Year: 1861




1851


ron presenting in behalf of a minority of the
COMMITTEES on Federal Relations minority
port which recommended the adoption, by the
Senate of preamble and series of resolutions,
identical with those offered in the Senate by Mr..
Ray, and in the House by Mr.. Holcomb, two
DAYS before. They are printed in the Senate pro
ceedings of that day in the BREWER LEGISLATIVE
RKPoRT.


REPORTED By ". II. DRAPER.


Mr. Raw. believe it due from me, Mr.. Pres
ident, as one of the Committee on Federal Re-
lations, to make some observations upon the
pending question. feel it due to myself to say,
while do not object to the tone and spirit of the
majority report vet feel that it falls so far short
of the demands of the crisis, that this Senate.
looking to the condition of public affairs, should
adopt the amendment instead of the majority re
port. We are, sir, now in the throes OF revolu-
ton, and shall be the last man to introduce par
tsan discussions in this hall further than is neces
sary to explain NV own position and the position
of the party 10 which have the honor TO belong.
1t does not become that conciliatory and amable
spirit which prevailed last evening in the Com
mttee on Federal Relations to drag party politics
into this discussion; but, sir. do think that the
portentous position of public affairs demands that
the State Of Indiana, through her representatives,
should make broad, tangible declaration of SEN
timents that will be received by our Southern
States as the sentiments of a magnanlmOus and
conservative people, people who are opposed
to the shedding of brothers blood. i think, sir,
at this time We ought to rise above all partisan
feeling-the patriot alone ought to speak in
peri0us crisis like ths-and whoever would bring
about party discussions for the purpose of up
holding his own party or defaming the opposition,
ought not to be ranked as a patriot in times like
these Then, sir, what is the duty of IndianaZ
hold that her duty rises higher than the raising OF
a flag from the dome of our State Housesor the
passage of empty and harmless resolutions of at
tachment to the Union. 1t is cheap declara-
tion of sentiment, that in favor of the per-
petuation of the Union; this is but regular
Fourth of July declaration for the last seventy
five wears. The times demand something more
practical, something more tangible, something
that the country can rally around to save this
tottering, trembling Republic.


know very well that our Republican friends
find great difficulty, partisans, in making these
concessions and yielding the positions necessary
to save the Republic; but sir, it is only critical
occasions that demand partisans to cast of their
partisanship and rise above 1t. 1t is cheap glory
when the abandonment of old positions can do no
good / know how our Republican friends feel
about this; and know what a struggle must be
going on in the bosoms of leading organs and
oracles of that party to determine their line OF
duty. But, sir, public sentiment in the Northern
States is rapidly drifting into two great channels,
and two lines of policy are about to be adopted,
unless. indeed, the Republican party of the North
shall consent to a course of conciliation, compro-
mise and concession, which, while it will be hon.
orable to the magnanimity and manliness of that
party in view of the perlous condition of affairs,
will mark the era of the restoration of permanent
harmony and the Union of the States.


Mr. President, almost in silence we are the
spectators of the most thrilling and imposing
drama ever performed on the stage of human ac-
tion-the curtain is rising but the lights going
out and soon we will be left to the darkness OF
revolution and the smoke of battle. Do we fail
to realize or are we Indifferent to this spectacle
of wasting and crumbling empire? Do we re-
alze without tremor that we are standing on the
precipice of a dismembered confederacyf Do
Senators indulge in the delusion that this is a
mere episode in our national career? Whoever
supinely reposes in the hope and trust that Union
and peaceful reign of a Northern, sectional dy-
nasty viii be the crowning sequel of the present
panic, will, too soon / fear, be startled by the
thunder and electrified by the lightning OF the
waring elements


We are also, Mr.. President, bound to admit, II
there be anv significance in the rash movement:
of the cotton States, and in the tone of menace
and defiance SC generally breathed by the Repub
lican leaders of the North. the issue is rapidly
narrowing itself down to the simple proposition
shall the snri-slavery party of the North be pre-
served and the Union wrecked, or the Union pre-
served and the anti-slavery party wrecked. This
is coming to the simple issue, disguise it as yo'
NAV. Weshould be opposed to secession and als'
TO civil war, for we can not have the one wlthou
the other, they are inseperable; but if 1t wer
otherwise and we were driven to the dire neces
sity Of embracing the one or the other, we shoul'
choose peaceful dissolution if all the Southern
States demanded it, because peaceful dissolution
would carry with it the hope and the feasibilit


4 ha tr.
strong and enduring to be ever again shaken b
the intermeddling of morbid and spurious phi
lanthropy IN the North, or the naughty spirit 0
iisuboriinatson which displays itself in the pro
scriptions insult and lynching of Northern me
which now so disgrace the civilization OF tn
South Several of the cotton States have rt
solved themselves out of the Union, and IN tn
next sixty DAYS Others will join them, and IN tn
natural order of events, under the Repubhca
programme of mo more compromises, eac
sIaveholding State will gravitate, through syn
pathy and interest, TO common Southern COI
federacv: whoever does not see and comprehen
this IS blind, and whoever dreams of preventin
this by military power, instead of Cancellation an
compromise is mad and his counsels should b
rejected


No Cancellation, no concession, no comprr
mise. are now the watch words of ultra men.
saw that without conciliatiOn, concession an
COMPROMISE this Union can not survive the crisi
and the party that shall stand alOof at this tin
ON mere punctilios of doctrinsl antagonism, a
as much involved in the guilt of moral treason
this Government as if they participated in a s
cession convention, when il is sef-evdent tn
the yielding of barren party abstraction wou
rescue us from ruin.


And here, Mr. President, let me remark tn
our Republican friends have adopted the tacti
of the disunion leaders of the South in hurryiI
he people into mad schemes by taunts, jeers al
inf1amatory appeals TO sectional pride and pref
dice IL is coming to be the slang OF parts;
newspapers and Wide Awake leaders, who ha
nothing at stake in the stability or overthrow
the Government TO taunt conservatives with
ing svmptthizers with South Carolina, abetin
of treason, and the like, in order to appear to
on the patriotic side, and TO intimidate Others
exciting the odium of Abolition fanatics again
them. For myself and those with whom l az
Mr. President, such conduct has no terrOrs, nj
we will continue to act upon and support the Ii
of policy shadowed forth in the minority repo
and this scheme Of precipitating a united Nor
into a war to crafty the hostility and magni
of AboIitionists, will signally fail. although
has been pursued by Southern demagogues
purposes of hasty and thoughtless revolution
pandering to bad passions and abusing and pl
verting good ones, and for base and selfish pl
poses, the INSCRIPTIONS and hrelng demagogu


North and South, have brought the country


the very verge of ruin, and now unholy eifo
are being made both in the North and at !
South to precipitate armed collision to graf


Abolition rancor and party malevolence, and
the hope upon the one side of the eventual ov


throw of slavery, and upon the other Off grea


security and strength Against this false app


TO sectional pride and anti-slavery fanatics


against the urgency with which the present


ministration is pressed to armed conflict by


Republican press, in the name of my countr


solemnly protest


Mr. President, without inquiring for the n


ment where the responsibility rests, it must


conceded that the American people have invol,


themselves in an issue of fearful magnitude