Civilian & telegraph. [volume] (Cumberland, Md.) 1859-1875, 1861-10-10

for our next House of Delegates, | think yon
owe it to my fellow-citizens, no less than
myself, to publish the resolutions which were
read by me at the Union mass meeting held
at our Court House, in January last, being
the first and largest Union meeting ever held
in this county. These resolutions were not
published as part of the proceedings of that
meeting, as I had right to expect. Their
length, probably, was the cause of this
neglect. Very respectfully,
SAMUEL M. SEMMEs.
l. Resolved, That in our opinions the
slave. holding States have no concessions to
ask or demand from Congress or the Federal
Government, in regard to their slave pro-
perty; that their rights, that is to say, the
right to hold their slaves as property, the
right to pursue and recover them as property,
and the right to such property as a political
element in the weight of these States, by
making every five slaves count as three in
the population entitled to a national repre-
sentation, are rights all admitted in our ex-
isting Constitution as it stands; and that
none of the departments of the General Go
vernment-neither the Executive, Judicial,
nor Legislative, so far as it has hitherto vim
dictated its sense of duty in respect to those
rights by the proceedings of the past-can
be Justly said to have shown at any time any
want of proper appreciation of those rights;
but, on the contrary, the operations of the
General Government hitherto have not only
tended to promote but have absolutely pro-
II Of oil 70 ~ tfp1
claims upon it for that purpose, the increase
of the slave interest and the slave territory of
the South.
2. Resolved, That Senator Crittenden, of
Kentucky, is entitled to our most cordial
thanks for the spirit of Cancellation mani
tested by him to restore union and peace to
our present distracted and divided country,
by his propositions recently submitted to the
Senate embracing sundry amendments to the
Constitution; but that, in the OPTION of this
meeting, his proposed amendment in respect
to the territory now held or hereafter to be
acquired by the United States, so far from
tending to the protection or value Of slave
property, will be more likely to operate I'M
favorably for that interest, because such
amendment, when adopted, changes the Con-
stitution from what it now is as expounded
by our Supreme Court and ablest statesmen;
and not only excludes slavery from millions
of acres of territory where it may now exist,
but restricts it to less than one-haf Of our
present national territory and there only
makes it lawful to retain it until the popula-
ton becomes sufficiently numerous to form
new States for admission into our national
Union. when the people may elect to retain
or exclude it as they may prefer; which right
of election in the people, we think, ought to
be more grateful t. the South as it now ex
lists, extending as it does throughout all our
national territory.
8. Resolved, That the immediate causes
which have led to the present crisis in our
national affairs, consisting as they do of open
revolutionary movements on the part of seve-
raj of our sister States for the avowed pur-
pose of totally subverting the government of
the United States within their several limits,
Selling in their progress forts, arsenals and
other property in defiance of the rights and
authority of the United States, are, in the
opinion of this meeting, serious if not an
insurmountable objection at the present time
to all propositions for amendments to the
Constitution, however acceptable they might
be to all national and patriotic men at a time
when such amendments could only be re-
gardcd as just and wise measures Of conciia-
ton, not extorted from the public fears but
meant and intended in a proper national
spirit to strengthen that unity of government
which constitutes us one people and which is
so Justly dear to us; for, in the language of
Washington, "it is main pillar in the edi-
fee of our real independence, the support of
our tranquility at home, our peace abroad; of
our safety, of our prosperity, OF that very
liberty which we so highly prize"
4. Resolved, That, in the opinion of this
meeting, the slave-holding States have no
just cause of complaint against the govern
ment of the United States; but, on the con-
trary are bound to it by the strongest ties of
interest, of obligation, and of honor; and
that we should despise ourselves if. in this
land of free speech, free religion, of free
press and free demagogues, we felt that our
love for the Union could give way before the
fires of revenge, however ardently kindled
within lis at the hell-inspired conduct Of law
less fanatics, or the crushing disasters we
occasionally meet in the collision of parties.
s. Resolved, That we know of no good
reasons why we should now reject the advice
given to us by Henry Clay in ons of his last
speeches delivered in the Senate of the United
States, who urged that Congress should alb
stain from all legislation upon the subject of
slavery; who said in respect to compromise
line. proposing to interdict slavery north of
it and to leave it unsettled south of it, that it
would only prove ilrsory to the South ; that
it was better, far better for the South, that
there should be non-action as to slavery both
north and south of the proposed line; and
who, after emphatically asking "what is
there gained by the South if the Missouri
line is extended tc the Pacific with the inter-
diction of slavery north of it ?" repeated his
advice that non-acton by Congress is best
for the South, ard best for all the views
which the South have disclosed to us from
time to time as corresponding to their wishes. -
6. Resolved, That, in the opigion of this
meeting, Abraham Lincoln, President elect,
is already pledged, as plainly as language
can commit man, to pursue during his adj
ministration calm and concliatory policy,
to the intent of restoring harmony and kind
feelings between the different sections Of our
common country for in his speech delivered
at the Cooper Institute, New York city, last
February when referring to our federal rela-
tions, he uses these and other words to the
like effect: "Let all the guarantees which
the fathers Of the Constitution gave to the
institution of slavery, be not grudgingly but