Year: 1860

ia hSlCS OuL W { uO SNy IIldC L0e DtOOt OF
Guch phenomenon should be cogent and
invincible. Reader, is it possible to make
q more odious or invidious distinction be-
tween the laws and institutions of differ
ent States than this.


The motives which induced Congress in
1920, 10 devote the northern portion Of the
Louisiana purchase to freedom, were not
slight or trivial. The debates were able,
ingenious, and eloquent, and the discuss
ION and consideration mature, The i'm
mense domains of Louisiana, Missouri aud
Arkansas, each with sufficient territorial
extent, ifblessed with free institutions, to
found an empire, had been in law and in
fact devoted to slavery. The national
treasury had been laid under contribution
about thirteen months before the passage
of the act in question, 20 purchase another


large domain for slavery, by obtaining
from Spain the cession of east and west
Florida. General jackson once declared
that the most just, fair and federal distri-
button that could possibly be made of the
proceeds of the sale of the public lands
was to place them in the National treasury
for National use, under the direction and
control of Congress. So that the most
just, fair, federal and Nutionul disposi-
ton that conld possibly be madeoo of the
National domain: was to devote it to Ma
tional use in the very manner in
which it was actually done AS the insti-
tutious of the two sections, on the
subject of slavery, were, in the language
of Judge Campbell, antagonistic :"
let each section enjoy it's equitable
share OF the immense national territorial
acquisitions in its own way, in fact in the
only practicable way, in the only mode
equally agreeable to both sections. AS
East and West Florida, Louisiana, Missou-
ri and Arkansas had been devoted to
slavery, why not let Kansas and Nebraska
be devoted to freedom. The purpose could
be accomplished as to those two Northern
Districts, by simply enacting that the law
OF nature should prevail in them, while
remaining in n territorial condition This
rc-enactment of the law of nature, is the
law of pretended exclusion, which appa-
rently fills the breasts of the Supreme
CouFt with so much horror. It would be
stringent law of exclusion, indeed,
which would exclude Southern emigrants
as cftectually as the despotic aristocrncy
of chnttel slavery, set up in n territory,
excludes Northern emigrants. Where the
frec-labor system would exclude one, the
slave-lAbOr system would exclude hun
drcds. If any section of the country had
reason to complain of the act of the sixth
of March, 1920, it was not the South
Towards that section the arrangement was
emlnently liberal. What better could
Congress do2 Without such u power of
extending equity and justice to the differ
ent sections of the Union, and of attend
ing to their wants and wishes, the nation
nj government would be essentially defer-
tive, and incapable of providing against
national exigencies or securing national
happiness and safety. 1t would be as in
capable of performing its proper functions
rs large man with q broken or paralytic
limb. No logic is so invincible as the
logic of stubborn facts. Where the Di-
vine wisdom was incarnatc upon earth he
said, "by their fruits shall yc know
them" Now, the fruits of the Missouri
Compromise were peace, concord, har-
mony, good feeling amongst all sections of
the Union, during IL very long compara-
tive period of our national history.


If any heart-burning or hard feeling
arose ut all, it was transient passing away
like the morning cloud or the early dew.
For the quarrel carried on between Il few
humane and benevolent, but i'll judging
0bolltionists, not amounting to more than
two or three per cent. of our people, and
the Southern fire eaters, who choosed to
engage i'll logomachy with them, cannot
be regarded as q national affair. During
the long interval between the passage of
the Missouri compromise act and the Mex
ican war, slave States and free States en-
tered the Union without opposition. with
out rcpining or complaint, and we eniovcd
higher measure of happiness and pros
pcrity than ever before, in earth's annals,
was vouchSafed to nation consisting of a
dominant and enslaved race. In 1916 the
idiot folly of Mexico, brought onsthe war
with thai power which ended as every
man knew it must end, in an immense
conquest of territory. The disposition of
that territory occnsioncd momentary
disturbance in the national mine, but that
question settled, the national feeling he
came as calm and unruftled as the current
of our BEAUTIFUL RIVER, and so continued
until December 1853 Before that time,
the last of our great old statesmen had
been carried to his long home, and it re-
quired all the art. all the skill, of the cum
ming, selfish, mousing politicians, who at
that time met in Congress ut Washington,
| to blow the flames of sectional strife into
wide wasting conhagration Then, and
not till then, did q feeling very near akin,
alas, to undying and immortal hate, take
possession of the public mind in both sec
tions of the Union. This they effected by
penuing up the friends of liberty and of
slavery. upon the same soil and compel
ling them to fight and struggle like cocks
in pit or boxers in ring. And this they
did Perfdi0uSIy in spite of their own
pledge by which they had stolen the heart
of the nation, and by which they had bound
themselves to oppose all further agitation
of the slavery question, either in or out of
Congress, under whatever color or pretext
it might be attempted. Then it was that
Il heartfelt sense ofinjustice and of wrong,
took possession of millions of Northern
minds. Then it was that Southern politi-
cians were encouraged and incited to
commence n series of never ending, still
beginning aggressions and encroachmcnts,
until even their Northern allies ut Charles