remove legal obstacles to
the diffusion of Slavery, and that the bill owed
II ,ntarn 10 hot
fact How is it possible then, for publcist, with
the eyes of the world full upon him, to say that
" The long continued and Incorporate interior
" ence of the Northern people with the question
&" of Slavery in Tie Southern States has at length
produced its natural effects? Is the Presi-
dents brow brass that it should not crimson with
the consciousness that the whole world will know
this to be a lie? Does he not know right well
that the children in our public schools will point
the finger of shame at the author of such as
sertiOns, who fingers on the brink of the grave
to libel and traduce the most intelligent and con-
scientious portion Of the people about to be re-
Heved from the incubus of his rule
That this man should go back quarter of
century and rake up from the very kennels of
pictorial handbills and infammatOry appeals
" were circulated extensively throughout the
" South of a character TO excite the passions of
" the slaves" can excite no additional wonder;
still, the falsehoOd is a most insane one. Who
" circulated" " such appeals and handbills? If this
thing was done extensively" many must have
been caught at it. If these pictorial handblls"
represented imaginary Outrages and cruelties n-
llicted on slaves, who could readily detect the
misrepresentation as the slaves themselves! If
they truly depicted scenes with which slaves were
familiar, how should they be excited by pictorial
representations any more than by the actual &C.
currences thus depicted Why is it that false
hood must always be exposing itself by absurd.
ties
Mr.. Buchanan asserts that it would be 90 easy
" for the American people to settle the Slavery
" question for ever" and this simply by letting
the Slave States alone, and permitting them to
manage their domestic Institutions in their own
"way." Yet in this very Message lie proposes
to force Slavery down the tbrOats of the North
ern pepOe, and compel them to take upon their
consciences the responsibility of justifying, pro-
and important acts-as follows
]. By amending the Federal Constitution 80 as
to embOdy in it "an express recognition of the
right of property in slaves in the States where
- it now exists may hereafter eJist"
9. BY further amending the Constitution 50 az
TO affirm therein the " duty of protecting this
right in all he common TernitOries throughout
" heir territorial criStenee and until they shall
- be admitted as States into the Union, with or
" without Slavery, as their Constitutions may
" prescribe"
3. BY purchasing Cuba from Spain at the cost
of all the States with the moral certainty that
tbe slave-holdne interest in the Union would thus
be strengthened by ten or twelve additional Mem
bers Of Congress and as many Electoral Votes
or President.
4. BY paying certain Cuban slave-traders the
value fixed by them Oh the Amistad negroes
taken as slaves from Africa TO Cuba in clear yi0
ation of the laws Of Nations and of Spain, who
liberated themselves as oil laws give them per-
feet right TO do, and were landed on our shores,
whence they were sent back to Africa, after our
Courts had decided that they could not be legally
given up to the Cuban pirates who claimed them
These measures of PrO-Slayery aggression are
pressed upon Congress by this same buchanan,
who tells US in lhe same breath that all that is
asked of IL is that SIC let Slavery in the States